September Update: 10 Favorite Photos from Eugene

At the beginning of September, we traveled to Eugene, Oregon to visit with Sean's parents, a trip that was long overdue. We had a great time; the trip was packed with fun outings and celebrations. Sadly, on the very last day, on the very last outing, we lost our camera that contained the photos for the whole trip. Luckily Sean's dad had been snapping photos throughout the trip, so there was a record of the events. From those, here are the 10 best photos that show the highlights of the trip. For a look at the whole photo album, click here.

Auric found his reflection on the outside of garbage can at the Logan airport.

Auric sitting in Grandma and Grandpa's dishwasher.

Climbing Mt. Pisgah, Auric on my back and Thora on Sean's shoulders

Auric celebrated his first birthday on the trip. We spent that day exploring the Oregon coast and eating dinner in Newport, OR, at of all places, the surprisingly family-friendly Rogue Brewery. Before heading out, Auric got to open some presents.

I think he forgot to hold up what he wants to show us.

Once we got to the coast, we were all wowed by the blue skies and warm air. We relished in this experience playing in the sand and running from the cold waves.

At a cove, overlooked by a lighthouse.

It was here that we brought out the cupcakes that we'd bought in Eugene. (We'd asked for the icing to be put on the side, and Thora and I enjoyed decorating them ourselves.) We sang Auric "Happy Birthday" and we all enjoyed a cupcake before getting back in the car and heading further up the coast. We stopped at a few more scenic lookouts, one that, at low-tide, revealed star fish and anemones, and had a large rock covered in seals lying in the sun and some splashing in the water.

Chocolate-covered Auric, after his birthday cupcake

The following day was Sean's birthday. Here he is cutting his birthday apple pie.

It was on this trip that we also spent two evenings at the nearby swim/splash park where Thora, Sean, Auric, and Brian swam. There was a large, twisty slide that Thora loved, a wave pool that was less of a hit, and a lap pool where Thora practiced her doggie paddle without any flotation aid. She can swim by herself now! And while photos and video of this happening at the swim park is lost with the camera, here is a video of it at our neighborhood pool on the last day before it closed. (The water pools in her swim bottoms and has to be emptied each time she gets out of the water--hence the partial disrobing each time.)

September Update: 20 Favorite Photos

This month was a busy one. We crammed so much in. What with the fall activities, the last days of summer, and our final days with our great friends, Lauren and Noah, we seemingly didn't let a day go wasted. For a look at all the photos from this album, click here. Below are the 20 that best capture the highlights.



This summer, with Auric developing into more of a peer for Thora, she's enjoyed finding all sorts of ways that she can play with him. Pushing him on the swing is one of her favorite things to do at the park. Also, she's found a new nickname for him: Baby Beluga. They sing a song at school about a baby Beluga whale and the name just fit. Particularly hilarious is her expression and demeanor when she uses the nickname. It's like her body goes all floppy, her voice gets all syrupy, and she does things like cradle his head or stroke his cheek and says things like, "Baby Beluga, I just love you too much." Pretty funny. She also likes to pick him up from behind, under his armpits, waddle a few feet across the carpet, and then plop him down. She feels very grown up and big sisterly when she's doing this. And most of the time, she's also defying our rule that she not pick him up when one of us is not right there, so that satisfies the part of her that always wants to challenge authority. (A win-win for her!) Usually Auric is either amused, or quickly composes himself once his bottom hits the carpet. He's pretty resilient.

This September also marked Sean's return to rugby. While not fully engaged as he's been in years past, he did get to play in an Old Boys game, which was fun for him. He's yet to decide how much he'll play in the future. He likes his fitness when he's running seriously. But he loves the game too much to let it go. We'll see what compromise he finds. Below, here he is, being lifted for a lineout.



