June 17th and June 18th

June 17^th – 18^th blog.

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June 17^th, 2006

It’s early Monday morning and I’m writing for this past weekend. We didn’t sit around the pool like I had anticipated on Saturday. Mitchel had to work some so the kids and I took off to Goddard State Park. http://www.riparks.com/goddard.htm The great thing about Rhode Island’s state parks is that they’re free to get in. The bad thing is you have to pay to rent anything… a picnic table, a picnic table with a grill, playing field, etc. Sometimes you have to pay for parking but we haven’t come across this yet. We got a little lost getting to the park… there are a lot of streets up here that don’t have street signs and we missed Division street or road or whatever it is. We stopped at a gas station and a nice boy with a big tattoo got me going in the right direction.

We made it to Goddard Park and drove directly to the stables where we inquired about horse back riding trails. You have to be 7 years old to go riding. I explained that Anna, our five year old, has been taking lessons for a year and was better at it than me but I have to talk to the owner. She wasn’t there, but I have her phone number and I may be giving her a call. It’s $30 per person, so we’ll see. Stephen and Anna, at least, got to pet a horse so they were content.

We got back in the car and drove to a beach area. Unfortunately we weren’t in our bathing suits but the kids didn’t seem to mind. Stephen was in shorts and promptly took of his shirt and got in. Anna was in jeans so I rolled up her jeans to just above the knee (as far as they would go) and she got in and waded. I know to locals the shells and rocks are probably no big thing but to us they were new and different. We also found a lot of “sea glass” which is basically a broken piece of glass that has been worn smooth by the sand and the waves.

There were bunches of jelly fish but the kids never got stung. A family had some clear plastic cups from Dunkin Donuts and gave one to Stephen. He used them to catch the jelly fish. Pretty cool. I’m not worried about our kids not having any interaction with other children. They can make friends wherever they go. And there is usually a new friend in the pool each night. Dunkin Donuts is very popular up here… I may have mentioned this earlier, they are everywhere! I’m wondering if they are headquartered here.

Anyway, we left the park went back to the hotel and went out to eat. We ate at Seven Moons Chinese restaurant. It was a higher end Chinese restaurant. Good food. We all had leftovers. Then back to the hotel to swim. Stephen and Anna will both be excellent swimmers by the time we leave here. Dinner was, of course, Chinese leftovers and we watched TV. all evening.

June 18, 2006

The next morning, Father’s Day. We knew we were hiking today. It’s what Mitchel wanted to do. So we hiked a part of the East Coast Greenway. http://www.greenway.org/ It’s a trail that will one day be the biker’s (bicycle, not motorcycle) equivalent to the Appalachian Trail. It will go from Maine to the Florida Keys. The trail isn’t just for cyclists but that’s what it is being billed as.

Okay, I’m wondering if I should sugar coat this or not… I guess not. It was great for Mitchel… which is who it was for anyway. The kids and my idea of a hike is maybe a mile or two out and a mile or two back, with frequent stops. Why we don’t get through our head that a hike with Mitchel is never like that I don’t know. We hiked three miles out and three miles back with a few stops out. There was much wailing and gnashing of teeth ALL around. My mom returned a phone call while we were hiking and as we were ring off she asked… have you turned around yet. I was amazed at her understanding of our problem and no, we had not turned around yet. I kept repeating to myself… it’s father’s day, it’s father’s day, it’s father’s day… There were a few interesting spots where we stopped, a rock wall, a lake or reservoir area and ah, bliss, a sign on the trail that announced if you cut through the woods to the right you would find a deli. It was about 12 pm so we cut through the woods. I told the person that put it up that he was a genius! This was at the 3 mile mark… we hadn’t even started back yet. I was waiting to feel the blast of cold air from the deli but there was none. It was almost as hot as the outside. But we used the restroom and the water in the sink was freezing. I drenched myself and Anna, and being the loving wife, even though I wasn’t particularly feeling it, took a paper towel soaked with the cold water to my wonderful husband. The kids split a pizza and Mitchel and I both had wraps, I had a roast beef wrap and he had turkey, I think. We had leftovers but didn’t want to take them on the trail. They boxed them up put them in the refrigerator and told us they closed at 3. We told them that if we weren’t back by then to send a search party. We hoofed it back with no stops. And made it back in about an hour. I forgot to mention that Mitchel has a GPS system that he received for his birthday from my parents. I don’t know if this is good or bad. I knew exactly how far we’d come and exactly how far we had to go. I also knew how fast we were walking. Mitchel likes this little toy… a lot! We made it back to the car and went to pick up our food. I took shower and would have gotten ready for bed if I thought I could get away with it. Back at the hotel the boys watched TV. and the girls went to the pool. Later on I took both kids to the pool and there were people there… Oh Joy! The kids played in the pool; I read a book and did laundry. We probably were there for a couple of hours.

Now a word from Stephen:

I liked the museum (children’s.) because it had this water thing. It was fun because there was a tube a small tube that squirted water out when I pushed up on a lever and I put another small tube on it and aimed it at this other big tube put a ball on the small tube fired the ball it’s up...it’s..It’s...Good! I scored! Woo Who! I also liked Goddard state park because it had a beach. It was fun too because we got to swim in it. There is a picture of both of these stories in the pictures.

Be impressed; be very impressed, because he typed the entire paragraph by himself. We got a Mavis Beacon Typing program so a he’s learning with that. A lot of what he typed was typed with his fingers on the “home” row.

Now a word from Anna:

I liked, hmmm, playing at the zoo. Hmmm, playing in the pool. Hmmm, spend time with daddy. Hmmm, what else? Eating out with daddy. My favorite thing is snuggling up with daddy and taking a nap with him. Watching t.v. I like Goddard park because, hmmm, because, because I played at the beach. And I liked seeing the horses and petting one. Counting my money. Seeing the army truck and the army man. (Car show at Denny’s Diner) And finding shells for my mom at the beach. And snuggling up to my mom. And when I eat with my mom. And when I play in the pool with my mama. And while I build a sand castle with my mama. Okay, that it.

The weekend was nice because Mitchel was around more, even if he did have to work a lot. He has some documents that are due on Wednesday. So things should slow down then… hopefully. I don’t know what we’re going to do today but it won’t be sitting around the hotel room!

Hope all is well with all of you. Keep sending the comments; it’s great to hear from you!