An amazing week!

This week is Family Week in Provincetown!  Our family gets to spend the whole week in a beautiful seaside town with MANY other LGBT families and attend fun events and meet adults and kids from all over the country.  Just today we met two Dad's from Texas, New York, New Jersey, and Maryland.  What a BLAST!

Since the kids are older now we decided to stay in a hotel with a pool and the beach versus a condo near downtown.  What a great change!  We loved the condo, but this week has been splendid!  No car needed to swim in the pool or enjoy the beach.  All we do is ride our bikes into town and participate in fun activities.  We had a little mishap this morning with our bike lock.  The darn thing wouldn't unlock so Koen and I rode with the Tag-a-long down to the bike store to see if they had any advice.  They had a small wire cutter but looked too small for our lock.  We ended up renting a bigger boy bike with GEARS on it for Koen since his was the only one stuck in the lock.  He didn't hesitate to try the new bike, but we had to put the seat all the way down and the brakes were very hard to reach.  Off we went back to the hotel to meet Lisa and Tessa.  As soon as we got to the first downhill, Koen turned around and said the bike was too big.  I was so proud of him for even trying it since it was much bigger than his regular bike.  We headed back to the bike shop to return it, but the guy there said he could adjust the brakes so they would be much closer for Koen's small hands.  We waited to see if it might work, preparing to just return the bike, but Low and Behold it worked and Koen could now easily reach the brakes!  He was off and running.  Don't think he will be using his other bike again now that his has a bike that can shift gears!  YAY for Koen!  What a big boy and athlete!

Tessa is still doing great on the tag-a-long behind me.  We are hoping this fall she can learn to ride her bike without training wheels too.  I think she will be ready.

Had a wonderful photo shoot with the kids this evening on the beach.  I will post a few, but the good ones I might wait for a card opportunity or something.  :-)

Between the biking and walking the Jetty (2.5 miles each way) we are all getting great exercise!  I think this is where we will be staying next year too!

Tomorrow is our second to last day here.  I really do love it here and wish I could stay forever!  But, of course, Concord calls, and school will be starting before you know it.

Summer is coming

Spent a great weekend in CT with Mormor and went to a wonderful wedding of my best friend.  Koen & Tessa are growing at such an amazing rate, I really can't keep up!  I thought Tessa would be a 2T forever, and now her legs and arms are so long she looks like a first grader.  She will start kindergarten this fall at Thoreau Elementary school where Koen is now.  The two of them will hop on the bus together and head off to school.  WOW!  

Here are a few photos from Otter Cove and from the wedding.  

Taking a walk around the river and goofing around!

 Friends!

All dressed for the wedding!!

Blizzard of 2013 - After...

Thanking God we did not lose power.  Both my Mother and sister are without power.  My Mother for the third time in what feels like about 1 year.  She lost it for 7 days during Sandy and 10 days during the other storm earlier in the summer.  Poor thing.  She is safe with the neighbor tonight, though.  Thanks, Bruce!  Not sure where my sister ended up, but crossing fingers she and her family are staying warm tonight!

Not surprisingly, the kids had a ball in the snow!  Lisa plowed us out and a few of the neighbors.  There are lots of angels on the street helping out the elderly and those without a snow blower so everyone gets out safe.  I am thankful for that too.

So, we ended up with 29 inches of snow, essentially 2 and a half feet!  The drifts are up to 5 feet and the piles of snow are up there too!  Here are a few pics from the day.  Tomorrow is supposed to be super bright and sunny so I will get out there and see if I can get some even better photos.

Almost lost the mailbox!

 Koen taking a 30 second break from playing.

 Snow on the roof is not too bad!  YAY!

 Mud Room Door

 Front Door

 Lisa hard at work!

 Tessa helping dig out.

