My last day- Boston

Michael and I slept in and had a leisurely morning at Alex and Tionna's house.  Then we packed up and parted ways.  He drove back to Vermont because he was flying out of Burlington the next day.  I was flying out of Boston on Tuesday, so Tionna was taking me into the city for the day and for my flight.

It just so happened that Tionna's niece was visiting from Tucson at the same time, so Danielle's mom (Tionna's sister) got her on the same flight as me so that I could be her flying buddy and get her safely back to Arizona.

We got to Boston around lunch time.  We took some pictures in front of the Boston Tea Party Ships before walking to Quincy Marketplace for lunch.

Oh, and there was a dead jelly fish.

I didn't take any pictures at lunch.  I had a seafood sandwich.  I give it a C+.  I also bought a totally unneeded Christmas ornament at Quincy Marketplace.  

After lunch we walked to the North End to visit Mike's Pastries.  I was temped to get a lobster tail (top right), 

but ended up with an espresso cannoli.  I ate it while walking down the street.  Not really so easy.

At this point I split up with Tionna.  She took the kids to the Children's Museum and I went to the Boston Tea Party Ships and Museum.

It was $25 to get in and I was kind of overwhelmed by that price thinking that it was going to be a self-guided tour where I just walked onto the ship, looked around and then wandered around inside the museum.  But it wasn't like that at all.  It was completely interactive experience- the guides wore authentic clothing and there were holographic displays and films. 

I had NO idea that Elliott was born on the 238th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party.  I'm sure I knew that date at some point in my life, but I certainly wasn't remembering it when I was giving birth that day in 2011.  I asked the guide (because it wasn't anywhere on the tour) and she said that based on diaries of people that were there, the town meeting starting around 10 am and the actual tea started being dumped in the harbor around 5 pm that day.

The tour started with a re-enactment of the town hall meeting.  People on the tour were given lines to say.  I didn't have one, but it was still fun.

Then we moved onto the ship.

We got to throw pretend tea overboard.  Huzzah!

Down below deck.

The captain's quarters with a creepy life size doll captain.

Tea in the harbor

This building is as close as they can estimate as to where the three ships were actually docked in 1773.

No picture taking was allowed in the museum, but it was really cool in there.  It wasn't really a museum at all.  We were in three different rooms and in two of them there were interactive, hologram movies to watch.  The last room had a regular movie screen with a 10 minute movie about the aftermath of the Boston Tea Party and the start of the Revolutionary War.  I may or may not have teared up a little during it.

There was a nice tea room and bakery for snacking after the tour, but I was in a time crunch.  Plus, I needed to do some very fast last minute shopping.

After I very quickly spent $60 I rushed back to meet Tionna.  Then I took Danielle to the parking garage while Tionna took the kids to get the parking validated.  Danielle and I changed in the car.  I may or may not have stealthily changed my bra and my shirt.  

Twenty minutes later we were at the airport where more than one person thought I was Danielle's mom.  She is 10, so this is actually entirely possible.  I took a picture and texted Tionna so she knew we made it onto the plane.

And a quick 6 hours later, we landed in Phoenix.  Where we immediately caught on fire.

Danielle's mom picked us up from the airport and dropped me off at home before they drove back to Tucson.  I got home around 10:30.  My mom and Elliott were asleep, but Spencer popped right out of bed when he heard the front door open.  He was waiting up for me.

He helped me unpack and since he was there I decided to give him his present from Boston.  Except, first this kind of freaky chicken claw mistake of a picture happened.

Ah.  That's better.

I drank a big coffee at the airport before we left Boston, so actually, despite it being 11:00 in Phoenix and 2:00 to my internal clock, I was pretty wired when I got home.  I ended up unpacking all of my stuff, putting everything away and reading until 2:00 am Phoenix time/5:00 am internal clock time before going to bed.  

The next morning my mom got up with Elliott and didn't remind him that I was home, which was nice, because I got to sleep a little later.  Not much though, because I had a 9:30 appointment to get hacked up one more time by my plastic surgeon.  But that is a story for another day.  Another day, like, tomorrow.