Sunday Funday Hike

Before I start saying lots of words, just take a second and look at this beauty: 

The light on the mountains is just so incredible in the morning. Really captured the awesomeness of this view. I feel so calm and happy in NH. These pictures help to capture why. 

After our big day of Storyland, we were up early (as usual). Mike helped me get the car mostly packed up and the boys ready before he headed back to Massachusetts for soccer. The boys and I headed north for some hiking.

Now this was my first time hiking with the boys "solo." It's a pretty amazing time in our lives that I'm able to do this sort of thing now. Dylan is getting so independent and Cade is following right in his footsteps. Cade still needs momma a good amount but not having 2 kids completely dependent on me on every moment means I'm getting braver about the adventures I can handle alone with them. And by alone, I mean not by myself. We met up with Mike's Aunt Kathy, cousin Gretchen and her son Derek for the adventure. But let's be real, kids only will "let" parents help so I went in expecting that.

On our drive to Storyland and back the previous day, I'd pointed out the mountain to Dylan and showed him what we would be climbing the next day. There were lots of visible rocks. Dylan repeated over and over that he didn't like climbing rocks. He didn't want to climb rocks. Well, guess what his new favorite thing is:

Climbing rocks!

He scaled those things like a champ and I had to keep reminding him not to get too far ahead of me. He told me over and over the rest of the day that climbing rocks is his favorite thing! Cade did great too but his little limbs still needed lots of assistance.

The mountain where we met up is one we'd done before. Except the first time we just took the loop over the bluffs and didn't go to the peak of the mountain. In any case, being familiar with it, knowing it was in the realm of possibility for my kids to do and being just north of our place in NH and a little south of Kathy's place in NH (she's only lived there a short time) and Gretchen's place in Vermont, it was a good place to meet.

And it has spectacular views for the effort.
You can see the slopes of Cannon Mountain ski area here.

Hiking Boys
Dylan, Derek Cade
(Aren't they all so cute carrying their own backpacks?!?!)

Studs

Me and My Handsome Boys
(Don't worry mom, it only looks like were close to a steep cliff...we were in a safe spot, I promise.)

Just Gorgeous!

Cuties in Backpacks

It was a ridiculously beautiful fall day....perfect for hiking! And to get to spend time with Gretchen, Kathy and Derek was a rare and wonderful treat. We'll see them again at Thanksgiving in a couple of weeks but definitely hope to have more hiking dates. It was great fun!

Gretchen, Kathy and cute Bruin

Doggy Bruin is very attached to his boy, Derek. Now since my boys call for a fairly slow pace and Derek is a very experienced hiker, he was usually leading the pack. If he got more than a couple of feet from Bruin (which was often), Bruin would whine. Cade's phrase of the day was "doggy sad, doggy sad!" So he would try to make dog happy by patting him and offering him some water.

Here he is offering Bruin a drink from his camelback.

Dylan personally requested his picture with this cool rock.

View to Franconia Notch

When we got to the bluffs, we stopped for a snack. Dylan and Cade found a great cave in which to dine.

Derek, Gretchen and Bruin

Boys on a Big Rock

It was really just a perfect day. The hike took a little longer than planned and we had a full day ahead of us which made a few things rushed later on, but the morning was just wonderful. Great weather, great company, fantastic views. For the record, no photo doctoring of any kind was performed on any of the pictures in this post.

Snowy Lafayette

This was our "yay we did it" picture in the parking lot.

After we said our goodbyes, the boys and I hit the road, grabbed some quick grub then made the 2 hour drive back home and went straight to a birthday party. The boys stayed there, Mike and I went back to the house, unloaded the car, then packed up again to head downtown for our big overnigt anniversary celebration in Boston. Our friends brought the boys home until the babysitter could take over. 

As for us, we had a great night in Boston. It ended up being not much of a story to tell. I guess we're boring like that now. Short walk to a nice, long, leisurely and delicious dinner. Bellies were too full and we were too tired to do anything else. But actually being able to have uninterrupted conversations is kind of a big deal in our lives right now. As is being able to laze around in bed in the morning....even though sleeping late isn't really possible for us anymore. It was a nice getaway to end a great, long weekend.

