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Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Vacation 2010

This is our vacation. Ian dictated a journal to me of each day of our vacation and I am going to use that as the blog. I'll try to fit it together with the pictures as best as I can.

Our Vacation
Day 1- Sunday
We went to church. It was good. We came home and packed the car, ate lunch and headed on vacation. The drive was boring. We ate pretzels and laid on mom's pillows because we could reach them. We got the the cottage! Me and Isaac and Daddy went over to the boat with Papa. Bella, mommy and Ra-ra (rah-rah that is what the kids call my mom) unpacked. We went to the Cove for dinner. It was awesome. I had a cheeseburger with fries. After dinner we went night fishing. It was awesome. We didn't catch anything but we still had fun. We looked at the stars and saw the Big Dipper. When we got back to the dock there were millions of minnows and when papa turned the lights off on the boat all the minnows jumped and it sounded like rain on the water. It was really cool. We also had oatmeal cream pies on the boat.

Day 2-Monday
We had a nice big breakfast of pancakes. Mom went for a run. Isaac, me, Daddy and Papa went fishing on the boat while Bella and Mommy went to the little beach. I pulled in a flounder but we couldn't keep it. We caught the bottom too. I got to steer the boat a little and have snacks and Gatorade in the captains seat.
We came back in for lunch. Me and Isaac went crab fishing by the cottage. We found a dead crab. Then we went to the train beach and I went swimming with Papa and Bella. Then we caught some blue crabs and green crabs. We caught 4 and then we let them race on the beach. They buried themselves in the sand though. Then we came back to the cottage and relaxed.
Papa took us out on the boat again and I caught a striper with Daddy. He was big but not a keeper. We came in and had fish and beef kabobs with corn on the cob and cous cous. It was cous cousy. We went back out and fished some more at night. We saw glowing plankton in the wake of the boat. When you disturb it, it glows. It was so cool. Then I fell asleep on the boat.





Day 3 - Tuesday
Today we went out on the boat and caught some scup so we could go chunking for stripers later. I caught a sea bass. Mommy likes to eat those. Mommy and Daddy went on a date and Ra-ra and Papa took me and Bella and Isaac to a nature center. I went on walks on paths through the woods. I saw a tree frog. I saw and old bee's nest and an owl too. A real one. I forgot what kind of owl it was. We got stuff in the gift shop. I got a geode and it had crystals in it when I broke it open. I got a dinosaur egg that I could dig a dinosaur out of. I saw some pumpkin seed in one of the ponds. Ra-ra and Papa took us out to dinner at Ten Clams. I had mac and cheese and Issac had chicken tenders and Bella had mac and cheese. I had lemonade. I got ice cream for dessert. It was vanilla with cotton candy swirl. Mom took us for a bike ride. Auntie Kimmy and her friend Sarah came to the cottage too.





Day 4- Wednesday
We got up really early and Daddy took us out for breakfast. We went to the beach when we got back. Its called Napa Tree. We got there on Papa's boat. The waves were big and one crashed me. I liked swimming in the ocean with mommy. We also built a sand castle and a mermaid and Isaac and Dad went fishing with Papa and they caught 2 stripers that were keepers. They came back to the beach later too. Isaac made a shark in the sand and we dug a big hole until we found water and Daddy made me a throne. When we got back to the dock it was low tide and the boat got stuck. We all had to get off and walk to the dock. I liked getting stuck. Papa pulled the C Lasher (the name of my dad's boat) into the dock when the tide came up a little.





Day 5- Thursday
Auntie Angela and Madi and Annika came today. We made a few new friends who live next door to the cottage. Their names are Forrest and Rose. I fell and bumped my head on their swing set. Our friend D.O. made a minnow trap and we put the crab trap in off the dock too. Took a long ride up the Mystic River and we saw two neat bridges that open for boats. One turns and one goes up. We went fishing again and Bella and Isaac caught more sea bass.



Day 6- Friday
After Annika took a nap we went to the Mystic Aquarium. We saw Beluga whales and touched Rays. We saw a sea lion show too. One of my favorite parts was going to the gift shop and I got a penguin whose eyes pop out and a notebook and shark tooth that I had to dig out of another egg. Isaac liked the barracudas and electric eels. We had tacos for dinner. I like tacos a lot. I had a croup cough early in the morning and I got to sit outside with mommy in the dark. We could hear the light house and the waves. It was kind of nice even though I had a croup.







Day 7- Saturday
We went back to Napa Tree Beach. It was fun. Me and Madi had fun swimming. We pretended we were doggies with Isaac in the water. Bella and Daddy body surfed a lot. We got stuck again at low tide. I like getting stuck. We went out for dinner at Ten Clams again. It was late and I was tired.









Day 8 - Sunday...last day
We went fishing early with Papa but we didn't catch anything except scup. Mommy wanted to catch a big one. Isaac said "Maybe God is saying we have enough." We played at the cottage and watched Bella kayak with daddy and we checked the minnow and crab traps again. We caught a goose fish in the crab trap. He was weird. After dinner we went home. It was sad to leave and it was a long boring ride home. We watched Mary Poppins and Cars.






