Finito

This isn't the end of Beach Bucket, but it's the end of... so many other things. It's been hard to collect all of the thoughts required to process these endings, so that's why I've had so many intentions of starting this post... and then false starts... and then no starts.

We moved out of Palazzo non Finito last month, and it kind of capped off what was the "finito" to so many significant parts of our life. Since this spring, we've said goodbye to:

Our house
Having a pool (!)
Our dog Kobe : (
My red Highlander
Our golf cart
Zach's electronics tutor (who moved to start a new job)
Luke's trumpet teacher (Luke quit trumpet)
Zach's aide (who got promoted to supervisor)
Zach's sailing/sea life mentor (who sailed off to get his captain's certification)
Our favorite babysitter (who got a full-time job)
The middle school
Our proximity to the beach
Dave's office (next month)

... and countless pieces of furniture, toys, kitchen equipment, and various other possessions that we unloaded on Goodwill during the move and thereafter.

Are we scarred? (and yes, I mean to say 'scarred,' not 'scared') I'm not sure. We are fortunate to have landed in a new house that fits us like a glove, and has become sort of a healing place. We each have a space where we feel comfortable and safe, and now that we've gotten past the mourning, the house is our place to recover and rebuild. (I was going to say "reinvent" but I don't think we've gotten to that stage of creativity just yet).

What have we gained? Luke seems to have grown in confidence as well as size, with countless friends and sports that keep him busy. Zach is happy with his new gang of buddies and is endlessly entertained by his saltwater menagerie. Dave is re-committed to building and strengthening his business. And I'm just... nesting, and trying to figure out what my life is going to look like once school starts (and beyond).

If anything, we've gained a new sense of security because we know that we need none of those things in the list above (not a house, not a car, not that red buffet cabinet, not even a dog) to retain our sense of who we are.

And the weird thing is, I wouldn't go back. I loved - loved! - the Palazzo, but now that I have the long view, I'm not sure I'd want to go back. It was always too big for us, and we always had the feeling hanging over our heads that it wasn't really ours, and we weren't in it for the long haul. I recently compared it to wearing someone else's designer shoes... You know they're not yours, and they're a little too big, and even though you like walking around in them and you get a lot of compliments, they give you a blister, and in the end you can't wait to take them off. It was JUST like that. (Shoe analogies = always handy.)

So now it's Friday night, and Dave and Luke are here to watch "Curb Your Enthusiasm," so there's no more time for wallowing or looking back. As Larry David would say, this night looks like it's going to be "pretty...pretty...pretty good."

Snake Mom

I've finished one whole semester of home-schooling Zach, and if it was worth anything, it was worth repairing the shattered, crumpled shell of a kid that he had become by the end of December in school.

From January through June we had adventures. We went up to the snowy mountains and put on our own snow chains and ice cleats. We went to Terranea and had a private sea-salt lesson. He tried boxing. He did a paddleboard science class. We investigated tidepools and wildflowers. We went places from the Tar Pits to the Ice Cream Museum. He kept up with his friends from school. He logged hours and hours in the garage with his favorite electrical engineering PhD Nathan. And he put in the "real" work on math, social studies, history, writing, and science with his aide Stavros. Was it super-easy? No. Did we have conflicts? Yes. But he came out of the semester happier, more confident, more relaxed, and (I think) proud of what he accomplished. We'll get his state testing results sometime over the summer so we'll be able to get some benchmarks on his progress.

In the meantime, the house is a happier place to be. Dave is good. Luke is good. And we have a new companion along for the ride, our puppy Kobe, who is ... how shall I put this? He's basically a kobalicious kobester. OK, he's a muy buen doge (Luke's purposely fractured Spanish that is designed to drive Dave crazy).

As summer rolls out, we're almost settling in to a new routine. Luke is gone in the mornings with JGs and lunch out with friends. Zach has been enjoying camp. Everyone rolls back into the house at about 1:00 and it's a new and welcome break for me to have zero kids in the house for more than an hour or so at a time. I keep hearing about parents who send their kids away to sleepaway camp for weeks at a time, and I can't help but feel jealous. What would I even do if I had more than a *day* without at least kid to worry about?