Blizzard of 2013 - First Look

Well Hello!  Here we are waiting for the EPIC Blizzard to cover us in SNOW!  Since it has been snowing since 10:30am we decided to go out and check out the progress.  The kids were squealing with excitement!  (me too, for that matter)  Here are a few of the photos so far.  We wanted a before and AFTER view on the onslaught of snow.  As of 6:45pm Concord, MA had about 4 inches.  We are hoping for 30 inches by tomorrow noon!

For all those in the Northeast, stay warm and safe!  For the rest, enjoy the snow photos!  We will post more in the morning!   

Getting Ready for the Snowball battle!  Nothing better than a snowball maker.

SNOW FALLING!

If we only had a freezer for these!!

A new year

Well,  I thought 2012 would be a better year for posting but alas, having 2 kids, 2 cats, a wife and full-time job proved to be too much.  I see many folks are able to accomplish "a post a day" with 1 photo and limited commentary...  Not sure I will be able to keep up with that, but my goal is to try a once a month post.  Wish me luck!

So, as a follow up to the camping trip. last year, yes, we had a blast and kids always have fun outside! We decided to hold off on buying a camper due to, first off money, plus storage, plus with busy schedules, how many weekends would we REALLY be able to go.  I am guessing it will get worse/busier as the kids get older and have soccer, gymnastics, skiing (hopefully), dancing, track (our little runner Ko), etc, etc.  We will certainly do it again next year, though.

After our 4th of July camping trip we had a GREAT week in Provincetown with the Family Equality folks for their annual Family Week festivities.  Here is a photo of the fam that was taken by a photog at the event - Song of Myself Photography on Commercial Street.

The kids spent lots of time in Falmouth over their summer break boating & beaching with Nana & Papa.

September found Koen in Kindergarden and Tessa in her last year of preschool.  Fortunately they both enjoy school for now and we are thankful to the wonderful teachers that keep them interested!  Koen is writing up a storm and Tessa loves reading and learning.  Yes - she is still a history buff.  The other day she wanted to discuss, the French Indian War.  Not sure I know a lot of 5 year olds that have such a fascination with history.  We surmise that she will either be a history teacher or a tour guide  on the Freedom Trail or on the Lexington Concord trails, although she claims she wants to be paleontologist.  The jury is still out for Koen...  Artist, architect, runner extrordinaire, or a pilot (my wish).  It certainly will be fun to watch them continue to grow and learn about what interests them.

In October the kids had a blast preparing for Halloween.  Tessa was a Dalmation and Koen was, of course, Rudolph.  His love of Rudolph is so sweet.

The kids had fun playing on the local Concord soccer teams this fall, and we loved the physical outlet it provided.  Perfect play date!  Being outside with friends running around.  What could be better?!  Spring soccer is just around the corner.  I know Koen will be excited to start again, but Tessa will probably stick with gymnastics.  Time will tell.

In November little Miss Tessa turned 5!  I can't believe Koen will be 6 in less than 4 months!

Christmas was wonderful this year.  Although it was the 10th anniversary of my Dad's passing, we were able to spend a good amount of time with my Mom (Mormor) down in Old Saybrook which is always relaxing.  The kids had fun experimenting with decorating Christmas cookies.  Yum!!  Here is a Christmas photo of the kids.

We, like most of Massachusetts, have been battling colds, cough, pneumonia (Koen, but he has recovered) for what feels like 3 months, but I suppose it has only been 2 months.  I really hope we will all be feeling well in 2013!!

One of the wonderful joys for me is the kids love of music!  We love to listen to the radio as a family and name the songs as they come on.  Tessa has become quite the artist identifier!  She can name the latest artists, Katy Perry, Pink, Nicki Minaj, Philip Phillips and the oldie but goodies, Billy Joel, Elton John, Michael Jackson.  BUT yesterday, Lisa said said Tessie was listening to a song with her best friend Lilly in the car and said...  Isn't this Michael McJagger?  LOL  Now that is a new one to me!  What a cutie.

We will keep you posted on the adventures of Koen and Tessa and please do keep us posted on all your 2013 happenings!!