Right Field Roof

Pete was given tickets to Sunday's Red Sox game by one of his coworkers, and we lucked out with perfect weather. The "seats" were actually for standing room up on the right field roof, which is one of the few sections of the park that we haven't been in before. I wasn't sure that I would like standing for an entire game, but I would do it again! It's much more comfortable up on the roof - you're not packed into the small seats and there's a constant breeze and plenty of room to move around. We were there early enough to snag a pretty sweet spot right along the small counter at the front of the space (overlooking the right field roof tables, which would also be awesome but are three times the cost), so we had somewhere to lean on and set our drinks. Maybe the best part of the right field roof is that the bathrooms are restricted so that only folks with the right field roof tickets can use them - there were never more than two women in line the entire game!

Overdue Number 1: Eat at Cafe Polonia

This is overdue, but I'm so glad that we made sure to do it! Number one on this past winter's To Do List was to eat at Cafe Polonia, a well renowned Polish restaurant located in Andrew Square in Dorchester - the heart of the Polish Triangle. This kept getting delayed over the winter, and the one Saturday we did make it there we were turned away because they were fully booked. I knew that the place was small and popular, but I certainly didn't expect to be told to "make a reservation and come back another weekend". I think that in the end, that actually made me even more determined to get there!

I should note that usually when I have a notion to try a new restaurant or to some type of ethnic cuisine, I have to do a certain amount of convincing to get Pete to go with me. This time around it was much easier - Pete only had to look at the menu once and he readily agreed to go with me. This time he even pulled a me and was scoping out the menu in the afternoon, planning what he would order! He may have done that with the intention of scoping out their beer list, which they don't have online, but it still made me think that maybe he was as excited for this as I was - and when it comes to food, that's just about never the case.

I got the Polish Plate, which is a sampler of pierogi (three different fillings - the potato and cheese were by far my favorite), kielbasa (tasty!), stuffed cabbage (I thought it was bland, we weren't fans), and bigos (lots of sauerkraut - not my thing). Pete got the Gypsy Pancake, which is two potato pancakes with goulash sandwiched between. It was INSANELY delicious. Pete also got the only dark beer they serve - a porter (seen above) that he absolutely loved. He basically wouldn't shut up about how good it was, and if you know Pete you know that "he wouldn't shut up" is not something people say about him, so it must really mean something!

We've already got our return trip planned - one order potato and cheese pierogis, one order kielbasa, and one order gypsy pancakes to share, leaving some leftovers to take home. Pete, I'm sure, will have at least one of those porters, and I'll be making sure to leave room for the chocolate babka cake for dessert!

Root, root, root for the RED SOX!

...If they don't win it's a shame.

And it was a shame. But we had fun anyway! Pete picked up a few tickets from a co-worker, and I snuck out of the office for a few hours to join he and Jamie for the game. The seats were awesome - immediately against the fence of the Tampa Bay bullpen, where there was a ton of hilarious interaction between their pitchers and the crowd.

The seats were also hot! It was 90° out (poor marathoners!) and we were in full sun for the entire game. I sweat my face off and managed to get sunburn on a small, crazy shaped patch on my back. There's always that one sunburn every spring just to remind you exactly how thoroughly you need to apply sun block, isn't there?

Being in the sun at Fenway, though...I'm not sure there's anything else that feels more like summer in Boston.

The Superman

Pete calls this Barley posture "the Superman" because he has both his front arms stretched out as long as possible in front of him. It's one of Barley's favs, and it's one of my favs for snuggling with him, too. It usually feels like he's hugging me, because each of his paws reaches up on either side of my neck. Except when he's adjusting himself and punches me in the neck and/or face with his furry little paws, then it's one of my least favorite Barley snuggle postures.

First

We spent the afternoon with friends - catching up, eating lots of tasty food, and celebrating Leo's first birthday. It was an awesome way to spend an afternoon!

Champ isn't big on physical contact - doesn't snuggle, doesn't really care about getting pets, and is very skittish so it's hard to even stand next to her. But the other day Pete grabbed a can of almonds for a snack, and suddenly Champ showed up at his feet. Then jumped onto the arm of the couch. Then Pete held up an almond for her to inspect, and she spent a loooooong time licking it and sniffing it and trying to figure out how to actually eat it. After a minute, Barley wanted to know what it was all about, but he had zero interest and left it for Champ.

Apparently the way to Champs heart is through her stomach.

Rare Day

Today was the day of rare things.

