A Fall Filled Weekend

This has been a very adventurous Lippman Family Weekend. Ahren and I decided that the weather was too fabulous to stay home all weekend, so we hit the road for a few great fall events. Saturday took us to Portsmouth NH where we enjoyed a Fairy House Tour. Both kids enjoyed the festivities, and really enjoyed checking out all of the very intricate fairy houses made by both children and adults.

On Sunday we joined the rest of North Andover at Smolak Farms for one of their Apple/Pumpkin picking festivals. The apples were great this year, and both Lexi and Zach had a blast seeking out the best looking ones. After a brief rest to fill up on some Dutch Apple Ice Cream, we were off to the pumpkin patch to find the best picks there. We had lots to choose from, and the kids loved running around among the pumpkins. Finally we picked our three favorite and made our way back to the car. We all left the parking lot with big smiles and droopy eyes. The rest of the afternoon calls for some relaxation and apple crisp...I just have to build up the motivation.

A lovely fall weekend in Massachusetts. I look forward to many more before the snow comes.

September Firsts

With September comes new schedules, new classes, new clothes and shoes...and it happens to be a very pricey time of year! This year Lexi will be going to the Older Learners classroom at NEMS. It's like a Pre-Kingergarden where they will work on things like reading and writing, and she'll be attending five days. This will give Zachary and me some time to do some one on one activities, which he rarely gets. So Zachary and I will be doing gymnastics and swimming, while Lexi is in school on Mondays and Fridays. We had our first day of the new schedule today and all went very well. Lexi had a great first day of school, and Zachary LOVED his gymnastics class. The schedule is more hectic for me, but the kids are happy and I'm sure it will get easier once we settle into the routine.
Lexi also began dance this week. She's been telling me for months that she does not want to dance in the fall...but when the day came she happily put on her leotard, tights, legwarmers and shoes and waltzed right into class. She'll be with her friend Elizabeth, and this will be the first year that she'll be in a recital, so it's a very exciting year.
Lexi and Zach will both be back in swimming lessons this week as well. Lexi will have to go to the SKIPPERS program (which means no Mommy), and she's a bit apprehensive about it, but I'm hoping she'll do well. I'll still have to put my suit on all winter with Zachary, but I think he's going to have a blast too.
We've had a great and relaxing summer, but now it's time to get back to business.

Salisbury Beach 2010

As we have for the past five years, we spent the last two weeks of the summer at Salisbury Beach with Gigi, Poppy, Great Gram, and this year Annie, Perri, Annie's sister Julie, Maddie and Jon. We had a fantastic time as always, although I know this blog post won't be able to do it justice.
We started the vacation with a birthday party for Lexi with her classmates and friends. We had about 40 people at the house, so luckily the weather was nice enough that the kids were happy to play on the beach. Lexi and her friends all had a great time, and the adults did too! The next three days it was windy and rainy - not bad for a walk or two on the beach...but certainly not "beach weather". We spent a lot of time in our house, at the center playing games, and just hanging out. By the time Thursday arrived, we were all very happy to see that big, shining ball in the sky. When the weather turned, it turned for good and we had ten full days of fantastic beach weather in a row. As a matter of fact, it got so warm that we had to leave the beach a few times during the warmest hours of the day, and for dinner just to get some respite in the AC. No one complained - we were SO happy that the rain was gone for good. The waves were pretty rough throughout the two weeks, only calming down a few days. The kids still enjoyed playing in the surf, but we watched many people getting pulled out of the water by the lifeguards, so we were very careful by the water.
We really enjoyed having the Gleason/Schnier's next door to us this year. Lexi spent a lot of time over there and would take any chance she could get to go for a visit. One night we were having a combined bbq, and Gigi and Ahren were discussing who had the charcoal. Ahren thought Perri had it and said he would go ask. From the bathroom we heard Lexi say, "I'll go as soon as I come out!" A minute later she popped out and said, "OK Mom, just let me get my jammies on and I'll be ready to rock 'n roll!" :) We found out later than Lexi was getting contraband (M&Ms) every time she went over...which may have explained all of the visits. They were a lot of fun to have there, and the entire clan was great with Lexi and Zach. We were very sad when Maddie left to move into college, and Jon went off with his friends for the last weekend.
Lexi and Zachary had a lot of fun at the beach. They love waking up and having Gigi and Poppy right there. Lexi was especially great with Great Gram...many mornings she would go right upstairs when she heard Great Gram get up, and help her get dressed. One morning she sat on the deck for 15 minutes, not touching her breakfast, while she waited for Great Gram to come out and eat with her. Both kids spent a lot of time in the water, playing in the sand, taking walks, playing games and collecting treasures. During the two weeks we found one baby lobster (dead), one starfish (that somehow survived), one whole sand dollar and many pieces, a snail, and one night about a million crabs washed up on the sand. Lexi also collected several hundred shells and sea glass, of which she was allowed to keep 15 when we left.
It was a great two weeks, as always. Here is a small sampling of the hundreds of pictures we took. I'll post the web albums as soon as I can get through all of them.