The other night as I was putting Zach to bed we were reading a book about baby animals. Apparently mother snakes (the approximately 30 percent of snakes that don't lay eggs) give birth to baby snakes and then just slither away - the babies are on their own. After we turned out the light, Zach said to me, "Mom, do you sometimes just wish that you were one of those snake moms, without having to worry about kids at all?" This was amazing because 1) perspective taking is such a hard-won skill; and 2) I hadn't even thought of that but once he mentioned it, it sounded pretty nice. How about just for like, two days?

Las Aceitunas

I started this blog about 12 years ago with the idea that it would be an ongoing catalogue of what's been going. And there's been good stuff. But mostly I've been preoccupied with the tough stuff that is not worth hashing out here. So for the moment, this will just be photo updates of the holidays. And also, it's been so long I sort of forgot how to use the Blogger platform, so don't mind a few photo missteps (you probably won't, but it'll be bugging me for sure).

Before we left for the East Coast, we had some Suzi and Bill time at a fun bubble show - followed by dinner. 

Then we had a little pre-Christmas present opening at home, which yielded two sportfishing poles and a desktop power supply, and you know what that means, of course:

Then in Moorestown before Christmas we had a chance to see our dear friend/former babysitter Tony, who helped the boys make cookies:

...and then we shared our 45th annual Christmas party with the Abbates.

And of course once Christmas was over, it was time for our Lukey to have a birthday, and in this case it was a momentous TEENAGE birthday (not that we're making a big deal of it or anything, ahem):

The two-day celebration started with an "alternative meats" dinner featuring python and turducken.

A man and his cake.

A man and his tramp. (There are probably better ways to say that...)

A man and his relatives.

...And a man and his steak (a fancy steak dinner at Fogo de Chao for the actual birthday). 

Plus Dave in his happy (pinball) place.

...And then we were off to Key West, a beautiful land where you are surrounded by ocean, key lime pie, tropical fruits, and a whole bunch of cats and chickens walking around.

Here's a giant jackfruit at Robert Is Here, our all-time favorite produce stand. This jumbo baby would have cost us about $100 if we had indulged Zach's desire to buy it.

We swam in one of the many beautiful pools at our hotel, surrounded by palm trees and artwork. 

We petted polydactyl cats at Hemingway House...

We (OK, Dave) channeled Hemingway with a surprisingly gray beard.

Luke became an accomplished ocean fisherman (no, really! We ate what he and Dave caught for dinner one night!)

Zach and his pal Milo rode sky-high at the top of the boat on our snorkel/kayak excursion.

And then we had lunch on the way out of town at Morada Bay... we kept our feet in the cozy sand the whole time we were eating.

And finally, we enjoyed a visit with the Florida cousins:

Could we have packed any more into those two weeks? Things I will miss from the vacation... Seeing everyone. Chickens walking around. Our beautiful hotel. Walking down to the bar and drinking key lime coladas. Dave's beard. Dave saying "ectb" (pronounced "yest" in Russian) instead of saying just plain "yes." And Luke filling every pause in conversation with a thoughtful, "Las aceitunas" ("the olives") his favorite new Spanish word.

Las aceitunas, indeed.

Checkpoint

It's hard to figure out how to get back into this, but it has been a tough spring, summer, and fall. Of course some great stuff has happened. But there have been some extremely difficult times that I don't even want to recount. I think (hope, pray) we're starting to come out of the shadow of that time so I can maybe sorta kinda feel like writing on here again.

What did we miss? Luke is an amazing swimmer, flipper, trumpet player, author. He is my sweetest sidekick, a constant source of joy. He's working hard to find his way in the world.

Zach is the happiest, must huggable kid in the world, who has a bottomless curiosity and an astounding (impressive, frightening) knowledge of electonics and circuitry. He's working hard to find his way in the world.

