c'est ma vie: Regattas & Pumpkin Floats

Foggy morning corn maze on a no-school day!

Another week of separation down and we're now racing the clock against decent Fall weather before the real cold hits. Bryon didn't get back from Louisiana until late on Saturday night but we still made a point to enjoy our entire Sunday as a family. The destination? Cambridge, MA.

It's the home of Harvard and MIT, and you can feel that the instant your feet hit the pavement. One walk down a main drag and we were surrounded by students, bookshops, art, music and plenty of good food. But the real reason we chose to see Cambridge on this particular Sunday was the 2016 Head Of The Charles River Regatta. This regatta has been around since 1965 and draws hundreds of thousands of rowers. We walked across a bridge and planted ourselves on the banks of the Charles River and soaked it in. (Now, I'm not well versed in crew terminology, so forgive me if I use any of the following terms incorrectly.) Bryon and I thoroughly enjoyed watching the racing shells speed by, especially listening to each cox (person responsible for pace-setting, steering, etc.) coordinate the power and rhythm of the team. Most of the races we saw were coxed fours (4 people, each with 1 oar) with the 5th person (the "cox") in the nearly laying within the bow (as opposed to sitting upright at the stern). It was funny for Bryon and me to imagine competing a race where you face backwards the entire time!

Although we were content to sit and watch for hours, we knew our time was up when Maksim and Deklan became more interested in trying to coax the nearby geese out of the water than viewing the actual races. So, off to Boston Common we went.

I'd brought the boys' Halloween costumes (both firefighters) along because there was an annual "Pumpkin Float" held at the Boston Common Frog Pond that evening. On our walk to the Frog Pond, we passed a fire station and the firefighters just loved seeing our 2 boys dressed up in full gear! The funniest thing was that when we stopped at "Saus" - a restaurant I'd been set on scoping out - a few blocks down the way, the building had been evacuated and the fire alarm was echoing. Although it was a false alarm, the SAME firefighters we'd just met got a good laugh when they showed up and our 2 little firefighters had beat them to the scene!

Ladder drills.

The Pumpkin Float had a great turnout! Attendees were welcome to bring their own carved pumpkins to be placed on a foam board and set out to float on the pond. Hundreds of pumpkins were delivered! The boys had a blast playing at the playground, dancing to music and people/Halloween costume watching - which was awesome because we were able to relax on a blanket in the park overlooking the pond and avoid the crowded lines for vendor booths and candy giveaways. Maks' favorite costumes included an adult sized Ninja Turtle and adult Werewolf. We stayed just until the sun set so that we would see the pumpkins floating in the darkness on the water (it was too dark for decent photos!) and then called it a night!