An All-American Baseball Game

Mr. H scored some free red sox baseball tickets last Wednesday.  

We took the bus into downtown (C was SOOOO excited for that bus)  and walked into Fenway Park.  

It really is an AWESOME stadium.  

It screamed 'Americana' and I loved it.

There was a gorgeous sunset happening and the stadium was beautiful.

The game was good, and C had a blast.  He loved saying the names of the players and dancing to the music.  And eating chips. :)

Matching cheesy faces..wonder where he gets that from :)

It was a great night!

A visit from the Sister

We were so lucky to have my sister L come visit us over the weekend.  She came in on a Thursday night, and I was so excited to see her!!! It had been 9 months, which is way too long.  

Of course we talked non-stop her entire visit.  It was so fun to talk about so many things.  It was fun to have her get to know C all over again.  He loves his aunt 'L' and insisted on having her pour his drink, get him a napkin etc.  

Shopping with L and playing at the park. L really got into going down the slide on her stomach. :)  

We took her into the city and went down to the wharf.  I love that is by the aquarium and we can see the free seals. :)  It was a GORGEOUS day!

 We finally got to do the Swan boats, which has been on my bucket list for forever.  Boston Public Gardens are GORGEOUS.

Mr. H took C home for his nap and L and I were able to explore the city for the rest of the afternoon.  We enjoyed a delicious lunch at Quincy Market and then explored the city and enjoyed Little Italy.  It was fun to just take it easy and talk and be together.

Sunday we took it easy with our meetings and went on a walk that night.  It was great.

Monday we were able to go apple picking.  It was GORGEOUS.  Everything about it was so quaint and gorgeous.

We were able to do a hay ride, pick apples, and then look at the farm with the animals.  We had cider and apple donuts.  It was delicious.

We made an apple pie that afternoon and sampled delicious pastas.

It was a great visit.  Thanks L for coming!!!!!
Can't wait to see you soon!

Life lately

We are slowly adjusting to life here in Boston.  There are some difficult things, for example: driving.  DRIVING here is insane.  Seriously.  I won't scare everyone with how many near misses I've had, but that is by far the most difficult thing I've had to face out here.  Oh---and GRUMPY drivers.  My goodness, so much honking out here.

Anyway....

We've been having lots of lovely adventures, mostly close to home.  

Walking to our new library.  This gorgeous river walk is right outside our apartment, and we LOVE it.  

C discovered he loves loves loves whipped cream.  

C has been demanding 24/7 attention lately.  It is a little exhausting.  So I instilled a little thing called 'solo' time where he plays in his room for a short time, and gets to come out after the timer rings.  Anyway, so far it's been successful!  The last time, C had made a little train out of all his trucks...it was so cute.   

Caught in the act: watching C movies to his hearts content with dad.

Some of my favorite things this week: my dutch oven cooking pot! (best wedding present EVER!!!)  Our window sills that can house plants, and looks over at the rivers.  Oh---and that cute face that loves to get his picture taken.  

and over again....the one in the middle was too funny not to share. 

Our beautiful temple here in Belmont.  

raspberries for days...

I love love love freezer jam.  

and raspberries.

Seriously...I don't think I've ever met someone who doesn't like raspberries.

Anyway.

I've been trying to cut out sugar from our family diet, but I still wanted to keep certain foods.  Jam being one of them.

I found this recipe online.

http://graincrazy.blogspot.com/2014/08/raspberry-freezer-chia-jam.html?m=1

It uses chia seeds, which are an amazing source of fiber, omega 3, and protein.  

1 lb raspberries

2 1/2 T chia seeds

3 T honey ( I would add more for a sweeter taste)

Add all the ingredients to a blender and let pulse.  I kept mine slightly thick.  

Put into air tight containers and place in the freezer.  

Here's to clean eating!

and then there were FOUR

We are so excited to announce Baby #2 is headed our way!

I cannot even express how excited I have been for this new baby.  

We found out around 4 weeks...I insisted on taking a test because I just knew I was pregnant. :)  My first test was positive, the second was negative, which scared me a little, but in my heart I was pretty sure.  

My faint but there Positive!

4 weeks 

After a really sweaty run! 12 weeks

                    We told C right off the bat (he's so good at keeping a secret)  and told our families.  

We are so excited to welcome another little person into our family.  C has been having us watch "C" movies recently, and all the newborn videos have made me get so choked up.  Mr. H says I have forgotten the first month, which is probably true, but I am so excited to hold a new baby in my arms again!  

Since I blog now, I want to document certain milestones with this pregnancy.  Around five weeks I got really sick.  Which was a bummer, since with C's pregnancy I was totally fine.  So I was super nauseus/ sick till about 10 weeks.  It was hard!!!  Mr. H said I can't ever be pregnant during a move again. :)  At 10 weeks, it all went away. So that's been really nice.  

I've had two dr. appointments, and I saw the baby in an ultrasound at the first one.  Today I heard the heartbeat I just cried.  The sweet midwife let me listen to it for awhile.  It is one of the most comforting noises in the world.  

I'm 13 weeks, and headed into my 2nd trimester.  Not craving anything, mostly just happy that food tastes good again.   Things are great, and we couldn't be happier. 

