Close ups

Our family friend took an amazing photo of Aidan wrapped in a scarf during his birthday party.





It inspired me to look through my photos and edit some that I had taken that were similar.
Here are two:


Sarai had wrapped her head in her sweatshirt at the top of Mt. Wachusetts a week ago.



This is Carmen at the beach in NC in August. She had found a scarf, wrapped it around her head and I was able to quickly take her picture.




My girls are striking with their dark chocolate brown eyes.

Anniversary Present

This blog is well overdue. Our anniversary is June 12th! The morning of our anniversary Jenna and Isaac came over before work and gave us a present. It was a family decal for our car. I had been saying for awhile that I wanted one for my car.

So Jenna found a site and custom designed one for us. It looks so great!

She created a tandem picture for Abram and I.

Don't you love Abram's hair! She tried to give him a goatee, but it looked like he had a duck's beak. :)

She also created the kids:

Tobin is running, Sarai is dribbling the basketball, Carmen is heading the soccer ball and Rachel is punting the soccer ball.

The site Jenna used allowed you to customize hair, sports and size of person.

The decal came as one long picture. In reading the instructions we were concerned that our back wiper would hit and rub off the decal over time. After debating for a day we decided to cut the picture. This decision created great controversy. I agreed that I didn't want to split the family up, but I also wanted to make sure that it stayed on too. We came up with a humorous decision. The back window of the minivan has the kids on the left side (driver's side) and us on the right (passenger side). We decided that it would be funny to have the parents chasing down the kids!

Most people instantly recognize my car now. I do believe I am the only one in town with a tandem decal on my minivan! We love it!

Hiking Mt. Wachusetts

Monday, October 12th was Columbus day. In Mass, Columbus day is a federal holiday. Everyone in our family had the day off. We decided to hike Mt. Wachusetts. It was a beautiful fall day. It was also Aidan's 1st birthday. Isaac, Jenna and Aidan joined us for the hike.

Up we go!

Some of us climbed up rock "stairs" at one point.

Here's the family at the summit.

Rachel paused at a trail sign as we began our descent down the mountain.

Snack time! Aidan's drink on the go.

I love this picture of my two older "chickens".

I always find it interesting that even though the kids resist going hiking they look back and talk about the fun times we had during the hike.

Cross Country Season Has Begun

Tobin's cross country racing season has begun. He ran close to 500 miles over this summer in preparation for this season. Tues, Sept. 8th was the first race of the season. He was racing against two of the fastest guys in the the state. Needless to say, the pressure to perform well was huge.

The race began strong and fast.

He stayed with thefront pack for the first 2 miles.

After that he couldn't breathe well and felt as if his legs wouldn't move and that he may pass out. He decided to drop out of the race. I believe he had an asthma attack; exercise induced asthma.

Over the next few days, I got a new persciption for an inhaler and extender tube. He is using it and feels like his lungs are a bit better.

Monday, the 14th, he had his second race. Shrewsbury was running against a team that didn't have much competition. Coach Smith decided to rest the top 6 runners. Since Tobin didn't finish the first race he was to run this race. If things were going well with his lungs he was predicted to win the race.

Everything went well for the race. He began strong and in the lead.

Tobin won the race! He finished 40 seconds before the next runner.

I'm not sure how long the race really was. It was around a 2.6 or 2.8 mile course. He finished in 16+ minutes. Shrewsbury also swept the race having the first 7 runners finish the race. This is the lowest score a team could get at a meet. It was also a triple meet, so these scores count double for us!

Let's hope for more of these races. He is going to an invitational race in Franklin Park this Saturday. The coach has only invited the top 7 from the team. I'll keep you informed as to how he does.

School's Begun

School began for everyone Sept. 1st. I began work on August 31st. I work as a kindergarten teacher's assistant in our school system. It was very difficult to transition back into work/school mode after a wonderful summer and beach vacation in North Carolina.


I took these pictures in order of bus arrival.


Tobin is now a sophmore at Shrewsbury High.






