Wow, Some Family Shots!

We met the nicest family at the Owl's Head Lighthouse today - 2 parents, maybe 5 kids, and 2 grandparents - the wife grew up in Rockland but they all live in Viginia Beach now. We took pictures of them with their camera, and they took pictures of us with ours. We should do this more often... there are so few photos of the 4 of us together!! I like Ollie's expression in the second photo - the sun was right in our eyes! The weather was gorgeous today; it was so nice to walk along the wooded path to the lighthouse, with beautiful ocean views the whole way there. After that we went into town and had lunch with mom and dad at the Rockland Cafe (yummy Maine shrimp!), then meandered down to the Farnsworth Museum to visit their wonderful Christmas toy train exhibit. Tomorrow is a big day - Aidan and Eli come!

Oh, How They Grow

We had such a fun time at the "Moms Around the Lake" Christmas Party... the kids would barely stop playing long enough to eat two bites of food the whole time. Santa was a big hit, as usual... he brought Ollie a fantastic Lego robot, and Maddie a magnetic paper doll kit. We stayed with Carol, Ryan and Addie about a half hour after everyone else left, and the kids rode around the empty gym in the plasma car, danced on the stage, and just had a blast. When we got home, Ollie got busy with his new Lego kit... he's quickly becoming a pro!!!

December!!

Way, way behind in my posts... just wanted to start this month off with a photo actually taken on December 1st, when we put up our fabulous advent calendar. It was Maddie's turn to go first (the angel ornament was in pocket 1; the soldier in pocket 2). When she took out the ornament, she said, "Oh, Mommy, it's a princess!!" So, our angel with forevermore be a "princess" (you can see her at the top of the tree in this photo). The kids were completely ecstatic over their Peppa Pig calendars; Ollie comes into our room every morning to ask what day it is so he can find the right number on the calendar and retrieve his tiny piece of chocolate. He helps Maddie find hers when she comes downstairs. Maddie has gotten a bit over-eager with the chocolates a few times, so I've had to secretly replace a few missing chocolates with Cadbury buttons. Believe it or not, we're even enjoying a fourth advent calendar this year -- the Jacqui Lawson London calendar -- every day reveals a new, fantastic animated event. Maddie always wants to see "Bem" (Big Ben), Covent Garden, the London Eye, and the "chimney" (where the elf sweeps chimneys so they're clean for Santa). Ollie loves that one as well, and he loves making snowflakes and decorating the tree. Happy, happy December.

New York New York

Note - this is written by Daddy!!!!
Well today mummy had a well-deserved day off to do ladies things with her friends which left daddy to come up with an idea of just what to do for the day. Given your new found interest in trains, Maddie, we decided to head to Dover train station to get on a train and just go for a ride. We arrived just as a train was pulling into the station and got our seats on the top deck and got comfortable. Daddy hadn’t at that point figured out where we were going and sheepishly asked the conductor where the train was heading, he said New York (hot dog! …I thought that, not him) Impulsively I asked if you wanted to go there and of course you both beamed! Before I had time to reconsider I handed over a big chunk of change (narrowly avoiding a fine as I hadn’t bought a ticket on the platform but I told the guard I wasn’t familiar with the whole train thing and he let me off!) and our journey had begun. We then found out that there were over a 1000 stations between Dover and the big Ciddy and this train was stopping at every single one of them, ah well, you guys loved every minute of it and so two and half hours later we pulled into Penn station (which surprised me as I thought we were going to Grand Central, the only station I know). Daddy hadn’t given much thought as to what we would do when we got there, (New York gives him stabbing chest pains at the best of times), and after spending 20mins trying to get out of the station we emerged into a bright and beautiful warm autumn day on this great big busy street and we made our way through the crowds. I realized straight away that my daddy skills were being tested to the max not to lose either of you and also to come up with something interesting to do, Ollie you were brilliant in looking after your sister, holding her hand tightly like a true big brother. You have an affinity for the big city that I will never have, it was written all over you. Maddie, never content to ride in the stroller, you walked the whole time, independent as ever. After a meander for 30mins it became clear that the highlight/destination would be a lunch stop and we headed for 5 Guys (who do make a fine burger), the place was packed, nowhere to sit, our burgers weighed several pounds each and promptly fell to pieces in our hands, and most of it ended up on the floor but we got through it and then decided to head back to the station, the pair of you all the time marveling at the goings on all around you, and soon we were heading home. Maddie you struggled to stay awake on the way back but just about managed though you would have fallen off the seat if your brother hadn’t held you. Ollie you continued to marvel through the window at the various delights as the NJ landscape passed by. Daddy is much happier on the side of a hill than in any city but it was just the best to spend this a great day with you both my lovely lambs, you were brilliant in every way, loving the whole idea of this unpredictable adventure as much as I did xxxxx daddy

Oliver Turns FIVE!!!!