September marked our final month with our friends the Chapmans. Lauren and I met back when our kids were just a few months old, at a new mom support group here in Cambridge. After 4 years of living here, they are returning to their native England--Cambridge as it would have it. So in the last few weeks, we've packed in lots of outings and playdates with Thora's friends Noah. Here they are, packed liked sardines, 3 across in the back of our sedan on our way to Southwick's Zoo, about an hour's drive from us. This zoo has so much to offer kids Thora and Noah's age. Besides the normal expectations of zoo animals, albeit on a smaller scale, there are kid-sized carnival rides, a farm animal petting zoo, a Fawn Meadow in which you can feed and pet baby deer, a train, a SkyFari chair lift (my living nightmare given my fear of heights--Fun!), a dog and pony show, and a bird aviary.

Watching the Dog and Pony Show

They're taking seriously the driving of this psychadelic pink bear-mobile.

Feeding the deer in the Fawn Meadow

Later, still at the zoo, we played for awhile at the playground. Here's Auric doing what he loves to do--point!



He's also incredibly skilled at climbing up a slide. With bare feet and hands, this kid can monkey up the slide in no time. Seriously, you cannot look away before he's halfway up the slide.



Late in the month, my friends Lauren, Hilary and I took our kids (Zach, Noah and Thora, plus Auric and Zach's baby sister, Ellie) apple picking in Stow, MA. The weather was warm and sunny and the kids had a great time. There were pony rides, pedal tractors, a hay maze, and all the apples you could eat. We capped the morning with MASSIVE scoops of homemade ice cream (the kids' size was probably double what I, as an adult, would've been satisfied with!).




This summer, Thora has gotten to be so gutsy. She is generally willing to try anything, from a bite of new foods, to brave things like getting up close to large animals, riding all sorts of carnival rides, and dunking herself under water. Here, she was happy to leave me standing at the gate, walk up to the attendant, have the attendant help her on to the pony, do the pony ride, and then get help back down before running back to me. This may not seem that notable. But when you've had experience with a kid who wants to do things, but at the same time hides behind your leg or won't let go of a hand or an ankle or a pant leg, this self-sufficiency was something to behold.

Zach, Thora, and Noah in a play tractor

Thora found some "kissing apples." (They were joined at the stem on the tree.)

Auric has enjoyed things with wheels for a long time now. But he's finally able to play with these toys, driving trucks across the carpet, making rumbling noises as he does. Check out a video of this here.

At the end of September, we had one final pizza party playdate with our friends Lauren and Noah. It was sad to see them go. But we're looking forward to visiting them in May, when Sean's English high school will be holding its alumni dinner.

Noah and Thora get one final cuddle

Thora and Lauren hug goodbye

Me, Summer, and Lauren

August Update: 5 favorite photos from our trip to NYC

In August, we made a second summer trip to NYC, this time for a long weekend to coincide with the Bronx Half Marathon, a race that both Sean and I were running. For a look at the whole photo album, click here. We drove down after Sean got off work on a Thursday night. On Friday, we hung out quite a bit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Here we are in a sunlit gallery.


Here's Thora and Sean in the Knight's Armour room.




On Saturday, we spent some time in Central Park for a quick visit with my friend Elizabeth and her family. It was so quick that I failed to get any good pictures of the two of us, or of Thora and Sam playing. Here's a great one, though, after they headed back home, the skyline of the south end of the Park in the background.


Then, from there, we went down to midtown on the East Side, to check out a bike fair they were having, in which they'd closed off all of Park Avenue from Houston all the way up to the 72nd St. There was music, water stations, other vendors, and we stumbled upon this bike company offering free rides on their pretty neat bike--it could be reconfigured to accommodate not just toting kids but 4 other configurations. Here's Sean and Thora taking a spin.


Finally, on Sunday morning, Sean and I woke woke at 5 to begin our trek out to the Bronx for our race. We ran it together, the whole way, which was so fun to do. We've not run together since... I'm not exactly sure. We did some regular runs together back when we lived in NYC, before we had Thora. And I think we may have done one or two runs together since we moved to Cambridge. But normally, running is something that we cram into the open spots in our respective schedules. So it was fun for us to share this experience. We did it in just over 1 hour and 51 minutes. We were strong through the first 10 miles; I set a tough pace, but we seemed to have it in us. But at 10 miles, I felt what I was sure to be a massive blister forming on the bottom of foot and so I stopped to try to fix my sock, and when I stood back up, my hip flexors were done. I felt like I could barely lift by knees to run. Needless to say, it was a painful and depressing final 3 miles. But thankfully Sean was there--with still functioning legs--who dragged us to the finish line. Here we are after the race. My smile is totally fake. The only happiness I was feeling was happiness that it was over.


