Secret Meeting

Apparently I walked in on a secret meeting in the bathroom this afternoon. Pretty sure I don't want to know what it was all about....

Reunited At the Bus Stop

(Apparently it was a long day away from each other.)

Just Hanging Around

Bikes!

We bought Charlie a new bike for his birthday today and took the kids to a bike path to practice. Charlie lasted the usual five minutes before throwing the usual I-can't-ride-a-bike temper tantrum, sigh. Maybe training wheels are the way to go after all...

First Baseball Game

The Indians played their first baseball game this morning, against the Quincy Red Sox. I unfortunately missed the game because I had to work, but Mike reported that Charlie went 3-3 at bat with 2 of his hits being fly balls that went well over everyone's heads and landed in the outfield and that these were the highest and furthest hits of the game, from either team. On the other hand, Charlie's fielding needs improvement; he apparently has the tendency to get right underneath fly balls and then just let them drop in front of him :-) They don't keep score at this stage so no report on who won the game :-)

I am excited to have off next Saturday for Charlie's birthday party, so I will get to come to his 2nd game, against the Orioles, yay!

Here are a couple pictures from today's game:

Batting Practice

Do You See The Snake In This Picture?

Me neither. I came outside this afternoon to find Charlie locked in a staring contest with this snake ("Only it's head and neck are sticking out and he sees me so I won't be able to catch him"), which I could not see at all. I had to zoom my camera all the way in and take the picture, and then even looking at the picture I still could not see it at all. I had to ask Charlie to show me where it was, and he dutifully pointed it out in the bottom left of the picture, sticking its head out from under the ledge of our neighbor's bulkhead. I *still* could not see it so I had to enlarge the picture with my fingers and then I could *finally* see it.

All I have to say is, good eyes, Charlie -- good eyes.

Sore Loser

Back To The Normal Routine

After a week of school vacation with the added drama of the Boston Marathon bombings thrown into the mix, we are happy to report that we are back to the normal routine. Charlie got up and out the door this morning with minimal fuss, Amelia had gymnastics, and Charlie even managed to do his homework without any meltdowns --fairly impressive after a week off.

Tomorrow is our usual Tuesday spin class and Wednesday Charlie has both Taekwon do and baseball practice, with his first game on Saturday (last Saturday's game was rained out.)

So in general we are hoping for a much less eventful week than last week, with no bombings, shoot outs or lockdowns, please :-)

Pre-school Science

Guess it's never too early to learn about the life cycle of the butterfly...

Always Finding New Ways To Let Some Energy Out

First Baseball Practice

Charlie had his first baseball practice this evening. We are excited for his first game, where his team -- the Indians -- play the Giants, 9am Saturday morning!

A Day In Harvard Square

Charlie and I spent the morning at Harvard's Natural History Museum where I ironically could not get him out of the Hall of Gems and Minerals -- rock hunting has suddenly cropped up as a distant second to snake hunting -- and Charlie felt the need to look at every single piece of rock in the place to the point where I gave up and bribed him with the gift shop to get him the heck out of the place.

After the museum we had a picnic lunch on Harvard Yard and then headed to our favorite playground on Cambridge Commons where I got to relax for a bit while Charlie played King of the Hill on the various climbing structures.

We wrapped up with Pinkberry -- a pretty good day! Here are pictures:

New Crocs

They read Amelia's mind when they came up with these Crocs -- mermaids and Hello Kitty?? What more could a girl want!

Snake Season...

Is finally upon us. It's going to be a long Spring and Summer!

New Kitchen Table

We finally decided that 11 years was old enough and bought a new kitchen table. This one has the advantage of having a bench and 4 chairs so that we can keep the bench under the table in our narrow kitchen and just pull it out when we have company.

The table was delivered this morning -- here it is!

Well It Wasn't The Best Day To Go Into Boston

I took the kids to the children's museum this afternoon without much thought about it being Marathon Monday until Mandy texted me telling me about the bombs that had gone off at the finish line. Mike had fortunately left work early and joined me at the museum, and we decided to make a hasty retreat out of Boston.

Because they canceled the rest of the race and closed many of the surrounding T stops, when we left the museum and started walking towards South Station we were joined by throngs of shell-shocked marathoners, some still wrapped in foil blankets.

We managed to wedge ourselves onto a packed train and headed back to Quincy. Charlie was standing next to a marathoner who had finished the race a few minutes before the bombs went off and proceeded to chat her up about what bombs look like, how many people were killed, where were the "bad guys" etc. Amelia mercifully was asleep otherwise who knows what would have been coming out of her mouth too!

We celebrated our arrival back in Quincy with a couple margaritas at a Mexican restaurant in Quincy Center where we had dinner and caught our first glimpse of the news.

Here are some pictures from the museum-- the kids had fun till we had to get the heck out of dodge!

Learning How To Properly Mount The Balance Beam

Not A Bad Gig, Being Sick

I kept Amelia home this morning and took her to the walk in hour at her pediatrician's office after she started complaining of a sore throat and spiked a fever. Here she is enjoying her treat at Starbucks afterwards, completely unfazed by her strep throat diagnosis.

Oh No

Charlie remembered that snake trap he got for Christmas...

