Too Funny!

I am always finding humor in my simple city life. Here are a few things that happened recently that made me chuckle out loud.

Story #1
As you may or may not know, our religious beliefs are such that we believe the Sunday, the Sabbath Day, is to be kept holy. This means we try to go to church and avoid shopping, going out to eat, spending money; instead we worship, spend time with our families and prepare for the coming week. Last Sunday we signed up to feed two missionaries from our church, we did all of our shopping Friday night for chicken enchiladas. I asked C twice to please check the recipe to make sure we had everything we needed, he looked at me smugly stating that he has made enchiladas so many times he could make them in his sleep. Therefore his logical deduction from this was that he need not follow his wife's advice and check the recipe. We went to the store and bought what we needed and thought we were set.
Sunday after church rolls around and the missionaries are coming to eat at 6:30p.m. We start making dinner around 5:15p.m. only for C to discover (SHOCKER) he had forgot to buy enchilada sauce!!!! Now, you can image the joy I had rubbing in how right I was and how he should listen to his wife!!! We all know that the key ingredient to enchiladas is the sauce. C felt that he had no choice but to run to Star Market and make a purchase, as we had people coming to eat at our house in an hour.
C makes the run to the grocery, while he is out I am frantically trying to get everything else ready for the dinner and I get a phone call. The call is from my dear sweet hubby, he is calling from the bushes across the street. You see, as he is walking home, the missionaries are walking up the street. Anyone who knows anything about our religion knows that you DO NOT want to get caught going to the store on Sunday, it is just bad form!!! So C decided that he would just hide in the bushes from the missionaries until they passed the house. I was cracking up to know that instead of explaining the situation to the missionaries and face his embarrassment, my husband would rather hide in bushes! Too funny!


Story #2
Last night around 10:30 p.m. I was sitting on my couch watching the DNC on TV in my PJ's (old KY t-shirt and bleached sweat pants), face washed, teeth brushes, bra removed. I was in my happy pregnant lady mode! Suddenly C and I started smelling a burning smell, the kind that smells like a hair dryer just had some hair for breakfast. We were using our sniffers trying to locate the strange smell. We could not figure anything out, but it was strongest in our living and dining room. We called our upstairs neighbors who were out, but came home and they could smell it as well. They could smell it in their apartment but could not figure out where it was coming from either. My neighbor called the fire department to see if they could come check out the scene. Okay, I thought, good idea. WRONG!! BAD IDEA!! Not one, not two, not three, but FOUR fire engines with flashing lights show up blocking off our entire street! Not to mention the plolice car as well.
Keep in mind I am NOT dressed in any way for company, and all of the sudden there are 10 firemen going in and out of my house sniffing and using their electrical camera to take pictures of our outlets. They are all dressed in full head to toe fire gear and come in to my house caring around their axes. One says to me, we can bust open your wall if you want. Ummm....yeah, that is exactly what I was hoping you could do...what? Needless to say all of my elderly neighbors are all out on their front steps, this is great stuff for the next days pourch gossip. Charlotte across the street is so worried about me, she doesn't feel that being pregnant I should be around all "that smoke." No seriously, no smoke, no fire, just smells. Are 5 emergency vehicles really necessary?
They ended up finding nothing wrong with the house and couldn't locate a problem. They just suggested an electrician come and look at things. I do have to say though, that all the firefighters and police officers were very friendly and funny. Thanks for coming to our rescue, if we ever need real help, I feel that we will be well cared for!

Peaceful Outing

This weekend we headed to Concord, MA to Walden Pond. This is a beautiful pond that you can swim in and just enjoy the beauty of nature. Work and life has been a bit stressful, so C and I decided we wanted a nice tranquil place where we could sit, relax and read a good book.

We had a really nice time. Do we look like we are ready to be parents? We need to enjoy these peaceful outings now, cause soon they will exist NO more.

When were done at the pond, we headed to Lincoln, MA (not far from Concord) to the DeCordova Sculpture Park.
NOTE to CAMBRIDGE FRIENDS: This was a new find for us, it is free after 5 p.m. and is open until dusk! Great activity for kids, family, and even the dog!
There are over 75 outdoor sculptures to see and it is set up in the beauty of the wilderness; it was really beautiful to see all of this great artwork.

This heart looked so sweet from far away, but once we got close it had creepy hands, faces and tools sticking out of it; not so sweet.

This one is called the Butterfly, we couldn't really decide why, any thoughts?

It was a great weekend once again in New England. There are so many different things to do and see. I am glad we have a few more summers here to explore all the things we didn't get to see this year. We are NOT done with our adventures however; Fall is just around the corner and there are plenty of apples that will need to be picked by our hands!

School starts for C this Thursday, so back to the grind for him. If you get a chance, send him an e-mail to wish him luck teaching his first Freshman Writing class.

It's a........

BOY!!!

Our little man is doing great! He has 10 fingers and 10 toes and is already moving his hands around a lot. His daddy thinks he has long fingers that are ready to play the piano. Our little man is also showing that he has a stubborn nature like his mommy, as during the 2 hour ultra sound, he wouldn't turn around so they could get a good picture of his heart. Other than his alien like features, it appears that he may have the Gentry chin. We are very excited about his arrival in January!

Summer Dayz

This weekend we made our way to Concord, MA for the Verrill Farm Corn and Tomato Festival. I had been looking forward to this for a couple of weeks, as I heart everything CORN. I was going to the festival ready to eat Corn, Cornbread, Corn chowder and whatever else corn they could throw my way. Imagine my disappointment when we get there and there is a sign that reads: Festival Closed due to Wet Fields! Yes, the 10 billion gallons of rain we have been receiving would do that I suppose. It was a major bummer, however, the Verrill Farm store was still open so I did by some ears of corn for our enjoyment at home. We cooked some of them up, and there is really NOTHING better in the summer that a buttery cob of corn!


