Author: kristennill

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!

Nothing like waiting until nearly Presidents Day to post about Christmas. I have a very well-established pattern at this point of being late to the blog. In trying to figure out why, I realize there are two main reasons: first, it is a huge chore to go through the pictures and pick out the right ones. I have well over 100 to sort through and those don’t even include Jason’s. Second, everything feels repetitive. I’m about to show you the same pictures as last year, the year before, etc: us getting our tree, the boys leaving cookies for Santa, and all the in-betweens. If you add the constant activity around here and the fact that we don’t have an office, there also isn’t much quiet time to sit and type. 

But, here we are, and the one main difference this year of course was COVID-19. We knew we would be celebrating just the 4 of us but Jason and I vowed to still make it as special as we could. Miraculously, Ashton still seems to believe in Santa so of course we played that up. Pete came as usual, we did the holiday crafts as usual, and the house looked very festive. We got a great tree and we way overbought on the Christmas presents. Like there was a WALL of gifts, it was actually ridiculous. 

So this was going to be in two parts – most of December and then December 24 and 25th, as those magical days deserve to be on their own. But then I decided, you know what? It’s bloody February, let it go Elsa. Blurry photos of opening presents? Gone. Shots of Jason cooking all the things? Gone. There are 12 days of Christmas – can I post about it in 12 photos?! Pssssh. Buckle up ya’ll.  

1) Getting our tree obvi. We take the same photo every year (hopefully 2020 will be the first and last one with masks!)

2) Our holiday card. 

I’ll admit, I realized the irony after I mailed these out. No one is holding anyone close right now except for those in their immediate household. If you listen to your governor. But anyway, it was super sticky and humid out, we were late for the photo shoot, and we had never used this photographer. All signs pointed to disaster but, I love this photo 🙂

3 and 4) This is super funny. There’s only so many places you can hide presents after your kids learn they can look for them. We actually stuck most of the boys’ gifts in the downstairs shower, literally 2 feet from where they go to the bathroom like a thousand times a day. 

Muah haha. They never suspected.

Yes Ashton has his shirt off a lot. Alex does too actually – supposedly they are “SO HOT”. 

10) Christmas Eve magic

11) And of course Santa came (see the wall of presents?? I told you, it was beyond). 

See the picture on the table? This is the upclose. 

12a)

So what I did was, the night of December 23rd, I snuck in and took pictures of the boys sleeping, being careful not to show their pj’s. THEN, on the 24th, I dropped them into a photo template and sent it to Walmart to get printed. 

12 (b). Santa’s note said:

Nothing like waiting until MLK Day to post about Thanksgiving. Heh. Truth be told, I was several paragraphs into my Christmas post and then realized I had completely missed it (and only because I was scrolling through my photos and saw the turkey). That’s just how things are going.

And the skilled child labor we employed for the apple peeling. I won’t tell you how many times the apples “slipped” into the trash. “OOPS Mommy. Still good, right? Right?”

We turned on the Macy’s Day Parade (well, this year’s version – still festive!) and filled the day by cooking of course.

I did the turkey burn Peloton ride with more than 40,000 other people!

Bloody Mary’s and shrimp and Phase 10:

Um, then whiskey sours…

And then dinner.

We all said what we were thankful for and in the end, talked about how we have so very much. Our plates and hearts were full and these two even tried the green beans.

This and (other Christmas miracles) up next! 

That’s 40. As in, how old I am. Like most posts this year, this one is extremely backdated (it’s actually December 29!). I’ve been 40 for going on 6 weeks already. It’s fine so far? Although lately I’ve seen some pictures of myself and it’s questionable. Like what is this. 

So here I am at age 40, in my heated vest (see above) and the weird wrinkle in my cheek (see above above). I can’t think of a number I’d rather be or a life I’d rather have. So very, very happy 🙂 xoxo

October 31, 2020 was a pretty unique day! Besides the fact that it was a blue moon and we were recovering from a blizzard the day before, it was Ashton’s First Communion! As a CCD teacher (ahem), this means that he was receiving the Sacrament of the Eucharist, the body and blood of Christ, for the first time. Now this is a big deal in the Roman Catholic church and I still remember my first communion, my dress, the white patent leather shoes, and the party afterwards. It usually happens in the Spring but since we were on lockdown basically, it was rescheduled to several Saturdays this fall and Ashton’s was on Halloween. He wore a blazer and tie and generally looked so big I almost couldn’t take it. We had to leave Alex at a friend’s because, no siblings, and the church, although empty, still felt special.

