The Zoe and Silas Show

7/30/14: Mom, her new hip and I headed out for a walk around the island this morning. The weather was beautiful! This afternoon we were invited to visit Auntie Stephanie at work at the Aveda Headquarters in Blaine. In preparation for the visit Zoe & Silas made cards for Stephanie to go with a gift they planned to give her. When we arrived we headed to see Auntie's office, where S&Z gave her the cards and a rock they painted with glitter glue. After lunch we headed out on a nature walk with Melissa, the Director of Community Outreach, to see the bee colony. We stopped to see the community garden, as well as countless other treasures along the way! After making it to the colony where over 200,000 bees work hard pollinating and making honey, S&Z each received a very special bee pin to commemorate our visit. Stephanie has worked for Aveda for 15 years. It was an amazing opportunity to be able to meet her co-workers and tour the...

4/6/14: Last Sunday I was able to spend an evening with two of my best friends, Tracy & Lisa. Derek was off work and we cooked for everyone, and I bought some beautiful spring roses to celebrate the occasion. Tracy was in Boston for a conference, so Lisa made the trek to see us from western MA with her husband Carlos and their adorable baby, Matilde. We were bummed that Tracy's daughters, Brynn & Delaney, had to stay home with dad in MD. I'm plotting a family visit with them as soon as we can swing it! It was the first time we've been together in 4 years!  We had a great time catching up while the kids did their thing - which for Silas meant "working". Note that he is sitting at "his desk" with a notebook, a calculator, and an old iPod and iPad keyboard. When I asked him what he was doing he said, "trying to connect to WiFi"! Auntie Tracy brought the kids these awesome Melissa & Doug stickers books, and ...

3/28/14: It was a warm but rainy day on Friday. I opened up the back porch door for the first time this year and S&Z were very happy to oblige with some bubbles. All of us are itching to get outside as much as possible as spring approaches! Auntie Eliza came over for dinner, and some nice bedtime snuggles were had by all :)

3/21/14: S&Z were very excited to have Auntie Stephanie & Uncle Jim here to visit last weekend! They made a puppet theatre with Auntie in the afternoon, and then had some downtime with Uncle Jim while Stephanie and I did a little shopping. Best of all is having other people around to read bedtime stories!

3/9/14: We had a lovely visit with Auntie Rhiannon and Baby Hugh on Sunday afternoon. S&Z played very nicely, keeping quiet while Hugh went down for a nap. Silas in particular took advantage of Rhiannon's baby-free time!

1/17/14: We took a chilly walk at Hale after nap/quiet time on Friday. It was warm and sunny earlier in the day, but as sunset approached it was pretty darn chilly! The kids were so happy to show Auntie Kristin our special place!

1/16/14: Auntie Kristin's fan club.

1/15/14: Reading bedtime books with Auntie Kristin.

We were so happy to see Auntie Eliza for a visit on Friday! We made BBQ Black Bean Pizzas for dinner, which were delish! There was lots of fun playtime, And I was happy to have post-bedtime quiet to catch up with her as well!

3/22/13: Silas is not always such a good napper so we have kept him in the pack 'n play in the guest room for quiet time even though they have been sleeping in beds for a few months now. He asked me yesterday if he could sleep in "grandma's bed" so I decided to go for it and see how he would handle it. After two days of napping on the guest bed I'm hoping we've made the transition! Cutie pie on our way to the library. Auntie Eliza is in town for spring break so she came over for dinner last night. S&Z were soooo happy to see her! We had lots of new library books so they put her to work before bed :)

1/2/13: Dinosaur-themed memory! She talks about Auntie Kristin every time we play it :)

12/9/12: Auntie Kristin gave S&Z dinosaur eggs from the Science Museum. We've been watching them slowly hatch for over a week. They were sooooo happy when they completely broke out of the shells on Sunday!

We didn't get our Christmas decorations up Thanksgiving weekend, so decorating was my top priority for this last weekend. Auntie Kristin was in town for a conference last week so we were very excited to see her this weekend. I figured Kristin would get a kick out of decorating with the kids, so we waited to trim the tree until she came over on Saturday afternoon. Kristin got to experience how impossible it is to take cute pictures of little kids. Of course S&Z were being total goof balls, so this is the best one she was able to get. Pretty darn cute if you ask me! And here's the finished product! After dinner we rolled out dough for cookies. So fun and the kids loved it! I can't wait to cut out and decorate sugar cookies once my parents arrive for Christmas. Getting the decorations up officially kicks off the holiday season for me, and there is always so much to do this time of year. The Christmas sweat shop has officially o...