Catching up - Some of the Wiens clan come for a visit

The first weekend in June, Kyle's sister, Deneen, and our nephew, Nathan, came to visit us from NM. The weekend was a whirlwind of activities and the time flew by, but we had a great time while it lasted.

After picking them up from the airport we strolled around Boston Commons.

During our stroll we discovered a little bit of hockey fan support for the Bruins during the Stanley Cup.

That night we had dinner at a local favorite pizza place, Regina's. The food was fantastic. We followed it up with a stop at Mike's pastry shop, which we ended up visiting a few times over the next few days. I think that may have been Nathan's favorite part of the trip. We did run into a little bit of trouble after dinner. There were severe storms in the area that night. MA even ended up having a tornado touch down. Needless to say, the rain was pretty intense and we waited in the subway stop for Kyle to bravely get the car for us.

We spent the next day driving up the North Shore, towards Hampton Beach, NH, to spend the afternoon with an old friend of Deneen's, Mary Rae, and her family. Sadly, I don't have pictures of the time we spent together, but we walked the Hampton boardwalk, went to an arcade, and had a wonderful afternoon all around.

Rockport

 The next day we went back to Boston and spent time at the science museum.

After the museum, we walked down to the harbor and toured the USS Constitution, which is a must if you visit Boston.

Sadly, the aquarium wasn't open by the time we got there, but we were greeted at the front door by some of aquarium's residents.

One of our biggest adventures was our trip to the Patriot's Gillette Stadium to see the US men's soccer team take on the World Cup winners, Spain. We underestimated the time and traffic to get there and missed a little of the game. That didn't diminish the experience though. We were in the 4th row from the field by one of the goals. The game was sold out with about 65,000 people in attendance. We also couldn't ask for better weather. The only down side of the game was that most of the crowd seemed to be rooting for Spain. Totally threw me off. I was saddened that the USA team didn't have more support. USA did lose the game, but it was a wonderful experience.

This was my sad attempt at a soccer ball cake. I think my sugar flowers came out much better than the cake.

 The top activity of the trip:

Catching up - Part 1

It has obviously been forever since I posted a blog entry.  I will attempt to get this blog caught up to the present prior to Logan's arrival in January.  So, in my next few posts, I am going to give a whirlwind tour of our lives between May and now.

To start with, there were a few more adventures in MA before we made our journey back to NM. Kyle and I spent a weekend in Boothbay Harbor in Maine. We stayed at the Topside Inn Bed and Breakfast and really enjoyed the quaintness of the town. We spent time reading in a fabulous nook right outside of our bedroom, played a few games, and walked around the town.

On May 29th, Kyle and I were lucky enough to spend a few hours kayaking around the Boston Harbor. It was a great way to see the city from a different perspective.

USS Constitution

We got to go through the lock between the Boston Harbor and the Charles River.

These jellyfish were everywhere.  First time we have ever seen so many outside of an aquarium.