Two Weeks in Connecticut

Our trip to Connecticut took us two days. The original plan was to stop at Kirtland, Ohio on the way out, because we haven't ever visited the temple or the other church history sites there. But that would have meant an 8-hour drive the second day, and I just couldn't stomach the last day being the long one again. So we skipped Kirtland (maybe we'll stop there on the way back in December?) and made it to somewhere forgettable in Pennsylvania. We slept decently and had a five hour drive on Saturday the 8th.

We were warmly greeted in Connecticut by Grandma and Grandpa Stratford and Sarah's four kids: Claire, Cooper, Jane, and Jill. The cousins were all very excited to see each other again, and it was nice that they had seen each other recently enough to remember one another. Ben and Sam came home from Scout Camp that night, and Sarah returned from a girls' weekend in D.C. on Sunday evening (when Sam left). We were all in that not-so-large house for a whole week, and all the adults had headaches and at one time or another were ready to slit their throats from the noise. But the kids had a great time with each other and made some good friendships and memories.

I was probably happier than anyone to be there. First of all, I was just glad to not be the only adult anymore--to have other people to talk to, to joke with, and to share responsibilities with. Despite the noise, I was very content to be there. But second, I am lucky to feel as comfortable at my in-laws as I do at my own parent's home. They treat me like a daughter and I feel completely accepted and loved as I am. They hug me when they can see I'm having a hard time, and they cheer me on in all my endeavors. They are also wise people, and I appreciate the wealth of experience they share with me. I couldn't have better in-laws--all of them.

Abby with Cooper Boyle. They are only a few months apart and claim their minds are identical.

Mary was usually in the parlor reading or working on her language skills (or sneaking computer game time), but Isaac was out with the younger kids all the time. They all looked up to him and wanted to play with him, and though that usually meant conflict, this was one moment when he was using his influence for good, and I wanted to catch it on film. Despite his ridiculous face, he was having a good time teaching the younger kids to play marbles.

The very first night, Linda fell as she was climbing down from her bunk bed and got a beautiful shiner.

Most of the time we spent at Grandma's house, but we did spend one lovely day at Jenning's Beach on the Long Island Sound. My kids were a little grossed-out by the seaweed, but had a decent war with it. These Utah landlubbers hardly know what to do with a saltwater beach.

Mermaids Linda and Claire Boyle

Jane, Claire, Jill, Joe, Cooper, and Linda, with Sarah on the background.

Abby and Linda begged for days for Grandma to do face paint. 

Uncle Ben was kind enough to take Isaac golfing, and to my surprise, Isaac loved it.  Ben said he was very well-behaved and played all the way through, and even showed some aptitude for it. Isaac asked a few times if they could go again before we left. I'm always happy when my kids find something new to be interested in (that doesn't involve a screen), and grateful to Uncle Ben for being willing to risk a less-stellar evening of golfing.

The cousins left on Saturday the 15th, and the following Monday we had our first day of "School." I wanted to get the kids accustomed to our "European Vacation" version of homeschool, as well as work out some kinks, before we arrived in Europe. We had a pretty strenuous schedule, especially because the weather was quite hot and humid and sapped a lot of energy. We started at 7 with chores and breakfast, at 8:00 moved to 15 minutes of scripture study, 30 minutes of math on KhanAcademy.org, then 15 minutes of French practice. Of course, the first few days were a total waste, taking twice the time it should and with so many technical difficulties I wanted to scream. In fact, on Monday morning I had to take a 20 minute nap when the homework was done before I could face the rest of the day. This schedule eased up as the week went along and the kids got more used to self-starting their learning. This will I hope be the most valuable lesson they learn from this trip--that they need to be responsible for their own education. Most of their school experience has been spoon-fed learning, and while there will definitely be aspects of that in our trip, I hope they will understand that education is something you do, not something you sit and listen to. 

After the morning homeschool, the kids packed their lunches and we set out on sight-seeing trips. The first was a Nature Preserve with short easy trails through swamp and forest land. Abby and Isaac caught huge frogs, and everybody got really muddy. 

