Sorry I don't post much.

[insert excuse here]. So I welcome myself back to this blog by saying if you would like to see some wicked cool pictures of us on Halloween just head over to my homepage.

We have had a lot going on since returning from our summer of vacations. After the wave of visitors left, we were left high and dry for things to do, so we dove back into school, church, and thats about it.

Funny things I heard today: "kinkley", "I can't believe my students all become a$%#@ the day before a test", and "Nerdular Nerdance"

A weekend in Queens and NYC

We spent the weekend in Queens and NYC with our friends Dan and Minna. We had so much fun. We visited central park and rode on the carousel and went to the zoo. Zoe and Gus loved the zoo and carousel but I think Sammy liked the zoo more than anyone. He wouldn't ride in the stroller he wanted to walk and explore by himself. I got a lot of video footage, but only a few pictures. You can see them at the new link.

Soon I promise

I know you all want to see pictures of Sam eating his blue birthday cake and videos and all that. So here you go. Enjoy the photos...The movie is now up also. Oh and I think I will be trying out this site called 23hq.com for a while. You can upload 20MB of photos for free...Let's see if I can upload that many in a month, if I find it too restrictive, or if I find it just right. I definately think it is priced well (it's free).

You know you are a nerd when...

You like to write your own song to let your 7 days of spring family know who you are and then you put it at the end of a mix cd you will give them on the last day of the activity. Well go listen to it. Go listen to me make a fool of myself. I know that it sounds like techno but I actually had something a little more country in mind when I started. Somehow the Garage Band synthetic tracks lured me into a slow rapping style, and although the lyrics sound so 'natural' I wrote them all out! Seriously, I thought this one through...can you even believe how cool I am and how great my song is? Our family is so much cooler than yours because we have this blog where we talk about almost nothing, and now we have a song with little or no meaning but really cool rhythm and sweet guitar solos. You might as well listen to it again... for the love of mike go listen to it again and tell me how cool this song is. I really need a boost right now. Actually an honest opinion is always the best even if I don't want to hear it. If you don't like it, I don’t mind, but I hope your foot steps in gum and then in rocks, and it makes you walk funny, cause then you would have some great lyrics for your own song.

Not all bombs are bad!

This week is spring friendship week at our church, and though it sounds very cheesy it is actually a lot of fun.  Each family that wanted to participate is given a family whom they give small thoughtful gifts to a few times during the week, much like the 12 days of Christmas.  The gifts are small but fun.  It is very exciting to give the gifts because you have to be sneaky and figure out ways to hide your identity.  On the last day of the week you let them know who you are.  Our kids have absolutely loved it.

One family in our church went out of their way to make a fun activity for their secret family.  They decided to send them on a scavenger hunt.  They really had the best intentions but it seems that one of the packages was mistaken for a bomb and the Arlington Police had to remove it yesterday!  I am still laughing about it. Perhaps someone will mention it in church this week!  hahaha

I blog now, I am a blogger!

This is my first, ever, blog post. I'm not even sure where someone would go to read this if they wanted.
I'm alone tonight. Tadd had to stay late on campus for a floodsafe meeting. I just got the kids in bed, and tidied sp? up the house. It's strange to be alone, I almost never am. It's nice though. I'm trying to think about what happened to day that I could write about, something exciting that is. The thing is nothing exciting did happen. It was just a regular day. We got up, got dressed and took Zoë to school. The little boys and I came home (Tadd was already gone to school). I cleaned, did laundry, worked a little on relief society stuff. Sammy played, ate and slept. Gus played, colored, watched Popeye, cried (a lot), ate (a little). After school Zoë played in the back yard with Serena & Gus, praticed piano, did homework and did some coloring. So, like I said it was just a regular day, but it was nice. I spent it with my babies doing the things I need to do to take care of them. I'm happy, and blessed and lucky. Tadd will be home soon, he will be so excited that I blogged. He is always encouraging me to be more computery. I blog now, I'm a blogger. I wonder what I'll try next?

