Caribbean Cruise

This year, Chase had a whole week and a half off from school for winter break, so we decided to plan a more serious vacation. Chase has really been into flags for a few years now so his request was to go on a vacation where he could visit the largest number of countries with different and cool flags. We decided the Caribbean would be a good way to accomplish that goal. He was particularly set on going to St. Lucia so that narrowed down our options to a few possible cruises within our time frame. We decided to go on a Celebrity cruise from and back to Puerto Rico that visited 5 different islands. We saw St. Maarten/Martin, Antigua, St. Lucia, Barbados, and Dominica. Chase not only loved visiting each of the islands and doing specific shore excursions (snorkling, zip lining, tubing, going to caves, and the beach) but also getting flag souvenirs and a few local coins from each country. 

In Puerto Rico, before and after the cruise, checking out the castles

In St. Martin, on the french side (Marigot) which we took a bus to. We then went for a boat ride in the lagoon. These two countries were still rebuilding from Hurricanes Irma and Maria about 7 years back. 

On the beach in Antigua after snorkling; by the waterfall in Dominica before tubing

We took a boat around St. Lucia down to the south (Soufriere) near the dormant volcanoes to do some zip lining

In Barbados, drinking coconut water out of a coconut and down in the caves

Visiting My Grandparents Again

[Previous trips to Barcelona: 2024, 2023, 2017]

My grandparents ended up staying outside Barcelona since we saw them last in the summer. I decided to go visit them for a few days to keep them company and see the sights of their apartment by the sea. We had a great time walking around their town, eating yummy food, and spending time together. 

Fall 2024

[Previous fall activities: 2023, 2022, 2021, 2012]

[Previous homemade halloween costumes: flags, siphonophore]

This year, Chase decided he wanted to be an orange cat for halloween so he cut out and ironed on the orange patches on a white jump suit. He had a ton of fun trick or treating with friends and going to all the Halloween school activities (his last year of elementary!). We also did some leaf peeping and I had some fancy glow in the dark stick-on nails that I felt like documenting. A highlight was celebration Thanksgiving with my aunt/uncle/cousin who have just moved to the US. Nate and I managed to cook a 20-lb turkey and make all the fixings for a wonderful meal together. Chase and his cousin uncle also had lots of time to play the week of Thanksgiving.  

All the halloween fun with trick-or-treating and school trunk-or-treat

Leaf peeping, the zoo, and my fun nails

Hosting a real Thanksgiving meal for the full family

Gardening Success

This year was our most successful year yet with gardening after a sort of failure 2 years ago and nothing last year. We started off the summer having planted watermelons, pumpkins, tomatoes, jalapeños, and eggplants. We ended up growing all of them, although the deer got too friendly and ate the pumpkins and watermelons. We harvested jalapeños, tomatoes, and eggplants clear until November! So fun and now we know how to improve for next year. 

Not only was it a good year for vegetables, it was a wonderful year for all sort of flowers, specifically our beautiful hydrangeas. 

Our deer friends were very interested in our garden as well and ended up eating all three of our huge pumpkins and our lone watermelon. We fixed the fence around September which kept them out for the remainder of the gardening season. 

Despite the deer, we were able to harvest lots of vegetables all summer and fall

Some more pictures of our harvests -- including finding out jalapeños turn red when they are ripening and are even spicier!

Chase didn't shy away from eating his home-grown vegetables. He said they were tastier (he rated the tomatoes 7/10) than in store (4/10). 

Painting Our House

[Previous home improvement projects: fixed fence and minisplits, reupholstered chairs and solar panels]

This year, our big home improvement project was repainting the outside of the house. We hired a local company and deliberated the color choice. We wanted a similar gray but also wanted to switch to a fun new door color. Thankfully, we managed to do both and we love how it looks now. The previous paint job didn't sand off the previous coat so the paint had started bubbling and cracking off the cedar siding. They sanded off all previous paint layers and also fixed a lot of rotten wood and other issues. It's so nice to have this done nicely and correctly for many years to come. 

Edit: Another home improvement that we did this year is we did indeed get a new couch for our TV room that comfortably fits all 3 of us. It's from La-Z-boy and has a mechanical side and a manual side along with a console and chaise. It is exactly what we were looking for and has been so comfy! 

Summer 2024

Chase had a very full summer! He spent the majority of it in camps in the morning and then spending time with his grandparents in the afternoons. Two highlights were some fishing camps (where he caught 14 fish in one of the weeks) and a STEM camp at Hamden Hall School which he just loved. We were all able to go on another trip to Barcelona to see his great grandparents for the first time since before Covid. 

Getting 1500 minutes in the local library reading challenge, catching a fish, and starting 5th grade!

Playing with his cousin uncle and the whole family together for my dad's birthday

Trip to Orlando for Chase's 10th birthday

[Previous Chase updates: 9 years, 8 years, 7 years, 6 years, 2nd year of school, 5 years, starting school, 4 years, 3 years, 25-32 months, 2 years, 15-20 months, 1+ year, first four months in Cambridge, data analysis from first 2 months, first few months]

Since Chase turned 10(!!) this year, we decided we needed to celebrate in a big way: a trip to Orlando. We were able to go to the Kennedy Space Center, Magic Kingdom and Epcot, and to Gatorland. We were able to go on pretty much all the rides we wanted between waiting in a few lines and a couple well time standby spots (specifically Space Mountain and Guardians of the Galaxy for Nate and me -- Chase isn't into scary rides). We also stayed at a cool timeshare/resort (Orange Lake Resort in Kissimmee) that was huge and had 4 pools including lazy river and a place for fishing. It was a really fun vacation and even though Chase was not into Disney beforehand and still really isn't, he had a great time at the parks. 

Fishing at the resort and at Kennedy Space Center

At Magic Kingdom

More Magic Kingdom -- the castle during the day and at night

At Epcot (we took very few pictures there and although Chase loves countries, it was a bit disappointing as a park) and with his two pins for first time and birthday

At Gatorland with a turtle, a train ride around, and holding a small gator and snake