Anniversary Beach Party Weekend

We had a surprisingly good weekend. Scott was scheduled to work one of his looong shifts on Saturday and into Sunday morning, but when his surgery team found out it was our wedding anniversary on Saturday, they told him not to show up. Scott actually wanted to go in for a few hours to see a cool skin grafting surgery, but he was threatened with a bad grade if he dared show up on his anniversary. So we got Scott for a whole weekend!

We had our anniversary date on Friday night because we'd already lined up a sitter and we didn't know that Scott would be free until Friday. I met Scott at the hospital and we walked to a really yummy pizza place (one that we'd gotten pizza at for one of our first dates in Boston). We ordered a pizza and took it to the Esplanade, a park by the river in Boston. We ate pizza while watching the sun set and then took the train to Harvard Square for fancy cholesterol-filled desserts at Finale.
On Saturday, I'd planned to hang out with my track club since I'd thought Scott would be working. I did a cross country workout with some fast ladies, and then went to a club beach party. The fam came along and hiked during the workout and then partied at the beach. Phoebe loves digging her fingers and toes into the sand. We've been to the beach a few times this year and each time, she gets hyper and crazy on the beach and then naps wonderfully afterward.
Bruce did his usual beach routine: build piles of sand, dig ruts to make little rivers by the shore, and collect cool rocks.

Happy Anniversary Scottie the Hottie!

Bridge of Flowers 10K

Last weekend I ran a race: the Bridge of Flowers 10K, which served as the USATF New England 10K Championship. Scott was working one of his epic 30-hour shifts, so I brought the kids along and my coach babysat them while I raced. The course was awesome! The first two miles had a few tiny hills, then the entire third mile was one humongous hill, and then the last 3.2 miles were downhill or flat. The hill was killer; perfectly fit runners were stopping and walking left and right. I pressed onward to reach the lone accordion player at the top. My time was terrible, but I was the fifth finisher on my team, so I was happy with that. I'm hoping for a better time at the Tuft's 10K in October.

Signs that a Third Year Med Student lives in the House

1. You find things like this peach in the trash can. Nice stitches!

2. There is a pile of blue scrubs on the floor. When Scott came home and saw us for the first time after our Ohio trip, I went to hug him and he said, "Don't hug me; I'm covered in people's bodily fluids." It was very romantic.

3. There are more textbooks than space on the bookshelf.

4. Scott asked for a scalpel the other day. He meant the tweezers.

5. When I ask what he did in the past 30 hours that I haven't seen him, his stories are much more exciting than mine (and I usually have some good ones!). Last week he held a person's heart, stitched up arms and legs, and did so many appendectomies that he sounds bored by them already.

6. He fell asleep for an hour on the sofa in the church lobby.

7. The other side of the bed is empty by 5 a.m.

8. The fridge looks untouched in the mornings, but ravaged late at night.

9. The pile of New England Journals of Medicine go untouched for weeks at a time.

10. The scriptures and a highlighter sit on the back of the toilet. No time is wasted.

Meet the Stuarts

My parents sent me home with a trunk-load of freshly picked corn. Some of it was for me, but some was for my youngest brother, Ben, who is serving a church mission in Hartford, Connecticut. Because Ben is supposed to stay focused on sharing the good word, he isn't allowed to contact family by phone or in person. He does send a weekly mass email that tells about his experiences as a missionary. Recently his emails have been telling about the Stuarts, a family he met and taught and baptized.
It turns out the Stuarts came to Boston this weekend to go to the temple. We met them there and swapped corn and stories of Ben. They took the corn home and cooked it up for Ben. We took a few pictures at our meeting; the temple grounds are gorgeous!

Cousin Camp 2010

The drive was worth it. We stayed and played for a week. We did all the usual events: tractor rides, biking, riding around on the Jeep, visiting relatives, playing with a million Legos in the basement, etc.
And then we went to Cousin Camp, which was held at a "cabin" in southern Ohio. The "cabin" was more like a mansion or compound. It was a huge house with 7 bedrooms and 4 bathrooms, a movie theater, an enormous kitchen, and a swimming pool outside. Our crew filled the place: 8 of my siblings were there along with their spouses and 26 kids!



We spent a lot of time in the pool, but also did lots of hiking, playing, watching family videos, cooking, and hanging out.

And now we are Here

This weekend my parents are hosting a "Cousin's Camp." They did one last summer, which we missed. I wasn't sure we'd make it this summer with Scott's crazy schedule, my job hunt, and a few states between us and camp.

But we made it.

Thanks to Phoebe giving me adequate sleep on Wednesday night, we drove out early Thursday morning and made an epic roadtrip across a few states. Scott had to work, so it was just me, Bruce, and Phoebe. There were a lot of rest stops, gas stops, screaming child stops, and even a McDonald's Play Place stop. We made it after 12.5 hours in the car.

Cousin Camp 2010 starts tomorrow! And now ALL of the cousins will be there!

Maine Event

This week was Scott's vacation, so we took full advantage by packing the week with fun activities (after a little work on Monday). We went to a 10-mile race on Tuesday night. Scott took the kids to a McDonald's Play Place while I ran up and down hills along the shores of Newburyport. My goal was to run under 7-minute pace, and I made it with a 6:48 pace. I felt awful afterward (lost my dinner, got a big blister...), but it felt good to push the pace harder than I have been.
After the race, we drove north to a cabin in Maine. Friends of ours invited us to come to the cabin with them; we happily obliged.
Phoebe was happy to be outdoors, crawling around in the dirt at least half of every day.
Here's the cute A-frame cabin we stayed in. It had plenty of space, a fully stocked kitchen, and even a bathroom. This was the view when we woke up in the morning. We were right on a lake, surrounded by trees. We did a lot of relaxing. We discovered that Phoebe has a thing for rocking chairs.Daddy's girl?The cabin was next to a set of train tracks. A diesel engine and a few passenger cars went by four times a day. The kids were in heaven. Bruce loved swimming in the lake with noodles.He and Scott and I swam out to a floating dock a few times. Bruce loved goofing off, especially when he had his audience of friends around.We explored the neighborhood with a short hike down the road. We picked blackberries and raspberries along the way. We went kayaking to an island on the lake, and picked lots more blueberries there. Phoebe played hard, and slept well too. She's growing up: she slept all through the night last night. 8 p.m. to 6 a.m. Glorious! Like me, she is much happier when she gets her sleep. Phoebe has two teeth on the bottom now, and chews on her tongue constantly (along with anything else she can get to her mouth). When we came home from Maine, we continued the fun. Bruce and I went to an outdoor movie on Friday night - Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs - and we all went to a beach on Saturday.

Now that we've had our R&R, let the surgery rotation begin.