En Fuego!

Dear Medium-Sized Huntling,

Your mom thinks that you have a certain attraction for fire. First, there was the accidental blaze over Passover weekend in CT. Then on the same weekend there was a forest fire on the drive home. Now, this.

Your mom worked all week in New York City, in the Bronx to be exact, assessing the health of trees. She measured hundreds and hundreds of trees! But one day, on their way out of the site, she and a couple other coworkers noticed a parked car with no plates and smoke coming out the windows.

Being a good mother, she was naturally concerned. She and the other squeezed past the car and went a couple hundred feet up the path when BOOM! A series of explosions came, most likely all four tires and the gas tank detonating. What a close call! Naturally, after such a brush with danger, your mom went back and had her picture taken with the wreckage.

We've noticed that since you've been a part of our lives danger and natural disasters seem to be more common. We hope this is not a trend!!!

Jess is at 28 weeks!

Pumpkins in Our Future

Dear Pumpkin,


Last fall, after a surprising bumper crop, your mom and dad decided to try to sell pick-your-own pumpkins on the farm this fall. This weekend was the real start of this project, as we laid down the plastic and planted hundreds of pumpkin seeds! We put in 4 rows of carving pumpkins and one row of pie pumpkins, which are really fun for baking, as we discovered last fall.

Here's a picture of Jess and Ian measuring and melting holes in the plastic. Ian was very taken with the torch-on-a-stick technology, and was a very good wielder of this power. He also discovered that it burned weeds extremely well. Look out dandelions!

You, little Huntling, will be in the world by the time these pumpkins are ripe and ready to pick, so we're hoping you won't mind spending some fall days at the farm stand. Your Grandma Hunt, who helped us plant lots of seeds, and your Grandpa Hunt, who spent a lot of time with us getting the plastic put down, are looking forward to you spending time at the farm too.

To celebrate the planting, your parents rolled out the barrel of whiskey! Of course, as future parents we did the responsible thing, and cut the barrel in half and planted things in it. But first, your mom tried out the view from the top. Jess is at 27 weeks!

Jess's Big Ticket

Dear Sprout,

This weekend Jess got to cash in finally, after carrying you around for six months! Yes, she qualified for her first ever Mother's Day! Your Grandpa Hunt put together a really nice cookout over at the farm, with two of your great-grandmothers, one of your grandmothers, your mom and your Aunt Kristie all there. Oh yes, and there were some dudes too. First, your Grandma Nancy got to show off all the loot she got at her Grandma Shower at school. Never heard of a Grandma Shower? Well, neither had we, but what a score!

She got two, count 'em, TWO Womb-Sounds Bears, which are nice cuddly teddy bears which also produce recorded sounds of the womb at the turn of a dial. So, with two she can place one on either side of you for the sterophonic effect. Your grandparent's house is already shaping up to be the place for fun! All your parents have are miniature tools and implements for you to be productive with.

So, hope you enjoyed your first Mother's Day family get-together! Jess is at 26 weeks!

Out West, Part 2

Dear Child-to-Be,

Well, after three great nights at Zion National Park, we packed up our campsite in the rental car and headed to Bryce Canyon National Park, which is to the northeast of Zion. It is also at almost 10,000 feet elevation, compared to 4,000-7,000 feet for Zion. On the way we went through the mile-long tunnel bored through the cliff face in Zion:

The drive to Bryce Canyon was beautiful, through quite remote areas. When we arrived, there was nothing like the mad scramble for a campsite we experienced at Zion- we mostly had the place to ourselves. In fact, we got one of the three campsites recommended by our guidebook, right on the rim of the canyon, with views from our tent of some of the hoodoos.

Hoodoos are weird rock formations created by the combined effects of erosion and water freezing and cracking the rock, and are Bryce Canyon's claim to fame. They are definitely weird, and we spent lots of time walking around the rim of the canyon looking at all of them. They look especially striking at sunset, when the red rocks start to glow.

After two nights in Bryce it was time to head home. We drove back to Vegas, had an amazing 2-hour dinner at a Moroccan Restaurant, where your mom had to get up and dance with the belly dancer! It was a fantastic trip, made even more so by the fact that you were along, even if you didn't help with the cooking or campsite setup very much. We kept talking about how we want to take you on a similar trip in a few years, perhaps to Arches or some of the other national parks out West. This might be the last of our big trips for a while, so we were so happy to get out on the road for a little while. Now, the third trimester is upon us, and your arrival is getting closer and closer. So, we hope you enjoyed your first trip as much as your parents did!

Jess is at 24 weeks!

Out West, Part I

Dear Sprout,

We have heard from a lot of people that the second trimester is the best time to travel, and also that we should take a trip before you arrive. We had debated whether to go to the Carribbean, to Belize or Costa Rica, or a bunch of other places, but as you may come to find out, your parents sometimes are bad at making up their minds. However, we came up with the idea of booking a last-minute vacation to take you on a pre-birth tour of a couple of the national parks, which seemed just about perfect.

We left last Wednesday and flew to Las Vegas. Since our flight got in fairly late, we had reserved a room at the Sahara, one of the older casinos on the north end of the Strip. We figured, it's just a room, right? Well, maybe not. The Sahara was dismal, and even at 11 at night we ad to wait something like 45 minutes just to check into a room that smelled distinctly of smoke. Some opened windows helped a bit, but child, if you ever go to Vegas, please don't stay at the Sahara. This may be your father's first piece of wisdom to pass to you.

However, after leaving the next morning things steadily improved. We drove a few hours to Zion National Park, where after a mad scramble to find a campsite we scored what we think is the best site in the park, next to the Pa'Rus hiking trail and with an amazing view of the Watchman peak.

Zion is beautiful, situated in a canyon in southwest Utah, centered by the Virgin River. A shuttle takes you up and down the canyon, and there are many stops with views, hikes, and picnic spots. We spent three nights there, doing short hikes, relaxing in the hammock by the river, reading books, and generally relaxing. Many people on the hikes were staring at your mom's belly- she was the only pregnant woman we saw out on the trail!

Jess is at 24 weeks!