Massachusetts Week One

***Warning: TONS of photos and stories to follow! Don’t say I didn’t warn you!!!

Leaving for Mass

I know its a bit late, but better late than never. I’m going to do my very best to remember all the wonderful things we did while we were out on the east coast. There was so much done in such a short amount of time, thankfully the thousands of photos that we took out there will help tell our adventure.

We took another over night flight, just over six hours, but it what works for our little ones. The hardest part is waiting at the airport. You have to be there so early these days just to make sure you make your flight on time, check in, security, walking to the gate, all takes twice as long when you have two kids that are up waaaay past their bed times! They did well though, we just pretty much let them do what their hearts desire until we boarded. We watched airplanes fly in and out, admired all the wonderful wall art in the airport, and took lots of little walks up and down the terminal. As soon as we boarded the plane, we got them all situated and shortly after take off, they passed right out. Lance and I weren’t so lucky! We didn’t buy a seat for Zoey, she is still under two, which we found later was probably a mistake, but lesson learned. The flight was great, not a smidge of turbulence!

San Francisco Airport Wall Art. Very interesting.
It’s amazing what people can do with everyday objects.

Boston, you are my greatest friend!

Six hours later, six very long hours, we arrived in Boston. I’ve never been so happy to see the early light of day. I’m not a morning person, but how can you not love this amazing view of Boston. I didn’t grow in Boston or visit it as a child, but I have grown to love this place. Its a beautiful city. Lance loves it, and perhaps I am learning why. Boston is a very intriguing. Its different from all the other cities I’ve visited. Can’t really put my finger on it, but its different. Knowing that we were about to exit this metal flying machine was a great thought. I was so excited to finally be here and a little emotional, too. It had been more than a year since our last visit. We were so excited about finally being there, but also upset with ourselves for letting time get the better of us. We packed up what seemed to be half of our house in the back of those tiny airplane seats and made our exit, which of course we were the last. We met up with the family, made our Hug rounds, and headed off for a delicious breakfast, of course, way better than that airplane food!

6/22 Day One: Reconnecting

We spent the entire first day at home with the family, recuperating, reorganizing, reconnecting. It had been much too long since we had been back to visit. We have missed them dearly and need sometime to be with each other. Of course, the day wasn’t complete without a romp through the backyard. We met a lovely little chipmunk, who we named Alvin, naturally, a quick little frog, and a few dozen spiders that I would have rather gone without. The kids slept really great that night, went to bed late, slept in late. I was so happy that they were sleeping good, nothing worse than cranky kids, high heat and humidity, there just isn’t much you can do for them.

6/23 Day Two: Making Plans

We made lots of plans for our second day there. I think it was even suppose to rain that day,
and thankfully it did not. We had planned to be outside as much as possible. The kids had so much pent up energy, we had to keep them running! We also celebrated Karin’s birthday and went to Hampton Beach.

We have a picture just like this with Lance and Xander when he was little.
They both love music soo much!

We couldn’t get these kids off the swings! There is something magical about swings.

This was Zoey’s favorite thing to do, water the garden. She loved to give the pretty flowers and all the green plants water. Its so hard to have a garden like that back here in California, it’s always so hot and nothing really grows that well unless you keep a very sharp eye on it. She loved to water herself too. She was keeping cool.

We think this might be Simon… not too sure though!?

We had a BBQ for Karin’s birthday. Lance and I did all the prep and cooking for a kabob night. Chicken kabobs with a pineapple chipotle marinade and gilled veggie kabobs and rice. It was like heaven on a stick! We love kabobs, they are so easy to make and cook quickly so it worked for ten of us!

Joe drove out from Ohio to visit with us. Seriously, this guy is amazing! He drives eight hours from Ohio to Massachusetts to visit and usually once a year he flies out to California to visit us there. If that isn’t a sign of a great guy and a great friendship.. then I just don’t know what is!!!! He stayed for a week and by the end of the week, I was really missing my sleep! We stayed up late almost every night. Actually, I think it was every night.

The kids exploring their awesome new toys from Nana and Grampy. We have lots of birds flying around our backyard and Xander is always wondering what they are. Now he has his own bird book and binoculars to check them out and learn about them and probably teach his mommy and daddy a a thing or two. Zoey just loved her kaleidoscope. I think it is one of the best old school toys ever! So simple yet so entertaining!

Off to Hampton Beach

Some of the most beautiful sunsets I’ve ever seen.

Fried Dough. Can’t leave Massachusetts without it!
That and fried ice cream, but we didn’t get the chance to have that!

We walked around for a bit and then the kids started getting pretty cranky and thankfully fireworks came to our rescue! They had a great time! It was like an early Fourth of July for them, for all of us really. Since we were flying home on the fourth, we wouldn’t be able to stay for Independence day celebrations. It was a great way to celebrate Karin’s birthday and fourth all at the same time, BBQ, presents, fried dough and fireworks, what more could you ask for?! Other than sleeping babies at the end of the night.