There was also a great "educational museum" with live animals and a room with tons of puzzles and toys that kept everyone busy for a full 90 minutes. 

Again, Joe prefers to wear the backpack rather than take it off.

Isaac was trying to communicate with the squirrel.

I took the kids to New Haven one day to see the Peabody Natural History Museum at Yale. They enjoyed it fine, but they were quite captivated by the simple experience of driving through New England. They loved the homes, the hills, the trees and the rural feeling of it all. As Mary put it (with uncharacteristic simpleness), "It's so much more naturey!" They all agreed they wanted to move to Connecticut. If it weren't for that little problem of Dad's job. . . 

At the Peabody, Mary and I were excited to see the new geological phenomenon "plastiglomerate," the rock composed of both sedimentary and organic materials welded together by molten plastic. In other words, we've introduced garbage rocks into the earth's geological development. 

I came around the corner and saw my wonderful daughter taking notes on the exhibit. So great.

I really don't remember what we did every day for our field trips, but I know we did something each day. In the afternoon each day, I also wanted the kids to blog for an hour, then after dinner do some assigned reading. By Tuesday evening I had already learned that I was pushing too hard, and that I need to choose what is most important. Mary may be able to keep that schedule, but I'll need to be careful going forward that I don't wear the kids out with so many academic expectations that they are emotionally or physically too drained to appreciate the sightseeing. 

On Friday and Saturday we got to spend some nice time with Grandma and Grandpa. On Friday we went out canoeing, and on Saturday afternoon we went to another hands-on science and technology museum. (How many of those do you think we can go to in the space of four months? The kids keep asking for more, but don't they want some art or architecture or music?)

Mary played mostly with the snap circuits.

Abby loved the many iterations of marble run.

What preschooler doesn't love a sensory table?

Linda and Isaac spent at least an hour with the life-size marble run.

Grandpa was the most entertaining kid in the whole museum. 

We had a wonderful time in Connecticut, and despite the craziness and hard work, it was relaxing and rejuvenating for me to be with family. But we were counting the hours until we could be with Ed. As our departure got closer and closer we all missed him more and more. 

ALSO: We had the benefit of a spiritual learning opportunity on Friday morning when Isaac went out to feed the rabbit and discovered it had died in the night. We had a lovely service and laid it to rest in the back woods with Daisy (the duck), Oreo and Doublestuff (cats), and various other animals from Ed's childhood. It was a good chance to talk to these sheltered, city-slicker kids about life and death and the blessing of the Savior and his resurrection.

A Week in Chicago

On Saturday, August 1st, after a great time at the Hickson's, we headed south from Lake Villa into Chicagoland. Our first stop was on the north side in Bucktown to see our old friend, Kim Hopkins. She was baptized into the Hyde Park Ward about the time Ed and I arrived in 2001, and Ed was assigned as her first home teacher. Over the years she babysat our kids, we spent Thanksgivings together, and we became fast friends. It was great to see her, but the kids were not at their best, and they only lasted about 45 minutes. I promised her we'd see her again before we left, which we did the following Thursday for lunch. These pictures are from that second visit.

Dirty, dirty faces. Chocolate frosties from Wendy's

We headed into Hyde Park through midday traffic and lots of construction and arrived in time to pick up the kids' first deep dish, Chicago-style pizza from Giordano's for lunch. We stopped at the Shurtliff's to eat it, and the kids were amazed at the amount of cheese on their pizza. Frankly, I had forgotten the heart-attack-package this pizza is. But my-oh-my, it tasted so good we bought another one a couple days later. 

The Shurtliff's live in "the Co-op," a condo complex popular among permanent Hyde Park LDS families who are lucky enough to be able to buy in there. It is favored because of its garden, playground, sandbox and basketball court in the center of the square. If you have small kids, it's the easiest place for a mom to live, with a park right out the back door and secure, locked gates. Ed and I lived there for a year at the Haraguchi's when we returned home from Denmark and we loved it. And our kids loved visiting there now, especially playing in the sandbox. We visited the Shurtliff's more than once during our week in Chicago, sometimes just to use them for their playground and sandbox.

