Busy Bodies

Here’s an overview of our three-day weekend:

Friday

Before our trip to Vermont I started reading The Shakeress, a book I recommend for light reading and as a preamble to Vermont. One of my favorite lines in the book comes from the protagonist’s love interest. He is describing his practices of prayer and expressing his feelings towards deity. Although he prays, he does not know if anyone is listening and essentially pronounces that God does not speak to him as He does to others. Then he asks the protagonist, “Does this make you despise me?”

Remember when I said that if our experience here on earth could be whittled down to a personal development workshop, I’d be stuck in an all-day session on Patience? Well, I would be taking Empathy night school as well. In fact, I’ve been taking a semester-worth already. Before this pregnancy, I was quick to be critical of child spacing, family planning, and, of course, abortion. After this past month though, I have gained a lot of perspective and empathy.

I’m a big believer in differentiated instruction, not necessarily in the classroom, but I think it is relevant in life and especially religion. Whether or not you attend the same church, the people you meet are on all a whole different unit of instruction than you, so be tolerant of others and also of yourself.

Love one another.

Be kind, rewind.

*descends from soapbox* Back to our trip. Sharon, Vermont is where Joseph Smith, Jr. was born, the Church has a monument and visitor’s center erected there. The missionary couple that had been called to serve at the center were sweet. The sister was Caleb designated grandmother for the day.

The foliage was SpLeNdId. I had read somewhere online that the first part of October is the best time to visit Vermont to see the leaves and our timing was perfect. I had never seen so many SuPeRb colors ever. There were also flower beds around the grounds of the monument which Caleb enjoyed. He was sad to leave.

It was nice to be reminded of beginnings and restorations. I think that is what I liked best about our visit.

After Sharon, we took a drive north to the Ben and Jerry’s Ice Cream Factory. It was neat. There is a playground for children, and a cute ice cream graveyard for all the flavors that had tanked. Inside the factory there is memorabilia, an ice cream stand, and a gift shop. There’s a 30 minute tour given, completely stroller accessible (which rocked), where they show a movie, the jest of ice cream production, and give you a free 2 oz sample of the flavor of the day (chocolate chip cookie dough for us).

On our four hour drive home Caleb fell asleep during the second encore of Lyle the Kindly Viking and Mike and I were able to listen to the audio book of The 39 Clues. We made it home by 6:45. Whew. Just in time for me to go out again with a few friends for a “round-robin” girls’ night out (Red Robin, shopping detour and Baskin Robbins). : )

It was a good day.

Saturday

I skipped out of bed and got the bare essentials out of the way: clothing, brush through hair, eat fudgy cookie for breakfast, brush teeth, love on Caleb, get rebuked by Caleb, call Mike a silly moose, slip on flip-flops, grab walletglassescellphoneandkeys and away I go to the Millis Library Book Sale. Like I posted on Facebook, I’m “not really a shopaholic, but library book sales are totally my Black Friday.” And Millis holds a book sale TWICE a year. I told you I live in the best town in America.

Here’s what I found this time:

Young Children’s Books:

• Touch and Feel: On the Go
• I’m a Big Brother
• There’s No Such Thing as a Dragon
• Doggies
• But Not the Hippopotamus
• Jamberry

Young Adult and Classic Children’s Books:

• Holes
• Stuart Little
• The Phantom Tollbooth
• Flat Stanley
• Number of The Stars
• Amelia Bedelia (totally vintage)
• Sarah, Plain and Tall
• Caleb’s Story (sequel to Sarah, Plain and Tall)
• Matilda
• Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
• Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator
• Old Yeller
• Shiloh
• The Little Prince

And, the only adult book I bought, Death of a Salesmen, was absentmindedly left on the checkout table. Sad day.

I blame it on the shortsighted cookie-for-breakfast plan. Next time, at least three cookies should be consumed. The book was the most expensive item I bought… for .50

I stayed at the library rummaging for an hour before heading home with my books.

Grand total $4.50 for 21 books. Not shabby.

I made it back in time to assemble the snacks, put Caleb down for his nap and tune-in to General Conference, which, as always, was great.

