Age before beauty

We've had lots of birthdays to celebrate around here lately.

Dad turned 65 yesterday. Here he is in his natural habitat, complete with birding accouterments. He seems to be having some kind of stand-off, possibly with an aggressive clapper rail or purple martin. Whoa! Click on that picture and you can see Dad up close and personal.


Great Aunt Margie, giver and writer of excellent children's books. Happy birthday!

Uncle Sidney celebrated last weekend with an unprecedented 48 hours off work. Congratulations! Maybe if you worked less I'd have a picture of you to post...

Cameron! Three on Wednesday! Look out or I'll embellish something for you.


Here is the other reason Sid and Millie are so busy. Happy belated birthday to Baby Tyler. He is a handsome little guy, much bigger now than he looks in this picture.

We have a big backlog of pictures from all our summer adventures. I'll get the best up over the next week or so.

Okra

Not sure what to say about this picture except the obvious: even a week of 100* weather cannot stifle Matt's passion for food styling. He does stuff like this EVERY times he cooks dinner.

Crafty crafty

How cute! What are they?




Crayon caddies, for when you need to take your Crayolas on the road. Since Barritt is more interested in eating crayons than coloring with them, these will be gifts for friends... Here's a tutorial, should you get inspired.

Under new management

I'm sure our three readers out there (Hi Mom!)have noticed some changes on the blog lately. Outdated entries, out of focus pictures and all around lack of content, to name a few. Well, Barritt has been busy. More on this later. Matt is so un-busy that he can't sit at the computer and Annabelle can't type yet. So it falls to me to update the blog. I'll do my best.

We've been back in Athens almost a week now and there really isn't any place like home. Our house seems so spacious, so comfortable and even so CLEAN compared to our little NC apartment! Barritt and Annabelle were both in pack 'n' plays to sleep since May. By the end of our trip, Barritt was testing its limits, climbing in and out at will and flipping it on its side to make a garage for his trucks. We're all glad to be back in our beds.


By the way, I'm famous.

 

 

 

Finally, pictures

Some of you have remained steadfastly loyal, hoping against hope that after days of drought, a flood of pictures would rain down upon you. Your wish is granted. Enjoy some of our beach moments with cousin Connor.

Hiatus

It should be clear that we are on hiatus. It wasn't our intent, but these days, living in what I have already learned to call the "summer house," we are lucky to even be able to find our toothpaste when we need it. So a USB cable to connect the camera to the computer is out of the question.

Life here is good though. More to come. But don't expect it in a hurry.

Creative energies

More of the Same

Mom is busy letting Annabelle be busy 'eating' milk, Dad is busy studying for exams, I am busy growing my molars, which make me grumpy and make me get up early.

This weekend we pack up the cars and caravan to The Dash. In the same way I use a thinly veiled nickname for the town I live in, Classic City, I'll use the Dash for the town we'll live in this summer. (Hint: the name of the town is two words with a dash in between. Further Hint: it isn't Wilkes-Barre).

I don't really know what is in store for me in the Dash. I'll finally get to assess for myself all the accolades mom attributes to her alma mater. I do know however that I will have a pool where I am living, and that utilities are pre-paid: if you visit, expect the A/C to be set at 42.

Dad Flirts with Greatness

2005 Tour de Georgia champion and Discovery Channel rider Tom Danielson came to town today after the end of this year's TdG.













He showed Dad some important things in Monday night's local group ride, such as:








- how pro bike racers tend to have 18 inch waists
- how pro bike racers tend to weigh 83 pounds
- what $12,000 bikes look like up close
- how cell phone cameras take crummy, but convenient pictures

 

 

 

Multiple choice

See that gleem in my eyes? Is it:

a) the light of Christ (I was baptized on Saturday, pictures to come)
b) a spark of determination to squeeze as many parties and "deats" out of this birthday as I can
c) a glimmer of the terrible/terrific twos
d) the glazed-over result of croup, a cold, a cough and the cocktail of drugs Mom made me take so she could get some rest

All correct responses receive your choice of nose honk, high five or face lick. Bonus points for other creative guesses.

day seventhirtyone

Happy birthday to me! Woot! Baby Sister does turn 3 months tomorrow, but will she get her own chocolate mint cake from the pages of Southern Living? Will she get a new Thomas the Tank Engine t-shirt?

I think not.

Anyway, if you want to celebrate with me, I have big plans for hanging out in the playspace at the new Chick Fil A on Atlanta Highway.

Actias luna

Look what landed on our screened porch. He's a luna moth and Annabelle hasn't slept since he arrived on Tuesday. His adult life is only one week long, so it's pretty special that he's spending so much of it with us. I guess she doesn't want to miss any of it.

New Pics

There are so many interesting things about this picture, I can't even begin to describe it.








Here is Annabelle's response.










Thanks for all of you for being diligent and checking the blog every day, though we haven't put up any new posts. There are a lot of excuses we could make: mom and dad are now a year older, and they are now more crotchety, and won't let us near the computer to post; the pollen has completely covered the laptop; etc. etc.