I'm glad they know we love them despite their sandbox.

We headed to our apartment to unpack and get ready for bed, a three-bedroom apartment on 53rd and Drexel (3 blocks from Pres. Obama's house) generously rented to us by a member of the Hyde Park Ward who has never met us but nevertheless trusted us to take care of their place. It had air conditioning, three bathrooms, two levels, and plenty of sleeping space for everyone. It was a great place to stay, especially since the owners have two boys and lots of toys that kept my kids busy when we weren't out and around town.

I got the kids ready for bed, then went out for dinner with Liesl Shurtliff, Julie Hammond, and America Cannon. It was great to spend time with them, but I wasn't that much fun. I didn't realize how tired I was until that evening when I had hardly anything to say. I also realized that the trip was taking an emotional toll on me, and having to be alert and aware 24 hours a day, including a lot of driving, was wearing me out. It was also an emotional experience to be back in Chicago. I have only been back one other time since we moved, but never with my kids, and over the years I've often thought about how much I would like to go back, and about how good it was there. I've also been very proud of my time there, and proud of how I tried to conquer the difficulties that urban living can create for a family with lots of young kids. But on this visit, after traveling for a week with the kids, I realized that I probably was no longer up to the stresses of living in Hyde Park, and realizing that I no longer wanted to live there, that I preferred my easy life in Utah, was like plucking away a part of my personality that I was prideful about. When I lived in Hyde Park, it was easy to look down on other women who wanted to move back to Utah and their garages and supermarkets and gas stations and yards and good schools, because I was doing the hard thing by choosing to stay in Chicago. And now, I'm the one who wants the garages and supermarkets and gas stations and yards and good schools. That was humbling, and it made me feel somewhat inadequate to the friends I still have in Hyde Park. I'm sure they don't think of me that way, however, and I'm glad for that. Sometimes its amazing how well pride hides itself in our character, and how suddenly that pride can be revealed and painfully pricked.

But aside from character revelations, it was a great week, starting with church in the Hyde Park Ward on Sunday morning. It was great to see old friends, and to show Mary and Isaac where they went to Primary. I recognized so many people, and I felt loved by all those who recognized me and welcomed me home. Relief Society felt like I had never left. The rest of the week we went to museums, rode the train downtown, and went to the beach twice. I tried to get the kids excited about staying a couple more days, but by Thursday everyone was ready to go on to Connecticut. And to tell the truth, I was, too. I was tired of being a single mother with no other adults in the house, and even tired of visiting Chicago without Ed, because he's the whole reason I learned to love it in the first place. 

This was my last visiting teaching companion in Chicago, Elizabeth Bundu, with her two daughters, Kadija and Rashida. She was a war refugee from Sierra Leone, who lived in Liberia in one room with ten people for ten years before she got a visa to come to the United States. During the time we were companions, her husband left her, which made her happy since he was abusive.  I asked her why she never left him, and she gave me a serious look, saying: "It is marriage. You don't end what God has started." In the last couple years, she has remarried a pastor of another church, but she has remained active in the ward. This was her last Sunday, as her husband is moving her to Des Moines, Iowa. She's one of the people I most wanted to see, and I'm grateful for the tender mercy of seeing her again. 

  

The kids found plenty to do in the afternoon while I took a much-needed nap. The owners would probably have a heart-attack if they saw all the various parts of their apartment that at one time or another became a car track.

This picture isn't all that interesting since it is mostly of people's backs, but every Sunday evening members of the ward meet on the lawn of the business school and listen to the bells of Rockefeller Chapel and share dinner. It's the kind of event that wards in Utah just don't do because so many people have family around them to share these moments with. It's the sort of thing I miss most about Hyde Park, where your ward becomes your family and you spend time loving and supporting and playing together, especially in the summer time when the weather is good and the academic expectations are dimished.

