So, the morning went as usual with chores and such. But after lunch, the twins went down for a nap. (They seem to still need the occasional nap). And then Clara, Jonas, Logan, and I were off!
Today’s outing took us to the Boston Public Library, because we are book lovers of course, but also, I had seen some really amazing pictures of the library itself. So, off we went!
And we got super lucky with parking, we found a spot just across the street that gave us two hours of parking for $7.
(The lack of parking, plus the absolutely exorbitant fees charged by parking garages in Boston makes me batty. If you are reading this and ever plan to come to Boston, try to find accommodations that are convenient to one of the train lines.)
We took a few minutes to wander around and we found our way over to the McKim courtyard which was just beautiful. And then we came across the map center, which had a really cool interactive display. It displayed a map of the world as we know it, and then distorted the sizes of the countries to illustrate various things: where the world’s resources are produced and consumed, where the world’s wealth and poverty are concentrated, where oil is produced and consumed, which parts of the world are most vulnerable to global warming, etc. It was very and interesting and rather sobering. Jonas in particular was very affected by the poverty and wealth projections. It made for a good discussion with the kids.
We then made our way over to the children’s section. And it was EPIC. That children’s section was larger than many full libraries that I’ve been in. It was so cool. I got the kids all happily settled and then I decided to go do a little wandering on my own.
Part of the reason for my wanderings is because I had seen pictures of pretty parts of the library that we hadn’t come across and I wanted to hunt them down. And I totes found them.
After I had checked everything out, I made my way back to the children’s section where I read for a bit. And then Logan said he was feeling a little antsy and I asked him if he wanted to see where I had explored. And he did, so we headed back to some of my favorite parts of the library.
He made for an excellent addition to the scenery. I think at the very least, he appreciated the opportunity to stretch his legs a bit.
Once again, we headed back to the children’s section and did a little more reading. Eventually, we were all starting to get hungry (we probably spent 3 hours in the library!)
I was looking at the map to look for possibilities for the rest of the evening and I saw that right around the corner from the library was Levain bakery. This is a NYC establishment that has apparently opened up shop in Boston as well. I’d had their cookies before and they are pretty amazing. So that’s where we went next. #dessertbeforedinner. We got a couple of different kinds of cookies and shared them. The chocolate and peanut butter was my favorite for sure.
After we had fortified ourselves, we went on a bit of a walk up Newbury street (this is a very high end shopping area- with Chanel, Burberry, and Armani among the options. We wandered into a couple shops (Nike and Zara). But mostly we just walked toward our destination.
The Christian Science Plaza. At one point, while we were at the library, I had to leave to go move the car, because our spot was only reserved for 2 hours and you couldn’t add more time. And I ended up driving around for a good long time trying to find more street parking (Spoiler: I eventually gave up and just parked in a parking garage). In my attempts, I did a fairly thorough circuit of the area around the library, and I saw that the Christian Science Plaza was very close.
I had come across it in my planning, and thought it wouldn’t necessarily be something to do on its own; but it might be cool to check out if we had the chance, or if we were in the neighborhood. Well, we were in the neighborhood!
The plaza is owned by the Christian Science church and has several buildings on it that serve various purposes: the church itself, the library, the publishing house etc. It also had a children’s fountain that kids can run around in. It was a bit too chilly and windy (they were getting cold without being wet) and so I wouldn’t let the kids play in it. Cause I’m the meanest 😈😈
We walked around for about half an hour, checking things out and the kids trying to catch paper that was blowing around the plaza.
We were all pretty hungry by this point, so we made our way to a spot where I thought everyone would be able to find something to their liking: The Cheesecake Factory. And it was highly successful. Everyone enjoyed their food. And we came away with some to go cheesecake.
After we had eaten, we made our way back to the car.
The parking garage cost $44 for 2.5 hours!!! 😱😱😱😱😱😱😱 I was pretty horrified. They didn’t have their prices posted on the outside the jerks. But as I didn’t feel like living in the garage, I paid the (extortionate) fee and made our way home.
Now, onto something much more pleasant and cute.
I.e. What did Jonathan and the twins do?
Well, they went on a little stroll (I had the stroller in the back of the van)
….to McDonalds
Where Evie apparently had the best meal of her life.
All in all, I would say that it was a successful evening for all parties.