I woke up before Pete: extremely rare. Unrelated: I took advantage of the situation to continue my Musical Movie Marathon and I put Oliver! on Netflix Instant. I think of all the musicals I watched this weekend, Gigi was my favorite and Oliver! was my second favorite - even if it did make me think of Newsies and I ended up with King of New York stuck in my head all afternoon. Imma wait here while you click through and watch that video......all done? Awesome, right!?! I love it.

Back to the matter at hand! I was up before Pete, which started the day on a rare note. Then after a few hours of lounging around, Pete came to me with an idea to get out of the house and he had a suggestion for something we both wanted to do! This is huge. HUGE. Doubly rare. It's usually me that's itching to get out of the house on the weekend (especially during football season. For the record, I had already set the Tivo to record the Green Bay game), and Pete rarely has any suggestions/opinions on what we should do on excursions.

So off we went, where it was a REE-diculously gorgeous 60 degree day out. Yet another rarity for late November! We got lunch, split up to check out a few stores (Guitar Center for him, West Elm for me) and then got some warm beverages (Dunkies for him, Starbucks for me) and went for a leisurely, scenic walk through Back Bay before hopping on the T and heading home.

We got home just before four and Pete settled in to watch the Green Bay game. I was trying to decide what to do with the rest of my afternoon and ended up making a last minute decision to go to a yoga class with one of my favorite instructors. When I say last minute, what I mean is that 15 minutes before the class was starting, I was jumping off the couch to change and get to the studio. Lucky for me, it's two short blocks away and I made it with plenty of time.

Side note...hilarious things from the mouth of said yoga instructor, that when taken out of context are totally inappropriate (I know. I'm like a 13 year old boy. But come on!):

• Did everyone grab their balls?
• Okay, I'm right behind you. Ready? This is something you can only do with good friends, right?!
• Oh my goodness, you're so tight! This is the tightest I've ever felt you!

I should reiterate that this is one of my favorite instructors, and that she's absolutely not inappropriate in context. She's awesome and you should go to her classes (her name is Jill and she teaches here, here, and here) - I just couldn't get my mind out of the gutter, apparently.

Back to the point (again - I'm easily distracted today), my doing yoga these days is also rare and it's especially rare that I do it when I haven't planned it out in advance. I'm enjoying the climb back onto that wagon.

Nothing extraordinary today, but a lot of rare. And a lot of awesome, too.

Cold Weather Camping

We spent Saturday night camping at Ponkapoag Pond with friends. I was a little nervous about camping when it was pretty chilly out (lows in the 30s overnight), but we had a great time and I can't wait to do it again. I can't recomend these cabins enough - close to home that you avoid spending half your weekend in the car, but it feels like it's a milion miles away. The cabins are great, and with the wood stove you stay so warm that you barely need a sleeping bag.

I still can't get over having grown up only a few miles away (I played soccer a zillion Saturday mornings on a field that is barely half a mile down the road from the gate to the access road), but never knowing what is there! I didn't even know the cabins existed until a friend told me last year, and I'd never actually been on the trails around the pond until earlier this summer. Our running club runs the trails around the pond (4 miles, minimal elevation but a enough small inclines to make you work for it) every few weeks and joinging them a few months ago was the first time I'd ever been in that part of the Blue Hills Reservation - I wish I had known about it before.

Uncle Meat

On Saturday Emily and I thought it would be really funny for her to just walk up to Pete and put Jackie in his lap, but our little surprise delivery never made it to fruition. Saturday night Pete did end up the last adult in the room with Jackie when the rest of us raced out to catch the ice cream truck before it left the neighborhood, but she was happily hanging out in her bouncy seat so he really just had to, you know, make sure the house didn't burn down with her in it.

Sunday, as we were saying goodbye, Emily was determined to get Pete to hold his newest niece...she was nicer than I would have been and she actually asked him if he was ready before handing her over. I would have just put Jackie in his arms and walked away without saying anything, haha!

Molly, Burgers, and Baseball

How cute is Molly? She was pretty excited about this awesome "retro" "vintage" "other trendy word that means old" phone toy. Molly has never laid eyes on a phone shaped like this - either the base or the handset - but she immediately knew it was a phone and how to hold it to her ear. How do kids know stuff like that?! This boggled our minds.

Pete and I flew to DC to celebrate visit Becky, Pat, and Molly (and celebrate Pete and Pat's birthday a few days early!) as well as to celebrate Adele's first birthday with her, meet our newest niece Jackie, visit the rest of the fam, and have photos shot as a 40th anniversary gift for my parents. Definitely not too much to cram into one weekend!