We walked through the gothic-style Rockefeller Chapel (where Ed once arranged to have our stake conference when we was serving as the Stake Executive Secretary--how fantastic to have church in a gothic cathedral!!). The kids, of course, had to take turns sitting in the altar seat. My kids don't have a lot of tolerance for sightseeing in churches, plus it was really hot in there, so we found the bathrooms then headed back to the picnic spot.

Someone brought a snake to the picnic and let all the other kids have a turn holding it. 

We spent about 4 hours on Monday and 3 hours on Wednesday at the beach, and the kids said it still wasn't enough. I was getting a little bored, but they can play in the sand all day long. 

Ty Shurtliff and Isaac digging to China, with Liesl in the background. (Liesl Shurtliff is the award-winning author of Rump and Jack--if you haven't read her excellent middle-grade novels, you absolutely should. Red will be out next spring.)

Topher Shurtliff, Joe, and Linda

We hadn't planned to go to the beach on Wednesday, but Joe was up all night with an earache, and when I called Liesl for a doctor recommendation she picked up all my other kids and took them to the beach so I didn't have to manage them at the doctor's office. Bless you, Liesl. You were so kind, you made me cry. And you made my kids happy.

One of the other families had paddle boards, so Isaac was in heaven. He thinks kayaking is the best pastime on earth. This was his first time on a paddle board and loved it.

This was about the only picture I took at the Museum of Science and Industry, one of the highlights of our week; we were too busy to take pictures. We were still going strong after three hours, but the museum closed and kicked us out.

We visited Ray Elementary, where Mary went to Kindergarten through second grade. She hardly remembered it, but she did recognize this patio where she would wait after school for parent pick-up. In this picture, she is showing me the scar she got on her knee when she fell one day on this cement. It's funny what we remember most about being young, isn't it?

I took the kids downtown only once, which reminded me why I didn't take my kids downtown very often when we lived in Hyde Park. It was a long day, a lot of walking, and with the heat and humidity, the kids were worn out by 1 pm. But they were well-behaved, especially around the trains. I told them the story of when we lived in Denmark and I was yelled at in Danish by a train conductor for letting Mary and Isaac run toward the train on the platform. I was 9 months pregnant and couldn't chase after them, and I think they scared the conductor half to death. So now, all the kids were overly-conscious of the yellow line and kept well away from the edge. Mission accomplished. 

Cloud Gate (affectionately known as the Bean) was installed during the time we lived in Chicago, and it's one of my favorite pieces of public art. Abby was pointing at a pigeon, but I love how it looks like she's touching the Bean. 

Inside the Bean.

Mary kept falling behind because she wouldn't stop reading her Kindle. I finally had to take it away. 

One of the main reasons for going downtown was to visit the Art Institute, one of the finest museums in the world. I wanted to give the kids some museum practice before we got to Europe. I got the great idea online to pick up postcards at the gift shop before going into a museum, then have the kids do a treasure hunt to find their postcard art. What I didn't realize is that when you have five kids, each child should only pick one card, not two or three, and at a museum this size you should definitely stop at the info desk to find out if any of them aren't on display and what rooms the others are in. But the kids lasted and hour and fifteen minutes--fifteen minutes longer than I had hoped, so I consider it a win.

Even though Ed wasn't with us, I wanted to show the kids the Oriental Institute and the place where he spent so much of his life. Here are the kids making embarrassing noises in the otherwise silent archives/library. 

And here they are whining in the lounge, the other part of the OI where Ed spent most of his life.

I asked them to line up for a photo in the OI museum. . .  (No, Mary's only pretending to touch the bull.)

On our last evening in Chicago, Liesl invited us over for dinner. The kids played in the sandbox one last time, and I enjoyed the company of great friends.

Shaun and Mary Fullmer were also there. They just returned from a family history mission in France and the Czech Republic, and it was fun to catch up with them. Ed and Shaun served together in the Stake Presidency, and Mary and I used to go walking around the Point together on Lake Michigan in the mornings.