40 is the new awesome.

This past weekend, all the girls in the family were able to meet up in Boston to celebrate Joy's 40th and some fun time together. We are super lucky to have quite a group of close friends in Boston who know lots of fun things to see and do and have cool landlords who let their Vermont friends stay in the vacant apartment next to theirs (Thx Rob and Lani!) After we picked her up from the airport and were awaiting the rest of the VT crew, we met up with our good friends at the Highland Kitchen - a bustling/cool family run joint serving American comfort food. I had my first shrimp gumbo. It was delicious. I've always wondered what it was.

Then we met up with McKay and K80 and got settled into our weekend accommodations and basically chatted until the wee hours of the morning. We hadn't gone to the grocery store like we planned so breakfast was hilarious with a cantaloupe I brought, some bread K80 baked, some spread McKay added, and some other random bits but enough to get us ready for the day in the city.We walked down to the T stop and headed down to Back Bay where we wandered around the Boston Public Library and down Newberry Street (were Joy got a hand treatment at Lush and McKay tried on blue at Aldo). We hunted out the sales racks wherever we wandered.

For lunch, we made our way to Max Brennar that serves up some amazing chocolate and delectable goodness. I had these incredible waffles with red berries citrus salad, milk chocolate ganache, and vanilla crumbled ice cream--yes! They brought out Joy this little bday chocolate and candle for a cool touch.


We wandered a bit more but headed over the common to get tickets to see "The Artist". My girl was getting ready for a nap so I fed her and she fell dead asleep so I thought it was going to be fine but the minute we got in the theatre and the ads began, her eyes popped open. She sat gazing at the screen for a while but once the movie--the silent movie-- started I could tell she wasn't going to have it. So with her first squwack I headed down to the entry aisle and watched what I could holding her and swaying--a lot. I saw enough to understand all the accolades. The music was infectious and we hummed it the rest of the weekend and glad we saw it, seeing as how it won Best picture, the next night.

After a long day out and about we took the T back to the apartment. We went and got groceries to accompany a yummy lasagna K80 made and brought down. We feasted and then watched, "Moneyball"--another film that was up for Best picture. It's a good watch and then I think we stayed up another hour or so chatting so the next morning we slept in and lazed into the morning by watching "Crazy, Stupid, Love" while everyone slowly got up and had a yummy breakfast of fresh fruit salad and bagels. Chelle sure can cut fruit up into the best fruit salad. I have seen that movie so many times since coming out it cracks me up every time.

That's when we attempted some group shots with my camera timer and remote. We sort of got it, at least good enough to remember the occasion. McKay headed home and the rest of us drove over to Cambridge and met up with Amy for some Ivy League wanders through Harvard Square. We browsed around the COOP bookstore and Amy took us to get hot chocolates at Burdick's . Of course, this is from a non-chocolate person but it was INTENSE. I had a taste of Chelle's dark chocolate and I could hardly get it down so glad I got the milk chocolate. After more wandering we topped the day off, with some mexican and made our way back to the apartment in time to tune into the red carpet pre-Oscar show. It's tradition in our family and we called Mom to chat about the first few dresses we saw. My favorite was Gwenyth Paltrow in the Tom Ford cape dress and I would like Rose Byrn's bob but there was a lot of discussion on the gowns of the night which I am too tired to go into further.

We had our ballots and Oscar Bingo (Chelle got it first and a black out) and snacked through the show. We  stayed up late once again but Joy had to be the airport by 4:30 AM so it was a short night. It was a fabulous weekend with a group of incredibly cool people.