Sunday

OKAY: Attending church on your couch in your pajamas, eating our traditional conference chicken salad, listening to modern revelation being expounded via the internet while Caleb wanders around aimlessly “sweeping” everything in sight.

BETTER: Attending church on your couch in your pajamas, eating our traditional conference chicken salad with ritz crackers, listening to modern revelation being expounded via the internet while Caleb takes a nap.

LUXURIOUS: Not having to cook an evening meal because Maria invited us over for dinner.

Last clue... very embarrassing.
Still waiting though... next week is the explanation of the clues. You're excited/relieved aren't you?

Me too.If only you could "click to look inside"

Of Salad Days and Salisbury

Babymooning used to describe the first few weeks with a newborn, nowadays it’s the vacation taken before the arrival of the babe- a last Hoorah! if you will.

When I was six month pregnant with Caleb, we babymooned by traveling to Blackfoot, Idaho. This time around, we really can’t babymoon with a toddler, can we? So we refer to another idiomatic expression: salad days. I’m not referring to the diet restraints my food aversions have put on our family, we have been dining on various salads as of late (tuna salad, chicken salad, taco salad, chef salad…). Who wants to turn on an oven at 4:00 in the evening? YUCK.

No,

we are trying to enjoy the summer before our lives change (again). Before Mike returns to school. Before we are evenly matched by our children (and I’m officially out-numbered, yikes.) Before we start asking ourselves what we have gotten ourselves into.

In other words, ignorance is bliss and we want to indulge in it while we can.

9/80 has started again, which means summer is underway at the Thomsons’. Michael works eighty hours in nine days and gets Friday off. This past Friday we had planned a day trip, but New England weather botched it up, so we postponed until Saturday.

Our family of THREE went to Salisbury Beach (thanks for the suggestion April). It was a fun drive and as Mike pointed out, “All signs point to N.H.” Salisbury is by the uppermost tip of Massachusetts next to New Hampshire and Maine.

We visited the State Reservation, which is the only way to go. It costs $9.00 and was well worth it to park next to the bath houses, snack bar, CLEAN restrooms and playground.

From someone who has only visited beaches in Mexico and California, I have to say I was impressed with how well the beach was maintained, how clear the water was, and HOW COLD the ocean was. But your body gets use to it… once you lose all feeling.

Our visit was for three hours, we left the reservation with a sleepy Caleb in tote. And stopped by DQ to grab some ice cream, and Mike’s first Dilly Bar.

Dilly Bars,

cherry coating,

canitgetanybetter?

I submit it CANNOT.

Next Friday off I’m planning a trip to Sandwich and Ellisville, MA to do some family history exploration there. If you have been to Sandwich, please give me your suggestions regarding places to eat and things to see or do!

A Parting Pun...

Read at your own expense:

We look forward to the day when Salisbury will become a self-sustaining stake…
: )

N.H. Update:

Next Monday, the 3^rd, we’ll get our second trimester integrated results back. On Friday, the 7^th we will be having another ultrasound to checkup on development and maybe take a peek at the gender.

{New York City}

During my parents’ stay in Massachusetts we ventured to New York City for three days. We parked the car in Scarsdale, at a chapel, and took the train into the city.

Surprisingly, after six-or-so years Michael was still completely in his element; knowing streets, sites, and subways, I felt quite confident in my husband.

While visiting the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, Mike was pretty jaded. I guess I would be too if I rode the ferry every Tuesday for six months. Something I didn’t know before meeting Mike (now that I think of it, how else would I know about this?) is that missionaries do service at Ellis Island. They work on scanning and entering information, preservation-sort-of-stuff. I have always thought that was neat. Since Michael has told me that, I have reflected on how much his mission prepared him for our marriage and the preservation of our family.

Although he had “been there, done that” I know it was different for him this time visiting because Caleb was there. And he was able to see a blessing that was a direct result for serving a mission honorably: {our family}.

It was my first time visiting New York City, and honestly I couldn’t have asked for better company or a better tour guide. I love my husband.
More pictures of what we have done the past month will trickle onto to the blog. I promise there will be appearances....

maybe.