Our Easter Weekend involved a massive Easter Egg hunt at CBD, Easter service at Dane Street, and dinner and family time in Townsend. Here’s a recap of the weekend in pictures!
Easter Egg Hunt
More photos from the Easter Egg hunt.
Easter at Dane Street
More photos from Easter at Dane Street.
Easter in Townsend
More photos from Easter in Townsend.
Today, we were excited to become members of the Museum of Science! We went down to the museum early in the morning and signed up for a membership. We took advantage of our first day as members to see geckos, tamarin monkeys, bonsai trees, nanotechnology exhibits, and more. The girls even took part in a Harvard University research study.
Esme rocks out on the balcony. Longfellow Bridge in the background.
View more photos from the Museum of Science.
Another great thing about today was the awesome turkey taco dinner I made tonight. We did it make-your-own-taco style, with separate bowls of seasoned ground turkey, black beans, brown rice, sour cream, shredded jack cheese, salsa, soft and hard taco shells, and a heaping pile of Xochitl chips. The girls loved making their own custom tacos, and ate plenty of them!
Turkey Tacos!
Finally, I experimented today by taking all of the photos for our visit to the MoS on my iPhone! Usually on this type of trip, I would bring my digital SLR, a few lenses, and some other supplies. This time it was just me, Rebecca and the girls, and my iPhone. I think the photos turned out pretty well. What do you think?
Yesterday before leaving for work, I handed Catherine this small box from a recent Amazon order. I knew she’d do something creative with it.
Lifting Device
I wasn’t disappointed. This morning I found it and asked what it was. She said, “It’s a lifting device. If I want a snack or something, you can just put it in and I can pull it up.”
The things someone comes up with when they sleep on the top bunk. 🙂
It’s been almost five years since I first told my blog readers that I wasn’t going to be buying the first iPhone. Perhaps you remember that post? I put forth my “alternative,” the MyPhone.
In 2008, I again posted that I wouldn’t be buying the iPhone 3G, although I did buy an iPod touch at that time. I updated that post a year later to say that I wouldn’t be buying the iPhone 3Gs.
Since those posts, many things have changed. We’re in a significantly different place, financially, than we were five years ago. I’m no longer as put off by the price of the required data plans as I was back then. The iPhone has become more and more compelling and capable with each release. I’ve upgraded to an iPod touch 3g, and Rebecca got an iPod touch 4g, so iOS has been making itself a part of our lives. Finally, Sprint now supports the iPhone, one of the biggest hurdles, meaning that we could buy it without terminating our contract and with the benefit of the Sprint upgrade discount.
So, today, Rebecca and I bought iPhones* – two iPhone 4S models. Rebecca’s is white, and mine is black, and we’re having a great time learning all of their in and outs, and sending each other silly videos via MMS, and texting with those cool iChat-style bubbles.
iPhone
The iPhone is certainly no longer the hot new thing. At work, nearly everyone in my department has an iPhone. Most of the people I know in Build Guild have one (or if not that, then some sort of Android smartphone). A number of people at church have them. As I think of it, I’m not sure I know of anybody in my family who has one, but there are probably a few. But I’m no longer the guy who is known for getting the hot new technology, and I’m okay with that. If I wanted to buy one just because “everyone else” had one, I would have done that (and spent a ton of money to do it) years ago. Even the iPhone 4S started shipping almost five months ago!
I’m going to go chat with Siri now, but I’ll leave you with Etta James.
*I will say that the process of buying them at the North Shore Mall was a bit of a hassle. We spent a while at the Apple Store, picking out the models we liked and looking at cases, and finally going to talk to a specialist to purchase the phones. But when we got to the activation process, the Sprint activation network was down. So they told us they couldn’t help us, but sent us downstairs to the Sprint store. That should have been quick, but as it turns out, we had some features set up on our Sprint account that they were having trouble removing so that they could convert us to an iPhone-approved account. So they had to make some calls to Sprint service to get that all fixed up, then we went back upstairs to buy the cases we wanted. They were busy at the time, and the lady I talked to had me download the Apple Store app on my new iPhone, and use the Easy Buy feature to buy the cases. But that wasn’t really an “Easy Buy,” because it couldn’t scan the bar code on my case. So one of their people ended up having to do that. And *finally* we had everything. I guess those are the perils of buying a Sprint iPhone? The guy at the Apple Store said that most of their customers are buying AT&T iPhones, so I’m sure they don’t have as much exposure to the Sprint process.
Our sweet Esme, who loves to sing and dance and who can tell Mr Bates from Carson and Anna from Edith, turns three today!