Oliver's birthday morning!! All the presents from the whole family were stacked on the kitchen table, along with several from his friends that we hadn't had time to open the day before. He had loads of fun opening everything up.... a few things he played with a LOT were his new Chuggington trains and track, his stacking robots, his dinosaur excacation kit, and his cherished new stuffed owl. Here's a photo of him with his goggles on, hammer and chisel in hand, slowly digging to reveal the encased bones of a T-Rex. He got several of different kinds of building sets -- Lego, Erector, K'nex -- we can't wait to start building with those. At bedtime, he was super excited to see his new glow in the dark solar system model. Now (a few days later) I can report that he has become a huge Lego fan... he was almost exploding with excitement as we built his new Lego firetruck, and has hardly stopped playing with it since.
After a late breakfast (bacon! eggs! toast!) and more playing, we finally headed out towards Kittatinny State Park with the "superbike" loaded and ready to roll. The weather was stunning, a perfect fall day. I had a great walk with Maddie to the airport at the end, where we met Andy and Ollie, resting on a park bench after their manly bike ride. We found some creative ways to include Owl in the bike ride, since Ollie couldn't be parted with him... first he was inside Ollie's shirt, which was snugly tucked in, but Ollie wanted Owl to be able to see where he was going. So we stuffed him into our camera bag and attached that to the bike with a carabiner clip - the winning solution! Happy boy, happy owl.
We had a quick stop at the grocery store on the way back, then headed to our new favorite restaurant, Alice's, for an early birthday dinner. Andy and I had yummy burgers, and the kids shared one (mammoth) portion of mac&cheese. After dinner, the waitress brought a big bowl of chocolate ice cream with a candle in it, and we all sang Happy Birthday to our glowing, blissed out boy.
So many times during the day, I would tell Ollie what Daddy and I were doing 5 years ago exactly.... how we hadn't met him yet, didn't even know if he was a boy or a girl, were heading to the hospital, was in labor and feeling super ouchy... and he was pretty curious about how he wasn't REALLY 5 until late that night. In fact, as I type this, it was about 16 minutes from now, at 10:56pm. We are blessed that you are ours, Ollie - you are the most lovely boy we have ever known.

THE OLIVER OLYMPICS!

