Boston LeBuffes: November 2017

Soccer, Fall 2017

Both of the kids did soccer for the first time this year. We knew Max would love it. He loves anything sports-related. But we were a bit worried that Veronica would not like it at all. Luckily, we requested to have her put on a team full of girls she knows from Kids' Corner. They were all super excited she was joining their team and I knew she would be fine. Both of them did really well. Max loves it all and Veronica is "a natural defender", according to one of her coaches. Soccer began in September, actually on the same day as Veronica's 8th birthday party, so the kids were lucky to have the additional audience of Gramps, Grandmom, Ninang, Tito Erik, and Ninong at their first games. Soccer ended in November. The weather was considerably colder! Here are a few photos from the season. They got medals at their last games.

Click here to see more photos and videos from Soccer this fall.

Halloween 2017

For an adult with no kids, Halloween involves, generally, carving a pumpkin, maybe a costume party, and handing out candy. However, when you have kids, it's multiple days and multiple festivities. As a parent, you just hope their costumes last through it all, since they're not made to be that durable. This Halloween included:

Winchester window painting,
the Kids' Corner Haunted House (proceeds go to charity),
candy and a Halloween show at a local elderly home,
the Winchester Halloween parade and trick-or-treating in the town center,
a Halloween craft activity in Max's kindergarten class,
carving pumpkins at home,
a Halloween parade for the kindergartners,
and, finally, trick-or-treating on actual Halloween with Ninong!

Kids' Corner has an annual Haunted House for charity. What's nice is that they can dial up or down the scare factor. Unfortunately, the kids always want it all the way down, but I want it all the way up! Check out the video in the album linked below for a video I took inside.

Veronica's class painted emoji pumpkins.

The 2nd graders at Lincoln were all invited to a local elderly home for trick-or-treating and a show. Veronica was picked to help out during The Twelve Days of Halloween. She was 5 Crawling Bugs. Check out the video in the album linked below.

Ready for the Halloween Parade and trick-or-treating in the town center!

Max's class did Halloween crafts.

Carving pumpkins!

Lining up for school. Max was Hiro from Big Hero 6 this year. His costume is black with blue accents. He's in the front line, to the right of the boy in the pirate hat.

Finally, on to trick-or-treating! Ninong was here and he was Star Trek: The Next Generation's Captain Picard. Sadly, I don't have a photo of him in costume. Veronica is Mal (complete with her spell book) from the Disney movie The Descendants. Since Mal is Maleficent's daughter, I decided to be Maleficent. I was obsessed with my horns and glowing staff! Max wanted Daddy to be Baymax from Big Hero 6. Daddy is a good sport.

Video of the glowing staff in the album linked below. It turns different colors!

We had fun trick-or-treating and were so happy Ninong was here for the 2nd year in a row. Click here to see more photos and videos from Halloween 2017.

25th Wine & Dine, Oct 2017

The 25th Wine & Dine was in West Chester, PA this year. Adrian and I have been involved with this crew since the 8th Wine & Dine! This was the first year there was an actual kids' table, with 10 children in attendance. It's great to reconnect with old friends, see how they're doing, meet their kids, and watch our kids play together.

Driver gets to choose the music. Daddy chose Pearl Jam. Veronica thought it was noise and kept asking us to change it.

The day before Wine & Dine, we went to Longwood Gardens, a vast botanical garden nearby (click this link for more info). They have a daily fountain show set to music, and lots of indoor and outdoor gardens. The highlight for me was the orchid room.

There is an awesome video of the kids singing a Moana song together, check it out at the album link below!

That evening, we got 2 babysitters for the 10 kids and the adults headed out for dinner and drinks!

And the next day was Wine & Dine! This is Jerry and Evan, 12, secondary sous chef. Everything was delicious, as usual.

This big boy is 5 liters of red wine! That doesn't have a technical name, per se, but it is between a Jereboam (4.5L) and an Imperial (6L). The more you know!