Each year, we’ve taken a trip to the Boston area to visit our friends. Well, originally, they were Cyndi’s friends from MIT. Well, actually, they were Cyndi’s college roommates from MIT, but we all married our MIT college sweethearts and had children. During college, I was sort of adopted by them, since I spent so much time at Cyndi’s dorm.
   Anyway, some of you might remember them from our wedding in Florida: Justyna(Polish) and Vadim(Russian), and their kids Doran(9) and Danika(13); Tricia(Americanese) and John(Vietnamese), and their kids Andy(3) and David(8); and Christine(white American) and Tony(African American), no kids yet; and there’s us, a blend of Mexican, Irish, Italian. Overall, a pretty diverse set, and we are glad that all the kids get along and enjoy each other.
   It’s a evening and a day’s drive to Boston, and we always arrive about 7pm, where dinner is waiting as are the large group of friends. The kids have known each other since they were babies, and have forged strong friendships. The grownups share all sorts of funny and scary stories about parenthood and the previous year, and there is much drinking of Koolaid and card playing and soaking in the hot tub.
   We stay and spend a lot of time in Justyna’s house in Acton. Although we usually spend at least one day being slugs and doing generally nothing, we usually go somewhere together, like Boston, a science museum, etc. This year, Eddie and Vadim and John took the bigger kids skiing at Wachusett Mountain, about 30 minutes away. We had dinner at Tricia’s house in Arlington, with John’s home made pizza, where the kids played with a very large collection of legos, played hide and seek, and produced general chaos; Tricia is very good for chaos. Tricia gave us a personal presentation of her extensive historic embrodery work at the Plimoth Plantation. The older kids are now playing their own card games, and even joined the adults for a few rounds of Pinochle. And, of course, there was the amazing trip to the Flying Trapeze school, decribed in a previous entry.
   Here are a few pics of this year’s trip:

Dinner out with Tricia, Vadim and Justyna

Danika, Adam and Aaron playing cards

Doran and Arianna playing with Doran’s birthday present, Star Wars Lego Imperial Cruiser

Eddie and the boys skiing