Due March 2015

Labor day + a really hot week

I always thought Labor day was meant for laboring.  It just seems fitting. :)

But Mr. H was a sweetheart and made sure we did not labor the entire day.  We got some killer labor day sales at Old Navy and then headed downtown to the Isabella Stewart Gardner's Museum.  I again, forgot my camera, but this museum was AMAZING.   It's an art museum that was built by this really rich lady that took most of her inspiration in the design and collections from the beautiful architecture in Venice.  

It was delightful, and I loved seeing all the John Singer Sargent paintings ( shout out to my art history days).  The only hard thing was that we quickly realized art museums are really hard with two year olds. So we didn't get to stay long, but I can't wait to come back.

Mr. H started school this week, and so C and I were on our own.  We discovered a park, threw rocks in the Charles, and listened to old ladies speaking Russian in the park.

We also got to go to Walden Pond which was AWESOME!  I love love Henry David Thoreau and have wanted to go here for so long.  We hitched a ride with some new friends and spent the day.  (I do have to note that this was the first time EVER in C's life that he skipped his afternoon nap.  I am getting lax!) The water was warm, and C had a lot of fun with the kids.  What a great day!

We've been attempting family movie night/ pizza nights here and this week we watched Toy Story 3.  I don't know why but the last scene always gets to me. :)

Saturday we headed up to Nahant Beach. The whole week was in the high eighties here, and we have been so so so hot.  (Our apartment has been at 87 degrees for way too long).  So we decided that a water day was a must.  It was about a 40 minute drive from our house, and it was awesome!!!  It wasn't super fancy, but it had free parking, sand and water so I was happy.  C was super scared of the ocean, but Mr. H and I tried to warm him up as best we could.  We jumped the waves, chased the waves and had a blast.  We also spent a considerable amount of time finding sea shells and putting them in glasses, as well as C being so excited to see the wind surfer's huge sails.  It was such a great morning.  

We've been attempting family movie night/ pizza nights here and this week we watched Toy Story 3.  I don't know why but the last scene always gets to me. :)

That evening Mr. H and I were able to attend the Massachusetts LDS temple.  It was a beautiful temple, and a great time.  

We had a great sunday relaxing, eating good food and falling asleep to Blue Planet.   

First Day of School + C isms

Mr. H started grad school this week....so exciting!!!

He gets to ride his bike along the Charles, which is really nice...but we were not expecting how hot it was going to be!  He gets a little sweaty...but he's enjoying all the good exercise!!!

Our first day of school pictures:

C wanted his first day picture too. :)

C has been so darling lately.  

I've been trying to teach C who my brother S is on his mission.  We were going through family pictures, and I pointed to his picture and asked C who it was. "Jesus" he replied without any further thought. 

He loves playing duplos and filling up his cars with pretend gas. We were eating spaghetti one night and he started using the noodles as the gas line to fill up his cars.

He loves watching all the home movies lately, and calls them "C" movies.  So cute!!!

Pre-school adventures!

In the midst of unpacking, Mr. H and I both wanted to have some down time to have fun and enjoy this beautiful city!

We were able to go on a gorgeous kayak ride with C down the Charles River.  This was so AWESOME!  C loved being in the boat and wearing his life jacket.  He kept his hand in the water the entire time, and was in pure two year old heaven.  The Charles River goes right by our house and makes it way through Harvard and ends in down town.  We made it so we could see the view of the city skyline.  So fun and pretty.  

His little hand in the water

A random highlight of this adventure was a car drove into the river while we were kayaking.  No joke.  We rode past the scene probably five minutes after it had happened, and saw a giant thing in the water.  We thought it was a big rock, but then on our way back heard all these sirens and saw helicopters over our heads.  The police boat rode past us, and we saw them getting the car out of the river.  C LOVED the helicopters. :)  We then rode up past this family in a canoe that had seen the car dive in, and they had rescued the passengers in the car.  What a miracle for those people in the car.  Anyway, I was just glad to hear that this was not a normal occurrence. 

I went to our church group's playgroup in downtown and C got to swim in the Frog Pond in Boston Commons.  It was darling!  I love all the free public spaces here!  It was fun to hang out downtown and get to know some more people.  

We also got to go and see some fireworks over the Boston Bay.  I brought my camera, but sadly I left my memory card at home.  Major bummer!!!  There was a playground right on the pier, and we watched the sun set over the skyline---it was incredibly beautiful.  C had a blast playing, and then we waited for the fireworks.  We had amazing seats---we were right up against the ocean, looking straight at the city.  The fireworks were magical.  Truly magical.  It was so pretty to see them over the water and reflecting in the city's buildings.  C was a little scared at first (his first time)  but quickly warmed up to it and we just soaked in those magical moments together.  

All the way home C became a broken record: "Fireworks..in the sky...green, purple, blue...boom!"  Over and over and over again.  It was darling.  He did not stop talking about them until he fell asleep, and the next morning the first thing he said was "Fireworks!"  It was fun to see him so excited.

It's sad to think that summer is on it's way out, but we are so happy we were able to have such an amazing one.  Happy End of Summer!!!!