Author: kristennill

There have certainly been many, many bloggable events since Alex’s birthday. The boys accepted offers for their club hockey teams next year and played in the parity rounds, lacrosse has been going great, we re-did our front walkway and landscaping, the boys got their boosters, Alex had his first communion, and so on. I’ve been super busy with the PTO and am elbow deep in planning the carnival that we are hosting on June 5th. But nothing has stopped me enough to write a blog post until yesterday’s major moment. 

Ashton came home from school yesterday having lost a tooth, for the first time in a few years actually (his 9th, to be precise, and I didn’t even know it was loose!). I said Oooo the tooth fairy is coming tonight! And we moved on with our day.

Cut to bed time. The lights are off and I’m tucking him in. Ashton had the little box with his tooth in it in his hand. I was kissing him goodnight and he said “I’m going to hide my tooth. I’m going to pick a really tricky place and if the tooth fairy is real, she’ll know where it is. She’ll be able to find it no matter what.” 

I have to say, I was a little panicked. What was I going to do – comb through his room in the dark at 11 pm trying to find this little thing? It didn’t seem likely that I would. I didn’t respond right away and Ashton said “Will she be able to find it? She’ll find it if she’s real right?”

“Do you think she’s real? What do you think?”

[pause]

“I think the tooth fairy is you.”

And we just looked at each other and I knew it was the right time. I said, “You’re right honey, I am.” And he responded by hugging me. I could have melted. And then he said “What about the easter bunny? You know there were a lot of things this year that had me wondering. Like, I saw Ariane hiding the eggs for Ainsleigh in her yard. The Easter Bunny is supposed to do that but maybe Ariane is the Easter Bunny for Ainsleigh. Are you the Easter Bunny for us?”

“Yes I am.”

“Okay.” [thinks] “You know, my biggest question is about Santa. And Pete. Are you Santa?”

[pause – ahhhh!]

“Yes honey, me and Daddy are.”

“You move Pete every night?”

“Yes.”

“Where is he right now?”

“Oh, well sweetie he is in the basement with all the Christmas stuff.”

His eyes opened so wide, like he could hardly consider this a possibility.

“All those years, when we weren’t supposed to touch him, I never did Mommy. But I could have?”

“You could have.”

“And nothing would have happened!”

“Nope.”

“WOW…” and he smiled really big. “I can’t wait to hold him! Wow, Pete! Really, wow!”

It was the sweetest conversation. I told him the truth about everything. Surprisingly Pete was the biggest focus. “So Pete doesn’t bring us pajamas, you do?” “The notes Pete left, you wrote those?” “When Pete didn’t move a couple of times, you just forgot?” He’s very beloved in our house 🙂 He asked about how I did this photo from two Christmasses ago: 

And I told him. He smiled. And hugged me again.

“So, the tooth fairy, the Easter Bunny, and Pete. And Santa. Wow.” and then, “Wait. Thanksgiving is just Thanksgiving right? There’s nothing to know about that is there? That’s just great on its own?” 

“Yes, Thanksgiving is great on its own.”

We kept talking, about how Alex didn’t know and so many other kids don’t know, (meanwhile Alex is SHOUTING from his bedroom that I hadn’t kissed him goodnight yet and what was I DOING in Ashton’s room for so long) and I whispered to Ashton that he was on our team now to keep the secret. He liked this very much. I said there is so much magic, just because Santa isn’t real doesn’t make Christmas any less special. Christmas will still be a wonderful time, and you can help! He said, “Oh I’m going to use Pete to play so many tricks on Alex! I have so many ideas, it’s going to be great!” 

He just kept sighing, and smiling and shaking his head, and telling me a few stories about how he found Santa’s wrapping paper and tags, how he saw a present that Alex ended up getting from Santa, etc. So, he knew in his heart but I think wasn’t ready to truly find out until that moment last night. It was something I will never forget – a rite of passage in every child’s life.

Of course, the tooth fairy did still come. I knew Alex would ask and I didn’t want Ashton to feel entirely grown up. But there are, of course, some secrets parents keep to themselves 😉

My my, Alex is eight years old. He’s got a mouth full of holes, a chipped tooth, and his most defining characteristic continues to be his hair. 

Affectionately known (not by me) as the “mohawk mullet”. 

So what do we say about Alex. For starters, he is probably the smartest person in our family. It does not make him nice. In fact Alex is kind of edgy and has quite the temper and attitude. In the mornings, I never know what side of the bed he is going to get up on (one time he claimed he was up all night. He said “You know, the closest I got to sleeping was blinking, Mommy” and stated that he should probably have a later bedtime. Ha! I don’t think so.). 

How about another example? Sure. So not long ago I stopped and got donuts. They were out of the kind Alex likes (strawberry frosted) so I purchased a regular glazed. When he arrived home from hockey, I gave it to him and held my breath. Here’s what happened.

