Boston Day 4

This morning I had the great pleasure of joining Rebecca for her monthly play date where a group of Catholic moms get together with their small children. This was the first time I had to drive in Boston, as Chris was in business meetings all day. The drive to a small town north of the city was supposed to take me just under an hour. Well, it took me 45 minutes just to navigate from the hotel to the necessary highway a few blocks away. I had a GPS system, but I kept missing all my turns, then the GPS system would have to re-plan my route and I'd miss the next turn. Meanwhile, John is at an age when he's nearly incapable of being quiet, instead offering a running commentary on everything. I wanted to scream at him awful things about "shutting up," but instead I kept my (external) cool and kept asking him and reminding him to be quiet, telling him how much I needed to concentrate and so forth. I told him I was lost and he replied cheerfully, "No, the man [the male voice on the GPS system] just told you to turn right. So, you're not lost!" Then I was forced to explain that I wasn't really lost, but I couldn't make my turns. I even pulled over to collect myself and then handed John a book in hopes that he'd read quietly. It turned out that I handed him a delightful book my Aunt Sarah had just given John: a book with four buttons that, when pushed, play realistic traffic sounds such as an ambulance, a fire engine, and a car horn. After a few minutes of my jumping every single time John pushed a traffic sound amidst my traffic nightmare, I realized I had to take away his treasured book, so I replaced it with a "Frog and Toad" collection, which he then "read" to me from the back seat. It was really very trying and the only silver lining is that when exhausted Mary screamed in an out-of-control rage I have not often heard from her for 30 minutes, it was the last 30 minutes of the trip and not the first when I was trapped in the hellish maze of downtown Boston at rush hour.

I finally got us to the play date an hour late and the kids proceeded to have a fantastic time for nearly three hours.

Our thoughtful hostess cooked the kids and adults lunch. I thought it was so sweet to see the preschoolers of the bunch seated around the big table, eating chicken nuggets. (There were also some kids as old as five, many babies, and, I think, three pregnant women.)

After the play date, Rebecca spontaneously joined me for my planned journey to the Boston Children's Museum. It was so much easier to follow her driving and there were many times she took a different, much easier route than the GPS system was advising.

How does Mama maneuver two kids by herself? By impersonating a pack mule! Here John was flattening and imprinting a penny with one of those neat tourist machines and he needed me to lift him to place the coin.

We found the traveling "Curious George" exhibit!

John enjoyed crafting a pinwheel at this craft station. (He was so pleased with it that later at night when a hotel employee delivered our room service, John asked me in a stage whisper, "Can you tell that man that I made a pinwheel?" Then turning to the employee, "I made a pinwheel! All by myself! Well, Mama helped me.")

He clutched his pinwheel even while going down this slide repeatedly.

What a joyful boy!

This conveyor belt machine carried foam squares up a clear tube.

This is the set of the apartment belonging to the Man with the Yellow Hat in the Big City. The boys absolutely loved the pretend elevator, such that we mamas had to carefully orchestrate their taking turns.

After going back downstairs for a late lunch, we next went to a wonderful room just for children three years old and younger. It was securely locked, so one didn't have to worry about a child escaping. There was an interior locked area just for crawling babies and there were many comfortable couches for nursing (and a closed, dark room for nursing an especially distractable baby). Everything was just right for really little kids. (As an aside, when it was time for the staff to close this room for the day, a cheerful "pied piper" staff member stood at the gate and blew bubbles, which distracted all the preschoolers from the tantrums they were just about to throw at their mothers' feet. The kids ran over to the bubbles as if hypnotized and quietly followed those bubbles right out into the hallway, with the gate closing behind them and no tantrums to be had!)

This car played the most ridiculously addictive song.

Mary is so brave about slides: she found this slide and went down it by herself and without hesitation, landing with a big thud on her bottom, then jumping up to try it again.

The "Arthur" television show area had a real blue screen. I took a photo of the television screen where you can see John in the bottom left corner "joining the show."

Playing in an airplane

The museum is only 2.5 miles from the hotel, but I still wondered if it might take me nearly an hour with all the driving mistakes I might make. As it was, I found the most remarkable secret path home, which included one two-mile long street with no cars on it. I was in the middle of dense Boston driving at rush hour on some hidden highway-like road all by myself at 45 miles per hour! My guardian angel must have been watching out for me this time! Although I will admit that it was so creepy to drive for two miles in dense Boston without seeing another car that I was reminded of movie representations of Armageddon.

On the nights John takes a bath before bed, he is distressed about putting his wet hair on the pillow. Some time ago he came up with the solution of wearing a hat to bed. Tonight he donned not only a hat, but his mittens too.

Tomorrow, God-willing: home sweet home!