Happy Thanksgiving!?

Where do I begin with the month of November. It was just one crazy episode after another. It started out with me slicing into my middle finger at work and having to spend the rest of the evening in the ER waiting to get stitched up, then there was my birthday which I spent 8 hours of it singing with my a ccapella group the "She-E-O's", then Owen was diagnosed with phenomena and had to take antibiotics as well as use a nebulizer, (which he hated and kicked and screamed the whole time) and all of this is happening while I am trying to make 750 wedding announcements for my brother and his fiance and planning the meals and shopping list for 10 people for Thanksgiving.

Ahh, now that brings us to Thanksgiving. Our friends the Baird's were kind enough to let us borrow there house on Loon Mountain up in New Hampshire, and how do we repay them, you ask? By blowing up their stove while making Thanksgiving dinner. Yes, you read right, I had everything made except the mashed potatoes and gravy. The ham and stuffing were warming in the oven when a huge pop and a giant flash flew out from behind the stove and that was the end of that. Dinner was quite good despite the loss. (I made my first real Turkey) I am sure she will be missed, she was an old, but rare beauty, may she rest in peace. After dinner, Andrew & Rebekah, Alex, Janea and the girls, Jonathan and the boys and I joined in on a family talent show. What a great time that was, we saw sides of us we never knew we had!! Janea got it on film so we have it for posterity. The best part of the vacation was no one really wanted to get dressed and made up so we all stayed in our pajamas the whole time. (hence, no pictures). Everyone left on Friday, but we stayed until Saturday. It was fun to just hang out with ourselves for a day. We took the boys on the Hobo Railroad and got to see Santa Clause. Owen was so proud of himself for not being scared of the over weight, white bearded man and Isaac got to give Santa his list in person. What more could you ask for?!

Happy Halloween!

Halloween was quite the party time and sugar high for us. Owen went as "Mr. Incredible" and Isaac was non other than "Spider Man". They were the two cutest "Super Hero's" that I have ever seen. Everywhere we went people kept stopping us so they could look at and talk with them. It was incredibly funny because in Isaac and Owen's minds they were "Mr. Incredible" and "Spider Man". They were ready to defend any passer by that needed their assistance. What a couple of crack-up's. We started out our festivities on Friday night with our Church Halloween Party which was full of food, fun games and an amazing amount of sugar; way too much sugar if you ask me. The next night on Saturday we had the Crimson Kids Halloween Party on the HBS Campus, which was also a lot of fun. We had pizza and spooky punch as well as a fishing pond and "Party Pictures". After the party we headed out to the SFP Garage and "Trunk or Treated" which was a good time, more sugar, but it was fun to see all of the kids excited to show off their costumes for a little treat. Then came the actual day of Halloween. The boys and I hopped onto the bus and then the "T" and made our way down to Charles Street. Jonathan met us and we headed up Beacon Hill to do some ghoulish hunting for candy on our way we ran into "Dash's" parents, so we took a family picture and then we were all on our way. The houses were all decorated really well, it was fun to see how much effort they put into the Holiday. The best part for Jonathan and I was after walking up and down about 5 different streets the boys buckets were full and it only took about 45 minutes. We were hungry for real food by then, so we walked around the corner and found some pizza and grinders, as Rachel Ray would say "delish". The night ended for Owen on the bus ride home, the poor little tike was so tired that he fell asleep in his stroller, but Isaac got to go with Jonathan over to our friends the Anderson's house for some fresh donuts. It was a long, but fun Holiday! We hope you had a frightening one as well.

Duck Tour!

Isaac and I went on a Duck Tour date. We had a good time driving and quacking around the city of Boston. Our driver was full of a bunch of useless information and some useful information, he was pretty funny though. Isaac was very patient while we were driving in the city because he REALLY wanted to drive on the water. After the city tour we made our way to the water. Our vehicle turned into an amphibian boat. We toured around the bay and saw some sites from the water and then Isaac's day got pretty exciting. He got to drive the boat/truck and had a great time doing it. He did a great job keeping us a float. After the tour we had lunch at the Science Museum cafeteria. I was a great day with one of my favorite boys!

Whale Watching!

