Year: 2021

Before I dive in to the December holidays (spoiler alert: Jason got covid- he’s fine), thought I’d take a quick minute to get us through November. My birthday, Thanksgiving, family pics, the fun just doesn’t stop. Hit it! 

First, turning 41 was meh. Definitely not as lustrous as 40. We did have Katie and Brian over for a sushi feast that was positively amazing but this is the only picture we took.

I don’t even try to do this. It’s become somewhat of my trademark, along with randomly leaving my car door open. This is at the Bentley hockey game whoops.

Don’t worry Ashton didn’t like it 😉

And with that, we bid November, turkey, and 41 goodbye 😉

Guys, MILESTONE TIME. We’ve just hit our tenth halloween over here at A New Nill. There wasn’t a post ten years ago, but Ashton (only child at the time) looked like this.

This was before we knew about allergies and eczema and I cringe looking at his skin 😦  Oh god plus his cradle cap that was a scaly mess – it’s all so painful. BUT, Ashton today, 10 years later, is pretty perfect. 

Myself on the other hand. No, that’s not a costume, I really look like that. In my defense, I had just helped to pull off a huge event at Lilja that morning and was exhausted haha. I’m on the PTO and we did a big “Morning Mischief” Halloween party with a trunk or treat, crafts, food, music, facepainting, etc.

Back to my original rant. I get that last year, with COVID, it was all about contactless this and that. So everyone put candy outside for kids to just take. No doorbell ringing, no thank yous, no Happy Halloweens. This year, maybe it was the same rationale, but if you ask me the faceless grabbing is probably here to stay. I mean people that wanted to be friendly sat outside in chairs and around firepits, but others I imagine relished not having to get up from the couch every other minute to greet trick or treaters. And honestly, as a parent, we covered the neighborhood in half the time. But it wasn’t the same

The costumes also went off without a lot of fanfare. Ashton wanted to just wear his football uniform and Alex his hockey pads, but no no no. I forced them into a SWAT outfit and some sort of GI Joe whose pants were too small.

 It’s been twice (half?) of Ashton’s life since we last threw him a significant birthday party. That was the Lego party, if you’ll recall. Insanity is what that was. So while building blocks were a central part of Ashton’s life back then, nowadays it’s Nerf and so that’s what we went with. 

Alex and his bro Harry

Ashton and one of his besties Jae

This picture is blurry but somehow, it feels appropriate.

The armies as one!

It was a gorgeous day and the party wrapped at about the 3.5 hour mark lol. So exhausting but so fun. Live footage here and here (kind of cracking up at how into it Jason is). Anyway, that’s a wrap on double digits!

Double digits y’all. Ashton is TEN and well, whoa. Read on for all the details about him and how we spent August 3, 2021. If it’s even possible I love him more every day. 

This boy weighs 79.6 pounds, is 4 feet 10 inches tall, has size 4.5 feet and wears clothes bordering on size L and 10/12. His haircut is shaved on one side and he keeps the top long, it’s a very enviable blond in the summer time. We have a large collection of headbands and sweatbands he wears to keep it back and basically he looks like a teenager. Eats like one too – no amount of food makes him full. Oh and he is also starting to smell like one. I make him wear deodorant and after hockey and football practice, oooof. 

Ashton is largely uncomplicated and I love this about him. Agreeable and mild-mannered, he does not have a manipulative bone in his body. If he gets frustrated, he walks away. If he is overwhelmed, he cries. And he still loves to be hugged and kissed all the time. Ashton knows right from wrong, follows the rules, and has a hard time around boys that tease, are rude, or are unsportsmanlike. It is perplexing to him when people are mean. If he hears a story or is telling me about something that happened at school, he will put his hands out with wide eyes and say “Can you believe it?” or “Why would they do that?” And shake his head.

Ashton is also very humble. He’s tall, handsome and sweet, and naturally quite athletic. He’s a great teammate, easy to coach, and has received the Bobby Orr award in hockey (basically for being an outstanding, fair, solid player) for the past two years in a row. But he has no idea about it. If he gets a compliment, he looks down, smiles genuinely and says thank you. Sometimes if it feels particularly good he will do a little hop. He also jumps when he is excited or thrilled by a game or competition. This is him on exactly his tenth birthday, in an arcade, playing skee ball. He’s done this kind of thing since he was little.