Newborn Esme
First Birthday
Second Birthday
Third Birthday
Esme, you’re our little ray of sunshine! We love your sense of humor and your excitement. It is so wonderful to watch you grow up and learn so many things from your sister and the world. You love music and ‘Squeeze’ and sharing grapefruits with Mama. Papa thinks you’re a fantastic chef and loves to cook with you! We all love to do things with you, even if you only want to ‘subberbise’!
Happy, happy birthday, little one. Your Mama and Papa are so honored to be on this journey with you!
Today we visited The Works, a science and technology museum located in Newark, OH. We went down with my parents, my sister, brother-in-law and niece.
Cousins at The Works
This museum was chock-full of activities for little kids. From the minute they entered the building to the minute they left, the girls were playing, experimenting, and learning. We got to try playing a theremin and a xylophone bench. We built and tested marble tracks, built some circuits, learned about light, prisms, and lasers, tested our vertical leap, played in a kid-sized city with grocery store and doctor’s office, watched a glass-blowing demonstration, explored an interurban railway car, and learned about Licking County history. Catherine said her favorite parts were building circuits and the Invent Lab, where she got to build a robot from salvaged computer parts (this was probably one of my favorite parts, too).
Papa and Catherine Dissect a Keyboard
The museum is in downtown Newark, which is about 25 minutes from Columbus, and about 40 minutes from Mount Vernon, where my parents live. Admission for the four of us came to $20 – $7 for each adult and $3 for each child. I would definitely recommend a visit for anybody with kids who lives in the Central Ohio area, or anybody paying the area a visit.
To see all of the photos from our visit, visit the full gallery.
(The Wood family is currently in Ohio, staying with Peter’s parents, and visiting with them, Peter’s sister, brother-in-law, and niece, and doing the things that there are to do in Central Ohio. We join their activity already in progress…)
We’ve been here in Mount Vernon since December 29, and have been enjoying spending time with family. We celebrated my Mom’s birthday, did another Christmas celebration in Mount Vernon, visited a train, celebrated my niece’s birthday, celebrated New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day.
Catherine admires some art
Puzzling Painting
Today, Catherine, Esme, Rebecca and I took off for a family trip down to the Columbus Museum of Art. I haven’t been there since I was a kid, and apparently it’s recently been overhauled. We had a very enjoyable visit to the museum. Nearly every gallery had some kind of kid-friendly activity, whether a matching game with photos from the current gallery, or a puzzle of a painting in the gallery, assembled with the actual painting on the wall for reference.
The museum is a very manageable size, and yet maintains an impressive collection. It even has an area devoted exclusively to kids, the Wonder Room.
Wonder Room
We spent a little over two hours at the museum, and the girls enjoyed every part of it, except for the part where we had to leave! Since both girls are under 6, and AAA offers a BOGO discount, we only paid $10 for the four of us! I highly recommend a visit if you’re in the Columbus area.
Tomorrow we’ll be headed to Newark with my family to visit The Works, a science and technology museum with lots of hands-on activities for the kids. Looking forward to another day of exploring and expanding young minds, and having fun with family!
If you head over to our gallery, you can see the daily photo galleries from our trip so far. Far more photos than I’ve included in this blog post!
Crafting up a storm
We’re just a few short days from Christmas. The Wood household is busy with activity, particularly in the evenings when the little ones are asleep. Rebecca has made and mailed Christmas cards, knitted and sewn a plethora of gifts, wrapped and packed gifts for loved ones, and started decorate the house with decorations from this glowing blog. I am usually busy getting the girls ready for bed, doing chores, and offering opinions on Rebecca’s creative endeavors where requested. Last weekend, I took the girls with me down to Somerville to visit my cousin Mark, and so that we could all be out of Rebecca’s hair for the day. She appreciated the chance to do some serious crafting with no interruptions.
At work we’re at the end of ‘Wind-Down Week,’ the last week before Christmas where the busy-ness of the season starts to slow down. The company spends the week showering us with free food, folks bring in treats to share, and everyone starts taking stock of the previous year and planning for a successful new one.
Nativity
Our house is lightly but tastefully decorated for Christmas. One of my favorite decorations is the advent candle holder that Rebecca made from a slice of an old log. I also appreciate Catherine’s attempt to replace a ‘fallen angel’ from our nativity set with a doll from her dollhouse.
I’ve got one more day of work, then we’ll be spending part of Christmas Eve in Townsend with the Quitadamo family. We’ll come back for the Christmas Eve service at Dane Street, and on Christmas morning we’ll have a little Christmas at home, attend the Christmas Morning service at Dane Street, and then head out to Townsend again to spend the rest of Christmas day with Rebecca’s parents.