But let's start at the beginning, which is visiting Becky, Pat, and Molly. I have this super awesome special talent that not many people know about it. I can book a trip to DC, call Pat or Becky to tell them I'm coming and see if they are around, and without fail one or more of their relatives will also be visiting DC that weekend. Apparently I have a strong connection with their families and need to see them constantly, so the universe sends us to visit DC at the same time. Now I don't even wait for them to tell me that some family member will be in town, I just ask who it is that I also get to catch up with. Unfortunately this time, our timing wasn't quite as perfect as usual and I missed catching up with one of Pat's sisters and her adorable family by hours.

I digress. We spent our Friday hanging out in PJs, chatting and playing with Molly, and then walking over to Barracks Row to get lunch at Ted's Bulletin. I spied a family opening a pastry box on the sidewalk out  front and then pulling out giant, homemade pop tarts...not appealing to me, but pretty sure it's a sign that the place is going to be fun! Next clue: awesomely attired bartender. Followed by some really good looking art deco hanging lamps and decor. I'm pretty sure that the further I walked into the restaurant, the more I fell in love. L O V E.

The menu didn't hurt, either. I've been hankering for a good cheeseburger with an egg on top ever since I passed up the opportunity a few weeks back at a friend's birthday party, and guess what Ted's had on the menu? Yeah, a burger with an egg on top. Yes, please! I don't think I've made a menu-related decision that easily in months. The egg didn't have as runny a yolk as I would have liked, but it was still a very tasty burger that I'm sure I'll eat again. What can I say? When I find something I like, I stick with it. My next visit is going to include one of the adult milkshakes that I didn't try this time, too.

After lunch it was nap time for Molly and me, and then we were off to see the Nationals/Phillies game...where they played two outs of baseball and then ended up in a two hour rain delay before we even made it to our seats. Seriously, why play those two outs? Couldn't they have announced a delayed start before we got to the stadium so that we could have stayed home and not paid $8/beverage for two hours?? Oh well...we managed to stay almost entirely dry...and maybe we had a little fun, too.

Number Six: Go to a Paw Sox Game

To be fair, this item on the Summer To Do List actually came from Pete. I was pretty sure it would be fun for me, too, so I stole it. I say that like Pete actually makes a list of things he wants to do each season, and I took this off his list and put it on mine instead. ;)

At some point in the spring, probably when the baseball season was still young and Pete was in the midst of his annual baseball fever, he told me he thought it might be fun to go to a Paw Sox game. Sometime in May, I received the quarterly email at work that details any free museum admissions or discounted tickets we can get by showing our work ID or calling the listed contact, and surprisingly there were two Paw Sox games on the list of discounted events. In the end we only saved $2/ticket, but that's $4 we could use towards my $10 ballpark dinner, right?! I don't think I looked to see if they were "good" seats - McCoy Stadium isn't big enough that you need to be concerned about where your seats are. But for $9 each (plus a $2 ticketing fee), it's cheap night out.

Bonus: the tickets we bought were for a game against the Lehigh Valley IronPigs (awesomest team name is baseball, if you ask me!). The Lehigh Valley IronPigs are coached by Ryne Sandberg. Ryne Sandberg was Pete's favorite player back when Pete was a wee boy. Probably right around when this photo was taken (thanks for sending the photos, Judy! We had a blast looking through them all!).

Barely related: when Pete was playing Little League, he was so much taller than the other players that his mom had to carry a birth certificate with her to his games to prove that he was the right age for the team and not some older ringer that they brought in to pitch for them! And then somehow he stopped growing...

He was cute then, huh? If you're lucky, when (if?) football season rolls around, I'll share the crazy adorable football-themed baby photos. But let's not start the football torture early.

We had a really fun time at the game. For one thing, there was plenty of good people watching for me. The awesome commentary from the two older couples behind us ("COME ON! They need to pick it up! They didn't use to take this long to play!", "oh - the guy at bat is so-and-so's ex-husband") who then left after the 6th inning and we later saw eating dinner in their motor home kept me chuckling for half the game. There was a young couple in front of us where the husband was keeping score on his scorecard until about the third inning. I'm pretty sure they are at the park frequently, because he was cheering for all the players and may have been the fan most interested in the game in our section. There was a family with three young kids who came prepared: They each had a sharpie, a ball, and a small bucket with a rope attached so that they could hang it over the railing to dangle in front of the Paw Sox dugout below us. And then there was the guy next to Pete, who leaned over somewhere around the fifth inning and asked Pete how long they played for. Pete was confused and asked him to repeat the question before telling him the game is nine innings long.