The big day finally arrived -- Oliver's birthday party!! It was really cool having his party on Saturday and his actual birthday Sunday -- a whole weekend of fun, ending with a super tired, super happy boy. When we began thinking about the party ages ago, Andy said it would be cool to have an "old fashioned party" where we planned (gasp!) PARTY GAMES! Like in the olden days, you know.... :-) So our brains started churning, and at some point I expanded the idea to become the "Oliver Olympics," knowing that the kids would get a kick out of winning gold medals if they or their team won a game. I found some cool decorations online, mainly some excellent long flag banners and cut-out paper Olympic rings, as well as the gold medals. Then we had to decide on the cake, and all the Olympic themes seemed really boring (a torch? rings? bleh), so when I looked through a cookbook for ideas and saw the cutest owl cupcakes, I showed them to Ollie and he said, "I want those!" A thematic departure, but we didn't care one bit. The last order of business was to plan the party games. We knew of some favorites off the top of our heads... musical chairs, pin the tail on the donkey, a relay race... but for more good ideas I looked online and found lots of great ones. We narrowed it down to 10 games, though we didn't have time to actually do them all at the party! More on that later. I typed up a master plan, complete with assigned teams when needed (I actually pulled names out of a hat to do this, incapable of making these CRITICAL decisions on my own). The food at the party was definitely the weak link... we made mini sausage-rolls, our favorite English standby, and had loads of corn chips with guacamole, salsa, and hummus... and that's about it. Lame. I forgot to put out cheese sticks and chex mix for the kids (and hungry adults, for that matter). Although I must say, the party was at 2pm, a between-meals time.... and we did have cake! I made it the day before, a recipe I've used often, knowing we'd be too busy on the day of the party. Very pleased with the owls.
On to the party.... Ollie's eleven closest friends came (very sorry we couldn't invite ALL his friends, just not enough room!), along with younger siblings, so there were TWENTY kids here, including Ollie and Maddie. Moms and many dads as well, so a very big crowd indeed. Before I forget, thank you to EVERYONE for being so helpful... every time I turned around, someone was offering to help - setting up for games, tidying, rounding up the troops, passing out cake, etc. We're so grateful! So, the best way to describe the party is through the games - here goes!
1. ZOO RESCUE
Probably our most successful game... I had hidden (with some help, as I forgot to do this in time and had to finish after our first guests arrived) about 75 stuffed animals around the downstairs of the house and the front yard. I know what you're thinking: 75 stuffed animals?? I'm shocked as well. We don't "collect" stuffed animals by any means, but apparently, when you have 2 kids, these things just accumulate. Many are quite small, three or four inches long, but many others are as big as a standard-issue teddy bear. Our range is quite impressive, including a hedgehog, a little fox, a good number of singing birds, pigs of all sizes, a hermit crab, loads of lambs, and on and on. We divided the kids into two teams, gave everyone their own plastic bag for collecting, and explained that ALL these animals had escaped from the zoo and we needed them to hunt for them... the team that collected the most animals won the medals! So they all dashed out in every direction, gleefully hunting and stuffing their bags, and then returned to their team bases for the big count. It was close - the winning team found 39 animals, and the other team found 33. The only unfound animals were a couple stuck deep into the sofa, and one very small frog in a shoe in the hallway. Nice job!
2. BALLOON POP
For this game, we had blown up one balloon per child (plus a few, since I miscounted), each with a little folded piece of paper inside. All the papers were blank, except for one that said, "WIN!" After everyone had a balloon, we said "Go!" and they had to pop the balloons any way they wished, to see if they held the winning balloon. Well, I had no idea it could be so hard to pop balloons, when you're actually trying to! It was a hilarious, raucus free for all, with kids attempting to sit and jump on balloons (not an easy task, really), intermittent loud POPS!, and lots of excited shouting. Ollie kept batting at his balloon, sort of chasing it and punching it, not a very effective technique, but lots of fun to watch. Lowry had the winning balloon, and won the gold medal.
3. MUSICAL CHAIRS