Dave is the funniest, running-est, most delightful and joyful companion I could ask for. We promised each other a long time ago to rejoice in each day we had together - and we're still doing that. He also seems to have found where he wants to be in this world.

Oh, and we moved into a house with a pool. So that was good because we spent some of the hottest days (and nights) just swimming away.

And we had a chance to celebrate my parents' 50th anniversary in one of my favorite places (Terranea) with all of my favorite people (my family, Dave's family, even Elizabeth) and all of the cousins were together for one grand weekend.

Now we're in New Jersey, relaxing, chilling, and letting Christmas happen instead of trying to drive some big series of events and plans. Right now the boys are upstairs playing (?) together (!) so it seems to be working out pretty well so far.  Not going to mess with it.

Foolish

I'm going to ask you to think about all of the members of our family, and try to decide who you think is most likely to go all-out for April Fool's Day. Think hard.

I know what you're thinking, and you're wrong. Think again.

Nope, still not right. Think again.

Luke, with a self portrait of his internal organs.

OK - I'm just going to give it away - It's Luke. Yep, good old serious and thoughtful Luke. He got me, and he got his friends, over and over again. Here's a brief summary of what went down on April Fool's Day:

7:30 a.m.- Luke wakes up in the morning and I give him a bowl of cereal with a drop of green food coloring at the bottom. I tell him to pour his own milk, and when he does, it comes out green. Gotcha! Laughs all around.

Sometime around 8:00 a.m. - Luke switches the keyboard on my phone so the "y" and the "z" are reversed. I don't notice this until mid-morning when I am trying to text someone about "Yach." It requires the assistance of two different people to fix this. 

8:10 a.m. to 2:35 p.m. - Luke repeatedly pranks his friends, including, but not limited to: Offering them part of a cricket bar for snack and telling them it is a power bar; switching out items in their pencil boxes; leaving fake phone numbers in their pencil boxes; telling them his peanut butter and jelly sandwich is actually onion jam; and last but not least - bringing a change of clothes to school and completely changing his outfit mid-day (he went from wearing all all-neon outfit to dark colors).

3:00 p.m. - Luke and his friend come home from school; I offer to make them French fries. They're actually apples cut in sticks, baked and sprinkled with cinnamon. I serve them with raspberry jelly and even though Luke catches on right away, his friend is still clueless even after eating two "fries" - he's more concerned when he realizes the red stuff is not actually ketchup.

3:30 p.m. - Luke puts tortilla chips under the toilet seat so they crunch when I sit down. Boooo.

6:00 p.m. - Dave comes home and we offer him a cold glass of "beer," which is actually apple gelatin.

April 4, 8:00 a.m. - Luke, frustrated that I STILL haven't noticed his final prank, calls attention to the fact that all of the pictures on the mantel in our bedroom are upside down. I always take off my glasses in the bedroom so I hadn't even noticed. Bahahahaha! You got me, but I also kinda got you, kiddo.

Homebound

This is HUGE, people. It is already the end of February and we have not (really) gone on vacation yet in 2015. (Smack me now, please.) The bigger point is that Ski Week came and went and we didn't go skiing or desert-ing. We pretty much just stayed home. And everyone was extremely mellow and OK with that. Imagine that.

OK, technicalities: The boys and I did go away for one night, two days at Legoland. Two days at Legoland doesn't seem like a lot, but it kind of is a lot, at least for one parent, and really, the boys were pretty much done after about four hours each day. (Side note: We just got sent a deal for "Buy one day at Legoland, get four days free" - Four days?!?! Who are you people?)

Anyway, the one thing Legoland had to offer was some of the boys' favorite things (Luke = Frank Gehry, or more specifically, the Sydney Opera House; Zach = Einstein).

We also had a most astonishing experience at the Mindstorms robotics lab: The boys were given a project to program a robot and they Worked. On. It. Together. Like a team! They solved the problem! This is significant!

