Halloween was different this year, but we managed to celebrate while staying safe.  The holiday started off with the usual Larchmont window painting, masked this year.  We painted a window at D’Agostino Tailors since several of Blaine’s friends also signed up there.

On Wednesday 10/28 we carved the pumpkins!

On Friday, 10/30, the kids were allowed to wear costumes to school!  Costume masks were not allowed, and no facepaint, only cloth covid masks.

After school we walked over to the library to see their treat chutes.

Blaine received a coupon for a free small french fries at Manor Park Deli, so we headed there next.

On Saturday, 10/31, Blaine and Andrew made Halloween biscuits!  Blaine had the idea and asked Andrew to buy Halloween cookie cutters, so we had bat and pumpkin-shaped biscuits.

In the afternoon we walked around in costume.

We also got ready for the small Halloween gathering our wonderful neighbors were hosting.  We prepared a bunch of eggs with mini lights and glowsticks in them, and had an egg hunt with four families on our street who all have children of around the same age, seven kids in all.

We got the house all decorated in our usual Alfred Hitchcock inspired way (which even won second place in a local contest this year!).

And we put out a treat table for passers-by.

Then the kids got in their costumes!  Blaine was pleased with how this pic came out, looks like he is actually about to shoot some force lightning as Darth Sidious.

The whole group!

I took a moment to try to capture the evening’s blue moon (blue hunter’s moon to be exact).

Happy Halloween, everybody!

Some more pics from October!  Here is a pic of Sarah at her desk at school.

We finally cleared out the giant tomato plant from the front bed.

Our grass seed grew like crazy and now the lawn looks magnificent!

I finally got around to giving Sarah her first home haircut!  I watched a few youtube videos and then went for it — turned out pretty well!

One day at Sheldrake we came across this new “meditation garden” and the kids stopped on this bench to meditate.

Outdoor dining at Smokehouse in Mamaroneck.

Blaine in a new mask by Gram.

Sarah lost her other top front tooth!

Sarah’s grow panda from Aunt Jane.

On 10/27, Sarah lost another tooth!  This one was on the lower left.  She has now lost 5 teeth, with one more wiggly one on its way out.

Sarah opted for a smaller celebration than Blaine had requested.  Here she is celebrating at school on 10/8 (school was fully remote on the 9th).

For her party we invited two friends over to make glow-in-the-dark slime on the patio.  We got kits from a local slime place, DIY slime, and set up stations that were 6 feet apart.

Then we had individually wrapped cupcakes from the Snackery!  Yum.

On Sarah’s actual birthday, 10/10, she picked all the food!  Waffles for breakfast, more Walter’s hot dogs for lunch, and dinner was her current fave — barbecue chicken, cornbread, and kale chips.

She was very excited about this model of the solar system she received.

We also played this Star Wars board game Blaine got for his birthday.

When we asked Sarah how she wanted to spend her birthday, she rejected all the outdoor suggestions — no hike!  no playgrounds!  She really just wanted to open presents early and play with them all day.  And she wanted to have her face painted!  So, I did my best.

Then it was dinnertime, with homemade chocolate chocolate cake for dessert!

Happy birthday, Sarah!

On 10/11 we did a daytrip down to PA for some socially-distanced, mostly masked, outdoor time with the Mahoneys.  We finally got to meet Maeve, who was already 6 months old!  What a cutie.

And we kept our distance over takeout lunches on the patio.

It was too brief, but so good to see everyone.  Who knows when we will be able to gather again?

One last picture of the kids enjoying their new corn hole set from Mom-Mom!

When Blaine heard that the school would not be allowing the usual birthday celebrations in class with a special snack, he asked if he could invite his pod over after school for a s’more.  At first we thought it wasn’t possible to do anything during covid times, but after thinking about it a bit more we decided his idea might actually work.  So, we invited the pod of 13 kids to stop by after school on 10/7 to celebrate with Blaine.  We individually wrapped the s’mores ingredients in advance so there was no communal food, we asked that everyone wear masks except when eating, and we had plenty of sanitizer.  It went well!  We had 11 of the 13 kids stop by, I believe.