Anyway, as Alex is more touchy than I would like, I got him a punching bag for his birthday thinking it would help LOL.

Temper aside, he was very excited about the gloves 🙂

When Alex isn’t stomping around, he’s actually quite funny. And sarcastic. He thinks nothing of telling adults what the real deal is and can make a joke out of anything. His teacher is his hero and probably the one person he reveres besides himself and his grandparents. Alex is quite the showman too and for this personality trait I got him a microphone.

Ashton takes it all in stride thankfully. As a brother, Alex does like to use his fists and there is a fair amount of shoving, laughing that turns to crying, indignation, and argument over resources (i.e., parent attention) but overall they are super tight.

Anyway, here are a few more recent photos of Alex as he has hit 8 years old. 

Don’t let this last one fool you. The boy does ZERO chores and I was indulging him because he claimed he was so good at cleaning he was going to start a service. I said, “Well that would be nice to have. What is your rate?” and he said “Obviously, 10 out of 10.”

“I meant, what do you charge?”

“Oh. Probably too much for you to pay actually.” And promptly quit. Sigh. 

(Haha, I looked up last year’s 7 year old post and there is a specific line that says “You might be Alex if ‘your chore chart is empty. You have literally no chores as you’ve decided the money isn’t worth it.’ “

Everything in that 7 year old post is still true.

Up next: His first communion. And he was asked to be the gift bearer at the mass which should be interesting…

Well everyone there is not a better time than March to relive our Christmas spectacular. Although this post hasn’t happened yet because there is not much to relive. SPOILER ALERT:

Letters and cookies and decorating more things. The usual business.

The boys were still very into Pete our elf. Although he’s becoming more high maintenance as they are requesting that Pete maybe do funny things and get into trouble in the letters they leave for him. I guess elves in other houses have made a reputation for themselves SO, the best I could do was have Pete bring a friend over (Cherry Cinnamon from next door). The boys just about had a heart attack when they saw there were two. And of course Cherry brought some kind of magic where you put tic tacks in sugar and they grow into candy canes overnight.

Behold, the following photo with the results:

How many days would that have to sit on the counter, be moved around, spilled and “replanted” before you considered it really annoying? 

That’s rhetorical.

Changing the subject, I very much like to decorate my Christmas card envelopes differently every year. I chose washi tape this time around and WHOA was it a hit with the boys. Yards and yards wasted, but…they spent HOURS “helping”. The holiday season is about making sacrifices isn’t it? Refer to comment above about open glasses of sugar on the counter in a very busy area.

So cute though 🙂

Then cute becomes intense. (Kari show this picture to Callie, it’s her flamingo key chain that Alex spent a lifetime wrapping LOL)

I’m feeling the need to advise the 3 other readers here on the flamingo back story. Which is that Alex went to Hobby Lobby on December tenth, saw this at the checkout, and proclaimed Callie just had to have it. Like, as a present. 

Callie has now duly received said Flamingo so Kari, comment below on its status. Most 7 year olds don’t have keys so…no expectations 😉

Which brings us to Christmas Eve. In addition to wrapping the glorious gift above, Alex also spent a tremendous amount of time making a Lego version of Santa’s sleigh in preparation for Santa’s visit.

One of those creations where you find yourself laughing in surprise at how good it is.

Anyway, here’s the Christmas morning picture.

And the rest is history. Lots of blurry photos and paper everywhere. It was about 11 am that we found out Jason was positive and everything stopped in their tracks. We spent 5 days home as a family (HOME home) and that was a wrap. The boys and I never got it – Jason didn’t isolate from us in the house and we tested repeatedly, so maybe vaccines work after all 😉 I’ll take good health as my Christmas present any day. xoxox

 Hi guys, this post is for me so I can make this note and come back to it later. Ashton had his allergy testing/skin pricks today for the first time in a couple of years. Of note, the cashew allergy seems to have developed and the egg wheal is now bigger than the sesame one! But size does not indicate severity of a reaction, only the certainty that there WILL be a reaction if ingested. Dr. Lee said some kids take until age 16 to grow out of their egg allergy so it could still happen. The sesame and nuts, not likely. Ashton eats walnuts and cashews and his mouth fills with saliva, he pulls at his ears and feels quite sick. The last time he reported his chest tightening and no joke I was thisclose to an epi but the Benadryl kicked in and he was ok. So we are going to start to steadfastly avoid those. He has never liked peas, even super young he claimed they made his mouth itchy but we thought he was just trying to get out of eating them. Fast forward to today, anything with pea protein (which is actually a lot of things, included Reduced Fat Skippy) makes his mouth very itchy. So that’s officially documented now too. The only tree nut he is not allergic to at all is pistachio, and he does seem to tolerate almonds and hazelnuts and he is to keep eating those.

Poor Ashton, he was very uncomfortable this morning. No bloodwork needed as the reactions were clear enough that he is not eligible for any food challenges.

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!