The Children's Museum of New Hampshire

The Portsmouth Children's museum reopened its doors at the end of July in Dover under the new name The Children's Museum of New Hampshire. Of course we were there the first weekend. The musuem is where I have had both of Rowan's birthday parties and its holds a very special place in my heart. I also went there as a child and I have many fond memories of the Yellow submarine.

That being said, you can only imagine how heart broken I was to find that the new museum has a very tiny replica of a submarine and it does not have slides or anything fun. I was so upset in fact that I emailed the museum to express my disappointment.

I reiceived a response stating that the yellow submarine, although fun, was unsafe, resulting in many injuries and it also fostered a feeling among the children that running and jumping were ok behaviors through outt he rest of the museum.

Whatever!! Its a flippin Children's museum! Ahh well, i'm obviously not going to win that battle so i've said my goodbyes to the submarine within my heart and i've shed a few tears.

Moving on, the new museum is quite nice. It has many of the same exhibits with a few very neat new ones. My only complaint (aside from the obvious) is that its very open and airy which means that it gets uncontrolably noisey. The old museum was seperated out into rooms so the noise didn't carry quite as far.

I've been back 3 more times since, and I will no doubt have Rowan's birthday party there again this spring.

Happy Ba-day you....

Happy Ba-day you..... That's how Rowan practiced singing happy birthday to her best friend Lily..... she turned 2, yay!!!!

A steaming hot day at the park....

Every year the Prescott park arts festival puts on a play. They build a stage right in the middle of the park and it runs all summer long. This year was Beauty and Beast! I had taken Rowan to a play a few months earlier in a theater downtown Portsmouth so I was sure she'd love it. And would have, had it not been about 90 degrees and as humid as a South American jungle.

Either way, we putz around the Prescott park flower gardens for a while where Rowan could dip her feet into the water fountains, and then we squatted down on a blanket for the performance. The play was fantastic... i felt horrible for the performers as they were all wearing large heavy costumes... I can't even imagine how hot they were!

We didn't stay for the entire thing as it was quite long and frankly we were sweating BLEEPS off. Either way it was a fun day and we enjoyed it. :)

Raspberries and Strawberries.. Mmmmmmm

One of my favorite parts of New England are all the local farms we have. And every summer and fall I make it a point to be sure to hand pick every fruit possible. This summer started off with raspberries and strawberries. Rowan had a great time and she was actually really good at picking.. (and eating) both. In fact at one point, we had so many raspberries she started to smoosh them down with her hands to fit more... yay... hahaha

Here is yet another slide show :)

Oh say can you see!!!!!

I love the 4th of July. Its always been a huge holiday with my family. Everyone packs up and heads to my parents house in Northern NH for a weekend of camping out, drinking (of course) and swimming. My parents live in a very small town.. they've got a nice big yard on a very quiet picturesque road. Its peaceful up there and I miss it.

Anyhow, this year was a smaller affair. My mother was diagnosed with MS this past winter. She's handling it very well but its certainly taken a toll on her ability to move. It takes a lot of work to prepare the house for over 20 guests so she decided this year it would just be us: meaning my parents, my sisters family and of course Rowan Barney and I.

We headed up Thursday evening and stayed over until Sunday morning. Our original plan had been to tent it in the back yard, however after going camping a few weeks earlier we realized how much "stuff" you had to bring for that type of thing, so we decided to sleep in my parents house.

Now, I grew up in this house. We moved there when I was about 6 or 7. However, the house is very very old.. built circa early 1900's. I'd say its about 100 years old or so. We always knew growing up that weird things happened... ie.... spooktacular types of things.. noises, bumps in the night... the occasional hearing of voices etc etc. It never scared me though.. it was my home.. and whatever it was, or whatever "they" were, never felt threatening or scary.

Since we moved out (my sister and I) things have begun to happen more often. My father wakes up often to the floor lamp beside his bed shaking uncontrollably. He has to grab a hold of it to stop it. He hears voices often, as does my mother.

Most recently, my mother had flown to Florida so spend some time with some friends leaving my father home alone. He emptied the dishwasher and then went to watch TV. He came back into the kitchen to find all of the upper cabinets open (even the ones with only food in them). He had had a beer and thought perhaps he just didn't remember leaving them all open, so he closed them and went back to his news channel.
Upon returning a few minutes later, he was greatly disturbed to find that the doors again, were all open.

