deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum

Every summer Friday, five attractions in the Boston area offer free admission.  I love it.  We recently took advantage of the deCordova Sculpture Park and Museum's free Friday.  The offerings of the deCordova are, well, a little strange, for my taste, but it's a beautiful setting for gamboling about and it was free!

Here's some Frances gamboling.  She picked out the flower herself.

This is one of the tamer sculptures.  Frances and I liked it quite a bit.

And then we retreated to the snack bar for some drinks.  This heat is killing us!  (I am aware of the multiple layers of irony there, just so you know.)

Thirty-Two Months of Toddler Frances (and Hyannis, MA)

I know Frances and I had just come home from Maine, but we needed a little vacation for the three of us.  Plus, sleeping in air-conditioning sounded really good.  I thought Hyannis, Massachusetts, sounded nice (Hyannis = Kennedys = beautiful homes to ogle, right?) and it had cheap hotel rooms, so we headed off.  On the way, we stopped in Heritage Museums and Gardens in Sandwich, Massachusetts.  It was lovely, highly recommend it to any locals.

We started in their car collection, housed in a reproduction of the round barn at the Hancock Shaker Village, which is also near and dear to our hearts.  Frances was impressively interested in the old cars, but her favorite was this car she was allowed to touch.

This could easily be my favorite water feature ever - just a very simple water trough that spilled out into a lily pond.  Frances liked all the larvae in the pond.  To each her own.

Eat your heart out, John Singer Sargent...O.k., maybe not, but close.

We were momentarily lost on the garden's trails, but it was not a bad place to be lost.  

There was also a Norman Rockwell collection (which we skipped, I'll admit) and a carousel (which we rode many, many times, but it's hard to get a good picture on a carousel).

We finished up in the children's area, which was almost worth the trip all by itself.  It included xylophones, drums, a tree house, crafts, plants to water, and more.  It was well worth braving the light drizzle coming down.

A final shot of Frances in the gardens.

Then we traveled on to Hyannis, but it turned out to be, well, a tourist-trap, to put it nicely.  Apparently, the Kennedys hung out in Hyannisport, but we wore ourselves out looking for nice parts of Hyannis and never made it to Hyannisport.  It was still a very needed get-away.  We all loved the gardens, Frances loved the hotel pool and Mark and I loved sleeping in air-conditioning.  We did stop on the way home and buy a window unit.

The pictures above were taken on Frances's Thirty-Two Months Birthday, so I'll do my little run down.

• Favorite reads: Still Curious George, but I found some more modern re-incarnations of George at the library and they're preferable to the originals.  Much shorter, but I'm still waiting for the man with the yellow hat to realize George is not going to be a good little monkey and stay out of trouble.
• Firsts: School, of course!  She goes all day for four days a week, which is a lot of time, but I think we are happier together when we are together.  I hope she's learning to branch out and I'm getting to do some volunteer work.
• Frequent phrase: Still "Why?" but I've come to realize she asks all sorts of questions all the time.  She'll even ask "What's Frances doing?"  I wish I could count the number of questions she asks a day.  I bet we've had days of up to 100 questions.  Sometimes I don't even notice it, but other times I get very worn out.  A typical conversation sounds like this:
• Frances: What's that?
• Me: A red car.
• Frances: Why?
• Me: (deep sigh) Because it's a car and because it's red.
• Frances: What is Frances doing?
• Me: Putting on Band-Aids.
• Frances: Why?
• Me: (deep sigh) I dunno, kiddo.  Is it fun?
• Frances: Yeah.  What's that noise? etc.

         I try to keep the sighs in check, but sometimes it's hard.

• Names:  Frances has figured out that her name is Frances Upton and that mine isn't.  This is a little bothersome to her because she wants to be alike in as many ways possible.  For example, it gives her great pleasure when we all wear stripes or flowers, although she hasn't caught daddy wearing flowers yet and probably never will.  And she thinks it's great fun to tell me that my name is Frances.  A few times, she's told me my name is Morgan Upton, but she doesn't seem too traumatized that it isn't.  If she ends up emotionally scarred by the difference in our last names, all those folks who asked Mark why I didn't change my name can feel justified.  I'm not holding my breath.

When your dad is six foot six

Good ol' Dad

July 4th!

We had grand plans to visit one of the Harbor Islands on July 4th, but it was not to be.  The U.S.S. Constitution was turning around and that shut down any extraneous boating in the harbor.  Luckily, Boston is a great place to find oneself on July 4th; it never fails to entertain.

We started off at this excellent fountain.  It has mist and plumes of water.  It reminded me of a whale.  I asked Mark if it was supposed to make us think of whales and Boston's whaling history.  He didn't think so.

I wanted to run across it.  Frances did not.

Next, we went to Faneuil Hall.  Good ol' mom went for coffee.  Frances went to spill milk (hence, the shorts) and act goofy.

Then, we stumbled upon a military parade which included, I believe, currently serving Marines and reenactors from the Lexington/Concord area.  They take their revolutionary war reenactments seriously around here.  Frances's favorite part was the confetti she picked up after the parade.

Finally, we ended up at a memorial to Benjamin Franklin's parents, Josiah and Abiah Franklin, in the Granary Burying Ground in downtown Boston.  Frances liked all the pennies scattered around the memorial.  The only explanation I can find for the pennies is Benjamin Franklin's "A penny save is a penny earned," although that's not what he said and he isn't buried here.  We discouraged her from taking any pennies home.

Then it was nap time.  After naps, we grilled some meat, like any good Americans.  Very nice day.

Off to the Big Time

Frances headed off to Copper Beech Montessori at the beginning of July.  She's been looking forward to "my school," as she calls it.  She was particularly pleased with her new backpack and lunch box.  We took these photos moments before walking her across the street to school (yep, if I want to I can watch her in the playground from our house).

I was very nervous about this change.  I would have about 13 emotions about it - per hour.  I ranged anywhere from "I'm a terrible person for abandoning my child!" to "I'm a good mother for giving her the chance to develop the social skills her parents have yet to muster" and everywhere in between.  So far, we all seem to be surviving.  Especially at the beginning, Frances was very enthusiastic.  She kept referring to "my kids" and wondering why they weren't on the playground waiting for her at all times.  Her sleep patterns changed radically, and not for the better, but may be settling down.  Lately, she has been reluctant to let me go in the mornings, but by the afternoon, when I pick her up, she's all smiles and giggles.  Fingers crossed that all continues to go well.

Return to Russell Orchards

Since Mark didn't get to come to Maine with us, he wanted to do something special with Frances (and me, I'm sure) when we got back to Massachusetts.  "Special" to Mark often means Russell Orchard in Ipswich, MA, for berry picking and ice cream.

We checked in on the farm animals and then...

...headed out to the picking fields for some strawberries.

That's a strawberry in Frances's hand.  Can you tell?

Here's Frances on the prowl.

And here's Frances not so much on the prowl anymore.  Like Sal, she planted herself in one spot and worked from there for quite a while.  It was pretty hot in that field, especially after our chilly week in Maine.

Finally, we had some respite from the heat.  A little ice cream (well, a lot of ice cream) and...

...some swishing.  Frances is always up for some swishing, God help us.

Strawberry shortcake for dinner!  (Anybody get the reference?  Anybody?)