Children Actually Do Require Sleep

Well, we are back from our vacation and we thoroughly enjoyed our week in Massachusetts! We packed in every imaginable family memory as well as fun times with all of our friends. Somewhere in the midst of this, we thought our children could actually survive going to be bed 10 o'clock for nine nights. While we were right, they survived it, it was not without cost. We got home last night, put them both to bed by 9:30 and didn't hear from either of them until after 10am this morning. Caleb got up first, but Kara slept in until 11am -- a first for her! Meanwhile, I'm mostly unpacked now!

While in Massachusetts we spent two Sundays at North Shore, which was quite nice. We had a get-together at a local park for Kara and her friends from church and school, and we were pleasantly surprised that her Kindergarten teacher from Beacon also came out for the get-together. I had left a message with her, but hadn't heard back. This was particularly impressive to Thom, as he had not seen that kind of devotion in a former-teacher. Kara enjoyed digging in the sand with all of her friends. She also spent two whole days with her friend Katie -- who she has missed the most and she had two great days there -- aside from the moment when she poked herself in the eye with a stick and thought she was going to go blind and when she fell off the swing. I'm guessing she won't forget those days! For Kara and I our most exciting day of the trip was Tuesday, when we went out on a whale watch. It was the most amazing whale watch I'd ever been on. One of the whales was breaching out of the water over and over again and it was just amazing. The highlight of the trip was two whales breaching side-by-side, of course, I missed this in a classic moment of turning around at just the wrong time. Kara is now quite proud to tell others that she saw it and Mama missed it. Thom and Caleb had their outting on Thursday while I visiting with QE for a while. They took in an exhibit of paintings at the Peabody/Essex Museum.

In between visits with Kara's friends and admiring Sir Walter and QE's new baby Sir Isaac Newton we found time to venture out to our favorite beaches and introduce Caleb to the ocean.

All in all it was a wonderful and fun trip! Not so sure I can say it was relaxing, but it was definitely refreshing.

For Kara, school starts next Monday and we will spend this week preparing for that and enjoying the last days of summer.