Two nights on the town

A couple of weeks ago Julie and I went out for a night on the town. We left the kids in good hands and went to see Les Miserables. I have never been before but I loved it. I loved it because there were people on stage singing about how great and crappy life can be at the top of their lungs. It was fun to be out with Julie and in a fancy building like the opera house. There were chandaliers and tapestries. The ceilings were painted with scenes from what looked like the renaiscence, but of course weren't because the building wasn't that old. It was funny to see the orchestra in front of the stage. We even had to wait ten monutes to use one of the only two bathrooms in the building! Julie was very kind not to mention that she had much better seats when she went with her girlfriends many years ago. She did mention it but not until after the intermission. I feel bad that our seats weren't as good, but we had a great time anyway. I liked it so much that we wanted to see another musical so we went and bought tickets to "The Incredibles Disney on Ice". haha. Actually we did buy tickets to Disney on Ice but it wasn't because of Les Miserables. However, I do hope we go to another play or musical soon. Spamalot is playing now and Wicked begins in a month! This is a photo of the theatre just say I was there.

Disney on ice was at best entertaining. I hate to say it but it was pretty much awful. I did like that we each got to wear an incredibles band, but that was the climax. The skating was fine and the special effects were actually decent. The problem was the storyline. Basically, the incredibles go to Disneyland to have an "American Vacation", but they of course bump into a clone of Syndrome their enemy from the actual movie, mayhem insues, the find Edna to make them new Incredible suits, and they fight with the Syndrome Clone. The storyline is almost identical to the movie despite the small difference in going to Disneyland. This makes it hard to watch, predictable, and boring. Honestly, the kids were bored some of the time. Boy am I glad we paid half price. The other problem emphasises the motivation of Disney. From the moment it begins they won't stop pushing their paraphanelia at your face. Everywhere you look and turn there is some person wearing a disney uniform holding 25 million trinkets, popcorn, cotton candy, or drinks of somesort. It was worse than the circus and I really don't like the circus...or clowns. Anyway, the kids were great despite the constant bickering of the salesmen. They really wanted to get something but they did as well as can be expected and I give them a very comendable effort to resist the "can I have, I really want" phrases. We made a rule before we went in that we wouldn't buy anything, and we didn't. Good thing too. The cotton candy was $8! That is outrageous. Like I said Disneys motivation was obvious. Maybe they should focus on content and innovation on ice rather than selling so many trinkets and maybe they would have more success...then again maybe not, people are suckers, including us, we went didn't we. So now that I feel guilty being a part of such nonsense here is a photograph.

Gus says "I am learning a lot of new things from TV"

This evening Gus said that he was learning a lot of new things from TV.  He was refering to a baby cabbage patch doll for boys that he would like to buy and a product that you can spray on your pennies and it will make them look like new!  

Although I worry about how much TV he watches, I am convinced he is learning something from all that wasted time.  I mean at least he knows what gets persistent penny stains off and where the best dolls are!  

Tonight we took the kids to Costco because they have a new product, Churros.  Yes Churros!  I am happy to say that costco in Boston now has a treat worth buying.  Of course, they have always had pizza and hot dogs for less money than most places but now they have hot sugary churros too!  I also went to Home Depot and got a few things for class tomorrow.  It turns out that Home Depot has all of the things I need to make a watertight seal for an underwater motor!  

I just found out about Churros con chocolate where people dip churros in a thick sort of hot chocolate...guess what is for dessert tomorrow.

A nature walk

Zoë, Gus and I decided to take a nature walk on Saturday, before the Nor'easter hit. We had a lot of fun and found few interesting things. We took some pictures of the interesting things we couldn't document. It was really cold so we didn't write in our field journals. When we got home we looked at some of the rocks and things we collected. We took out our journals and began writing. Here are some photos from our adventures.

The sign says Menotomy Rocks Park.

