Unofficial end of summer

Ahh.. the temps have cooled off a bit and the air is much drier. Thank goodness! The forecast for the upcoming week is beautiful, too bad Becca has to head back to school tomorrow. She is excited and I am excited for her. Kenzie is excited that she gets mom all to herself again (though this was stated when she was mad at her sister.) I know she is going to miss her. Kenzie has one more year home with me before she can start Kindergarten. I considered sending her to preschool, but since I have a degree in early childhood it didn't really make sense to send her just for the social aspect. She gets plenty of socialization from dance, story hour at the library as well as programs at the rec department and of course her big sis! I was a little hesitant to sign her up for dance again after the hard time she gave me at the end of last year but she insisted she wanted to do it again so we'll give it a try. Becca has signed up again to, but after four years of doing a ballet/tap/jazz combo class she decide she wants to do Irish soft shoe.
She had a chance to try it for a few classes over the summer and loved it.

We've packed lots of fun stuff into the past few weeks including lots of playdates, sleepovers and trips to the lake. We also had another geocaching adventure. We found a trail near the lake that made a loop and had three caches hidden along the way. The first one was right at the beginning of the trail and was full of lots of neat treasures. Kenzie found the second cache and was so excited she did a happy dance. On the way to the third cache Becca and Boomer accidently disturbed a log with a nest of yellow jackets in it. The poor kids got stung about 10 times and Boomer got stung too. She isn't allergic, thankfully, but she didn't want anything to do with hiking or geocaching for the rest of the day. She was very brave, no tears but she was upset and having been stung several times on the ankle refused to walk. So it was a bit of a long hike back to the car.. but we made it. We didn't stop to try to find the last cache, Becca was in no mood and there were lots of muggles around. ( Muggles are non-geocachers).

So with the start of school the unofficial end of summer is here but we do still have some fun stuff planned in the next few weeks. Thanks to my in-laws we will get to spend a week on Merrymeeting lake the week of Labor day. It is only about 15 mins from here and from Becca's school so it is an easy commute. The Hopkinton State Fair is soon and Dom and I will hit another Nascar race too!

Typical New England weather

The actual temp today is 92. Heat index is 105 and the dewpoint is 75. Earlier this week the temps didn't get out of the 60's and there were frost warnings in the northern part of the state!
Is there any other place in the country where the temps fluctuate so much in 24 hours??

Will post about our summer highlights later, when it cools down. I finally have my own little craft nook complete with computer but it is the hottest part of the house right now! Summer is winding down here, Becca heads back to school Tuesday to start second grade. Boy time flies. We're off to the beach right now to cool off!

Toy Recall

Like most parents the recent recall of toys has me concerned for my children's health and well being and while you may think that this is a rant about safety and cheap labor practices, it is not. After reading the articles and finding out more details about the recalls I felt relieved that the main danger was for children who still put toys in their mouths and could potentially get lead poisoning or swallow magnets that have fallen out of toys. Since both the girls are older and no longer put things in their mouths I could relax a little. Heck I can hardly get Becca to put food in her mouth never mind a toy!
So I set about perusing the list of toys, thinking that with the amount of toys we have crammed into every conceivable nook and cranny of the house that this could be a very time consuming process. Then I got excited. I 'd been looking for any excuse to get rid of the excess of toys and here it was! I quickly made a list of toys I knew we had, fueled by the thought I was saving my children from harm. I was giddy with the anticipation of throwing out toy after toy all in the name of safety!
I finished my list and then checked it again. This couldn't be right. Only three toys! Only three measly, stinkin little toys out of all the things scattered all over the house??
Yes, it was true. I was actually disappointed that my children's toys weren't recalled. Am I crazy or can some of you parents out there actually relate? And before anyone points the finger about me being the one buying all the toys, there are many family members responsible...(you know who you are....) I appreciate your generosity but am seriously dreading the upcoming birthday/Christmas season.

Though, I guess the girls don't actually have to know which toys really have been recalled......

Geocaching in the White Mountains

On Sunday we went to the White mountains to try our luck at Geocaching. Dom downloaded a few caches in the Waterville Valley area which is one of our favorite hiking spots.

For those of you unfamiliar with geocaching basically you use a GPS to find the location of a cache that someone has left previously. The cache is usually a rubbermaid container or ammo box that someone has hidden off of a hiking trail. Very often they include hints written in code to help you. (For more info visit http://www.geocaching.com/). We decided to bring along Boomer for his first official hike in the mountains and to tire him out. Thanks to the clever hints we found the first cache quickly and the girls were so excited. Often a cache will have a log book for you to sign and some little trinkets to that you can take as long as you leave something else. This particular cache had an animal theme and the girls each chose a treasure to take. Kenzie chose a dinosaur and Becca chose a tiger. They left a squirty fish and a grasshopper finger puppet. We hit the trail again to find another cache when the girls decided they would rather just sit by the river and put their feet in. It was a rather humid day so we found a cozy spot by a huge boulder to hang out. Boomer played fetch endlessly in the water and the girls stuck their feet in the water and just played and snacked on trail mix. Since we had gotten a late start to the day we didn't really have time to try and find another cache but we'll definitly do it again on another day!

Fisher Cats Fun!

The girls got a chance to experience their first minor league baseball game recently. We headed to Manchester and got tickets to a Fisher Cats game. The Fisher Cats are the minor league team for the Toronto Blue Jays and they were playing against the Rock Cats, the affiliate of the Minnesota Twins. The games are very kid friendly with lots of interactive games and contests between innings. We even rented a suite at the hotel that overlooks the field. The girls were actually more impressed with the hotel room than the actually game. In fact by the second inning both girls wanted to head back to the room. I admit it was an extremely humid day, and the temps were still in the 80's even after the sun went down. We convinved them to stay until the 5th inning with promises to visit the gift shop and then retired to the room where Dom and I watched the rest of the game from our hotel window. Once back in the air-conditioned room Becca took a little more interest and kept an eye on the scoreboard to see if we were winning or not. I am happy to report that the Fisher Cats had a come from behind victory!

Despite a lack of enthusiasm from the girls we are headed back to another game tomorrow night. Dom got some free box seat tickets and there is a fireworks display scheduled after the game.