We have been hit hard the last three weeks with record amounts of rain here in Boston. This summer has been much more bearable as far as heat and humidity is concerned, however has been spent with much less walks around the neighborhood. After church, it was sunny and clear so we decided to take a family stroll around Somerville. I just love the houses and the feeling this area has. Here are some of the things we enjoyed seeing, hope you enjoy them as well.

Above is a typical Somerville house.

McDuff is always happy to get out of the house and take a walk.

Hip Hip Hooray!

Christian got some excellent news today! He is the proud recipient of a commission from the Barlow Endowment! What does this mean? He is being commissioned (PAID) to write a 20 minute piece of music for piano and violin! I am so proud of him and happy he is once again able to see the fruits of his labors! Congrats honey! I am so proud of you; this is such an exciting and amazing opportunity!

More Adventures in BeanTown

Last October I heard on the radio about how Kenny Chesney has started his tour off in Foxborough, MA each year at Gillette Stadium (where the Patriots play). This year was to be no different, and he would be coming with Gary Allen, LeAnne Rhimes, Sammy Haggar, and Keith Urban. (If you are not a country music lover these names mean nothing to you, but it is a pretty good concert, trust me!) There are not a lot of country music lovers that I have found here in the Cambridge/Somerville area so I wasn't sure who I could go to this concert with. Heavens knows Christian would NOT be going with me, as he loathes country music! That is when I e-mailed my aunt JaNean and asked her if she wanted to go, half thinking she would never even consider it. Within minutes she responded back that she wanted to go and that is when the planning began.
My aunt and grandma came out for a week and we had a great time exploring the area. I pulled them all over Boston; this is a LOT of walking for someone who rarely walks around. They were troopers though and didn't complain once! Of course we made our visit to Mikes Pastry's, I go there anytime I am in the North End. So Yummy!

Here is my cute Gram and Aunt Nean!
After exploring Boston on foot, we took the Duck Boat tour to give our feet a rest and see the city by land and "sea" Boston is such an amazing city!

After our adventures exploring the area we met up with Christian at the Hard Rock Cafe to celebrate his Birthday!
Many of you know that his Birthday isn't until October 2, however Nean and Gram weren't going to be around for the big 30th, so we decided to celebrate early. Christian was super surprised when they came out singing to him as he didn't realize we were celebrating his big day that is just a few months away. It was pretty funny to see the look on his face!

On Saturday we headed to the BIG CONCERT! YEAH! I had no idea what madness I was about to experience. They said they sold 60 thousand tickets within 10 minutes of them going on sale. This is hard to picture until one is there! The concert started @ 4:00p.m. It only took us an hour to park for the small fee of $40!!!!! YES, this was the going rate to PARK! Many people were waiting to park for much much longer. The Parking lot was FULL of tailgater's BBQing, playing games, and getting WASTED! Most people were in bikins and went by the theme of Kenny's song:
"No shirt, no shoes, no problem."

The concert was great and all the performers did a wonderful job! I have to say half the fun of the concert was just watching the people. I saw all of New England's finest at this concert, that is for sure! We saw girls falling all over the place, I have never seen so many smashed people in my life! Girls were crying, men were yelling, fights were breaking out. PURE ENTERTAINMENT!!! Also the clothing choice for many people was quite interesting to say the least. If I had a $1 for every jean mini skirt I saw I would have a great retirement account. I am pretty sure I had the most clothing on of anyone in the stadium. I also saw a lot of bras---please see below picture to see what I am talking about:
A) This bra does NOT blend in with the shirt you are wearing!
B) Why are you even wearing a shirt if you just want us to see your bra?
C) "That's Hot" --Paris Hilton

All around good entertainment! Seriously, we had such a fun time! The concert was great, good music, good company, and GREAT people watching!

Here I am rockin' out to Keith Urban! I love me some Keith! Thanks Nean for being so willing to come out for this concert! This was something I think I only need to experience once, but it was such a fun one time!

Country Music brings out the very best in people!

CAPE COD

After a year in Boston, we finally found a reason to explore the Cape. Grandma and JaNean really are not into historical sites so we thought it would be fun to go explore the Cape with them. It was beautiful to be so close to the water and amazing homes in the area.

I could get used to eating all my meals to this view!

Have you ever seen LOBSTERS this BIG in your life? These guys were 8-9 lbs and full of spirit and fight. I was totally freaked out by them; what ugly crustaceans!

During our Cape adventures we stopped in Hyannis and did some great shopping. From there we went to West Yarmouth where we staying the night and endured the rain. The next day was clear and beautiful as we drove to Chatham and Provincetown.
Chatham was probably my favorite town; it has a cute beach, fun shops, a lighthouse, and amazingly big and beautiful homes.

Me, Nean and Gram just hanging out on the beach.

Here is my cute family on the big rocker in Hyannis. Good thing we have Christian around all the time to keep us laughing, he is such a ham!

The Cape was beautiful and such a fun experience. I loved the drive home along route 6A, we saw so many unique looking homes and landscapes. Next time we go it is going to have to be for longer so I can enjoy these beaches a bit more. We just need to find someone rich with a beach home that we can stay with. Suggestions anyone?

Thanks gram and Nean for coming to visit! It was fun to have so many adventures with you!