Sheep Shearing Festival

We live down the street from a mansion called the Gore Place. For all those history buffs out there Gore was a former governor of Massachusetts (very early 1800's or during the Federal Period.) Anyway, the mansion has beautiful and extensive grounds which are a nice change from block after block of city. Each spring the Gore place holds a sheep shearing festival. After almost three years of living here we were finally able to attend!

The kids liked getting close and touching the sheep that had just had a hair cut.

Shaving an alpaca...

Playing with a big mask.

Watching sheep.

Sheep shearing the old fashioned way...

look at those huge shears! This was an impressive sight.

See how the fur looks like one big blanket?!

All of my boys, two of them sporting their favorite froggie rain boots.

This was a really fun family festival, however, I was shocked that my boys weren't that interested in the sheep dog demonstration! Maybe it was too late in the afternoon or too hard to see what was going on.

Playing with masks continued...

The Waltham garden club had a plastic swimming pool filled with bark mulch. They hid potatoes in the bark mulch and the kids used shovels to dig the potatoes out. Dave and Will did this over, and over, and over again. We had to drag them away from it screaming when it was time to go home.

Since the Gore place is less than a mile from our house Brad was sure he could walk home faster than I could drive. He took David by foot and I went with William by car. I beat him home by a good twenty minutes but he claims he would have been a lot faster if he could have cut through a fence and didn't have to around it to get out of the parking lot. :)

It was fabulous to enjoy this perfect spring day outdoors. We only wish we had gone earlier and seen some of our friends who had attended this festival in the morning.

Admit it...

I wasn't the only one who got up early to watch!

Because of a morning run I missed the balcony kiss which I had to watch later online.

And yes, I do believe it was a true fairy tale.

Another Car Road

Dave and Will are always making car roads and the most recent variation on this idea was to unroll toilet paper all over the house for their cars to drive on. I've pretty much accepted the fact that in order to complete any task I have to be ok with another mess somewhere else...hence me allowing them to unroll the toilet paper and mess up the living room.

I have to say it was pretty creative and kept them busy for awhile. It also went up and down our stairs, down the hallway and into our playroom.

Easter

Easter Sunday was wonderful. The drive to church was bright and lovely. Our services and classes appropriately and beautifully celebrated the Savior. I noticed so many family gatherings and children playing on the drive home from church as well. New England takes Easter more seriously than any other place I've lived. Lots of concerts at local churches (there is a church on the end of every street it seems, including ours) and white cakes in bakery windows.

It was an experience just to take all of that in.

We had a fantastic dinner with close friends. The spread was impressive. Our hosts had little details like handmade paper baskets for the kids, personal trifle dishes with grass and candy for the adults, and an an elegant table runner to name a few. It was really a peaceful afternoon!

The one thing that wasn't peaceful: trying to get the boys to cooperate for pictures before we went to church...

Egg Dyeing

Playgroup Egg Hunt

Can't help but be a little nostalgic as I think of what egg hunting looked like last year:

Our ward has a great playgroup. We had a lot of fun at the egg hunt this year. Our old neighbors from Windsor Village (where we used to live in Waltham) joined us. It was fun to see Patrick and Tessa one last time before they move!

The kids got to ride (and run) around the parking lot while the eggs were being hidden.

Friends

My boys and another good friend Bean

We upgraded from Mom's purse to a paper bag this time...

I think Will found a little toy boat in this egg. He loved it.

The moments we live for!

I'm pretty sure my kids had lots of candy instead of lunch.

2011 Boston Marathon in Moments

The wheelchair racers are the first to whiz by.

For me the most touching moment was when a wheelchair racer that was struggling came by (I didn't get a picture.) She was back with the runners and was literally INCHING up the hill. She had already completed almost 20 miles but the going was really rough. You could see the sweat dripping off her nose and the tense arm and back muscles permanently flexed underneath her clothing. I was moved to tears. For every inch she went she probably had 60 people screaming encouragement at her. It was emotional. I hope she finished.

Arguably the cutest moment: Will and Annelise share a chair.

The silliest moment: supporting our friends who were running with "illegal" chalk drawings and messages.

Janelle and Melanie trace Lacey--she was supposed to be a person running.

So excited to see three of our fellow ward members run by!

The most tragic moment: completely missing said ward members as they ran by. :(

The most exciting moment: cheering for a man wearing a BYU shirt. Someone in our very large group of friends saw him early and we all SCREAMED and cheered as he went by. It was loud and crazy and fun. There was no doubt about where much of our crowd had been to undergrad! He had a huge smile on his face and I think he was video taping us with his iPhone as he ran. Who is coordinated enough to do that?! Hopefully that scream from 20 or 30 (including kids) unknown fans gave him the extra juice to finish strong. It was awesome.

The elite women run by the winner pounded out an average of a 5:42 mile.

The elite men run by the winner did averaged a 4:69 minute mile.

Arguably the second cutest moment: David spent a lot of time with his K9 friend Cody. Forget that Cody has a little family member Lilly who is also his friend.

The waves and waves of runners come by. This year we weren't sitting close enough to watch them throw their cups down from the water station but even without the cup tossing it was fun and inspiring to watch.

Another successful year spectating at the Boston Marathon!