And then we went home again, and they were more or less OK with being home and hanging out together. The trampoline we got for Christmas is no small factor. They'll bounce for hours. Every two or three hours they have some sort of collision or fight and they get angry and swear they'll never bounce on the trampoline together again. But they do.

On Saturday we went mining for gems. This turned out to be a very good use of time. The boys, like pro miners, found tourmaline, aquamarine, kunzite, lepidolite, and a few other -ites I can't remember. But it was good clean (OK dirty) fun.

The mining day was made even cooler by a four-wheel drive tour around the mountain and mine entrances. It was ostensibly led by a tour guide, the driver, but it was really led by the miners' dog, who happily scampered ahead of our little buggy the whole way along the mountain path. I don't think we stopped smiling the entire time. Oh, to be a miners' dog...

So now we're back home, and school's back in, but we're gearing up for even more adventures ahead. More to come!

Now you get around to it.

What? Did I miss something?

You know, you quit your job, and then all of a sudden you don't have any time left to do anything. But honestly, I'm sad about having skipped the updates in the past few months. Here are some highlights:

Time in the Berkshires with Lauren, Liz, and the gang:

A selfie with our hiking group:

My trip to Idaho:

Our weekend at Terranea for Mom & Dad's 49th anniversary:

Our family Christmas stromboli contest:

Three of us in Central Park (looks like we're standing in front of a painting but it's real, people!)

...Followed by the famous Bow Bridge in Central Park (did I mention that it was freezing?):

...And finally a selfie in front of the Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center:

 
My lovely Luke turning 11 on the "best birthday of his life":

 And Zach in love with his motherboard:

Now, was it really that hard for me to do the updating? No, it just took a while to get around to it. As for 2015, they say it's going to be a great year. I'll get back to you as soon as I finish all the laundry from 2014.

Trackers

You've probably already read the whole train trip rundown on South Bay Sparkle, but I somehow don't think I managed to capture the total glee that we all experienced on that trip. From the moment we boarded and saw our family cabin, until the moment we hopped off the train in Seattle, we kept looking around and congratulating ourselves on our cozy good fortune. That was a fun trip.

In fact, there was no one time when we felt claustrophobic or tired of our surroundings. Somehow both the days went by so fast we barely noticed...and we still felt like we were having a great time right up until the end. When we got off the train, right before we saw the cousins, Luke stopped by the window outside our room to give it one last wistful look. Until next year! (?)

In Seattle, you probably already heard about the raspberry picking from Jolly Tomato but you may not have heard about this crazy bunch of berries. (How did they all fit in there anyway?)

...And once we got home, Julie and Zach teamed up to make an incredibly delicious (and incredibly beautiful) gluten-free raspberry-peach pie. Zach did such a good job on the lattice crust that I decided to make a second post out of it on Jolly Tomato. ("It's easy - First you do the crisses, then you do the crosses.")

The weather was actually cooler than expected in Seattle, but we still took an afternoon out for a lake swim. Luke, Helena, and Antonia took the big kid "swim test" to get access to the floating dock. And although it took me several rounds, I finally got a picture of Luke taking a giant leap off the diving board:

On Day 2 we were supposed to go kayaking but it was too windy, so we spent the day at the innovations museum and we went to a special chocolate tasting there. That museum had just about something for everyone (Retro video games? Check. Inventor's building laboratory? Check.) and we probably could have gone again a second day without any complaints.

Nevertheless, the weather improved (declined?) by Sunday and although we had a light rain, there was no wind so we got the all-clear for the kayaks. We split up into three boats: Julie-Antonia, Jeanne-Luke, and Eric-Zach-Helena. It took us all a little bit of time to get used to rowing with our partners, but pretty soon we were maneuvering like pros. Luke was thrilled to kayak up and down some of the little water "streets" to see Seattle's famous boathouses.

We also paddled over to Gas Works Park, where we ate our picnic lunch and climbed on the "no climbing" structures. (Hey, everyone does it!)

...and then we finally paddled back to the landing spot, slightly damp but exuberant.

What do you think - does a day like this call for some pie? High five to that!

See you again soon, Seattle!