And that was it! No brunch afterwards, no nothing, but a mere 5 hours later and it was time for Halloween! 

Our neighborhood, I will say, really stepped it up. People sat around their firepits in order to greet trick-or-treaters outside and most houses had a table or some other kind of display where kids could take candy in a socially distanced way. We walked around with the Stahls and the kids got a TON of candy – everyone really overcompensated. There was no pizza party or hanging out after, and it was cold, but there was no wind and ended up being quite enjoyable 🙂 

First, our set up. Ooo, a man-eating spider!!

And then the costumes. Alex was a skeleton and Ashton, for the second year in a row, just decided to wear his football outfit.

Notice Jason helping in the background LOL.

And just because this post is feeling a tad lack-luster (for how AWESOME my Halloween posts usually are 😉 ) I’m going to link to Ashton and Alex’s first Halloween as brothers, when everything felt like this.

We are heading back to hockey practices this afternoon after a two week shut-down, but cases are on the rise again here. Add to that, it’s been 5 days and they still haven’t called the presidential election, and things are feeling a bit precarious. Off I go to eat some candy…

Well to state the obvious, summer is long gone. The kids have been in hybrid school for the past month, Halloween decorations are up, and it gets dark at 6 pm. Waaahhhhh. 

But what is there to say about this summer? Covid wreaked havoc on the majority of our vacation plans and the boys didn’t go to a single camp. For several months straight they managed to entertain themselves within the confines of the neighborhood, in our friends’ pool, and wherever their bikes could take them. It was kind of glorious. Yes we had our moments of boredom, but it was a time in our lives unlike any before and I honestly think we made the most of it. The boat helped 😉

Let’s start at Memorial Day weekend and the time we bought a 2000 Chaparral 180 SSE (a little 18 foot motorboat specifically purchased to fit through the tiniest tunnel imaginable. But we’ll get to that). Knowing that a) I was going to be remote all summer b) any plans for activities for the boys were cancelled c) we did not join Longfellow d) the beaches, at the beginning, were closed or at least closed to non-residents and e) there wouldn’t be any parties or events to look forward to, I knew we needed something good. I said Jason, we are simply going to need to buy a boat 😀

So we did! Now, Lake Cochituate is 5 minutes away and has three sections: North Lake, Middle Lake, and South Lake. The boat launch is in Middle Lake but the only place that towables and water sports are allowed is South Lake. And the only way to get there is through this tunnel. 

That one tries to decapitate you. Anyway, once you’ve made it through these tunnels, you are free to tube, waterski, or however you want to recreate. And it’s so so fun. We spent the summer on all three of the lakes, swimming, floating, kneeboarding and generally lazing on the water with select family and friends.

It’s a lot of pictures, friends, because it truly was our entire summer. I’ll save you from the videos 😉

In the middle of the summer there was July 4, and then the rest of July and August was a mish mash of Long Island, a couple trips to Vermont, Ashton’s birthday, some time in our friends’ pool, a few family visits here and there and a lot of hanging out with neighbors and all. 

In no particular order, and sorry it IS a lot, I have got to stop cramming 6 blog posts into one!! 

LASTLY, Labor Day weekend, we went to Martha’s Vineyard for a few days with our neighbors that have become super close friends of ours, the Stahls. It was gorgeous and a perfect way to end it all. Wait, that didn’t come out right. You know what I mean 😉

Along came August 3rd, 2020 (argh yes I’m so behind!) and all of a sudden, our first born was NINE YEARS OLD. Half of this past year he’s basically been in isolation with the exception of one or two friends, which is crazy to say. But it has not affected his energy, curiosity or sweetness. He’s just the best and he’s an amazing older brother. The night of his actual birthday was pretty minimal since we had already had a couple mini family celebrations in New York and Vermont. So we got cupcakes and he got to open a few more presents, one of which was a video camera for making “Youtube videos” 😉 

I had asked the parents of his friends and classmates to make him friendship bracelets and cards and he got a TON of birthday mail as a result (mainly from girls 😉 ). It was really wonderful. But well Alex freaked out, he was SO upset, kept saying it wasn’t fair, etc. etc. He cried and cried and generally had a really hard time that it was Ashton’s birthday and not his. See his face? Grainy picture, but aw.

