February Events, 2015

This month, Marcus has made crepes and Chinese dumplings in his cooking class after school on Thursdays, and he loves all of it. He did swimming and rock-climbing and ice skating at his February school vacation week camp; he now can swim fifteen yards across a pool unassisted before tiring. On Saturdays, he's been loving doing soccer while Samantha does swimming.

He's still practicing the piano daily and taking weekly lessons (when snow doesn't interfere).

 

We've had a few fun weekend activities this month. Robert took the kids ice skating on Agganis Arena one day when they had an alum skate event.

Another day, we had a Thanksgiving dinner for our friends and missionaries Mike and Caroline.

Mostly, though, February has been dominated with snow, and snow days. I made green eggs and ham one day, and the kids did crafts and models and other inside activities on other days. Their favorite way to pass the snow days is watching E.T., and then playing "Do you remember in E.T. when...?" (As in, "Do you remember in E.T. when they said Elliott was going to die but he didn't? When the little sister gave her mom a note from the two brothers? When E.T. went trick-or-treating with them? When we saw just his foot under the fence in the backyard in the beginning?) They love every minute of the movie, and have now watched it about ten times. When the kids' bikes fly, they are absolutely spellbound, every time.

Playing in the snow and even going sledding have become old hat around here, given the 95" of snow we've gotten in a thirty-day period. Insanity! The roads are terrible due to massive piles of snow blocking lanes, the T has barely been open, and getting anywhere around town has started taking 3-4 times (at least) as long as it used to, but the kids are of course thrilled with the snow.

We went with Carlos and Sandra to the snow festival at the Franklin Park golf course one Saturday, and that was a nice way to enjoy some of the snow. They'd shoveled out a path from the golf clubhouse (where they had boardgames and crafts and, nicely, bathrooms) to a hill for sledding, and Marcus and Olivia had a ton of fun while Samantha and I and Sandra and Alex stayed inside and played random games.

We celebrated the Lunar New Year of the Sheep/Goat as well, amidst the snow. First we saw the lion dancers at the Super 88 supermarket and food court in Allston one Saturday when grabbing lunch after swimming and soccer. It was great because it was really not crowded, and they obviously didn't use fire crackers inside so it was not at all smoky. Marcus got to get pretty close to the dancers, and Samantha got to cower in Robert's arms at the first sound of the drumbeat.

The following weekend we went to the Quincy celebration, in the North Quincy high school building: there was face painting and kids' games with small prizes, necklace and origami crafts, a Quincy librarian reading picture books aloud upstairs, a food court set up in the cafeteria with noodles and sushi and cotton candy, and then martial arts and dance performances in the gym. Happy new year!

 

 

 

Go back to web essays or over to links
robertandchristina.com was made with a Mac.
© 2015 C&R Enterprises
Email christina@robertandchristina.com or robert@robertandchristina.com
Created: 3/1/15. Last Modified: 3/1/15.