After the party Blaine and Sarah made origami yodas.

Blaine was disappointed that he had school on his actual birthday, 10/8.  We tried to make it special by letting him pick all the food.  So, we had pancakes for breakfast, Walter’s hot dogs for lunch, and dinner out at Larchmont Tavern.

Blaine’s other birthday wish was to help me cast my vote!  We carefully selected a Mister Rogers stamp for good luck, since Mr. Rogers seems like the opposite of our current president!

Then the kids helped me drop it in the nearest mailbox on the walk to dinner.

Back home we had presents and cake (chocolate chocolate ice cream cake from Longford’s, of course).  Happy birthday, Blaine!

On 10/2, we celebrated our 10 year wedding anniversary!  When we told the kids about our wedding they were most interested in the cake, so we had to locate some pictures to show them.

Here we are, 10 years later!  We couldn’t celebrate in a big way thanks to coronavirus, but we marked the occasion with dinner out (and al fresco) at one of Larchmont’s fanciest restaurants, Vintage Kitchen.

The kids were along for the occasion, of course!  We haven’t had a sitter since March.

One day Blaine declared he would like to climb Mt Everest.  We suggested that he might start with something smaller, so we looked for the nearest mountain we could find and came up with Turkey Mountain (elevation 771′, elevation gained during the hike was only 469′ though), which I guess is actually a hill.  It was a nice view!

Also, the playground at Constitution Park in Larchmont finally opened!

We went for a Fall outing on 9/26 in search of a corn maze!  We ended up driving out to Rhinebeck to Kesicke Farm, which had a huge corn maze, yummy apple cider donuts, and reasonably priced pumpkins!

We escaped the maze in about 50 minutes, not too bad compared to some of the other groups we encountered!

On the way home we stopped for an early dinner at Fireside BBQ.

The kids’ first day of the hybrid learning model was on Monday, 9/14.  They had remote learning at home in the morning, lunch at home, and then went into school from 12:35-3pm.  They will have this same schedule 5 days/week.  In the morning they have work assigned by their teacher as well as specials.  It’s on a 2 week schedule, so out of every 10 days they have 6 live specials over zoom.  The other 4 are pre-recorded videos.  Here are the kids all ready for their first day at 9am that morning, sans shoes because we were going back inside for remote learning.

There wasn’t a lot of actual work that morning, so we filled the time.  Sarah and I made another elaborate chalk drawing of a panda.

After lunch we got the bags packed, shoes and masks on, and headed out to school!

Thanks to our neighbor, Molly, for taking this last pic!

After school we had to leave the school grounds immediately, and I somehow let the kids talk me into stopping by the Mr Softee truck to celebrate.

The first week went really well!  The kids’ teachers seem great, they are happy to go and happy when I pick them up, can’t ask for more.  I was sad about getting the PM cohort instead of the morning, but now it seems to be working out okay.

On the following Monday, 9/21, they opened up the school playgrounds!  It seems to be a limited opening because they are not open on the weekends, sadly.  But it was still pretty exciting!

Here’s a pic that the assistant principal sent me of Blaine at his desk!  So nice to get a glimpse inside.

I’m so happy that our school district put together a thoughtful hybrid learning model.  It seems to be working well because we have been able to get into a daily routine, and it’s enough time that the kids are getting their core instruction in math, reading and writing in class.  So much better than the Spring!  We are happy and hope that it will last…

We spent the last week of summer as we usually do, going to doctors’ appointments and getting outside as much as possible.  On Monday Blaine and I went into the city for the first time since March to see his doctor at NYU.  On Tuesday we spent the morning at the Rye Nature Center and the kids were excited to show me all the sites they’d learned during their week of camp there.

This rock is known as “dinosaur rock.”

Then we had lunch at bartaco in Port Chester before Blaine’s PT and OT.

On Wednesday we went out for lunch at Polpettina in Eastchester.  We’d been missing their pizza since the Larchmont location closed due to covid and never reopened.