We’ve taught both our boys that it’s important to wear nice clothes to school, that it’s a sign of pride. Off they go every day, in their collared shirts and clean sneakers. Not only do they not fight it, they defend it. Ashton gets some flack for it from his classmates. “Ashton, you know you don’t have to dress like that for school.” “Ashton, why do you always wear fancy clothes?” The other day he was again telling me about the negative attention he gets and I think he must have gotten fed up. He responded “Because it’s a sign of respect.” The kid was like “That’s dumb.” And Ashton said “No it’s not. You don’t see teachers wearing messy clothes do you?” That’s probably the edgiest Ashton has ever been. He wasn’t mean about it, but it shut that kid right up. You should hear what he comes home telling me what other kids do and say, it’s so upsetting. As far as I can tell, he rises above it and he knows how proud I am of him. 

What else about Ashton. He is obsessed with fantasy football and loves sports. He is currently playing football on the 4th grade team for the Natick Redhawks:

and Squirt A on the Natick Comets for hockey. Ashton likes challenges in general, both physical and mental. He saw a video on YouTube about how a guy used magnets to separate iron from soil/sand and made a version of this toy. Not only did Ashton go dig out a bunch of magnets, he raced down to the pond and by the end of the morning had an entire container of iron (and about 6 kids that were so into what he was doing, they had run home to get their own magnets and try it themselves). He’s curious and basically loves to experiment with things. Like this video in which they spent hours taping boxes to make a basketball arcade game (Alex is inside LOL) and our house in general is perpetually contests of coin spinning, arm wrestling, tower building, how fast someone can do X, Y or Z, slow-motion recordings or toy car or bike jumps, marble races, and on and on. 

So I think that paints a pretty good picture. If any of my readers have any comments please leave them! Considering Ashton is 10 I want this to be a very thorough documentation and I think we all agree I’ve achieved that lol. 

So for birthdays in our house, we like to have a family outing. We chose Kimball Farms in Westford which is a general fun spot with mini golf, zip line, batting cages, bumper boats, etc. Here are some of my favorite pictures from the day. His friends came over in the morning to watch him open his new Strife (this was widely anticipated in the neighborhood), we had salmon for dinner and some presents and Ashton loved it all. And we LOVE him. Wait until his Nerf party!

After this we had crazy ice creams and then later on after dinner, cake of course. And in between that was candy they won in the arcade. That’s what birthdays are for, right? (Gulp.) Happiest 10th to our beloved Ashton!!

Ok so here we gooooo! Our summer vacay was in Chatham and while on the shorter side, here is all the fun and sun we had this year! Same crowd, same beaches, same lunches, you know 😉 In fact, if you read this post, you almost don’t have to read this one lol. Although actually, one of the bonuses this year was my bestie Katie and her family (also our neighbors in Natick- first introduced in the linked post above) hung out with us a bunch since they were visiting her parents who live there too. 

So the first day we went straight up to our favorite most breathtaking beach – White Crest in Wellfleet. 

“The chair” – it was a thing. 

Me and Kari

Alex, off to a strong start:

Me and Katie

From left: Erik, Ben, Kari, Holden, GG, Callie, Me, Ashton, Jason, Alex, Katie, Kellan, Brian and Crosby. The best crew!

Two years ago the waves were big and seals abounded (?) so this year we actually got to swim and it was great!

The men all walked down to the Beachcomber for some oyster shooters and then it was time to go home and get through the very difficult task of sitting outside, having wine and a raw bar with Grandma and Grandpa ((just arrived). Tough stuff, vacation 😉

Next day notables included the men swinging the sticks,

the Whydah Pirates Museum (with actual treasure in the form of gold coins, Ashton was going ballistic. It was actually super fascinating, the rise of piracy and the history behind this one particular ship). Arrrggggh!

Bumper boats

And then Hardings Beach for some fishing and fish tacos.

Suppose I didn’t really have to post those two photos, but hey.

And then in a flash, one last group shot and it was time to go 😦

In between all these photos, we had amazing dinners every night and went shopping and spent some wonderful days together! So glad we got some QBT (quality beach time) but hopefully we will be able to get back to BI for 2022.

Next up, the epic month of Ashton’s tenth birthday. Here’s a preview…

Well what have we been up to since my last post (May – gulp). The answer is: a lot! Of course the burden of documentation has been mounting so I shall condense it all into a nice mix. 

After Mother’s Day came Father’s Day, naturally. And I was especially proud of the gift we gave Jason this year. There was one particular favorite photo this winter I took of him and the boys skating on our backyard rink on a snowy night:

I took a chance on a website called Instapainting and the result was amazing! They took this photo and turned into an actual work of art. It came rolled up on a legit canvas, I was so impressed.

