Connecticate

One of the things I like about this time of year is that not every day is spoken for. From summer through Christmas it seems like every day is part of a countdown to a big goal or deadline, culminating with the vast unwrapping at 7 am on December 25th. But in winter, you don’t feel like you’re “wasting” great weather (because you didn’t have great weather plans), you don’t feel like you’re on deadline, you don’t need to get projects started, and following all the winter planning you did, you don’t really have anything planned.

So it was with great surprise that about two weeks ago I noticed we had a three day weekend coming up. “Hey!” I thought. “Lookie! A three day weekend!” After verifying that my brother was not up for visitors that weekend, I started to think about other things I might like to do. It occurred to me that the last time I brought Grey to our Alma Mater (Connecticut College, in New London), I was still nursing him. And I read this book by Susan Cooper which referenced Mystic Seaport. And then I read a great book to Grey about the Mary Celeste (a book which I would recommend to other parents of budding deductive reasoners!). So I got into a nautical mood and decided a trip to the Mystic Seaport was the thing. I found a hotel room for like $62 dollars, and decided to make a weekend of it. (Thane was very excited to go to Connecticate. His pronunciation was so charming I could hardly bring myself to correct it!)

We started off Sunday morning. I would say bright and early, but I’d be lying. How about bright and middlin?! We stopped to see the boys Great Aunt & Uncle, whom we haven’t seen in perhaps two years. And we made it to Conn in time to check out Harkness Chapel, walk around the Arboretum Pond, and facilitate our children rolling down a small hill for nearly 45 minutes. Then we went to Norm’s diner (Rosie’s having, apparently, been closed down and replaced by a Five Guys) and then to our hotel room where our children proceeded to not sleep. Ah! Vacations!

The Mystic Seaport was cool. By all rights, it should have been frigid out there on the water in mid-February. But we lucked into a sunny 40+ degree day, so while it was by no means warm, it was bearable. We checked out the Charles W. Morgan and got a special presentation on the kids who had lived on board the ship. The boys wielded hot glue guns with abandon, enthusiasm and little regard for seaworthiness as they constructed balsa wood boats. We took a horse drawn carriage ride. We played some cool instruments in the cool instrument exhibit. To sum up: a good time was had by all. After checking out a few more of our old haunts (and after Adam pawed threw many of the very same supplements he forebore to buy from Citadel back when we were students over a decade ago) we once again wended our weary way north to every day lives.

All of this is a boring description to explain all the pictures I’m about to post. Half the fun of outings like this is to take great pictures that, in retrospect, make it seem like life is full of cool adventures and fun things together as a family.

And you know what? There are cool adventures and fun things!

Here are the pictures!