So the sunshine has finally broken here in Hudson after 26 straight days of rain.  Obviously, this requires us to be outside for all waking hours as we renew our levels of Vitamin D.  I know that there is rain in the forecast for tomorrow and the next day, but I can live with that as long as there is sunshine too.

Saturday found us down in Wakefield, MA where we were able to relax for the 8th largest Fourth of July parade in the United States.  My only complaint?  While there were lots of marching bands, clowns and fire engines, it was completely lacking in bagpipes.  There was not one bagpipe in the entire 2 hour parade.  It just wasn’t a real parade in my books … Apparently, they replace bagpipe bands with American muscle cars.  Oh yes, I have a second complaint – candy.  No one was throwing out candy.  Give me a parade on Foord street anytime.  Regardless, the boys had lots of fun and Jake happily blew his one note trumpet with all the bands as they went by. Smile! 🙂

Considering that it has been raining for a month straight here in Hudson, I decided that I would spend some time redesigning the site.  It seems like I go through this every two years or so.  In fact, if you go back to the very first post I still have from 2000, you will see that I was … doing a redesign.  Speaking of going back to 2000, you should note that I was blogging long before this.  I just happened to edit the front page each week, and didn’t keep my past content.  (It would have been static HTML pages.) I’ve thought about asking Carleton if they have a data backup of my first site in 1996, but I doubt they still would after 13 years.

As redesigns go, this one was pretty simple.  I decided to go the easy route and only slightly customized a nice simple WordPress PHP application.  This marks the first shift for me away from ASP and Microsoft technologies.

Enough about that.  Does anyone really care?

So it’s been raining here in Hudson for a month straight and everyone is going a little crazy.  Even Ellie, who was doing so well after our trip to the Outer Banks, has reverted to her less cheerful ways.  The last few nights have been pretty rough on both Heidi and I – probably more so on Heidi.  Can someone please send us some sunshine?  It will cause us to smile.  🙂

Another year and the crazy travel months of March, April and May are behind us.  This year witnessed a reduction in travel because of little Ellie, but I still managed to make it to London, San Francisco and Las Vegas twice in a four week period.  Thankfully, that is all behind us.

We’ve just finished up a week long vacation to the Outer Banks of North Carolina where we were able to unwind, wiggle our toes in the sand, and visit with family.  The boys had an absolute blast playing with cousins and swimming in the pool, while Daddy enjoyed his yearly swim with the sharks.  Mommy was able to sit by the pool and soak up the sun … hopefully recovering from the three longs months of little Ellie crying from noon through night. ‘Twas wonderful …