Brady meets friends and family in Ohio

The day after going to the Cubs game, Katie took a trip to Eaton to visit with her parents for a week and see some friends.  It has been so nice to live closer so that we are able to make more trips like this.  While living in Jersey, it was much harder to come visit Ohio.  The week was spent mostly just relaxing around their house and taking Brady and Griffey on walks.  Katie's long-time friend Meleah and her daughter, Shaylen stopped over to meet Brady.

And Katie's parents have season tickets to the Miami Redhawks football, so Katie and her dad went to the game on Saturday.  They played University of Massachusetts and pulled off a win.  The game was kind of boring and poor Miami doesn't draw much of a crowd, so after the 3rd quarter, we decided to go uptown to the bookstore and Katie's old employer - Attraction's....or now as it is called Bar 45 East (stupid name if you ask me) .   We just sat at the bar and watched all the young college kids have their fun and reminisced about when I was in college.  We agreed that I had a lot of fun at Miami and my parents had a lot of fun visiting me while I was there.  We couldn't stay too long because I had to get back home to Brady.  My mom was watching him and being a nice grandma despite it being a very sad day for her because earlier that morning, their cat - Sasha - passed away.  She was a really old cat (15 years) and had been sick for awhile but she gave my parents a lot of company and joy over the years.  It was really hard for my parents to let her go, but in a way it was sort of a blessing so she didn't have to suffer any more and she went peacefully in her sleep.  She will definitely be missed and I was hesitate to unload Brady on my mom after having such a tough morning, but she said it helped her keep her mind off of things while enjoying Brady.  I knew Brady was in good hands, so I was able to have a fun afternoon with my dad in good ole Oxford.

                           

Also while in Eaton, Charlie's mom and grandfather (Grumpa) made a visit up to Eaton so that Grumpa could meet his great-grandson for the first time.  It was quite cute introducing them and Brady was as usual a very good baby and enjoyed meeting Grumpa.

Brady's first baseball game

Tuesday September 18th was Brady's first ever baseball game at 7 weeks old (which beat a record of one of our friends sons :) ).  The day after we moved into the house in Lake View, we decided unpacking boxes didn't sound nearly as fun as walking to Wrigley Field!  And to make it even more perfect, the Cubs were playing the Reds.

We bundled Brady up in his Cincinnati Reds gear and Charlie carried him in the Baby Bjorn carrier. This was our first time using the Baby Bjorn carrier and it will definitely become a favorite baby item to use.

Brady with a Cubby Bear

Next to the statue of new Hall of Famer Ron Santo

We originally planned to only stay a couple of innings but Brady seemed to like it so much, that he lasted the whole game.  Wrigley Field even has a First Aid room that mothers can use to feed babies, so Katie took advantage of that.

Brady seemed to love the baseball game, so much that he fell asleep.  Everyone around us congratulated us on having such a cute baby and we even met one guy who didn't have his son with him but told us he has brought his 11 month old son already to 5 ballparks.

It was so much fun bringing Brady to his first baseball game and even though he will not remember it, we will always cherish these "firsts".

Park: Wrigley Field

Score: Reds 3, Cubs 1

Winning Pitcher: Homer Bailey

Brady's Reds record: 1-0

Brady's Home team record: 0-1

Moving into the Chicago house

Saturday was the middle day of our drive, and was the longest day.  But the drive from Chicago again took about 7 or 8 hours (for what's normally about 5).  Just the standard deal with the baby :)

We stayed in a hotel downtown Sunday night, then on Monday the movers came to move all of our stuff into the house.  Charlie went into work for a half day Monday - he had an orientation for the office to attend.  KPMG is in a new building in Chicago - the Aon Building, and it is certainly state of the art. After all the boxes came out, the inside of our house mostly looked like this.

The permanent drive to Chicago part 2

Saturday morning on our trek from Jersey to Chicago we left the luxurious Western PA Microtel Inn and headed toward Eaton/Dayton via Columbus.  If you're a geography wizard and are trying to figure this out - you're correct, neither Columbus nor Dayton are not on the way from New Jersey to Chicago.  But we wanted to drop Griffey off at Katie's parents so he wasn't stressed out by being in the house when the movers came Monday.  We also got the chance to see friends and family on the way.

We entered Columbus shortly after the Buckeye game versus Cal started - so there was a bit of traffic, but not too bad.  We stopped there to see our friends Bryan and Kristen, who were celebrating their son Will's first birthday that Saturday.  It presented some good photo opportunities for us.  Charlie and Bryan were housemates for over 5 years between college, grad school and starting off in Columbus, and Kristen and Katie were sorority sisters.

Griffey also was a fan favorite - he had a new friend in Kristen's niece for the whole birthday party!

After Will's birthday party, we drove down to Dayton to see Charlie's sister Abby.  This was Abby's first chance to meet Brayden, and it was our first chance in a long time to eat LaRosa's pizza!  A win-win!

From there, we drove to Eaton and stayed at Katie's parents house.  It was our last night with Griffey for a while, so we were sad to leave him in the morning but at the same time excited to move into our house in Chicago!

The permanent drive to Chicago - part 1

So it's been a bit crazy since we moved from New Jersey - we haven't had much time to post, even though there has been a lot of things to post about!  We'll try to start back where we left off - which was we had just spent our last day in New Jersey.

Friday we checked out of the hotel we'd stayed at in a nearby town, then had to go back to the house and do some final clean up - spackling, vacuuming and the like.  We left mid-afternoon and made the 5 hour drive to a hotel a little North of Pittsburgh.  We say 5 hour drive with a smirk on both of our faces!  Ramsey to Pittsburgh is a 5 hour drive for Charlie when he feels like going that long without a stop.  But when you have a 6-week old baby, a 5-hour drive becomes a 8 or 9 hour ordeal!  An hour in, and Brady was hungry again - and certainly not timid about letting us know!  The drive made us really appreciate the stops where there is a restaurant right off the exit, and despise the ones where the nearest restaurant is 1.8 miles away.  Those 1.5 miles make a big difference when you have less than 2 hours in between stops!  The blue signs should be required to note things like this on the highway.

The drive was also sort of weird for Charlie, as he drove right by the spot he got in an accident while driving our first car out to Chicago just a week earlier.  We made it past that point, though, and did accomplish a first - Brady's first time in a public restaurant!  We stopped at the Primanti Brothers, which is a pretty famous restaurant that started in Pittsburgh many years ago.  They put vinegar-based cole slaw and french fries in the sandwich at Primanti Brothers - and the combination is delicious.  We left Griffey in his cage in the car, went in for a quick bite at 9 PM.  Brady thoroughly enjoyed the experience - he is a bit of a flirt and was laughing it up with our waitress!

He also seemed to like the hotel room!

Griffey's enthusiasm was more subdued.  But he was a very good dog on the trip - especially since he had to stay in the car while we ate at Primanti Bros. - so he earned the right to snuggle up under the covers after the long drive.

That was the first part of the drive - which seems enough for one post.  Next post is the rest of the trip!

Go Reds!