A Family Week

Karen arranged her vacation days so that on the weeks that she normally has Tuesday and Wednesday off followed by a Saturday and Sunday (in the following week; her week starts on Saturday), she ends end with six consecutive days off to spend with the family. It only happens three times during the boys' 13-week summer vacation, and last week was one of those weeks.

It was the last week of the boys' swimming

lessons. They each took three weeks at Brewster Beach brushing up their skills and doing very well. Lessons started at 9:40 and went for half and hour, so our excursions for the first three days of Karen's vacation started in the late morning.

On Tuesday we visited a farm museum, the Remick, up in Tamworth. The boys were particularly fascinated by the new litters of pigs. You should have heard Danny when the docent told us that these pigs were for sale. "Danny, you see the mother pig?"

"Yes."

"If we buy one of those little piglets, it will grow to be as big as her."

"I meant we could keep it in our back yard." Sigh. Needless to say we are not add

ing a piglet to our menagerie any time soon.

Karen's favorite part of the day was the tour of the Remick house, with an interesting mix of antique and modern furnishings. The house is from the 19th Century, but it was used until the 1990s.

Since Tamworth is, sort of, right on the way to Sandwich, we decided to stop at the Sandwich Creamery for ice cream. It's way off the beaten path (they sell most of their dairy products to markets and restaurants), but worth the trip. The ice cream is self-serve on the honor system. We has black raspberry chocolate chip.

Wednesday was a short trip to the Wright Museum, a local museum dedicated to the World War II years. The boys, of course, got interested in all the military hardware, but Karen and I were more fascinated by the displays showing a little of what life was like during the war years. Of particular interest was a series of signs showing relative costs of everyday goods.

In 1942 you could buy a new house for about twice the average household income. Where can you find a new home today for that?

Thursday was a laid-back beach day and the last days of the swimming lessons. On Friday we made our annual trek to Storyland.

This trip was a little special, though. In addition to our favorite rides and the Royal Hanneford Circus, we stopped to have dinner with Thomas, who is now living in North Conway, just a little south of Storyland.

We had a little adventure, too; in the rush to get kids out of the car and make sure we had everything at the park, Karen left her cell phone on top of the car. It stayed there all day, still unnoticed, and fell off the car at 40 miles per hour on Route 16. After we picked up Tom, we went back to retrieve the pieces, hoping at least to recover the pictures off the memory card.

What we found was the intact phone, lying on the side of the road flipped open, and completely functional. I never would have guessed!

A busy, fun week for everyone. Now Karen is back to work, I'm still searching for work, and the opening date of Almost, Maine looms large on my calendar. And so back to work!