I brought the kids to the annual advanced design team picnic this week at the IBM rec center. Connor was his usual chill self, just wondering around and loving the attention of all my teammates. And Cailee was her usual shy self – hiding behind my legs for the first 20 minutes, crying if I left her side. Slowly, she came around and warmed up to everyone, to the point that she didn’t want to leave by the end (but Connor was beat red and flushed from the heat so it was time to go). Cailee’s favorite activity was fishing. Jack is the resident fisherman and he learned right where to throw the line in order to catch the little fish quickly, as Cailee’s patience is nil to none. She still hasn’t learned that you don’t just throw the line and then reel it right back in, lucky for us we had some hungry fish (and a turtle) so her method worked a few times.

I had plenty of good babysitters and appreciated all the extra eyes on the kids – one always seemed to be going the opposite direction of the other (and Connor was determined to go for a swim in the pond).