FHE Activity

This is what happens when I am "On Activity" for Family Home Evening and it is a 70 degree day. I get Pops to come to the beach with us.

Digging in the soft sand is relaxing.

The Ashley's- at a socially responsible distance.

 The Ashley's at a socially irresponsible distance.

Plus, they met us to hand off the face masks that they made for us.

The Ashley's are the best.

This is the face mask that AJ made for Little Chief. He set a goal to learn how to sew a face mask and give it away to a friend. He chose LC. He is the cutest friend.

Pokemon Trainer

Jaws has dedicated much of his time to the art of training Pokemon. 

If you ever need to find him, a safe bet is to look in the back yard, which doubles as his Pokemon gym. I don't like to disturb him so I observe from indoors. This is serious business. He runs up and down the hill waving his arms and making a myriad of sound effects as he subdues those pesky Pokemon. He mightily bounds through the air on the trampoline in hot pursuit. 

But he always come up victorious.

Truth is, we let him do this most of the day. 

The rule is no electronics until the school work is done. 

Truth is, Pokemon training is a lot more fun than school work.

Me Time.

I miss my biking friends. But I am glad that I can still get out and enjoy a nice long ride. I didn't have much of plan other than to see the coast and enjoy myself. I was having so much fun that I didn't want to stop and ended up cycling 42 miles- which is about double my longest ride so far this year. I saw forests, cranberry bogs, light houses, estuaries, palatial coastal estates, beaches, shore birds, villages and miles and miles and miles of good New England coast line. 

Having both the time and perfect weather at the same time is a serious treat. 

It was great not to have to rush back to responsibility and just enjoy the freedom of the open road.

If I had a choice between a long ride and a spa day I would choose the long ride every single time.

Soaking Up the Sun

Now that we are months away from friends and sparking social events we are really starting to appreciate each other. Can you imagine a whole outing to the beach without one outburst of negativity, insult or violence? We are really enjoying each other and appreciate opportunities to leave the house. 

It is the little things really.

Also, we are really blessed to live relatively close to the beach and have friends with beach front property where we can park. 

All of the beach parking and street parking is closed.

 Nothing but great expanses and fresh air to sooth our souls.

Story Time

I'm telling you, the list of pandemic benefits is long, including daily story time with Jaws. He is becoming a very good reader.

I feel like a lady of leisure lying in a hammock being read the great literature of our time.

If only Jaws would let me take a pic of us reading together...

Ah... there it is, kind of.

Pop's Pandemic Ice Cream

We all agree, the best thing to come out of the Covid-19 Pandemic is Pop's homemade ice cream. Ever since we got the Ben and Jerry's ice cream cook book there is hardly a reason to go looking for a better ice cream. 

Hornstra is a definite contender, but it is currently closed so we have to take matters into our own hands.

And Oreo ice cream is always a crowd pleaser.

It's going to be hard to convince our descendants of our suffering during the pandemic with blog posts like these!

Wompatuck Bike Picnic

We've got the bikes and we've got the time.

Last year I got this amazing bike bag for my birthday. It was intended to be my bike-commute bag, and I did get some use out of it last summer. 

Who knew that we would get so much mileage out of it as our bike picnic bag?!

Also, I should say a word or two about this shiny red bike of mine, my old friend. This bike is a major reward! When I was working at Myriad when we were first married the team I was working on used nitrocellulous filters. But we used them for an atypical purpose. So we used about 2 boxes a day. Most labs would struggle to use a box a month. In every box came a  little wooden token that could be spent on prizes that the vendor offered for buying their products. One of the team members started saving the tokens so we could collect the prizes. I always joked that I would take my portion and collect the grand prize- the mountain bike! It was a joke because even with our brisk use, the plan was to divide the tokens amongst us so they wouldn't accumulate super quickly. Well, time passed and all of the other team members moved away to other jobs and each time they insisted on leaving the tokens. I was the last man standing. One day I turned over the jar and counted up my gains and realized I easily had the tokens necessary for a brand new bike! The bike came in the mail unassembled. I built it myself- and actually installed the brakes backwards. I love this bike! I used to commute to work on it when we lived in SLC. Pops and I tied this bike and the blue bike that I got for my 15th birthday to the roof of our little white car and hauled it behind our moving van when we moved to Boston. We barely made it through Emigration canyon before we realized the bike rack was slipping off the car and the bikes got hucked in the back of the moving van for the rest of the journey. Bikes are important- they don't get left behind!