Upon hearing this story, Barney (the hubby) vowed never to sleep in the house again. He hates ghost stories and anything creepy. He'd already had an uneasy feeling sleeping there and this just added to it.

Anyhow I digress, you can only imagine how hard it was for me to convince him to sleep inside again.

The first night, we had our room all set up. Its a room off the back of my parents house that is most definitly and addition. They keep a couch and a TV back there. We had an air mattress on the floor and Little Miss Rowan was already completely zonked out on the couch.

We got all snuggled into bed, pulled the covers up and had all the lights off.... after a few minutes and at the point where we were just entering sleep.... We heard a noise. A loud one, and a deliberate one, "knock knock knock."

Now I'm not kidding when I say my husband probably jumped out of bed at least 4 feet into the air... he cursed quite loudly... "what the BLEEP was that!!!!". I could hear his heart pounding through his chest.

Now I'm sort of half asleep at this point also, and I could have sworn the noise came from behind us, on the outer walls of the house. I begin concocting explanations as any logical woman would do.."mouse in the wall.. this room is an addition with no slab underneath, maybe its a squirrel or a skunk under the floor boards" etc etc. Of course I know damn well that this noise was not something an animal could do. Its sequential and evenly spaced.. knock knock knock.
He's already up at this point, gathering clothing to pack up and leave... and trying to find the light switch....

After what felt like an eternity, but was really only about 2 or 3 seconds, I hear a giggle.... its my sister. She's behind the door, and she's looking for her necklace that she left laying somewhere...

I almost pissed my pants laughing.... Granted, the knock really did sound like it came from behind us and not in front of us. But my poor husband had a heart attack and thought we were being attacked by some ghostly spirit, when in fact it was my sister merely looking for her jewelry.

We laughed about it the entire weekend, and we would not let him live it down... we still laugh about it actually. Poor poor Barney.

Anyhow, the rest of the weekend was fabulous. We watched the little town parade (two fire trucks and a girl on a horse) and ventured into the towns fair (a bunch of tables selling used crap and one booth selling fried dough).

We also tried to keep Rowan awake for the fire works on Saturday night. We got her all psyched up for them all day long... so she wouldnt' be afraid of the noise. At 9:30 they finally started, and she fell asleep at 9:20. Oh well, maybe next year! hahaha

The Zoo... Again

Barney had things to do one rainy saturday so I packed Rowan up and we headed to the York Zoo in ME for the day to meet up with two friends that also have kids.

It was a fun day... even with the drizzle and the coolness. Rowan has been potty trained now for quite some time so it was our first big outing in big girl undies. She did very well and let me know when she needed to use the potty. :) such a big girl!

At the zoo we saw tons of animals of course (no duh right?). Rowan loved them all expecially the goats because she'd recently learned to say "BAH!!!" haha.. she really wanted to see some cows but alas, there were none.

Another highlight of the day was seeing the Lions and Tigers... which Rowan called Kitties of course... and she very politely called to them..."here kitty kitty.. kiss kiss."

gotta love a kids point of view on the world.

And another slide show.. because I love them.

Where did the Summer go?

Its been soooo long since I posted so I have alot of catching up to do. First of all, we've had a great summer, although its gone by far to fast and I didn't do nearly half as much as I'd thought I'd do. I had day dreamed about trips to the beach, long walks, hiking, etc etc. The days rush by so fast and it feels like every weekend slips through my fingers.

One highlights however was our trip up to Ossipee to go camping with my sister and her family which also included a trip to Storyland. That was a ton of fun even though it rained all weekend. My ever industrious husband was kind enough to build us a Tarp city to keep us all dry and warm. (he's a Virgo and can't sit still)

Rowan loved the whole experience because she was outside the entire time. Our campsite was also right on the water with its own small beach. There were two families of ducks that would visit sporadically for nibbles of bread. The tiny baby ducklings were still fuzzy and super adorable. Rowan was beside herself with excitement. If anyone knows Rowan, you'd know she's been obsessed with ducks since birth. I have a thing myself for rubber duckies so her baby nursery was done in yellow and blue with rubber duckies everywhere... therefore she loves them as she had no choice.

The trip to story land was ok. Rowan wasn't really into the rides much.. and she was afraid of almost everything we went near. The one thing she did love of course was the duck pond, wonder why? She also had her first shaved ice which she gobbled down at record speed.

Here are a few pics from the trip.