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Published: December 16th 2005
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Homeless and heading to Boston
Dara and Ellie head to Boston by train to visit the the Hersh's, Dara's sister and family.
As I mentioned before, I had some stuff written but saved on my computer and couldn't get it on to the site. Well now I can. Sorry if this seems like ancient history, but I wasn't going to let it go to waste. I will try to get more current soon.
On November 18, we moved out of our house and a very nice family moved in. Even though they are renting the house furnished, the weeks leading up to the move were a frenzy of activity. Pretty much all we had to do was clean out our closets and kitchen cabinets and put all the stuff in the basement. It is surprising how much stuff we had (and, as our neighbors will attest to, we don’t even have that much stuff. After being packed up, one neighbor who saw our basement said, “Is that it? I have that much just for Christmas!”).
So, on that fateful Friday, our homeless family headed north, starting almost two weeks of jumping from place to place. This time, we had an important date to keep. Jenna, Ari and Ellie’s cousin, was turning four and we didn’t want to miss the party. Jenna,
We made it to the top!
While visiting the Hersh's, we made the trek up the Great Blue Hill in Canton, Mass. Here's us with Jordana enjoying a snack at the top. along with her parents Marcy (Dara’s sister) and Craig and her little sister Jordana, lives in Canton, a suburb just south of Boston. Dara and Ellie headed up on the train and Ari and I hung around so he could attend one last birthday party. After the party we headed to Grandma and Grandpa’s house in New Jersey, slept there for the night, and continued up to Canton on Saturday.
The days at the Hersh household passed relatively uneventfully. As usual, the cousins really enjoyed playing together. Jordana is about a year and half old and is absolutely adorable. She has bright blue eyes and delicate ringlets down the back of her head. It was incredible to watch her as each day she added more words to her vocabulary and was often calling for Ari and Ellie (and often drooling, too). Not to short-change her, Jenna is a darling, too. She and Ellie played very well together (most of the time). Since Jenna does not have an older sibling, Ari and Ellie inadvertently helped to expand her vocabulary, too.
We went and visited Nana at work one day to give her the chance to show the kids off
SNOW in New Hampshire
We bundled up and had a great time with old friends in New Hampshire...one last picture to remind us of what we\'ll be missing! and then on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving, we headed up to my parents’ house in Winchester, just north of Boston, to make room at the Hershs’ for Marcy and Dara’s parents (Grandma and Grandpa) and grandmother (Bubby).
The big excitement of the week came on Thanksgiving. We were back in Canton for the day. After a day of playing and having the kids take a nice bike ride (with Ari being a daredevil bombing down the hills and Jenna building her confidence after she tried Ellie’s bike), it was time to eat. As Jeff (Grandpa) started to carve the turkey, it was obvious that despite the requisite 4 hours in the oven, it was nowhere near done. After another hour in the oven it still did not look even close. After another hour in the oven to no avail we gave up and sat down for dinner, sans turkey. The rest of the fare (stuffing, squash, sweet potatoes, cranberry surprise, spinach pie, etc) was delicious and we were none the worse for having skipped the bird.
The Thanksgiving week celebration continued on Friday at my parents’ house. One of the guests brought the turkey this time so there
Ari's snowman
Ari made a snowman in NJ and took a picture of him with his new camera (Thanks Grandma and Grandpa!) wasn’t nearly as much excitement. Saturday was spent up in New Hampshire visiting my old high school friend Dan Meserve and his family. They have 3 children - two boys (one a little older than Ari and one a little younger) and a girl (a little younger than Ellie). Just as importantly, they had 4-5 inches of snow.
The boys hit it off immediately. We had hardly even taken off our coats and they were already at full speed - upstairs, downstairs, legos, swords and more. It took Ellie a little longer to warm up to Katelyn but soon they too were having a great time. After barbecuing pizzas for lunch (yes, that means cooking pizza on the barbecue) we all headed out for what is sure to be our only romp in the snow this year. We had a great time there. Although we know that Ari usually makes friends quickly, it was heartening to have a reminder as we head off to the great unknown. We also know that Ellie can be a bit of a shy girl, but I think she is getting better.
On Sunday it was back to the Hersh's, then Tuesday off to Grandma and Grandpa’s house. For those of you confused by all of our bouncing around, don’t worry - I was confused, too. On Wednesday, we all headed back to Yardley for the day. Ari had been out of school for a month before we left due to a teacher strike, so he really wanted to go back so he could see his friends.
Ari had a great day at school. His classmates had all signed a t-shirt and the latest Harry Potter book for him to remember them by (a million thanks to Diane Moran, the classroom mom who organized this). We have been told by Ari’s teachers over the years that he is well liked by everyone and this certainly seemed to be evidence of that.
While we were in Yardley, we figured Eliana could also go to school for one last day, if she wanted to. And of course she wanted to. So we dropped her off and then Dara and I went our separate ways - she went to get the car inspected and meet some friends and I was off to the airport and a meeting with prospective business partners in Bogotá, Colombia.
Dara and the kids ended up spending the night in Yardley, then spent the next day visiting Bubby on their way back to her parents’ house. Time will tell how wearing this stretch on the road has been. It really takes a lot out of you to be sleeping in different places, living out of suitcases and, despite the tremendous hospitality shown by everyone, you never really feel at home. Either it has been a valuable experience and has helped the kids learn to be adaptable or it has just been tiring and will just make the next couple weeks that much harder. I say this because it is continuing in Costa Rica - we do not have a place to live lined up yet. But more on that later...
(How is that for a cliff hanger ending?)
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Lovely report -- nicely 'embellished' as your mother would urge. You left out a discussion of Ari's hike down to the pond to throw stones on the ice, and Ellie's exploration of the Haunted House. Just as well -- most of us are anxiously awaiting news of Costa Rica, rather than learning more about the preliminaries, as eventful as that period was.