I think we found a covid-friendly winter activity!!

I had attempted ice skating with the boys last year, and to my surprise it was a huge success. The Isaac fam doesn’t really do winter sports, and I didn’t know if I could physically help both boys at the same time. But it worked, so we’re back at it this year!

I was really excited to learn that a few DC area rinks were opening up for the season, with covid precautions. The boys LOVED it.

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Hudson didn’t venture too far off his little whale, but he DID use it as an attack vessel, yelling “coming in hot!!” as he sped towards us 😂

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Maybe Dylan will wear pants next time (but probably not) 🙂

Need a little more Dylan and Hudson in your life? I don’t blame you – these guys are FUN 🙂

This blog is my photojournalistic attempt to share my adventures with Dylan and Hudson. I hope you enjoy!

In the meantime… photo highlights of the 3 of us from the past few years:

I can’t say I’m ready to give Dylan and Hudson a real camping experience (still a city girl over here!), so we did the next best thing – we stayed for a few nights at a cute cabin on an extremely kid-friendly campsite in rural Maryland. The boys loved it – we made so many s’mores in our firepit!

Scenes from our cabin and campsite:

I didn’t expect to be able to do much for Halloween this year, but lucky us – these campgrounds went BIG for the holiday. Every weekend in October they have cabin-decorating contests and campers bring giant buckets of candy for the kids. My little pokemon characters did not mind digging into the candy a couple weeks early 🙂

There was also mini golf, a giant jumping pillow, and a few other ridiculous activities:

On our way home, we had two stops. First: Antietam battlefield! The boys were interested in learning about Civil War history for about 90 seconds before playing chase and jumping in the leaves.

Lastly, we hit up a fall festival outside of Frederick, MD. Turns out there is quite a bit to do in the fall in the middle of a pandemic. No shortage of fun with these two!

Wait… 6? That sounds like a big kid! And he’s kind of acting like one, at least in some ways 🙂

Dylan’s bday celebrations lasted about 2 weeks (seriously). School celebration, special dinner with Daddy, special dinner with Mommy, bday party, Florida birthday, and then extra presents keep trickling in 🙂 Dylan is NOT complaining.

I loved going to read to Dylan’s class – he picked a book (Finding Winnie), and he got to lead the morning meeting and got a special crown from his teachers. We had dinner at union market, where Dylan got to choose any dinner he wanted, and he chose… wait for it… a veggie hot dog 😂 and ice cream!!!

He also had a party with his buddies at an indoor bounce house type place, which he loved. Teenage mutant ninja turtle cake, pizza and pink goldfish for all.

Favorite bday presents? Definitely his Pokémon cards, bakugan (?!?), bey blades, and legos!! He’s been telling us what he wants for months now 🙂 His koala crate (monthly art / science kit that’s delivered in the mail) is also a big hit.

Happy birthday to Dylan and happy 6th anniversary of motherhood to me!

We were into it this year!! The boys love their Chanukah pjs (Dylan’s favorite – they are first to be worn, even now that Chanukah is over). And they had a great time at our neighborhood menorah lighting, with crafts, pizza, sufganyot and hot chocolate! We were just going to “stop by” and Hudson insisted on staying longer so he could play with his buddy that he bumped into 🙂

We made Chanukah cookies – shaped like dreidels, Jewish stars and… dinosaurs. We ended up eating so many desserts over the holiday that the cookies are in the freezer until next time.

Presents are tricky this time of year because it’s SO MUCH with Dylan’s birthday and all our generous relatives (ahem, Omi Sarah and Aunt Judy), but the boys did a great job being appreciative and hopefully didn’t get too spoiled 😬😬 We likes learning about the actual holiday this year too!

Now that Omi and Opi are snowbirds in Florida, we are taking advantage! I took the boys down to visit over their winter break, for the entire chunk of time between Christmas and New Years. As always, it is heavenly for the boys to spend time with Omi and Opi.

Pool time is extra fun now that Dylan can swim and is getting stronger, and Hudson is hysterical in his swim hoodie, goggles, floaties and noodle get-up. We also checked out some nature centers, an aquarium, got buried at the beach, played with lots and lots of bday and Chanukah presents (so many games!), and ate as much junk food as Omi Sarah could sneak in without my noticing 🙂

We can’t wait for our next trip in February – what a treat to get out of the northeast in the winter!

Rosh Hashanah at the beach and Yom Kippur in the woods? What a cool way to celebrate the High Holidays this year!

We took the train to CT – that was a treat! I could get used to that. I actually finished my book, and the boys ate snacks, watched their favorite shows, and excitedly checked out the cafe car. We arrived at a decent hour (so nice – we usually arrive after midnight!) and got to spend a few days with Omi and Opi. We made our usual trips to the beach and Stews, and got to spend special time with Grandma Gertie, Grandpa Werner, Unkey, cousin Sam, and other family – how lucky are the boys?

We stuck around DC for Yom Kippur, but the three of us had off and I wanted to keep up our tradition of doing something in nature. So we checked out Roosevelt Island, right in between DC and VA in the Potomac River. We all loved it there – I suspect we will be back! It was tough fasting while feeding the boys, but we made it most of the day without issue (right until we had to pick up a couple groceries for our break-fast that afternoon!)

I am sad to say that we had a very DC moment, where I attempted to bring the boys to a kids’ YK service at 6th and I synagogue in downtown DC, and we couldn’t find parking! So no synagogue for us, but we’re going to (sort of) make up for it with a sukkah party at our neighborhood synagogue / havurah in a few days.

Some of our neighborhood friends came over, along with Omi and Opi, who were on their way to FL for a couple weeks – convenient! We had a perfect sunset and about 7 small maniacal kids on the roof and it was a lovely way to end the day 🙂

Shana Tovah to all our friends and family who celebrate!!

We had an epic “fall” day in late September (actually 90 degrees out and sticky) – caught the last day of the Wings of Fancy butterfly exhibit at Brookside Gardens and checked out the regional park and playground nearby. What a great day! Totally wiped my little monkeys out.

The butterflies plus a walk through the garden (with our buddies Grace and Felix) plus a playground and picnic lunch PROBABLY would have been sufficient, but wouldn’t you know it there was also a Montgomery County festival going on with live music, free food and bounce houses. Dylan and Hudson went to town… including walking a couple miles to and from the car – their legs are getting strong! No surprise they passed out in the car on the way home.

We are getting the hang of this no nap schedule, but probably need to schedule a little bit of quiet time into our day!

We went on a lot of trips this summer! And we capped it off with a couple nights in Charlottesville, which is about 2.5 hours by car from DC. We got my city boys a little nature (Kemper Park), went on a family friendly tour of Monticello (Hudson was probably still to young for this – whoops!), went swimming at our hotel pool, and ate dinner outside on the downtown mall.

I am loving traveling with these 2!! Excited for more trips and already thinking about where we should go next summer….

Hudson is now a preschooler in DC public schools! He had a blast on his first day – he was familiar with Peabody after seeing Dylan go there for a year, and he had buddies in his class that he already knew from his old school or because they’re Dylan’s friends’ younger siblings. And, when I picked him up from the playground at the end of the day, he said “Mommy, can I stay longer?” A sign of a very successful first day!

And, major plus: no more daycare payments, and both kids dropped off and picked up in the same place – SCORE!!!

We also said goodbye to Little Scholars, where Dylan went for a year (2017-2018), and Hudson went for 2 years (2017-2019), what a wonderful experience we had there! After his first day, Hudson asked me to tell his old teachers that he is not listening to his new teachers 🤦🏻‍♀️