But then Ashton was Ashton and gave Alex a candle for his cupcake and shared his balloon. 

That really worked out because Alex actually is 6.

Now, without further ado, ASHTON’S STATS!! 

Height: 4 feet 8 inches (!!)

Weight: 72 pounds (!!!)
Vision: 20/20

Clothes size: Boys/Youth M or a 10 (preferably anything Under Armour)

Shoe size: Youth 3 (!!!!) 

Hair: Blond (although in all these pictures, it’s blue -> see Favorite Movie)

Eyes: Blue

Cavities: None. At his cleaning a couple weeks ago the dentist came out and was a bit bewildered. He said “So, Ashton’s teeth are, um, really white. Like, shockingly white for his age.” And when I tell you that comment was the biggest feather I’ve put in my motherhood hat, well you don’t even know lol. Last spring I got one of these and I’ve used it on the boys several times a week since then. I didn’t know when we would ever go back to the dentist! But now we have and Alex came out of the same appointment and announced  “My teeth are so white, I make MILK jealous!” 

Allergies: Eggs, sesame, environmental (dogs, dust mites). This is a bit perplexing I admit. He had his adenoids out last year and he’s on twice daily Rx nasal spray and Claritin and his nose is annoyingly, frustratingly, ALWAYS stuffy. He can never breathe through it without serious effort. His pedi just suggested trying Singulair as even though it’s for asthma, it’s shown to have some benefit for allergies. The only other thing left is immunotherapy and shots. Luckily he doesn’t know the difference but it’s difficult 😦

No fail dinner food: stromboli

Favorite Movie(s): Descendants 1, 2 and 3. These are teeny bopper Disney movies and it pains me to admit, the soundtracks are painfully catchy. And all the characters look like this, hence the boys’ hues.

Favorite Song: Bad Guy by Billie Eilish (obviously he has no idea what she’s saying or what the song means). Also Yummy by Justin Bieber (“He has a really good singing voice Mommy doesn’t he.” But same comment applies luckily haha)

Sports: Under COVID-safe guidelines, he is playing on a flag football team in Newton which he loves so far and he made Squirt C in hockey. 

Religion: Catholic by force but not really very much. CCD is online this year (I am teaching again) and his first communion was postponed from last spring and coming up October 31. Yes that’s Halloween but everything is already such a circus on that day anyway, why not add a sacrament?

How he spends his time: Ashton does love the iPad. He loves to watch Dude Perfect, Lego tutorials and people solving Rubik’s cubes at blistering and unrealistic paces. He wants to have a channel on YouTube Kids (so does Alex, hence the trouble with the camera above) but really what Ashton is best at is digging into things. He’ll have a day where is is totally into paper airplanes. It’s all he’ll do and they will go through 75 sheets of paper, test fly them, color them, time them, talk about why a particular one is so cool, etc. “WATCH HOW FAR THIS ONE FLIES MOMMY!!! WATCH!!!”

Then the next day it will be a yo-yo. He’ll search for videos of tricks, spend the day practicing, obsessing over the string (“Can you please untie this knot again? I can’t yo-yo with a knot!”) and of course complain he needs a new one because the one he has is “for kids”. 

The day after that, Pokemon. Neighborhood boys will come over, there will be trading frenzies, he will file the new ones in his binder, look them up, talk about their power and of course ask me to go buy more. 

The funny thing here is that while these are often one-day fads, he is SO into it that I almost DO go get him a new yo-yo, or a fresh Pokemon pack, or a book on how to fold 15 different kinds of paper airplanes. That’s Ashton – he’s interested and curious and will dive deep. And all his friends (and his brother) follow suit. If the activity of the day is a Nerf war, guess what – he will have every kid in the neighborhood showing up with their guns. He’s a very natural leader but doesn’t intend to be. He just likes what he likes and when he thinks things are SO COOL, it’s so authentic that it’s hard not to agree 🙂 

Final word: Ashton is silly, sweet, and so good. It’s what we always say about him. He’s a genuinely good boy. He doesn’t lie and he doesn’t understand injustice or why anyone would ever be mean. You tell him things and he listens – he hears you and absorbs it. He works hard to understand things he sees or hears that he don’t look or sound right. He cries when he’s frustrated. But after all that, you know he knows, and you can see the wheels turning as he files it away. 

Also, he eats a TON – someone send grocery money.

God Ashton we love you so much!!! Happy 9th honey XOXOXOXOXOXOXOX