Travelingjenny

Maple Sunday

March 22, 2009

Today was Maple Sunday, one of our favorite Maine traditions. All of the state's sugarhouses open their doors to visitors to celebrate spring in New England with pancake breakfasts and syrup samplings. After waiting for 45 minutes outside in the cold, the pancakes — with fresh syrup, of course — tasted especially good (just ask Tess, who ate the syrup without the traditional delivery mechanism)! We then checked out the farm's miniature horses, while sampling maple syrup over homemade ice cream. Yum. What a nice, sweet start to spring!
Ahhhh, warmth and sunshine

March 20, 2009

I think their faces say it all…

There were birds singing, and flowers blooming! Texas was wonderful, and it was hot and sunny for the second half of our trip. We even got to go swimming — outside! We all needed a good dose of the hot sun, and now I'm just hoping it will keep us going for the next three months — until it's warm enough to frolic in the sun here in Maine!
Fairy

March 12, 2009

The other day I was visited by a fairy. A sweet, little fairy with an angelic face and a mischievous twinkle in her eye. This fairy had a picnic with her blue baby, did lots and lots of dancing, and rode her big sister's scooter while singing a beautiful fairy song. Later, she did a dance performance with her favorite dancing partner, who taught her all of her fancy moves. I invited the fairy to come back to visit whenever she'd like. If you're lucky, maybe you'll get to meet her someday.

[Note: We're headed to Texas for a family reunion, so I won't be posting anything new for about a week. But you can look forward to some humorous (I hope) travel stories when we return.]
Potty time

March 11, 2009

As you can see, time spent on the potty is generally viewed as playtime, or time to sit quietly without being pestered by big sister. We sometimes get results, but more often than not, we get… silliness. And that's okay — for now, at least — it's really hard to get frustrated with that sweet little face.
“Let’s snuggle!”

March 10, 2009
Fox meets bunny

March 9, 2009

Back when the presidential election was going on, Grace's school voted on a mascot. The winner was the red fox, an animal found on the island that's home to the school. Grace's classroom has their own "pet" fox, and each weekend a lucky child gets to take Foxie home for an adventure. Grace was very excited to finally have her turn, and we took Foxie sledding (we think he liked it), and on a walk outside. However, on the way down the path towards the woods, Foxie fell into a puddle, so he had to go home to dry out. He was able to rest for a while on the couch with Grace — and Poppy. Only the adults appreciated the humor of that scene.
Inching toward spring

March 8, 2009

Mother Nature finally had mercy on us and gave us the gift of warmth this weekend. It was in the low 50's on both days, and sunny — and it felt like the best weather ever, in the entire history of mankind. We celebrated by taking a long walk in the park, leaving plenty of time for marching in the snow, running down slushy hills, listening to the birds sing (!!) and just feeling the warm sun on our faces. Thank you, Mother Nature. We needed that.
Rocketship

March 5, 2009

Seemingly overnight, Tess has blossomed into a toddler with a huge imagination. On Sunday, while Grace and Adam were at the hockey game, Tess and I spent hours playing "rocketship." Our rocketship was a big blanket thrown over the love seat and two little chairs. As the passenger in this fancy vessel, I had to sit to on one of the little chairs, hunched over underneath the blanket, while Tess said, "7, 8, 10….blast off!" We would then arrive at various places, usually Starbucks, and Tess would run off and buy us coffee drinks while I waited patiently inside the rocketship, trying to ignore the pains in my neck. It was worth it, though, because she loved having me as a captive playmate, and I loved watching her imagination at work. This morning we played different variations of "monster" — for example, "sleeping monster," which involved both of us stretching out on the floor and pretending to sleep until Tess declared: "It's awake time!" No offense to "rocketship," but "sleeping monster" just became my favorite game.
Adam blog: Hockey fan

March 3, 2009

People sometimes ask me if I wish I'd had a boy. I say: I do have a boy — her name is Grace.

"It was the best day of my life!"

Why?

"Hockey all day. And I got to give the pirate a high-five."
Snowed in

March 2, 2009

Portland has had 79 inches of snowfall this year — more than 2 feet more than normal. Today we got nine more inches (and another snow day) that we didn't really need. Thank you winter, that'll be enough now.

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