After the race, we worked our way via subway back to the Upper West Side, where we had a nice brunch with my dad and step-mom and our kids, and then piled in the car and headed back to Cambridge.

August Update: 7 Favorite Photos from Sarah's Birthday

My birthday was this August. I turned 34, officially entering my early-mid-thirties. At some point prior to thinking about my party, Sean mentioned, I think half-jokingly, about having a summertime keg party, I think merely to be able to say that he's having one. But the seed was planted. As I began imagining my birthday party, I decided that I wanted to have a kegger. And so I planned the Kid-Friendly Kegger. It was an early evening party that wrapped up by 8pm. The weather was wonderfully cooperative, so we were able to have much of the eating and (umm...illegal) drinking happen at the park across the street from our place. That way the dozen or so kids and toddlers could run around and the adults could comfortably watch them while standing around socializing. It was loads of fun. Here are a few of the best photos. For the full batch of photos, click here.

Here I am with the keg. I felt very young at heart! And my friends were all very helpful in trying to kick it. Thank you! Although, I have to say that despite feeling young and carefree, I did feel a bit sheepish about it being a tiny little 1/4 barrel. I mean, back in the day, my friends and I would've need a few of these, right? At least that's the way it seems in retrospect. In the end, I think we did a respectable job taking care of it, for a bunch of parents of toddlers.



Sean was a great husband on the day of the big party. He even surprised me with not one but two different kinds of fancy chocolate cake. It was a great day to spend time with good friends and feel totally spoiled.



This is what the later part of the party looked like, when we commandeered the park across the street.



Here are the kids having a blast.



Here are some more friends:

Lauren holding Hilary's baby Elllie


Julie and Lili


Liane and Aaron Weber

August Update: 10 Favorite Photos

I feel like it's been a lifetime since I last updated you all on our comings and goings. I don't like having fallen so far behind. In an effort to quickly catch back up, here are the highlights from August 2010. These are ten photos that give the fullest picture of how we spent our time. For a look at the full photo album, click here.


This summer will surely be remembered as the Zach and Thora summer. It's the summer that they became great friends. Here they are after Zach and his family's return from a trip to Hawaii with luau costumes for both kids.



Thora, Zach and Noah also became busom buddies this summer. Here we are on a sweltering August day taking the Charles River Boat Tour.


We cherished all our time with Lauren and Noah as they spent their last months here in Boston before returning home to their native England. They left last week. They will be sorely missed. Sean and I are already planning a visit to see them in May, to coincide with the alumni dinner for the English boarding school that Sean attended for high school.

The late summer provided us with lots of great food. We gorged ourselves at various harvest festivals. Here we are at the Verrill Farm Corn and Tomato Festival, out in Concord, MA.


And here we are shucking corn at Zach's house. This was a great job for three year olds. And entertaining for the babies, Auric and Zach's little sister, Ellie.



Also, our container vegetable garden was a success. We had tons of yellow cherry tomatoes, a nice crop of big, flavorful brandywine heirloom tomatoes, several peppers, quite a few cucumbers, and lots of herbs. Here's a harvest on a particular night.



And in addition to healthy farm and garden foods, we had many occasions for ice cream. Here is Thora, literally covered from head to foot in chocolate ice cream. Normally she's not quite this messy.


In August, we had several close encounters with animals, mostly pony rides and petting zoos. Here, Auric is getting his hat nibbled by a hungry goat.


And speaking of our boy, Auric got 4 teeth this summer. He's a speedy crawler and likes to walk holding on to hands. His favorite thing is to walk while pushing toys or large wheeled things like strollers or luggage racks. I'm sure it won't be long now before he's walking on his own.


We had many hot days and so spent a lot of our afternoons at the local playground that has a sprinkler. My friends and I regularly shared our collective dread at the long winter ahead when we'll be desperate for activities that allow our kids the exercise that they get at these local parks.


This was a great end of summer, one with lots of fond memories.