Over all we had a good summer in Philadelphia, but a round of COVID, canceled Florida trip, a sunburn, and a few days of MJ coping with an injury definitely made for some challenges. I joked with a friend that “we had a phenomenal Instagram summer!” because of all the activities and fun we had exploring. The challenges were real challenges though, and since we’re both still working full time while we’re there, it adds up. I’m going to leave these challenges in the past though, and focus on the fun!
I mentioned that the boys had been earning badges from the local library through a free program to inspire kids to do challenges and activities. They each earned four badges, and it was a lot of fun for all of us. I’m not sure I’ve mentioned before how much I enjoy the library programs from the Bucks County library system, but their branches are incredibly kid-friendly and the play areas are more extensive than what I see in most of the San Francisco bay area. My sister in law Irina suggested it’s because there are more outdoor activities year-around in California, so there’s less of a need for a library on rainy or frigid days, and she may be right. The culture here in California generally seems to be more catered to adults and mature kids than young ones.
The Bensalem library definitely ramped up things for the summer, and Aaron particularly enjoyed a presentation from the Center for Aquatic Sciences where he got to pet a horseshoe crab.
In the evenings we also got really into some Lego builds. Aaron even helped out a little, but would mostly work on his creative Duplo creations while Adam and I focused on building a train, a firehouse, and a fire helicopter. I think we’re going to end up with a little Lego City there.
Seeing family is also obviously a big part of why we were there over the summer, so it was nice to head downtown one evening to have dinner with MJ’s cousin Lauren and her husband. I had met her husband once before, but only MJ could attend their wedding due to a bunch of unexpected circumstances last year. So it was our first time seeing them as a married couple. We met at Emmy Squared Pizza where I got the “Angel” pizza consisting of Truffleist mushroom cream, ricotta, mushrooms, and it was spectacular! I’m still dreaming of this pizza. And it was also great as leftovers. I think our only complaint would be that something went a little wrong with our order and we waited almost an hour for the adult food to come out, which made the boys a bit antsy as the evening wound down and they had finished their meal. It was nice to have the extra time to catch up though, and Adam got his wish of getting to see the sun set on the Philadelphia skyline so we could enjoy the beautiful nighttime lights of the city. He’s definitely my kid, I love those nighttime city skylines too.
In other family news, our regular visits with Irina and little Sam were a highlight of our trip. Sam and Aaron are roughly the same age, so it was nice for Aaron to have a summer buddy. One evening we were able to go over to their house to have pizza and catch up, and Aaron was absolutely enamored with her dog Maya, and both the boys enjoyed spending time with Olive the cat.
Animal-wise, our neighbors were rabbit-sitting, so one evening we went over there to catch up and get the latest neighborhood gossip while the boys got to play with the rabbit. Predictably, all of this has lead to a string of requests to get a pet. I really would love to, but we have a lot on our plate right now, and our extended visits to Philly definitely make having a pet tricky. We’ll see, I haven’t been pet-free in decades, and while the loss of Caligula still stings, the pull of getting another cat is getting stronger.
During our visit I also was able to sneak out one afternoon to meet with Kris, a former colleague from my Tyco days. We’ve loosely kept in touch via Facebook, but we hadn’t seen each other in over a decade. Some of my posts throughout the summer clued her in to the fact that we weren’t too far away from each other. It was a great to reconnect, and we’ve penciled in doing something more involved with the boys next time we’re in town.
The final Friday before we left we made our way back to the Churchville Nature Center for a moth-themed presentation and camp fire. It ran quite late, and I think the boys were on the young side to appreciate a lot of the introductory lecture, but they got to walk around outside at night, see some bugs, hear a screech owl, and finally roast a couple marshmallows over a camp fire. I did a lot of camping as a kid, but it’s hasn’t been something we’ve done yet, so it occurred to me that the boys hadn’t really experienced a camp fire before. What an oversight! There’s a campground not too far from here, maybe next summer we’ll spend more time in California and do a weekend adventure in a tent.
Our last day in town we did some final clothes shopping (tax-free in Pennsylvania!) and then turned picking up the rental car that we’d be taking to the airport the next day into one final adventure with a train ride to the rental car center at the airport. The plan had been for MJ and Adam to go down alone while Aaron and I went on our own adventures around town, but apparently there’s nothing more fun than taking a train, so we all went.
Some of my low-key stress around packing and preparing to leave bubbled up during our train ride, but I did my best to be present and enjoy the journey with everyone. I mostly succeeded until Avis was over an hour late with our rental and we had to sit at the rental car center trying to keep the boys entertained. I should have brought more snacks. Then the stress carried into Sunday as we closed up the house and began our journey home. I hope this gets easier as the kids get older, but I also need to keep working on strategies to manage this family travel stress, I hate that the conclusion of our visit is so tainted by such an elevated stress level when there were so many great moments throughout the summer.