Here is an entry from Zoë's journal.

Gus had fun skating on the ice and collecting pieces of ice and climbing "mountains".

Some old marker for this tree is now a part of the tree. I believe this is a red oak.

Some lichen on one of the rocks. I wonder how many kinds of lichen there are?

Some interesting mushrooms growing on a tree in the winter!

More fungus. this type was much smaller than above and covered a lot of the dead trees in the area.

This moss covered most of the highest hill in the area. It was 1-2" thick and made the ground soft. We thought it was kind of strange since we have never seen anything like it before.

What a bunch of cute scientists.

I suspect that the poison ivy sign is referring to the vine growing up this dead tree... I wonder why they want to leave it there?

Some strange eggs on the underside of a rock...I was thinking they looked like praying-mantis eggs? That was the end of our adventure. I hope that we can return and see how much things change as spring begins to come...well after yesterdays blizzard I guess we should go back just to get some pictures of the park in winter...maybe go look for animal tracks!

What is a marionette?

Zoë and Gus decided to put on a puppet show today. They invited Julie and Sam and I to come into the front room for a performance. I want to put up a video, but it is very late now. Perhaps tomorrow I will bust out something quickly. The play consisted of two stages, 12 characters, several in audience apperances, stunts, love, surgery, and death! I actually liked it a lot more than Death of a Salesman starring Dustin Hoffman , sorry Dustin it wasn't you, it was the material. Maybe it was because the topic was very disturbing, maybe it hit a little too close to home, or maybe it was all the talking to themselves, whatever it was it makes me feel sad I ever watched it. It is my fault I watched it though. After reading the play in High School I wanted to see the play but opted to rent the movie instead. I never really appreciate a play when they are just read. Plays really take on a whole new meaning when they are acted out, and shouldn't they? I mean they are meant to be performed! Besides, it seems when I read a play it takes 4-8 hours to read it. When I go to a play they usually last 2-3 hours! What is up with that? I must be a slow reader. Oh, sorry back to the kids. Gus and Zoë had an amazing performance. I say Gus and Zoë because they never mentioned the title of the play, however the opening scene was by far the best part. It opens with two narrators discussing the type of play that will be watched. They are comical and give us a good awakening. However, the play does decend from there without plot or purpose. It lacks consistent character growth, and in this viewers eyes really needs some work in the presentation department. The scenes were non-existent. The play consists mostly of puppets, however, they all seem to have a very similar voice and repeat nearly the same lines. Although the puppet outfits are cute, I had a hard time sitting still for the 8 minutes they were performing. To its benefit the play ends on a good note. The doctor performing surgery does all he can but the patient dies and Sammy walks! Sam can walk! Seriously he can walk 4 steps now. He was taking a few steps between furniture later this evening, but Julie got him to walk from me to her and that was 4 steps. We did get video of the entire play...well most of it and some walking, but of course not the 4 steps...I had just turned off the camera when he took the steps...Video to come soon, I hope.

Gus is a photographer!

This weekend we borrowed a new camera! The new canon 20D. It was awesome, and I think we got some good family photo pictures. Since we had the camera I thought the kids should learn how to use it. Right now we only have a point and shoot so the look, feel, and response of a digital SLR was new to them...and they wouldn't put it down. Before long there were 300 photos taken on the thing from shots of the television to face shots of them eating pizza and candy. Gus especially enjoyed using it. Ever ten minutes he would stop what he was doing and ask "Can I take a couple of pictures again?" Of course, I indulged him. He liked it so much I thought we should buy one too. We don't have the money. Perhaps he will become a great photographer. So if you would like to help Gus and I become world renowned photographers, please send us a donation...a large one around $1200 would be nice! The first photo is Gus a self portrait and the second is one I took, but I just loved how the water was caught so well and the reaction of Sam! The timing would have been nearly impossible with our other digital camera Olympus C-740 ultrazoom, of course that's like comparing toothpaste and chocolate.