After Christmas, I’ll be working Tuesday and Wednesday, and Wednesday night we’ll begin our trek out to Ohio to visit my parents, sister and brother-in-law and niece. We’ll be out there for a whole week, and I’m looking forward to the road trip with Rebecca, Catherine and Esme, the visit with my family, and the break from work.
You can see a few more photos of Christmas decorations around our house.
I hope that you have a Merry Christmas, wherever you are!
I spent this past weekend on Martha’s Vineyard, visiting with my in-laws at their cottage in the MVCMA campground in Oak Bluffs. It was a nice vacation (which I define as any escape from the ordinary, regardless of how long). Rebecca and the girls will be staying down there this week to enjoy the Grand Illumination, and then I’ll be going down to bring them home this coming weekend. Here are some of my favorite moments from this past weekend:
Ferry Ride To The Vineyard
Citrus Cooler at the Farmer's Market
The lemonade stand at the West Tisbury Farmer’s Market is one of our favorites. Definitely try one of their drinks if you can make it to West Tisbury on a Saturday morning.
Lunch Date at the Right Fork Diner
This is a great diner located at the Katama Airfield in Edgartown. You can get a seat right on the edge of the airstrip and watch biplanes, turboprops, and other personal aircraft take off and land. The food is delicious, too. Rebecca’s parents watched the girls so that Rebecca and I could go out on our own to the farmer’s market and have lunch at the diner. Thanks!
Dinner with Nonni and Grandpa
Nonni (aka Dianne, my mother-in-law), makes the best food, and I always enjoy eating it when I visit. For Saturday’s dinner she made steak kabobs, rice, cole slaw, corn on the cob, and frozen banana for dessert. Yum.
Girls working together to build a pulley
Catherine builds an umbrella-tent
I always love watching my girls be creative, and this weekend was no exception.
Taking Catherine to see kids from the campground put on The Wizard of Oz
We couldn’t have avoided this if we tried. The cast came zipping around the campground on a golf cart, shouting that the Wizard of Oz would be starting at 7:30. Catherine and I, along with Ken and Dianne, went down to see it. The kids did a great job and Catherine enjoyed watching it, even if a few parts were scary.
You can see all of the Wizard of Oz photos here, and all of my photos from the weekend here.
A Report By Peter Wood
This weekend ranks up there as one of my favorite Father’s Day weekends so far because we went camping with the best gear from Survival Cooking. The weather was great, the activities were fun, and I got to do my favorite thing, spend lots of time with my family.
On Friday we drove out to Harold Parker State Forest in Andover, MA, to go camping with our friends Laurel and Scott and their kids, we got the most amazing rv decals. We had a big campsite where we each pitched our tents, as well as a screen room to put around the picnic table, which our friends had brought.
Our Campsite
L&S are very experienced campers, so we enjoyed the opportunity to learn from them and benefited from their service. My particular favorite was Scott’s buckwheat pancakes.
Scott, makin' pancakes
Catherine and Esme had a great time playing with the kids. Either family’s tent was fair game for jumping, cuddling, roughhousing, or reading.
Girls reading
I also got to enjoy some quality time with our girls. We walked to the campground’s playground, explored our own campsite, and went to look at the pond. Here’s a photo from one “adventure walk” Catherine and I took while Mama and Esme were napping.
Adventure walk with Catherine
Overall, the camping trip was very low-key. We didn’t have any real plans of what to do, we just relaxed and did what we felt like doing. I checked the time only a couple of times during the trip, but otherwise didn’t have a clock in sight. We had a really great time with Laurel and Scott and their family. It was also a good dry run for our trip to Michelle‘s wedding in July, where we’ll be camping for a few days.
You can see all of the (many) photos from our camping trip here.
After we got home from the trip, we unpacked and spent the afternoon puttering around the house, resting from the weekend and getting things put away. Later in the day, we went out to dinner at one of my favorite places, the 99 Restaurant.
Girls helping me put crackers in the seafood chowder
After dinner, we went over to Endicott Park to play on their excellent playground and see their farm animals. We saw the unusual (to us) sight of two female sheep butting heads. We also got to see the park ranger feeding all of the animals. The girls were both very excited.
Girls and Geese
I was glad to get to spend the weekend with friends and family. I feel very privileged to be the father of two great girls, and am glad to have Rebecca as my partner in helping them grow. Thanks for the great Father’s Day!
Papa with Catherine and Esme