All twelve big kids played this game, so we set up 12 chairs in a long line (we had removed the dining room table earlier to make space), each chair facing the opposite direction from the last. The kids walked and danced in a circle around them while Andy blasted Poker Face on nearby speakers. For the first round, everyone had a chair, but after that one chair was removed each time. I was worried there would be a lot of struggling for chairs and possibly hurt feelings, but the kids were just SUCH good sports. The best thing about this game was that the kids just had a blast with it, they weren't strategizing or lingering near chairs, they just pranced around and danced and were silly, and no one fussed when they got out. Our only regret was that we didn't do this game twice - it was just so fun. Claire, Brooke, and Harper were the last 3 standing (or sitting, as the case may be), then it was Claire and Harper, and Harper won by a nose - gold medal!!
4. FLAMINGO
It was an absolutely gorgeous day, so we thought it would be a good idea to get the crazy kids outside. Flamingo is a cute idea, but it didn't work with 5-year-olds... you divide into two teams, and one person from each team has to stand on one leg and try to keep their leg up longer than their opponent, while the other team tries any means (except touching the person) to get them to put their leg down. Your team gets a point if you held your leg up the longest. Eventually, everyone has a go and the team with the most points wins. So, the kids were too excited to really focus on who was on what team and who they should aim their attention at making fall, so we nipped this one in the bud. Onward!
5. COLD DAY RELAY RACE
Two teams again, and each team had a hat, mittens or gloves, and a scarf. The first two players have to put on their stuff, run all the way to the other end of the yard and touch one of the volunteer parents' hands, then run back and give all the gear to the next person in line, until each person on the team has gone. A pretty excellent game, though for some reason one team was a lot more motivated than the other!! Still, a pretty close race and really good fun.
CAKE BREAK!
We all headed back in and gradually made our way to the dining room, where all the kids sat in a circle and everyone sang the Happy Birthday song to Oliver as the cake came in. I'm not sure I've ever seen pure happiness displayed in human form as what I saw on Ollie's face then. So, so sweet. All the kids got owl cupcakes, and the big owl cake was cut up for the parents (and don't forget our fab neighbors, Steve and Maureen, who are lovely beyond words). Super happy we don't have a rug - crumbs everywhere, a quick sweep and they were gone.
6. PIN THE TAIL ON THE DONKEY
Andy was intent on making the donkey himself for this game, which I agreed to mainly because I couldn't find one to purchase that was bigger than about two feet across (lame!). My hesitation was in the logistics (not in his artistic prowess, of course!) -- primarily, how to construct a tail that would adhere to the paper/board. Problem solved when I found a huge piece of folded cardboard (sold for science fair displays, etc.) -- we could stick a pin in that! We made a little tail out of brown yarn and managed to get a pin to stay in it with glue. The kids really enjoyed it, and Oliver won! Not fair, really, as he got to practice a little bit... but Georgie came in a very close second.
7. PASS THE PARCEL
I hear this is a very traditional English game; you select a small gift (I chose an mini Simon game) and wrap it over and over and over again, layer after layer of wrapping paper. The kids sit in a circle and the music starts (this time it was Don't Go, by Yazoo) and the parcel gets passed until the music stops, and whoever is holding it gets to unwrap the first layer. This goes on (and on!), layer after layer, until the present is revealed. I think I wrapped about fifteen layers... the kids were great, really careful to open only one layer, though the excitement mounted with each layer! Congrats to Duncan, the big winner! His mom was just sooo excited to have a new noisy game to bring home (sorry!!!). :-)
So, we ran out of time and energy for the last three games... one was called Balloon Sandwich, a race played with balloons held between tummies or backs, no hands, and another was Sleeping Lions, where the kids lie on the floor and pretend they're asleep, getting eliminated if they move (would be good if this game lasted about a half hour, ha ha). The one I really missed, though, was the Plasma Car Time Trials, where we planned to set up cones in the dining room and time each kid as they completed two laps around the track on the plasma car. They all would have loved that, but we just ran out of steam. Oh, I can't forget the gift bags.... we gave each guest their own little stuffed owl, along with a few English chocolate treats and some extra gold medals. Great keepsakes from the famed Olympics/Owl birthday party! Planning and preparing for this party seemed a bit daunting at times, but in the end it was just so much fun (although I had almost no time for normal conversations with adults, which was a bummer) - and the kids were simply fantastic, honestly. Oliver, you were a star - gracious and fun - as always. We just love you beyond words. HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!