6/24 Day Three: Rekindling, Fires and Friends

Our camp fire, Lance did an amazing job building it and keeping it going!

On the Thursday after we arrived, we decided to have a BBQ with all of our friends. It was open invitation, anyone and everyone was invited. Lance and I BBQ’ed turkey burgers with pineapple and onion rings to top, it was so delicious! It was quite hilarious trying to fit everyone in the kitchen though!After dinner we all hung around and played some Wii and laughed so much and so hard! It was so great to be hanging out with such wonderful people again! And even better, all those people love our kids and love to spend time with them and us at the same time! Friends like that are crazy hard to find, especially when they don’t have kids of their own. Later that night, after the kids were in bed, we headed down to the basement for some good old monopoly!! I can’t stand monopoly, but Lance and Joe love to play it and with so many people over, it would be a thousand times more fun! They all played, I took pictures! It worked out for everyone! After a couple hours of Monopoly, we headed to the back yard for a camp fire! It was fun, hilarious, crazy, strange, and lots of other great things! Except for the mosquitoes, once again, they were out in full force looking for some fresh meat! Next time, we will have to send them on vacation!! Even the bug spray just wasn’t cutting it! Darn mosquitoes!

Joe, Steve, Katie, Alison, Bonnie, Slava, & Jenna came to hang out!

Hanging out, playing Wii, laughing, enjoying some great company!

If Katie is around, there you will find Xander!

Their crazy game of monopoly! Slava was going to win for sure!

6/25-6/26 Days Four & Five: The Reunion

The very next day, we packed up the van and ourselves and headed down to Weymouth for the family reunion. This would be my first family reunion ever! I was so super excited and had been hearing about these reunions for a long time now. The first day that we were there we went swimming at Lisa and Joe’s house. Since it was so hot outside, it worked out so well. The kids had such a great time hanging out with other kids and staying cool, it took us an hour just to get Xander out of the pool to eat some food! After swimming we played a game called Apples to Apples, another first. That game is so amazingly fun! We bought the next night on our way back home to Amesbury! The kids slept so well that night, once we got them to sleep! We slept over at Rick and Moshi’s house that night. It worked out so well, our kids are pretty close in age and played so well together.

Lance and Zoey & Rick and Logan

Cody and Emmy

Lance and the kids

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Zoey

Xander

Nathaniel

and Logan

The next day we drove over to Bruce and Betsy’s house for some reunion fun! Things like Family Fear Factor and canoes and some really amazing food! It was so amazing seeing everyone again, it had been more than a year and I got to meet a few more people that I’ve never met before! It was so much fun! We are already planning to visit the same time next year for another reunion!

The Family Portrait!

All of the kids had the greatest time! I barely even saw Xander half the day, he was always off running around with Nathaniel or Logan or Emmy. It was really great watching him play with some kids his own age.

Boys and their toys, playing the DS under the table! Apparently, it was too bright to see anything so they had to sit under the table out of the sun! Kids are just soo cute!

Karin and Sherena

Her come some of the Family Fear Factor games… so hilarious!

The Egg Toss (left) & The Ooey Gooey Chocolate Marshmallow Drop (right)

Training to be bank robbers! Just kidding!! They had to eat a banana through pantyhose!
Before (top) & the DISGUSTING After (bottom) !!!! It was really gross!

The shaving cream and cheese curls toss!! All we kept hearing was “It burns!”

The lake in the back of Bruce and Betsy’s house. It was so beautiful! I loved all the Lilly pads!

The lovely quartet! Joe, Lance, Kim, and Sherena. Pretty much inseparable for a week!

Canoeing!

The kids loved their hula hoops! Spend most of their afternoon playing on the grass with hula hoops and baseball and just running around with each other!

“Hmmm, I wonder how many of these I can stuff in my mouth before mommy stops me?!”

Just too cute!
Any parent knows, you sleep when baby sleeps,
especially when there are so many other family members around!

By the end of the night, the kids were getting so rambunctious and tired, still good just really tired! They were getting that last bit of energy out by running in circles and falling down, perhaps their very own version of Ring around the rosie or London Bridge! We left a few minutes after, we still had at least a fourth five minute drive home, and we were hoping for the kids to take a cat nap on the way home, which didn’t happen, but they went to bed fairly easy that night. After all that running around and outside time, surprised they even made it home!

On the way home, we stopped at Wal-Mart and bought Apples to Apples. We just couldn’t pass this game up! We played it as soon as we got home, after the kids got into bed. It is just so hilarious! We laughed so hard that night! Lance fells asleep early, leaving me, Joe, and Sherena up to no good! We put the lid on Lance’s head. He woke up a little while later, took the box off his head, looked at us, then put the box BACK on his head and went back to sleep!! I just couldn’t pass up such a great a picture opportunity! We already missed everyone down in Weymouth, but we were definitely happy to be home again and so were the kids.