Then we went to the Greenburgh Nature Center for another short hike and we were so lucky to see all the birds of prey being fed.  The eagles were getting some fresh trout, and the red-tailed hawk and great horned owl were both getting some mice.  The man who worked there was so nice and answered all of Blaine’s many questions.

We went to the beach on Saturday and again on Monday!  It was beautiful beach weather, clear skies, not too hot.  We saw lots of friends and everyone was talking about teacher assignments.

One of our dahlias finally bloomed in the front planting bed, just in time for the plants to all get pulled out to make way for the real plantings, which finally got in.  Almost done with this neverending landscaping project.

On 9/8 Sarah lost another tooth!  She’d been wiggling it for a long time.  She has two other wiggly teeth so the tooth fairy will be busy this Fall.

School officially started on Wednesday, 9/9, but the first few days were mostly training on new technology and brief video meetings.  On Saturday 9/12, Sarah had her first soccer league practice.

She was also so happy to get this giant box of rubber bands to continue her rubber brand bracelet making endeavors.  I was going to wait for her birthday, but I thought she might like to make a lanyard for her mask for the first day of in-person school on 9/14.

On Sunday we did our final preparations for school!  We painted Sarah’s nails, and gave Blaine a fresh haircut!

Then we celebrated the end of summer with some s’mores on our new fire pit in the backyard.

We left for the Cape on 8/22 and took a slightly longer route to avoid Rhode Island, which was on Massachusett’s list of covid warning states.  We stopped for lunch at the Seafood Shanty in Buzzards Bay and I had my first lobster roll of the summer: tasty, but nothing special.

We arrived at our rental in Eastham, near Campground beach.  Andrew cooked some dinner and then we walked down to the beach to enjoy the sunset at very low tide.  Our rental was really close to the bay side beaches and so we saw some beautiful sunsets and had a nice sea breeze.

The next morning we had some Hole-in-One donuts for breakfast and headed back to our local beach.  The morning was so foggy it seemed like we were in an episode of Stranger Things!

Sarah found a hermit crab shell!

That afternoon we went to Arnold’s to play a round of minigolf.  Everyone was wearing masks and we were impressed at how safe everyone was being, especially in comparison to our trip to NJ in June.

The house had some fun board games including Apples to Apples for kids, which Sarah really enjoyed.

Out to watch the sunset on our second night.

On Monday we went to the National Seashore beach, specifically Nauset Light Beach.  It was beautiful!

That evening I had my second lobster roll when we went for dinner outside at Mac’s Market and Kitchen in Eastham.  It was delicious.

On Tuesday we went for a whale watching trip, which we had not done since our first time on the Cape in 2017.  It was still a little boring for the kids with how long we had to ride to/from the whales, but the whale watching portion was spectacular.  We also saw some seals on the shore, and a giant pod of dolphins on our way back.

We were sad to see the Portuguese Bakery was closed that day, so we went to the Lobster Pot for lunch and I had my top lobster roll of the trip!  Everything was perfect.

After lunch we stopped and went to the national seashore in Provincetown, though I forgot to take any pictures!

The next day I finally painted Sarah’s nails in the morning.  She had been waiting for this all week since we ran out of time to do it before our departure as planned.

Then we went on a beautiful hike at the Fort Hill trail.

And played a second round of minigolf, this time at Cape Escape in Orleans.

We bought some salt water taffy, fudge, and this giant alligator float, and headed back to the bay beach after lunch.

That night we had dinner at Local Break; I had the fish tacos.

On Thursday the forecast called for rain, so we went on a morning hike at Great Island trail in Wellfleet.  It ended up being somewhat difficult since a lot of the trail was through soft sand, and we climbed a very large hill for some impressive views.

Then we went into Wellfleet for lunch at Mac’s Shack, and I passed on the lobster roll this time for sharing some dishes with Andrew.  The Wellfleet oysters were probably the best oysters I’ve ever had.

After lunch we did a very short hike up Bearberry Hill for some more pretty views.

We really lucked out with the rain — it started raining on the car ride back to the house, and then really started pouring after we arrived.  It rained for awhile, and then stopped briefly for enough time that we could grill and eat dinner on the porch before it started pouring again!