A true oil painting! I had it framed and he loved it 🙂 We all wrote a note on the back, the boys traced their hands, and it is hanging over the piano. 

So if you ask me, that was perfect 🙂 In terms of what actually happened on Father’s Day, Jason got the pleasure of escorting the boys to a massive lacrosse tournament while I stayed home. Also perfect 😉

The boys had their last day of school and then we started the summer! So far we’ve been to Vermont twice, Long Island once, and Chatham for a week. The boys have had some time at hockey camp, flag football camp, and there has been a lot of general hanging out with friends and family. In no particular order, it has all looked something like…

(I caught a baby shark!)

Oh! And on the birthday front, I went to California in June to celebrate (my) GG:

And Jason turned 44!

Which brings us nicely up to date for the most part. Next post is the Summer 2021 trip to Chatham, and then Ashton turns TEN!! Double digits ahhhhh!! It’ll be a doozy!

Another year, another Mother’s Day 🙂 I got two very different gifts this year. I mean, I have my usual two gifts:

I was not the only mom to receive the precious gift of watching a team of 7 year olds being herded by a bunch of adults hoping that some semblance of a play would emerge. 

This is me, Katie and Corinne. At least it was sunny and we had coffee. 

After lunch the boys had back to back lacrosse games. 

#16 came and gave me a rose at halftime.

And then Alex had a game and *gasp* I got a rose from him too! 

My other gift was a photofacial. The sh*t is going down at age 40 everybody. I had the sun damaged spots zapped off my face and it’s more exciting than I can tell you. Jason kind of incredulously couldn’t believe that was what I wanted but he is smart and knows he couldn’t really argue on Mother’s Day. 

So that’s post procedure, not too bad. The dark spots get darker initially. 

THEN we came home after lacrosse (the photofacial was actually the previous week) and had a nice  walk/rollerblade, a nice picture, and a nice dinner in front of my lacrosse roses.

And there you have it! Jason is usually not home for Mother’s Day so that in and of itself was a huge treat. Well he did go to work in the morning and sent me this gem:

Psssh. Trying to steal my show 😉 But he made it to the boys lacrosse games and it was great. I’ll say, Ashton and Alex just keep getting bigger and bigger and we are having so much fun. They read me jokes and stories, tell me about what they are learning in school, and can never have too many hugs or kisses. They wear what I ask them to wear to school (this is NOT a small matter) and are kind, respectful boys. I get compliments on them all the time, which of course is the absolutely the biggest Mother’s Day gift of all. They are the best yet!! 🙂

Frankly, I don’t even know how to begin describing Alex. And it’s super funny because I looked up last year’s post about what makes the boy and not a lot has changed. I even started that one the same way! Every year that passes he defies explanation a little more haha. He’s very smart, cocky and loves attention. He can be a complete PITA, namely because of his aforementioned intelligence. But he’s also sweet and very popular. We joke about his fan club – everybody knows him. He is a leader but also the first to high-five friends and teammates for a good game or performance of some kind. Alex laughs a lot – he is a goofball, the life of the party and the dynamic usually looks something like this:

And he just pulls things out, like blowing soap bubbles through his fingers, claiming he has “duh, always known how and does it all the time” which is like, totally untrue. Wha?

People are constantly laughing at what he says or his mannerisms, like “who is this kid?” and love to tell me all about it. Once he got asked how his trip to the dentist was, and he said “Psssh. It was GREAT. My teeth are so white they make milk jealous.” 

Recently at the grocery store, an elderly gentleman came up to me and said, “Are those your sons?” and I said yes. He said “You’ll never believe it, I winked at him and guess what he did?” I knew he was talking about Alex and I said “Let me guess, it was this one and he winked back.” And the man chuckled, totally delighted by it, and said “YES!”. How many times do I find myself smiling, nodding and sighing in response, like, “Mmm hmm, that’s Alex.” A lot, that’s how many. He is a character all his own and frequently a topic of conversation.

I have no stats because his well-visits are now completely off schedule due to COVID, but you might be Alex if:

* Your lovey is STILL Pluto. You think he is “the perfect fit”.

But when friends come over, you put him away in a drawer because you don’t think he needs to be out 😉

* People touch your hair a lot. 

* You are often heard saying: “Dang it.” Alex can be very “Calvin” and tries to get away with things. “Dang it” often follows.