Oh, to Bee a Dragon Slayer

Ever since Ollie's first Halloween, just before his 1st birthday, he was dressed as a dragon. The same dragon! Since he was a big baby, at 1 year old I got him a costume sized 2/3. The next year, it fit him pretty well. At 3, it fit well again, just a

tiny bit snug. And when he was 4, he was busting out of it, but it was stretchy, so no problem! So how funny is it that he chose to dress as a DRAGON SLAYER on his 5th Halloween?!! Really, he wanted a costume that would allow him to use a light sabre, and he had no interest in Darth Vader. So dragon slayer was the best we could come up with! And what a costume - the best!!

Maddie-Boo decided early on that she wanted to be a BEE... and she was the cutest bee ever known. We headed up to Maine for several days, since you can't beat Halloween on Watts Ave. Grandma and Granddaddy stayed at our house to hand out (buckets of) candy while we all went trick or treating with Rich and Weston. Our pumpkin was pretty awesome this year, too. Love love love Halloween!

Why I'm so proud to be Mrs. Hargreaves

It takes a certain kind of man to be willing to wear an orange skintight crushed velvet minidress. With a neon orange wig. Andy is that guy, and the reason it's so great is that he's NOT the guy you'd expect to wear it. I love his silliness and his seriousness, and everything in between. We were dressing up for our friend Beth's annual Halloween party, and the theme this year was "Orange and Black," with the rules stating we should aim for 2/3 orange, 1/3 black. I went as a volcano - got loads of fabric and had a good concept, but it never would have worked if my good friend, Kathy, hadn't come through with a offer to share her sewing machine and excellent skills! We had so much fun putting it together, and it was SO fun to wear. Biggest compliment of the night: someone asked me if I had purchased the costume! Score! Mom went as Mother Nature and Dad went as "the guy who thought he was supposed to wear two turds orange and one turd black." Ha! Andy was the star of the night, though, soldiering on with his itchy wig and hoop skirt, possibly enjoying the silky, stretchy fabric of the dress a tiny bit *too* much. :-) Our young friend, Dory, babysat the kids, and when we got back to the house around 9:30pm, they were snug as bugs in their beds. Such a fun night!!

Camping at High Point

What a fantastic weekend for camping!!! We had reserved site 2 at High Point's lakeside campground, a very private site that looked down on the lake from a bit higher up, and was cozy with trees all around. The kids were so excited and helpful. First Ollie helped Daddy put up the tent, then they set about building a fire for warmth and to cook dinner.

No rain like last time, but MAN the night was cold, as I recall!! Ollie and Maddie fell asleep with us quickly and didn't seem bothered at all, but I had a lot of trouble falling asleep and just couldn't get warm! Finally I piled just about everything on top of me that I could find, pulled my hat down snug, and burrowed under the covers... after that I fell asleep! The morning was truly stunning, watching the mist over the lake and the sun rising behind it, seeing our breath in the cold morning air - fantastic!!!

Ort Farms, We Love You!

We had a big day out today with Carol, Ryan and Addie at Ort Farms in Long Valley... what a gorgeous day! And by gorgeous, I mean it was nearly the middle of October and we were all wearing tank tops and shorts!!! We had SUCH a fun time together.

The kids climbed all over the big tractor and the haystack, visited the animals, rode on the toy train AND the monster truck (only the boys were keen on this!), and we all had a fantastic hayride out to the pumpkin patch. Ort Farm is just the BEST! I also have in my notes that today a famous quote was born. I was getting groceries

with the kids, late in the day, and at one point Maddie ran quickly towards me and tripped on her way. She began to cry and I picked her up and offered soothing words of comfort. She went on crying. After a minute I turned and began to inspect the nearby jars of jam on the shelf, reaching for one to examine more closely. At this, Maddie exclaimed in a most adament manner: "Put that back, Mummy, I'm still crying!!!" I just about died laughing. Does it get any better than that?!!!

England 2011: Last Days - York - and Farewell

Friday morning was a frenetic packing fest, and we all managed to leave the house by around 10am.  Carole and Maurice headed back to their house, laden with all the toys, books, foods, dry goods, and toiletries that they'd stocked the house with to make our visit so comfortable and fun (thank you!!!), and we set off for our bonus two nights in York.  Lovely York!  We parked outside the city and took a bus in, knowng that parking in the city can be rough.  We went straight to York Minster, the famous cathedral, where the kids were generally good but didn't seem nearly as impressed with it as Andy and I were.

They were entranced with the rows of little candles that were standing about, so we put a pound into the tin and lit a candle for Greenie and Granddaddy.  I was pretty sure they would like that a lot.  We walked around town a bit after that, then made our way back to the B&B that we'd booked.... which turned out to be a big letdown after our lovely accomodations in Hayfield (and also turned out just to be a "B," as breakfast wasn't included!).  Not to worry, we tried not to whine too much.  Steve and Al came by with the girls, along with Tom, Joanne and Steve, and after a nice chat we decided to go back to Al's parents' house for a pizza dinner and lots of playtime.  The kids had SO much fun together. 

On Saturday we had crumpets in our little kitchen, then stopped at the sweetest little cafe right on the river in York for delicious bacon buttys and coffee and cocoa.  We walked along river and to a big playpark where we met Alison and the girls, and the kids played for ages, especially loving the trampolines and bouncey slide. 

Then we all walked back to town for a Chinese buffet lunch and strolled around town for a bit more.  We were all quite entranced with the "Purple Man," a human statue of a man on a bike, coattails flying behind him.  Cool!  We stopped on the way home at Waitrose's to get some easy dinners to cook at home - curries for Andy and me, mac and cheese for the kids. 