Friday was our last full day so we decided to split it up.  We went back to Nauset Light beach in the morning, and then went to our bay beach in the afternoon.

That night we had our last dinner out at Arnold’s, where I got (of course) a lobster roll.

I did have the chance to have one more at Captain Scott’s Lobster Dock on the trip back the next day, but I could not resist this scallop BLT, which was amazing.

It was a wonderful trip, so refreshing to feel like it was pretty normal during covid times.  All the people and tourists were masked up and keeping distance so it felt very safe, and we were able to do everything outdoors!

August began with a visit from tropical storm Isaias on the 4th.  I took these pics of our tomatoes and dahlias in the front planting bed in case they were torn apart by the storm!

Andrew decided we should buy a portable generator, ordered one from Home Depot, and picked it up the same day.  Thank goodness, because we were all set when we lost power on the 4th!  Well, after a few visits from the electrician.  It was enough power to keep our fridge and freezer going, internet and lights.

The damage was pretty incredible, a lot of large old trees came down.  We were without power until Saturday the 8th but we were in good shape with our generator.  I was sad to see the damage to the village paddle courts, which have since, thankfully, been repaired.

I was also doing the laundry in the sink!  The kids were back at Badger Day Camp for three weeks in August, and had a wonderful time.  It was different this year with smaller groups, no buses, no laundry.  But still such a wonderful change of pace for the kids, and break for the grown-ups!

Sarah’s counselor was very diligent about taking pictures, so here are a bunch from her group, the Flamingos.

Sarah was very impressed by some of her fellow campers’ bracelets, and came home telling me about rainbow friendship bracelets.  So I dug out my old friendship bracelet kit from when I was a kid and taught her how to make them!  Blaine even got in on it for half a bracelet.

It turned out Sarah’s campmates were doing something new called rubber band bracelets, I learned when someone gave her one as a gift!  We bought a kit and now she is a rubber band bracelet factory.

Blaine’s counselor for the Jets was not so into photos, so I don’t have any of his group!  But I did have to pick him up early a lot for PT and OT and he was sad to miss out on the daily ice cream afternoon snack.  So we made up for it by seeking out the best ice cream sandwiches around.  The winner was this giant chocolate chocolate sandwich from Bona Bona.

We also took in the local sites and sought out this Mamaroneck historical site, called the “Skinny House.”

I took advantage of the Badger weeks by going on solo hikes all around town, on the Leatherstocking Trail, at Sheldrake, and at the Hommocks Conservation Area.  The sign says, “Leave only footprints” but the local yutes seemed to be leaving solo cups and natty light cans.

One day I also made my first pandemic trip to Costco, where I had to wait in a long line outside to gain entry.

One night we went out for dinner and stopped at the newly redone Constitution Park to check out our family brick.  The kids were sad the cool new playground was not yet open (and still isn’t).

We tried a lot of new 5-star fruits on fresh direct, including these plumcots.

Sarah’s new favorite book is called “Quit Calling me a Monster” by Jory John illustrated by Bob Shea.  She thinks this particular page is hilarious, where the monster says, “It’s not like I ever call you names, do I?  I could easily be like, ‘Look at that little meat snack over there!’ or ‘There goes the kid I’m going to chomp up!'”

In August we also got some caterpillars in the mail.  They quickly got bigger and formed their chrysalides, and then it was time to wait.

We ended up with some nice cherry tomatoes in the front planting bed!  Most went to the squirrels, but we got a few!

I took this one because of how much I love that Blaine loves to read on the beach.

Sarah’s baseball season came to a close!  All the kids were on coach pitch by the end, and they all had a wonderful time!  Thanks to Andrew and the other parents for coaching!

Luckily by the time we were ready to leave for Cape Cod all of the butterflies had emerged from their chrysalides!  They were painted lady butterflies.  We released them on the morning we were leaving!

One of the butterflies emerged a little crumpled, we think because the chrysalis had fallen onto the ground in the container.  Blaine named it “Weaky” and we left it a little food and wished it the best!  🙁  Poor little guy.