Ever since we moved here I have wanted to go Whale Watching and this fall we got to go with with the HBS Partner's Club on campus. It was so much fun. Isaac and I went out on the front of the boat as it made its way to the feeding grounds. The water was pretty choppy so we had people pucking all around us, but if you stood out on the front of the boat, it felt like you were on a roller coaster ride going up and then catching air and free falling. It was pretty fun. We also got to see quite a few whales, it was pretty cool watching them come up with their mouths open catching all the fish and then going back down and slapping the water with their tails. Both of the boys were pretty entertained by it as well and Jonathan and I. The experience was very educational. On the way back a couple of marine biologists came around the boat to answer any questions that we might have. It was a fun and educational day for the Clark family. Some interesting facts: After a whale has died the only way to tell how old he was is by cutting open his ear drum and counting how many layers of wax that it had in its ear, because every year a whale lays down a layer of wax. They also use to think that whales only lived to be about 100 years old, but just recently a whale was hit and killed by an oil tanker and as it was being harvested they found a harpooning spear that was dated to be 150 years to 200 years old, so now they are looking at the age of whales a whole different way. The world around us is pretty cool!

Apple Picking!

This year we went to Tougas Family Farms to go apple picking. We normally go to HoneyPot Hills, but since we had such good luck with our blueberries and peaches we decided to try out the apples, and we were not disappointed. The boys wanted to pick eating apples instead of baking apples, so we headed over to the Honey Crisps. They were so big, some of them took both of my hands to hold them and those of you that know me know that I have big hands. The apples were so good, crisp, juicy and sweet. Isaac did most of the picking and Owen of course did most of the eating. The boys ran around and in and out of the trees chasing each other and laughing the whole time. I love my boys, they are the best, some days I have to remind myself of that when the living room is a fort, the dinning room is a super hero's cave, the kitchen is the war zone, the bathroom is the hospital and the bedrooms have become the pirate ships, but one day they will be all grown up and gone, so I guess I should enjoy it. It was fun to watch them having such a good time. The day was so beautiful, the air had the crisp fall feeling, but the sun was beating down to keep us warm. It was the perfect day. The best part was when we were on our way back to the country store for apple cider and donuts when Isaac turned around and there was blood dripping down his chin. At first I was baffled as to why he had blood on his face, he hadn't fallen or gotten hurt then I saw the big gap in between his teeth and realized that he had lost his first tooth. I told him not to swallow so he spit everything out in my hand and sure enough sticking out of the piece of apple was his little tooth. He was so proud of himself for not swallowing it and Owen was pretty excited because there was blood and wanted in on the action. The people around us congratulated Isaac on his success. It was a fun and eventful day.

First Day of School

Isaac was so excited for his first day of school for that matter so was Owen. Ms. Goldshine had written Isaac a letter asking him to wear the color GREEN so that they could find each other easier. Everyone in Isaac's class was wearing some color of green. After they all lined up outside, they followed Ms. Goldshine into their class room, the excitement and apprehension was all over the little 5 year old faces, but they all squared their shoulders and head into the room with a high five, hug or hand shake which was given to Ms. Goldshine. Isaac of course chose the hand shake. Jonathan wanted to be there, but he had his first day of school the same day. Good times!! The weird thing is I still remember my kindergarten days!

James Taylor

I took Jonathan to a James Taylor concert a couple of weeks ago, to celebrate his "30th" birthday a bit early. We had been trying to see him for the last 8 years, but every time I would try and get tickets there were never two tickets together or if they were a big steel beam would be in the way.

The concert was in New Hampshire, so we got to spend some quality time driving. After we got there, we walked around a bit and found some dinner at a Mexican restaurant a few blocks away from the convention center. It was nice to be with Jonathan and be able to carry on a conversation with out "mom, hey mommy, mommmmmmmmmmmmmmy". When we were finished with dinner we headed over to the convention center to find our seats.

The concert was amazing. We had so much fun listening and hanging out with each other. During the intermission James signed countless hats, t-shirts, programs, tickets and everything else people threw at him. It was awesome to see how much he cared about his fans, his manager had to turn out the lights so people would leave him alone and he could get back to the concert. It was a grand night, I would highly recommend a James Taylor concert to anyone that wants to have a good time. :)

Blueberry Picking!