Wednesday, August 4, 2010

good old fashion summer fun!

This has been one of the best summers ever! The weather has been incredible, the kids are all at fun ages and it's just been so reminiscent of the summers of my childhood. This is what I remember summer being like when I was little, super fun, super hot and no pressure. That has been our summer in a nutshell. Here it is in pictures...

We went to Lake Compounce a few weeks back. Jason's boss very generously treats his employees to a day there, complete with bus trip and all meals. I really love the park there. It's nice and clean and they have free drinks everywhere in the park which is especially nice when it's 90 and humid! The kids had a blast. They boys were big enough to go on some of the "big people" rides and really enjoyed most of the rides they tried. Hannah and Bella are nuts and loved the roller coasters and fastest rides they could find.





We are so excited that our friends the Germains have moved close by. My friend Jen and I have been friends since we were born and it has been so nice to have her and her family close by. We've gotten to see a lot of them this summer and it's been so much fun! One day the kids all had a lemonade stand. They did pretty well thanks to some very generous customers who were very encouraging to the little entrepreneurs.


Everyone had a job. Ian liked holding the money best.
Another important ingredient for a great summer, water balloons. You gotta love an activity that takes at least 1/2 an hour to set up for and is over in 5 minutes or less. The kids made fortresses and teams and once the balloons were gone they switched to throwing buckets of water at each other.




Another day at the Germain's we made some slime. It came out really good. It farted in cups and made everyone laugh. Nothing provokes a genuine giggle like the sound of flatulence.


Bella and I had a delightful time celebrating my friend Megan's birthday. She had a wedding dress brunch. One of my weight loss goals was to fit into my wedding dress by my 10th anniversary (which is tomorrow!!!!). Megan provided me with an opportunity to not only fit into it but to wear it for a few hours! Hey, every good birthday party has a theme. It turned out to be just my friends Megan and Michelle in attendance with our beautiful daughters and it was a great morning. I even wore the lavender traveling suit that I had bought to leave my wedding reception (b/c driving in my wedding dress wouldn't have been easy and where else would I ever wear it!)
The wedding themed birthday cake.
Michelle wore a bridesmaids dress because her dress is packaged and preserved.
The beautiful flower girls.
I don't think I'll ever get too old to play dress up. I hope Bella doesn't either.
We were blessed to have my niece Madilynn over for a few days in July as well. We packed our time full of summer fun. We had a delightful backyard campfire...



Got messy with some soft serve ice cream on a hot summer evening...


and spent some time at the lake.

Despite all of our fun, there has been some down time that the children would call "boring." I call this time "wonderful." When you are a busy homeschooling mom, there is no such thing as being bored, only blissful moments of not too many things to do. Anyway, "I'm bored" is not allowed in the summer vocabulary around here. It only indicates a lack of creativity. One morning where "I'm bored" was on their faces and "go find something creative to do" was on mine, Bella decided to wash all of her doll clothes and make a clothes line. It was just too cute.

Although we haven't been too scheduled we have kept up with book club and piano for the summer. We also attended a craft day. The kids had a blast tie-dying shirts and making sponge balls among other things.

Another fine summer afternoon when the rain was blessing the outdoors the kids decided, rather than being bored of course, to make a mural with the Germains. It came out really nice and they all worked very well together.


We Corbetts have been doing a lot of hiking lately. It's been so much fun. Isaac, in particular, is like a little mountain goat. He just doesn't run out of energy! I can't believe the pace he can keep on an uphill hike. We've enjoyed some leisurly hikes and have endured some rather strenuous hikes as well. We've also been covering some miles on the bike trail. It's a lot of fun now that the kids are getting bigger and we can be active together!


One of the most important things we have done this summer is implement a chore plan. I divided our major chores into 4 daily chores and 4 weekly chores. They alternate between all of us. Our daily chores include, dishes, table washing/setting/clearing, sweeping, and putting dishes away. Our weekly chores include bathrooms, vacuming, dusting and sweeping. Everyone is also responsible for their laundry once a week and keeping their rooms clean and beds made (which was already in effect). It's been going well. If I can keep it going when school starts back up, life will be much easier! So far they don't seem to mind...too much.


Today we had a field trip to the Berkshire Botanical Gardens. It was so much fun. The theme was Dirt to Dinner. The kids took home a transplant of chives, toured the vegetable and herb gardens and we topped our trip off with a lunch of baked potatoes and the chives that we brought home.






After the field trip the kids cooled down on the slip n slide. I forgot how dangerous that thing can be. It didn't help that it ended right in front of a pine tree. They had fun and no one got any serious injuries.



We are leaving for vacation in a few days!!!!!!!!! The kids are counting down the minutes until they can be with Rara and Papa at the cottage and go fishing and hang out on the beach! Then it will be back home and getting down to business for me. I have lots of planning to do for this upcoming year! We are going to have a new student this year and have lots of awesome things to look forward too!