* How your day goes is either a) the best ever or b) the worst you’ve seen in your lifetime and your mom is scared to find out which. Because if it’s b, look out. You can be quite QUITE grumpy.

* You watch other kids your age do things and say “aw, that’s cute”. 

* The book you write at school is called “How to Annoy Your Mom”. It includes leaving all your laundry inside out and not using a towel after washing your hands so water drips all over. There are lots of pages.  

* It’s a big worry of yours that your front teeth are not the same length. Will they ever be? Will they?

* You regularly play football or lacrosse with 11 and 12 year olds. And win.

* You regularly play chess against adults. And win. 

* Games are very serious business and you are compelled to supervise, scrutinize and offer advice to others on what their moves should be. And people listen because dammit, you’re actually right.

* No matter what you do, you think it’s awesome and you will nod at yourself as you describe it to others. Your self-approval is high.

* Like always, you leave selfies and videos on phones and iPads, specifically addressing your “fans” and you know, just checking in with them. I’d link to a video on YouTube but it’s so obnoxious that I simply must spare you.

Alexander Michael turned 7 on March 16. He is a big presence in our house which is why it has taken so long to put these posts together. But here we go, part 1: with the vaccinations beginning and all the COVID protocols in place, we were actually able to have a little birthday party for him! If you’ll recall last year, he was one of the first birthdays after lockdown went into effect. But this year we were able to rent out Chase Arena and invited his Mite D hockey team and a couple other friends. The ice was ours for a whole hour. Even the dads played! We gave out goodie bags and had cupcakes in the parking lot afterwards and it was perfect. Alex is in the yellow jersey…

What did Alex do for the rest of his day? Played football with the neighborhood crew:

So here’s how the week started. Last Sunday, February 28, Ashton played in an awesome hockey game against Dedham. It was literally 1-0, 1-1, 2-1, 2-2, 3-2, 3-3, and so on. They ended up winning by one goal and it was epic. Ashton scored a great goal, Grandma was there (vaccinated herself and visiting! Yay!!), GG watched online, and it was just one of those great ones. 

Monday morning they went off to school for the first time in 16 days. After February vacation and then a remote week, boy was everyone ready.

The joy was shortlived. Tuesday morning at 10 am we get the email: a player on the Dedham team had tested positive. Because Ashton’s team had played them, according to the strict rules that govern hockey, they had to be quarantined and tested. So we pulled Ashton out of school and he spent the rest of the week bored out of his mind and flopping around the living room. All his hockey practices had been cancelled, he couldn’t play football with kids in the neighborhood, and he was unable to attend the first indoor lacrosse clinic. Luckily he tested negative on Friday, as did the rest of his team. But like, UGH. And this upcoming week is remote so by the time he goes back to school in person on March 15, he will have gone 1 full day in 4 weeks. ONE. 

In the middle of all this, one of the neighboring towns announced their plan to bring all kids back to school, in grades K-5, full time, by April 5. Natick is no doubt going to feel tremendous pressure to get all the kids in our district back as well, and in fact there is a huge meeting tomorrow night about it. As of last Friday, the Commissioner was likely to gain a state Board of Education vote mandating it. 

In the meantime, two additional important things are going on. First, they opened vaccination eligibility to all teachers and staff in K-12. Second, Natick launched pooled testing for the district last week. What this is is basically blanket COVID testing for any child whose parents have opted in. Kids are tested in groups of 10, and if a pool comes back positive, then those 10 kids will be individually tested to find out where the positive is. It’s faster and cheaper to do it this way and quite effective. There is state funding for the next 6 weeks to do this, but they send minimal staff and they put out a desperate call for volunteers to help keep the program running as long as necessary. I asked my director if she would mind me helping, since it is during work hours, and she said as long as it didn’t conflict with anything, I could. I signed up, and feel so good about it. I’ll be going into three different elementary schools (starting tomorrow/Monday 3/8) to coordinate nasal swabbing and the general administration/bar coding/etc that goes with all the samples. 

This is from the latest newsletter (3 days ago) from Natick Public Schools about it:

Pooled testing is designed to catch any asymptomatic or pre-symptomatic cases. In that vein, I was talking to my friend about it and she was like Oh my gosh, go get the vaccine. I was like, But I’m not a teacher. She said, you are a volunteer (“staff”) and you’re going in to test students. Go get it.

I couldn’t believe it. I woke Jason up. I was elated and actually had trouble going back to sleep. I got an appointment! And for the Johnson & Johnson vaccine which is just one dose!