A bit of blueberry trivia for you: "How do you know when your child has had enough blueberries"? Answer: "When he is pooping blue". Yes, I know a bit gross, but true. We went blueberry picking last weekend. It was such a great day out and the blueberries were so delicious. Isaac was a great little picker and helped fill up our box, Owen on the other hand was the eater and helped diminish the contents of the box. We were lucky to have Jules out for the weekend. It was a lot of fun to see her. The boys were over joyed with the fact that Auntie JuJu was coming to visit. We also went with Alex, Janae, Abby, Emma, Kira and Kade. It was a great afternoon filled with blue fingers, full tummies and a lot of laughs.

Keepn' Cool!

When July started out we weren't too sure if we would ever see the beach because it was so rainy and cold, but a couple of weeks into the month it became VERY hot and humid. Believe it or not, we were pretty happy about that and were very gratful to have so many options to cool off with. We have spent most of our time going to splash parks, Lake Cochituate and Wingearsheek Beach to stay cool, but our favorite by far has been Wingearsheek Beach, because daddy and Alex have gotten off work early and have come with us. The nice thing about Wingearsheek is that the beach is wide and deep so there is alot of exploring room for the kids and the water sits on a sand shelf so it is pretty shallow. We usually arrive at 3:30 or 4:00pm with the umbrella, chairs, sand toys, sun screen, portable grill, and plenty of hot dogs, kool-aid and s'more fixings to keep us satisfied until we head home around 7:30 or 8:00pm. Jonathan and the boys have pretty much perfected the "Water"copter. Jonathan will take the boys into the ocean and spin them around so their toes spray water in each others faces, the boys get such a kick out of it. I love to watch them and take pictures of them when they are in a state of happiness and excitement. It has been fun to have Alex, Janea, Abby and Emma here. It has given us an excuse to get out and about.

4th of July

I feel like such a slacker. I am posting our 4th of July happenings on August 3rd. I guess better late than never. We had a great 4th of July week. We started off our celebrating at Old Silver Beach in Falmouth, MA. We had a lot of fun, we played in the water and the boys buried me in the sand. On the 2nd we drove down to Pawtucket, RI to watch a Pawtucket Red Sox Baseball game. We won which was an added bonus and then after the game we watched a fireworks display, they did a pretty good job, it was fun to see all of the colors exploding in the sky. The best part was watching the boys faces as the colors exploded. We brought Jonathan's cousin Alex with us. He had just moved all of his families things out, but Janae and the girls were still out West, so he tagged along and seemed pretty content will all of our craziness. On the 4th we drove Alex to the air port and in the afternoon we enjoyed all of our friends company at a Big BBQ. We were so exhausted by all of our excursions that we couldn't keep our eyes open for the actual 4th of July fireworks. Oh, well maybe next year.

Isaac the Graduate.

Isaac Dunster Clark has done it. Last Thursday evening on June 21, 2007 at 6:00 pm. Isaac graduated, from the acclaimed "Christ Lutheran Nursery School", with flying colors. He and his classmates made their way done the red carpet run way with the latest graduate fashion ware upon their heads. Don't ask how they did it folks, but not one tripped or fell while on the carpet. The evening went like clockwork. Their ever fearless leader Mrs. Johnson spoke to the graduates as well as the families. The theme of her speech was to not take youth for granted, it was very uplifting and inspiring. After which the diplomas were handed out to each student, at the end there were tears of joy and hugs all around. To top the evening off their were rounds of apple juice and slices of yummy cake as well as assorted fruits. What a lovely evening it turned out to be. Now if we can only get his daddy graduated for the last time. :)

Jane Austen

Call me overly romantic, but I love Jane Austen's work. She really understood people and had such a talent for portraying them on paper. One of my girlfriends had this link up on her blog, so I thought that it would be fun to see who I was most like. I knew Emma and I were kindred spirits. I always thought it odd that when Jonathan proposed to me I said; "now I may call you my Mr. Knightly", and his last name is Clark. :) Rock on Austen fans!!

Take the Quiz here!

