Children's Museum, Friends & Zoo

We had a very busy week last week. On Monday we met my friend in the town we grew up in for lunch and then the three of us went to the Children's Museum there. Now the friend we met and I have known each other since we were around six months old. Yes, we are lifetime friends. We both now live in different states and our hometown is about halfway between us. Her youngest is my goddaughter who is looking at colleges for next year. Well, we took Hazel by the houses we grew up in and went to the New Children's Museum. Of course anyone from around the area of West Hartford, knows the museum by the giant whale in front of it. See above. After we went through the museum we went into the whale. Remember the picture I asked where Hazel was? She was inside the whale.

Some Simple Crafts

Well Monday, Hazel and I had an adventure. The picture above is from part of our location. Feel free to comment with your guess. I will share its whereabouts in another post. We went to the town I grew up in and visited some friends of mine. One of my friends I have known since we were six months old. She traveled about two hours to meet us for the day. I will share the details of our adventure another time. We ended our day by traveling to my sister's for a sleepover. Again, I will share the details for another time--probably next Happy Family Times. Well last Sharing Saturday We Made That shared a Wave Sensory Bottle. I loved the idea and had all the supplies so I made one to keep Hazel busy for our over two hour car ride.

My sister left a pink plastic lei for Hazel on her bed when we got to her apartment. Hazel loves it and wanted to decorate it today. So we made some tissue paper flowers for it. I cut with my scrapbook scissors some tissue paper circles. Then we stuck half a pipe cleaner through the center of several of them (2 or 3) and curled the top so it would stay. Then we used the stem to wind it around the lei. What do you think?

Ok, that is what we have been up to. We are having a relaxing catch up day today. Hope you are enjoying your day! Don't forget to guess where Hazel is in the top picture!!

Happy Family Times # -A Visit to Gloucester

Have you done something fun with your family this week? Come share it with us! Kelly from Happy Whimsical Hearts and I are collecting ideas to inspire us all to have more fun times with our families. Here is something we did this week and you can share below!

This week Steve had a day off and we headed to Gloucester, Massachusetts. I had been told about a wonderful health food store, The Common Crow, in Gloucester by the parent/child teacher at Hazel's school. I have been wanting to check it out for awhile, but haven't had the time or energy to find it. Since Gloucester is in the area that Steve is  in charge of for his company he knows it better than I do. We finally found a time to go before the summer season truly hit and made traveling hard to get to Cape Ann.

Source: Wikipedia

In my rush to get out the door since I needed to be home to go tutoring in the afternoon, I forgot my camera. However, this picture is one of the things that says Gloucester to anyone around here. We stopped at this statue as we drove by the water. This statue is surrounded by plaques with names of all the fishermen from Gloucester lost at sea. (Some of you may remember hearing about Gloucester, MA in the book/movie The Perfect Storm. Book written by Sebastian Junger.) A nice family told us about a playground by the beach, but we did not make it there this time.  We did manage to find a post card of the light house that we had bought awhile ago locally and found this nice photo card of the harbor.

After visiting the Man at the Wheel statue, we went to find the Common Crow. While dealing with one way streets, we discovered that one way Main Street was definitely a street we wanted to walk down and do a bit of shopping or checking out. So we parked near The Common Crow and checked it out. Then we were hungry for lunch, so we went looking for a good place. We found Sugar Magnolia's which was wonderful. Then we stopped in a few stores--the toy store, the children's clothing store and then headed for some coffee and tea. We stopped in the Pleasant Street Tea Co. where I got the best chai latte ever!!

Then we headed home. However some things about Gloucester and Cape Ann. Gloucester is the oldest seaport in America. It went through several different names, but Captain John Smith presented a map of the eastern coast to Prince Charles who named the land Cape Anne, after his mother, in 1614. The name has been shortened to Cape Ann, but still remains. (Source: Discover Gloucester) I definitely want to go back and explore Gloucester some more when I have more time.

To share a picture of our family I will show you a few from our family walk this weekend.

Now it is your turn to share how your family has spent some quality time lately.

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Ok, now for our PARTY!! Please share your FUN Family Times!!