The Zoe and Silas Show

The place we stayed in Lake George, NY last weekend was called Silver Bay and was run by the YMCA of the Adirondacks. It was a very special place and our room was in a historic inn that overlooked the lake and was set on acres and acres of beautiful grounds. The view from the giant wraparound porch of the inn that was lined with rocking chairs Historic also means there was no air conditioning and no cell phone service . Since it was 95 degrees when we arrived and our room was on the 2nd floor, we had a very hot night of sleep on Saturday. S&Z did great, though, and slept straight through from 10pm-7am. In order to take a shower each morning I figured out to put them back in one of the pack-n-plays and put on a "bideo". Thank goodness Silver Bay did have wireless. "Yo Gabba Gabba" gave me 23 minutes to shower and get organized for the day! My friend, Lisa and her fiance Carlos traveled for the shower as well. They were a huge help all weekend! I...

Because so many people were traveling to attend Kelly & Scott's shower, Kelly's sister organized  a BBQ for Saturday night. Scott knew that I was coming for the shower, but Kelly had no idea. She was SO SURPRISED when I walked in!!! It was awesome.  There were lots of other friends and family who traveled to help Kelly and Scott celebrate, including my close friend Lisa who lives in western MA.  There were tons of people to share in all the good cheer! The house where all the festivities were taking place belongs to Kelly's sister's in-laws. The space was absolutely beautiful (~8 bedrooms) and it was right on the lake. T here were also lots of other kids, and in addition to S&Z three of them were < 4 years. Zoe and Silas normally go to bed around 7:30 so I wasn't sure how long they would make it at a BBQ that started at 6:30. I could see them starting to go downhill around 7:15, but I managed to push them until well after 8:30. Everyone was so...

Kelly is a close friend from my time spent working at the University of Minnesota. She and her husband, Scott, live in Colorado. They announced a few months ago that Kelly is pregnant - baby girl is due on Halloween (although Kelly insists this baby will not be born on Halloween!). When Kelly's sister e-mailed me to say she was planning a mid-July surprise baby shower in Lake George, NY I just couldn't pass up the opportunity to see a dear friend! Due to crazy work schedules our family hasn't done any traveling since our trip to MN last June. Combine this with the fact I was going this one sans Derek made this trip a pretty big deal for us. After spending most of the day on Friday getting ready for our big trip, we were in pretty good shape on Saturday morning. Since Derek was staying home this weekend, he went to pick up a rental car mid-morning. It was really hot in Boston last week and thunderstorms finally hit on Saturday to cool things down a little. I had aimed to ge...

We're home now and I have a lot I want to write about our trip this weekend! But back to work today with a busy little week... I had no cell phone service in the Adirondacks all weekend. I e-mailed Derek to tell him we arrived safely on Saturday, and I sent him an e-mail on Sunday morning letting him know how the night went. I was so busy having fun and wrangling the kids that I didn't send anymore messages after the one on Sunday morning... Below is the e-mail I got from him on Monday morning. He cracks me up. Derek Dutra   to  me show details   8:55 AM (21 hours ago) Are you still alive? - Show quoted text - The kids haven't seen him in 3 days so I'm excited for him to get home from work this morning. Oh, and his vacation starts now!!!!! Hello, 21 days off :)

I can hardly believe it, but Derek's vacation finally starts on Tuesday!!!! He will be off for three weeks! That seems like such a long time, but after you take into account a 180 degree sleep schedule flip on each side it should leave us with just under 2 weeks of fun family time. In the meantime, I'm off on a super-secret-surprise getaway with Silas & Zoe this weekend. The M.V. has been cleaned and re-organized and we are mostly packed. We'll leave tomorrow after lunch and get back on Monday night. Derek will be sleeping before his last night of work on Monday when we get home, so he won't see the kids for 3 entire days. Due to our childcare/twin situation, neither of us has been away from them before so it will be interesting to see how this goes... We have tons of fun stuff planned for vacation this year. Next weekend the two of us are heading to downtown Boston to the hotel we stayed in on our wedding night, This was the view from our room at Hotel Nine...

Silas & Zoe's (then-adorable) baby teeth started coming in March/April of 2010, beginning with the two on the bottom. Over the course of 16 months they have grown 32 total teeth. And we're not done yet. We still have 4 "two-year-old" molars to go for each kid, leaving each of them with a final count of 20 total baby teeth.  As of tonight Silas seems to be in pretty good shape with his last "one-year-old" molar almost all the way through. Thank god. Because toddler teething has been pure misery for us. THIRTY-TWO teeth.  WOW.

As it has been across much of the country these days, it's hot hot hot here in Boston. It's 90 degrees at 8:30pm as I write this post. It was too hot this morning to bring the kids to the park, so Derek hung out on the back deck where they could stay cool with the water table. They were looking ready for some hot weather this morning! After breakfast they had fun playing with Daddy's laundry basket before heading outside. Where's Zoe?! I was happy to hear that Grand Forks had cooled down as of this morning. Hopefully the more moderate temps will be eventually making their way east!

Derek got subpoenaed back to court for an EMS case he was on awhile back, so I got to take the morning off today to hang with Silas & Zoe. What a treat on a summer day in the middle of the week! Since we're Mass Audobon members now, I decided to check out the Boston Nature Center . This spot rocks. It's only 10 minutes from our house and is an oasis located in the heart of three converging city neighborhoods (Mattapan-JP-Roslindale). There is a big parking lot, a conservation center, and several miles of trails in and around acres of woods. After walking one of the shorter trails, we discovered the coolest part of the BNC - a hands-on exploration area for kids! It's a wonderful space for parents to relax while the kids play, There are sand and rock sifting tables and rain catching barrels, The best part was definitely the sand/mud table. Coming from a family where all the members don't necessarily like to get their hands dirty (Alissa-St...