T-BALL

Isaac finished up his first season of T-ball while we were in the Bahamas. We were sad that we missed his last game of the season, but we had a lot of fun watching all of his other games. Isaac loved every minute that he was out on the field or up to bat. He hit some whoppers, but he declared that he prefers being pitched to instead of having the t-stand. My favorite part to watch was the fielding. As soon as the ball was hit, there would be 10 to 15 little 5 year olds all running as fast as they could toward the ball and as soon as they made it there a huge dog pile would mount up and the one on the bottom with the ball would pop their head out with an enormous smile attached. Owen had a good time as well, when he wasn't preoccupied with the swings he was a great little cheerleader for his "Big Brother". We are looking forward to next year.

!!!BAHAMAS!!!

Jonathan and I were able to celebrate our 10 year anniversary in the Bahamas. We spent 6 nights and 7 days in the beautiful crystal clear water and soft sandy beaches. We arrived the evening of the 9th which was Saturday. We checked in and then it was off to explore our new surroundings. Sunday morning we woke up and headed for down town Nassau to do some sight seeing of the historical aspect of the island. We saw Queen Victoria, the first Bahamian Governor and Christopher Columbus, who was situated very nicely in front of the Governors Mansion. We even explored the "Straw Market", next time I am going to bring some cash so I can get me a Kate Spade bag, they had some really cute ones for almost nothing. While we were walking through the long hallways of the straw market an elderly man stopped us and said something that I couldn't understand except the word "christian". Finally after a couple of tries to understand him, a nice woman on the other side of the hallway translated for us. She said that he was asking us if we were Christian. I nodded yes and then he said something about a glow. I caught the gist of what he was saying when the woman said; "they must have Jesus flown' through them veins of theirs if they be glown' that bright". We laughed and chit chatted a bit and then we were on our way. They were very nice people. I also want to purchase one of his carvings when I go back. He had some really awesome pieces. The first couple of days were a bit odd because we weren't sure quite what to do with ourselves since we didn't have the boys attached to us. We missed them, but were grateful to have a full nights sleep. Jonathan consoled himself by making friends with the pina colada machine. She was his new found girlfriend. I suppose it was a blessing that I like strawberry dacaris and that the machines were side by side, we probably wouldn't have seen each other as much as we did. :) Monday was a big day for me. I faced two of my demons. The first was fear of drowning in the ocean and the second being claustrophobic. How did I do this you ask, Jonathan taught me how to snorkel. Once I got the hang of breathing under water it was very relaxing. It was fun to watch Jonathan, he was like a little kid in a candy store. We found some starfish, conch shells and I saw a sting ray gliding along the reef. It was pretty cool. Tuesday we went out exploring in a kayak. When we got in the groove we could fly in that thing. It was a lot of fun. I wish we could have snorkeled out where we were, because we saw some huge starfish and conch shells, but there were wave runners and motor boats. Wednesday was the high light of the trip. We took a snorkeling cruise with "Stuarts Cove's". We had so much fun. Our captain and his first mate were pretty funny, which made for a good time. They took us to three different sites. The first was called "Hollywood Bowl" because so many movies are filmed in this area. We saw some beautiful fish as well as coral. The second stop was the set of Jaws 4, they even still had the plane on the bottom of the ocean floor which was pretty cool. The third stop we got to swim with Caribbean Reef Sharks. This event was a bit nerve wracking but also quite surreal. We had about 20 to 30 sharks as well as other fish swimming under us and at times around us. It truly was amazing. Thursday was a relaxing walk into Nassau. We originally wanted to walk over to Paradise Island where Atlantis is and check things out. On our way over a man in a car stopped us and asked us if we were going over. I thought that he was a taxi driver, so I told him no we didn't need a ride. He then said; "What is going to happen when I drive back across the bridge and you are walking across"?. After that we decided to turn around and have lunch in a little cafe. I asked about him as the front desk when we got back, but no one could explain his odd behavior. It was really strange. The rest of the day we played in the pool and the ocean. Friday was the journey back to reality. We pretty much packed up, checked out and watched the US Open while we waited for our transfer to the air port. All in all it was a fabulous trip that was much needed.

Genetics!? "Like Papa, Like Grandson"

I am not sure that I need to type any commentary for these pictures. They pretty much speak volumes with out saying a word, but there is no doubt that these two are related. I hope that you get a kick out of them as much as I did. Thanks Jules for the tip off.