On Sunday we had bacon buttys in our little kitchen, final (horrible) showers, then off to the National Railway Museum! Ollie was just a little bit excited.  :-)  And the rest of us, too!  We met Ian there,

and had a great time seeing the sites.  Nice drive back (poor Ian wedged into the back seat between the two kids, though he was quite charmed when Ollie fell asleep on his shoulder).  We had a quick coffee with Ian and Anne, then back home to Carole and Maurice and a lovely dinner with Steve, Al, and the girls, big farewells, bed!! 

On Monday, after lots of goodbye hugs and kisses for Grandma Carole, we headed to the airport with Granddad Maurice.  We dropped off our rental car, and after the final and (always) tearful goodbyes, we were off to catch our 9:40am flight.  Whereas everything seemed in our favor on the way over, just the opposite was true on the way back.  Not only did we not have individual tv screens on the seatbacks, we were actually sitting in the ONLY row on the whole plane that didn't have a WINDOW!  Wonderful.  For the next 7 or 8 hours we sat in this virtual box of nothingness, trying our best to keep the kids from going bonkers (and us, of course).  We survived to tell the story!  Another trip we will never forget, filled with 20 Trees, sweet shops, grandparents, cousins, friends, steam trains and castles, curries, stacks of crumpets, and of course - millionaire's shortbread.  Till next time, beautiful England! 

England 2011, Day 13: Last Big Day at the Hayfield House

Lazy morning... Andy went out on the bike one last time, I took a shower, the kids walked to town to the "sweet shop" with Grandma and Granddad, and we all went down to the cricket pitch to try out ollie's new boomerang (limited success).  Later on

we all drove to Bakewell, strolled around town and of course visited our favorite bakeshop, Bloomers, where we chose pork pies, lamb and mint pies, and (what else?) Bakewell Tarts!  We had our lunch at the river.  Carole, Maurice, and Ollie decided to take the bus home for fun, the

Bakewell bus to New Mills, with a quick stop to see Uncle Bill and Maureen, then another bus on to Hayfield.  Meanwhile, Andy and I and Maddie strolled a bit more, had coffee and baby toto, then drove back.  It was a gorgeous day... after packing up a bit, we walked to playpark, where the kids had fun giving their toy kitty and the owl keyrings a push on the swing.

England 2011, Day 11 & 12: LONDON!!

Oh lordy, I don't really have any notes for these days!!  All I know is that Andy and I caught the 10:20 train for London for our big adventure *without* the kids!!  Grandma and Granddad had lots of exciting things planned for the kids, and we wouldn't be back in Hayfield until after bedtime the next day!  The big event in London was seeing Uncle David (Granddad Maurice's brother) perform at the Globe Theater as God in a performance of The Globe Mysteries.  Pretty cool, right?!  We couldn't take pictures

during the show, but I took a few beforehand and outdoors.  It was SO fun seeing Uncle David perform, and even if we didn't know everything that was going on, it was completely interesting and so well done.  Afterwards we met David and Andy's cousins Kate and Joe at the pub next door, and Kate's lovely baby, Cecily.  Then we headed out for a curry with David and Joe.  Such a fun evening!  The next day was all about sightseeing in London... our big mistake was not having a "plan," which is good on the one hand because you can just wander around, but on the other hand, there are SO many choices in London

that if you don't pick a few and go with it, all your wandering can make you feel like you're going in circles.  Which we did!  One of the best parts of the day was seeing part of the Changing of the Guards near Buckingham Palace.  Then we strolled by Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament, soooo cool and impressive.  We considered taking a tour of Parliament, but

it was just stupidly expensive and we would have had to come back in 3 hours or something anyway.  We walked along the Thames, admired the London Eye, stopped in the Science Museum, had a quick lunch on some steps in a square at Covent Garden... and then it got crazy.  We decided to take the Underground to Harrods, but after Andy ducked into a little news shop to look for a paper, he apparently came back out and couldn't see me, so he went on to Harrods without me, thinking I must have gone on my own!  As if !  A LOT of time passed, and I just stayed put, having no bloody idea what was the right thing to do at this

point.  I enlisted the help of a very accomodating policeman (pictured), who helped me make a phone call (since my cell phone didn't work here, but thank god I could still look up my contacts) - I reached my sister-in-law Alison, who got Andy on the other line, and we were finally able to reconnect.  Phew.  Unnecessary angst, but it does make for an interesting story.  All in all, a memorable and fun trip to London!!