She's a Junior in High School - How did that happen?

Today was the first day of school.  

Lauren is a Junior this year. 

 I'm not quite sure how that happened, but it has. 

Lauren's 16th Birthday Party

Lauren FINALLY had her 16th birthday party.  

We were in Utah on her actual birthday, and since we've 

been home there hadn't been a good time to do one. 

 And since school is starting in a couple of 

days we decided it was now or never.

Lauren wanted to have a Ghirardelli double chocolate brownie cake.  

It was yummy!

Happy Birthday Lauren!

Labor Day Weekend

Guess where were for the weekend - Boston.  We left Saturday morning, stopped in Springfield to go to the Donut Dip and arrived at the Sheraton in Wakefield around 3:30pm, just in time to check-in.

Once we'd checked in we headed to the Breakheart Reservation in Sagus (about 10 minutes away). There was a concert by the NE Navy Band outside their visitor's center.  It started at 5:30pm.  So we got there, sat up our chairs and blanket, and then we went riding our bikes around the reservation until the concert started. 

 It was a hilly two-mile bike ride.  But it was a pretty area.   The concert was great.  They were really good, and did the kind of band music brass bands should play.

Three piccolo players playing the obbligato  in 

"The Stars and Stripes Forever".  They were awesome!

Lauren in her "vacation" pose. 
She did it at least once everywhere we went this summer.

We'd gone to Boston because our Stake President had asked Glen to attend a meeting on Sunday that he wasn't able to go to.  We decided that if we were going to go, we'd make a trip of it.

Monday morning we went to the
Omelette Headquarters for breakfast.  

Glen had read about it on Yelp and heard that it was good.
He was right!

This waitress had 10 plates stacked on her arm.  

She told us that her maximum is 15 plates.
She must have incredible biceps!

After breakfast we headed to Crane's Beach in Ipswich, MA.  

We'd heard that it was a nice beach and thought we'd give it a try.

We actually got in and swam for awhile.  

Lauren and Glen tried body surfing, and caught a few good waves.

The whiteboard at the parking entrance said
that the water temperature was 65°.  

But that didn't stop us.

After leaving the beach we decided to stop at Woodman's in Essex.  

I'd heard that it was the birthplace of "fried clams".  It was awesome!

And it was!  We ate half and brought
the other half home for another day.

By the time we were leaving the line was out the door. 

I'm glad we left the beach early enough to avoid most of the crowds.

After dinner we headed home.  It was a wonderful Labor Day weekend!