birthdays, babies and goodbyes

Today is also our niece Maria's birthday. She's the daughter of Steve's brother Bruce and his wife, Anna. She's an adorable, shy little 1-year-old! Apparently, all the kids in that family were blondes when they were little, which makes me wonder what color hair our baby will have.


Here she comes face to face with her very first birthday cake. She loved the ducks!



Also at the birthday party, another adorable new baby in our circle of friends, Isabel, adopted by Dan and Margaret from China in February. She is one of the happiest, good-natured babies I've ever had the pleasure of knowing.




That was today. Yesterday, we said goodbye to our friend Cathy, who is leaving soon for Jakarta, Indonesia, where she'll be teaching special education in an American school.


Steve and I met Cathy five years ago this month on a camping trip. Not just any camping trip — the very camping trip that brought Steve and me together. We (Steve and I) carpooled that weekend to and from Tettagouche State Park in Steve's car, four hours each way, and that's where we got to know each other (better, we say, than most couples know about each other after a month of dating). Bruce and Anna were on the trip, too — Bruce organized it — but they hadn't started going out yet. But enough about the camping trip and back to Cathy ...

Cathy grew up around the world — Japan, Saudi Arabia, Brazil — and her parents are also international teachers, so you could say it's in her blood. Still, we admire her courage in making this big leap. Cathy, we hope you'll stay in touch. Start a blog, won't you? ;-)

It was one of those parties where no one left without having a picture taken with Cathy.


Also at the goodbye party were our mutual friends George and Barb. (No, not the Bushes.) George was also on that legendary camping trip, and he met Barb not long after. And our wedding dates ended up being just five months apart!