The Paw Sox won, which was nice, and we fun providing our own interpretation for Sandberg's signs when he was doing his duty as third base coach. "I'm hungry. I will get on my motorcycle and go to the grocery store!" I mean, I'm not a baseball expert, but I'm 90% sure that's the point he was trying to get across. It was a smaller crowd, but there was a little league team who was doing a good job of cheering for a few innings (and it was a good thing, the organ player/sound guy was horrible and needs some lessons on how to get the crowd going). Pete was not into any of the cheering/chanting/clapping, even when his (not) relative Matt Sheely was at the plate! I mean, dude has your name and is on your home team, but you don't want to cheer for him?! What kind of fan are you?

I'm pretty sure there will be some more Paw Sox games in our future, and I think all of you that have little kiddos who are into baseball should check them out! $11 for seats directly above the dugout on the third base line? You definitely can't get that at Fenway.

The game isn't over til the board says 15

I'm not sure this photo truly captures the excitement of badminton - I'll work on my badminton photographing skills for next time! :)

We spent the evening at Jamie & Ryan's (unfortunately without Ryan, who was visiting family in the UK) - the boys playing badminton while I provided color commentary, grilling dinner, and chatting with friends around the fire pit. It was a pretty perfect summer evening.

Moose Antlers For Maine

We've been taking group photos on our vacations for a while now (2009, 2007) but this year the kiddos weren't really feeling it. This was my favorite of the bunch!



Of course we couldn't leave without taking a photo in front of the Caboose that Pete and I slept in all week, even if it was raining.

Maine Lobstah

Number 3: I Heart Kayaking

I've been interested in learning to kayak for a while now, and bought a deal on Living Social for a rental on the Charles River last summer (soon to be put to good use). I was pretty excited when the house we were staying in on vacation had a kayak, and it only took me a day to gather the courage to try it out. I'm not a huge fan of swimming in lake/pond water, so I was pretty not-excited about getting into the kayak from the dock and falling in. It turns out it was not an issue at all, woohoo! And it turns out I totally love kayaking! And so does Pete. And Leyre.

Leyre and I are planning to take the Intro to Kayaking class at Charles River Canoe and Kayak. Then we will proceed to kayak our little arms off! I do hope there's a lot of kayaking in my future, and I'm super glad to have finally checked "learn to kayak" off my life list.

Caged

It was beautiful out today, so Pete and I went on a bit of an adventure....Cracker Barrel, go-karts, batting cages, skee ball and ice cream! It was fun, we need to find a place to do this closer to home so we can do it more often.

Snuggle Bugs

Apparently I missed the memo that it was family nap time.

Number 4: We Are New England

It turns out that almost all of our nights out lately have been unofficially sponsored by Groupon. What can I say? I'm a sucker for a good deal. I also love trying new things and going on "adventures", so getting to do that on the cheap is even awesomer.

Neither Pete or I follow MLS, nor had either of us been to a Revolution game. Or to Gillette Stadium. And now we've remedied that despite the chilly, raw weather. Groupon posted a deal for a ticket to a Revolution game and a free t-shirt for $18. That's a pretty sweet deal! You had no control over what seats you got, but they don't exactly sell out, so if our seats hadn't been perfectly acceptable, we could easily have moved into seats that would have been great. We're lazy, so we stayed in our perfectly acceptable seats. Also, we didn't think to bring towels to dry off seats with, and our free t-shirts weren't super absorbent. Switching seats would have lead to cold, wet butts!

The Revolution won, and we had a good time despite the mildly obnoxious teenagers that were sitting next to us. It was fun to listen to the chanting and singing from the folks seated in "The Fort", and to ponder all kinds of very important soccer related things, like "what's the deal with soccer and scarves?"and "do you think they have to take acting classes as part of their training?" Now that we've got answers to those questions, I think we'll be much better prepared for any future professional soccer matches!

Shanti

Norm and I have been talking about trying Indian food for a while now, so when Shanti popped up on Groupon of course I bought it. Then I emailed my Indian coworker and asked her what I should get. Because she is awesome, Namrata sat down with me and we went through the Shanti menu online and she told me what to try...you can see the corner of my sticky note cheat sheet in the bottom right side of the photo up there. :)

The food was delicious, although I'm pretty sure the Taj Mahal beer wasn't anything special. There will definitely be more Indian food in my future!

Newcomb

Sometimes on the weekend, Pete convinces me to get off of the couch and out of pajamas early enough to enjoy breakfast out. We have three different cheap and tasty breakfast places within a short walk of our place, but lately Newcomb Farms has been Pete's favorite.

Also, note the look of annoyance on his face because I have my camera pointed towards him.