Taking Her First Homework Assignment Very Seriously

After Gymnastics Ritual

For the 2nd week in a row Amelia and I have made it to the Quincy High School track after gymnastics, so that I can go jogging. I am under the delusion that I will be running a 5k in June and since currently running 5 feet is difficult, I need some practice :-P I did manage to jog, pushing Amelia in her stroller, around the outside lane 3 times, stopping to rest after each circuit.

Here is Amelia, very tolerant of my endeavors.

Happiness Essays

Charlie's class had to write "happiness essays" today. Charlie's teacher sent home not one but two essays with Charlie this afternoon, because one of the other students wrote his happiness essay about Charlie.

Here it is:

"One time I met a person named Charlie. He was cool. We did arts and crafts. We played with each other with toys. He told me about salamanders. We were best friends. I wish I had him in 2nd grade. Friends forever!"

Charlie, of course, wrote his about snakes. Specifically about catching 3 snakes at Katie's Labor Day barbecue, although he refers to her as his cousin because, well, he thinks she is even though I have corrected him about this a hundred times. Here is his:

"I was very happy because I was going to my cousin's house. I was happy because there was always snakes at their house. I was looking very hard and do you know what I found 3 snakes in one day! I was so happy. I love when I am happy."

So there you go, Charlie's poor little friend has to take a back seat to snakes, as do the rest of us.

Must Be Spring...

Cuz Charlie's on his belly with a net...

New England Aquarium

Katie and I took the girls to the aquarium this morning. Since the aquarium is in the midst of a ten month renovation the main exhibit -- a huge cylindrical tank that rises several stories in the middle of the aquarium -- is closed, so ticket prices are reduced. Between that and the half price coupons we got at the library (and the fact that Katie may or may not have lied about Amelia's age) we got in for $5 a piece.

We had a nice morning looking at the exhibits and catching the seal show and then had lunch at Fanieul Hall.

Here are some pictures:

Make Your Own Pizza

How To Brush Your Teeth

Apparently Amelia has been watching too many instructional videos on Youtube...? For real, she doesn't watch Youtube at all, I swear, so I don't know where she gets this from...

Amelia's Pontiff's Hat

Summer Camp & Birthday Parties

It's that time of year again, time to figure out the child care arrangements for the summer and plan Charlie's 7th (seven!!) birthday party.

On the child care front, after a YEAR on the waiting list, Amelia is finally registered at Merry Deb nursery school, a private pre-school in Braintree. Aside from being extremely highly recommended by several people I know, Merry Deb has the advantages that a) it's about 50% cheaper than the daycare Amelia currently attends, and b) it has a summer camp for older children at the same extremely reasonable rate. The summer camp is virtually impossible to get in to without a sibling in the pre-school, so after Amelia's year long wait I was successfully able to enroll Charlie for the summer. They are both starting the first week of July (which is the first week of summer vacation thanks to all those snow days!) and I am hoping that since Charlie will be going with her, the transition to a new school will be easier for Amelia. The older child program sounds great, with field trips every week including hiking, mini golfing, a trip to the zoo, a trip to an indoor inflatables place, and a bunch of other stuff that I can't remember right now. And the price of having TWO of them in the summer program will only be $20 more a week than what we are paying for just Amelia now. Unfortunately, the location of the new daycare makes for a longer commute for Mike, who will be doing the dropping off & picking up the three days a week that they will attend, but you can't win 'em all.

On the birthday party front, Charlie wants --you guessed it -- reptiles for his birthday party, so we are having Curious Creatures come out again (they did his third birthday party) for a 40 minute show which will heavily emphasize the reptiles, per Charlie's request. I must be cracked in the head since I decided to a) have the party at our house to save money, and b) to invite Charlie's entire class. So if your idea of fun is seventeen 6 or 7 year olds and a bunch of reptiles (including a large boa constrictor and a baby alligator) in a tiny house, you'll want to be there, Saturday May 4th from 2 to 4! Otherwise I'm guessing we'll have a little family party up in NH the following weekend, coinciding with Mother's Day :-)

Night Awakenings

At three years old Amelia is still waking up on average 3 to 4 times a night. Since Charlie was also an awful sleeper at that age, this comes as no surprise. Amelia, however, is apparently determined to take my sleep deprivation to whole new levels.

Her usual run of requests in the middle of the night are of the mundane "I'm too hot", "I'm too cold" & "Fix my covers" variety, but every once in a while she throws in a completely nonsensical request to make sure I'm really awake (because she apparently isn't):

Amelia: "Where's my key??"
Me: "Your key? What key?"
Amelia: (shaking her bunny blanket) "The key to my bunny!"
Me: "Your bunny doesn't have a key."
Amelia: "Then how am I going to open it??"
Me: "You're not! You're going to go back to sleep!"

Or:

Amelia: "I can't find my bunny!!"
Me: "You're holding it."
Amelia: (looking down at her bunny clenched in her fist) "That's not my bunny! Where's my bunny?"
Me: "It's right there!"
Amelia: "No it's not, that's not my bunny it's a duck!!"

I know there was another one recently too, but since these conversations occur in the middle of the night, I don't remember 90% of them. Maybe in another year or two she'll be a model sleeper like Charlie, who only wakes up ohhh once a night... :-)

Flip Flop Weather*

*In Massachusetts flip flop weather is anything over 55 degrees.

Amelia's New Favorite Movie