Sarai and Carmen share a bus even though they go to two different schools. the schools share a back parking lot they are that close to each other! Sarai is in 8th grade at Oak middle. Carmen is in 6th at Sherwood Middle.



Notice Sarai's new hair color. She got it re-dyed before school. She has streaks of blue and purple in it. We also re-dyed the red/orange hair back to her normal color. I am amazed how dark her hair looks with these new colors.







Some how, Zori got into the picture:) She loves Sarai's attention in the morning.


Rachel is in 3rd grade at Spring Street.

August Fun

The week of August 11th was packed with activities. We began the week by going to Breezy Farms. There were three water slides and a lake to swim in. Rachel discovered treasures in the lake! She used her snorkle and mask from her birthday to find rocks, a fish and a life guard whistle. Tobin, Sarai and Marita read on the grass much of the time. I was too worried to take the good camera, so I don't have any pictures to share.

The following day, I took the girls to Clay time. (Tobin was working at Synqor.) My previous post showed our work.

Wednesday was very rainy so we went bowling. This time I brought the camera, but left the card in my lap top from the previous night!

Now, Thurs was fun. I took the girls to Kimball Farms. Kimball farms is well known for its amazing home made ice cream. It seems that many people come here on their lunch hour to get food too! After eating more ice cream than we should have, I believe we almost had a pint each, we went on water bumper cars and mini golfing. It was a hot day. I do have good pictures from this day!

Sarai took Rachel with her. Rachel was worried about controling the cars before she got in. she learned quickly and didn't want to share the controls with Sarai!

The bumper cards were great! There were 20 cars out at a time. Eveyone had smiles the whole time.

Carmen had traveled under a bridge and I was able to get her attention to say "Hi!". She's always full of life!

We played a game of minigolf afterwards. This was hot but fun. Carmen had to adjust to putting a light ball. She had been playing field hockey and was use to hitting the heavy ball with all her might. Needless to say the first few "putts" were well off the green!

I also enjoyed taking pictures of the water falls!

I am learing how to change the shutter speed. I love seeing the water droplet effect with a low shutter speed. I really am enjoying my new camera.

I do believe that after all this fun we went to Jenna's apartment to swim a bit and cool off.

What a day!

Clay Time

This summer we've enjoyed going to a local pottery place and painting objects. To say we "painted" these pieces is deceiving. The paint is really glaze. There is a plate at each table that shows you the fired color and number that goes with it. When you glaze your work the color can look very different from the fired look. It is a great place to go anytime of the year.

I went with Sarai two weeks in a row this August. The first time she and I were the only two home. We took a friend and spent over 3 hours working on our pieces. The following week I took the four girls: Marita, Sarai, Carmen and Rachel. Marita had spent a few days with us and was looking forward to painting pottery.

Rachel painted a monster. Really, I painted 2 1/2 coats of purple onto the monster! You need to put 3 coats of each color in order for it to have the best result.

Carmen worked on a winged pig.

Marita worked on a mug that has legs!

Sarai made two pieces. A mug that looks like a root beer float

and another that she is still working on, her zebracorn. That's a unicorn that has zebra strips.

Here is the bowl I glazed. I was trying to make something that would match my kitchen. I began painting on bunches of grapes and realized that I had 6 bunches. It was a coincidence that I could write every one's name on a separate grape bunch. Inside of the bowl it reads "My Wonderful Bunch, Dancy 09". This is the finish product.

The day before we did this we found a great lake with water slides. I didn't get any pictures to share of this adventure though. It is called Breezy Picnic Grounds. It is a nice family run area. There are only three water slides, but it's still fun. The part of the lake that you can swim in is very clean. Rachel enjoyed the lake. She brought her snorkel and found treasures. She discovered a lifeguard's whistle, many rocks, and saw an orange and white fish. I think she found a sun fish. It was swimming around my legs! Marita, Tobin, Sarai, and Carmen came too. The older teens just sat and read much of the time. They did however "play" in the sand and make a sand castle in preparation for the beach week!