boston. blog. beginning.

*** I would like to publicly apologize for the overuse of iphone pictures as we left our real camera at home because we were too lazy to bring it in an attempt to carry less baggage. To make up for it, I'm filling this post with a plethora of links for your internet perusal! ***

It's 4pm on Sunday & I'm in the beautiful logan int'l airport. 

I miss my kids something fierce and I cannot wait for an interrupted night of sleep. 

My heart is full. I've spent the weekend in Boston kissing, praying, and eating. 

So I suppose what follows is the Christian-less-well-written-more-cannoli-filled-version of Eat, Pray, Love. I have so much to share and I've devised this schedule to relay the contents of our lovahs getaway. 

Monday: first two days

Tuesday: foooooooood. 

Wednesday: state of the heart, a.k.a. ugly crying on Bunker Hill

Thursday: Saturday & Sunday

Friday: fashion friday, an essay on how to borrow clothing from friends & family to attempt and look cute for four days in a row when you're used to yoga pants and hoodies

Let's get started! 

I left you guys on Tuesday, and oh my goodness did I leave you in the best care or what?! Did you read those guest posts? They were my fave! Casey, Karissa, Beth, & Carissa - thank you soooo much. If you haven't checked all those out - pause for a sec, and do so. 

Then come back and here about our trip:) 

So Wednesday. 

Wednesday a.m., I woke up at the crack of dawn and triple checked all our stuff. I had the kids & I all packed and we hustled our little hinies down to Charleston to get them settled at their Nonny's house. We spent the day playing with Auntie Rubes and the A-kids, unpacking their bags, and lecturing them on being kind to their Nonny & Poppy while Mom and Dad were gone. 

Thursday I woke up ridiculously early to Benja screaming, "MOMMY! LOOK AT MY PUPPY!" at 4:45am. After two hours of shushing Benj, I got the kids dressed and ready and we all headed to Seacoast to hear the Rubes do some teaching for women on gospel identity. This is my public plea for her to do a guest post next week on what she taught on. Come on Rubes, do it. 

I immediately jumped in the car, sobbed for 3 minutes about leaving the kids, and trucked it back to Columbia to pick up Nick. Quick repack of the bags, little bit o' kissing (sorry, it's true), and a fast drive to CLT to catch our flight. Big thanks to Larlar for the airport drop-off, and that's it. We were headed to beantown. 

We rode from the airport to our sweet hotel wide-eyed and excited. Got settled, freshened up, and headed back out into the unusually warm night to grab some local pizza at Regina Pizzeria. (Regina Pizza? Pizza Regina? Pizzeria Regina? Everyone says something different!) Hour wait. Totally worth it. Blasting New Kids on the Block music inside. Perfect. Back to the hotel where I experienced awesome trip experience #1: putting on a hotel robe & my uggs with no intentions to be woken up by anyone. Ever. Well, for the rest of the night. 

freshened up. city folk.

staring at this door for an hour is worth it.

uggs. hotel robe. & I believe there was 30 rock involved.

Friday

Friday a.m., we'd declared sleep in and rest and cuddle morning. Of course, at 5:30, my internal alarm went off and my go-light was on. Nick didn't even curse me as I tapped away loudly on the laptop keys, rustled my Bible pages, and giggled as I g-chatted with whoever I could find awake and online. It was still a glorious and lazy morning. I mean, I was still wearing the hotel robe, how could it not be? 

all the makings of a lazy, perfect mornin'

sights in Beacon Hill

We walked through Beacon Hill and Back Bay, two beautiful areas of the city, and I slightly wished the Lord had called us to plant in those areas, but alas - we can't related too much to billionaires and we'd never afford their rent. We can, however, eat breakfast in their neighborhood and we loved The Paramount. Of course, I already want to tell you more, but I'll save it for food day tomorrow. 

Next, my first T ride took us to our actual future home of the neighborhood of Charlestown and I walked around in love. We dipped into the Bunker Hill museum for a potty break & realized they have a room that would be PERFECT for our first public meeting as a church. We prayed for favor for the space and jokingly invoked two statues as our first elders. 

Second T ride to the South End to meet with Nick's mentor and we had a lovely two hours of coffee, church talk, and just straight up encouragement. I had a moment with a T popcorn vendor because we hadn't eaten lunch. Food rules or not, Michael Pollan, if you're a hungry foodie walking by a public transit popcorn stand - sometimes you just have to stop. I loved Nick's mentor, Ralph & his wife Judy, and I'll for sure tell you more about them in the future. Back to the hotel, I went on a beautiful Charles River run, Nick took a rest and we were ready for dinner. There was something really freeing and invigorating about darting about in five o'clock traffic as I ran through the city. There was also something really humbling about every single runner on the Charles flying past me:). 

c-town. Makes me want to start singing Adele's, "hometown glory".

bunker hill museum & our first elders

the frozen charles on my sunset run

The North End (and Italian food, in general) called our name again and we headed to Ida's. Again, I'll tell you about the food later - but I can tell you straight up right now that Ida's is a definite back-alley-legit-five-families sort of place. Afterwards, we walked a few doors down to our second restaurant of the night for cannolis. Ahhhhhhh. Moment of silence for cannolis. I'm pretending like I just ate a cannoli, but there was also a sugary drink and some gelato involved. Oops. Vegan fail. 

We rolled ourselves back to the hotel, repeated the robe & ugg ritual, and passed out. 

my public transportation popcorn moment. mmmmmm.

I declare this: THE BEST THING I'VE EVER EATEN. 

holy (eaten) cannoli. And gelato. And a mocha. Who am I?

And that was our first few days! 

Or at least, the VERY short version. 

I can't wait to tell you more. 

UPDATE: our flight was delayed and it's now Monday morning. 
reaaaaaaallllly missing my kids now but more time to work on Boston blogs:) 
Love ya'll.