Storyland 2014

Well I am in full Thanksgiving prep and, if I'm being honest, already thinking a lot about Christmas (decorations, gifts, etc.). This morning we woke up to our first snow on the ground. The boys were really excited to play in it. Dylan wanted to as soon as he got home from school. Cade kept saying "snowman, snowman!" It was unfortunate that we had to explain to them that 1) there was not enough snow on the ground to make a snowman and 2) it will have melted by the time you get home from school. However, I also got to tell Dylan about growing up with Texas and having really infrequent snow and how it's not the same here - we will mostly definitely be getting snow again soon so he won't have to wait long to play in it more.

Anyway, that was my long way of saying fall is on it's way out and winter is on it's way in. I love fall so much and it's the perfect season to hike and play outdoors in NH. So, to commemorate the end of the season, I thought I'd recap one of the best weekends we spent in it.

Mid October, we headed up to our place in NH Friday night. Bright and early Saturday morning, we headed even further north to Storyland. We've been there a couple of times with Dylan and once when Cade was about 6 months old. It's an amusement park for younger kids. And we were there for it's last weekend of the season.

Waking up to this view never gets old.

On our last visits, we've started going through the park counter clockwise. We mixed things up this time and started clockwise. It was a fun thing we did too because we started in an area of the park we'd actually never gotten to. The kids were always tuckered out by that point. We started in Storybook village where it's basically like a big playground based on kids stories. The kids loved it and we spent quite a bit of time there.

The Talking Treehouse

Mary Had a Little Lamb Schoolhouse (complete with lambs in a pen outside)

Little Miss Muffet's Tuffet and Spider

Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater's House

Dylan was getting creative with his poses.

Eating Blackbird Pie

One, Two, Buckle My Shoe

Little Sambo

We finally had to encourage them out of the area so we would hit a few rides before lunch. First up, we went on a leisurely pirate cruise (which Dylan claimed was his favorite ride of the day). And so much for rides, it was back to the playground at pirate's cove.

Pirate Ship Selfie

Fire the Cannons!

And then back to more rides. We walked up to the princess castle but the princess wasn't there. So I took a turn on her throne. Then we road back down the hill in the pumpkin (complete with floating horses).

That was all we had time for before our stomachs started growling and we grabbed some lunch.

Lovely View of the Foliage

What's better after a meal than a roller coaster and a spinning ride? Pretty much nothing! Dylan opted out of the roller coaster so Cade and I went on it together. Whether he liked it or not is up for debate. Then we went on the Clockenspeil which is a spinning ride through a cuckoo clock. Pretty cool concept. Only problem, I just don't enjoy spinning like I used to. I think one or both of my pregnancies screwed that up for me. Mike didn't get to spin the boys nearly as much as he would have liked to.

This water ride was closed but Dylan got a big kick out of exploring all the "ancient Egyptian treasures."
He said he was "opening the tomb" here.

We pushed through Cade's nap time and he wasn't happy with us about it some moments. He kept saying he didn't want to ride the rides but I got proof that he actually enjoyed some of them.

Smiles on the Balloon Ferris Wheel

Whale of a Good Time

By far the most fun the boys had during the tired afternoon was in the Loopy Lab and the Submarine. The Loopy Lab is essentially a big foam ball pit dome with all kind of suction and shooting based toys. Cade and I stayed on the ground level for the most part. Cade was enamored with the ball vaccuum. Put a ball in front of it and it sucked it right up. But he would only use blue balls. He would spend a lot of time hunting around and collecting the "right" color to use. I think he could have stayed there for hours...he absolutely loved it. Dylan and Mike headed up to the second level where they found a ball gun and tried shooting at Cade and I. Then we had a good old fashion whole family ball battle where we all tried to pummel each other. Good fun.

Even though it was a cool day, the Submarine play ground was still shooting out water. We were able to avoid the water for the most part. The boys had a great time exploring.

Diver Dylan

Cade could not get enough of the submarine. He ran laps back and forth in that thing and kept yelling "fire the cannon" over and over.

Cade the Diver

As we were wrapping up our play here, I heard someone call my name. I looked up and saw one of my coworkers and his family (small world). We hung out with them for a bit and all rode a ride together. At that point, our kids were exhausted and the park was close to closing. So we headed home for dinner and an early bed time for all. But, on the way home, we did stop to take some pictures of a beautiful place that's close to our hearts - the Mount Washington Hotel. It's where Mike proposed to me almost 9 years ago.

That red roof against Mount Washington is always a stunning sight.