Nonetheless, here is your new update. We should have more good pics next week, as both Baby Sister and I are getting baptized Saturday.

Ladykiller

Ladies come from all around to get a piece of the B-Man.

Here, for example, is Charlotte, who is not from Charlotte, but Watkinsville . . .
















And here is a snapshot of Maddie, from the ATL, getting a little of my benevolence.
















If you need a piece of the action, leave a comment and I'll spread the love.

More free Cuteness!!!

More gratuitous cuteness, provided by the editors:

Monkeys get a bad rap

When I was born, my Great Uncle Tom and Great Aunt Mary Beth gave me a wooden toy bus with 10 wooden passengers. I take great delight in it, and care deeply for each passenger, regardless of race (there are blue, yellow, red, green, and orange passengers). To that end, I keep them safe in my red water bottle. Click here to see just how hard it is to get them out sometimes.

Some new pics

Angry-cute Annabelle picture makes regular-cute Annabelle pictures even cuter.

Super Bowl Sunday

There isn't a lot of news, but for the fact that we've both been spoiled by PapaJim and DeeDee who came down to visit the new addition. Baby Sister is starting to prefer only sleeping whilst being held by other people, I am starting to prefer eating oatmeal cookies every hour.

Regardless, here are some new pictures.




















































(thanks for the shirt Uncle P)

HONK if you love your sister

Mom says our relationship thus far is a little too acrimonious. So we've made up, for now. To manifest this new harmony, I have shown the B-man's highest mark of affection for another: the nose honk. I think she really enjoyed it, and she certainly enjoys the newfound irenic nature of our siblinghood.

I laugh at your pain! Ha!

In the interest of equal time, I present to you, this video. By the way, Uncle Patrick, I don't know what this means, but YiaYia said she thought you'd especially like this.

WARNING!

WARNING! The management (Barritt) does not endorse this video, and only recommends it for close kin and dear friends who want to see what I can only call unmeritorious cuteness. While my video posts are carefully selected, and show the highest degree of skill on my part, apparently all it takes for Baby Sister to get on is, well, sneezing. Watch at your peril. You've been warned.

All Points Bulletin

We're having some technical difficulties with posting here. We should be back to our efficient humorous selves within a coupla days.

B & A

Don't leave me hanging, Sister

I tried to be civil . . . this video was taken within the first minutes of my exposure to Annabelle. Clearly I am trying to break the ice with my current favorite, the High 5. Annabelle is having none of it. She'll rue the day she ever turned down a sweet high five from the B man. Yes, I did say 'rue the day.'

The Interview

Little Sister is looking less like me, and more like herself in these last few days. She is also looking kind of like a plump Irish or English lady if you ask me. Mom and Dad should have called her Dame Judy Dench instead of Annabelle Louise.We haven't spent much time together yet due to mom and dad's opinion that I am too 'touchy.' Whatever. Nonetheless, we did get time for the first part of our Interview:

Barritt: Welcome, we've been waiting for you. How does it feel to be here?
Annabelle: Cold.
B: It's 71 degrees today.
A: It was 98 degrees where I was last week.
B: Hmm. As for a different line of questions, how do you feel about being on the Barritt-blog?
A: What, is that like an honor? It's cute, but it is kind of sentimental and saccharine.
B: Sentimental and saccharine? We've already had 10,000 hits.
A: Well, half our extended family has this page as its homepage - we get hits from them just turning on the computer.
B: You're being kind of insouciant.
A: I think you mean I am either being impudent or saucy. Insouciant is the wrong word.
B: Maybe I meant both.
A: Just wait.

At this point she made me turn off the recorder, and she went and had some milk.

Annabelle's First Pics - more to come

 

Big News

Baby Sister Annabelle Louise is here. More news to come in days ahead, but she is a healthy, albeit sleepy, 7 lb 11 oz Wunderkind. Mom is now at least 7 lbs 11 oz lighter. Pics and narrative, and an exclusive interview by the Saturday Edition.

Happy New Year from the Masters of Disaster

Cameron and Thomas came down to celebrate the new year. Four days of mayhem - multiple coffee cups turned over, multiple macaroni elbows tossed to the floor, and multiple tractor movies watched and re-watched.

As luck - or fate - would have it, it rained almost the whole 4 days, until today, which we celebrated by going to the zoo. But yesterday, there was too much inchoate toddler testosterone for my parents' meek ranch house to handle, and we had to get out. Where would you go when it was raining, when everything is closed on new year's eve, and there were still two hours to nap time? That's right, you'd go to Wal-Mart.

This picture was taken on the Bob the Builder front end loader, which, though I believe it capable of some heavy duty construction, was located in the arcade section of Wal-Mart.

Thomas could not be in the picture because he was taking it with his new pacifier, which has a built in camera. Hence the grainy photo quality.

All in all it was the perfect few days of rest we needed to get our minds clear for the 'new addition,' which could be coming any day.