Boston Trip

Last week, Jeremy and I took a trip to Boston. We drove up Wednesday night after we got home from work. We stayed at the Bullfinch hotel. It was a pretty good price for being right in the middle of downtown. They even upgraded up to a suite, one of the ones right at the tip of the building.

 

On Thursday we drove out to Lexington and Concord. Our first stop was the Buckman Tavern. This is the place where all the "minutemen" waited to hear whether the British were coming.

 During the tour here and a bunch more times during the rest of the day, we learned that these men weren't really "minutemen", they were militia. It was kind of funny to Jeremy and I how big of a deal this seemed to be to everyone in Lexington and Concord. After the tavern, we walked part of the Battle road. It was actually really interesting for me to learn about the battle of Lexington and Concord.

 

The fighting continued all along the "battle road" as the British retreated the 15 miles back to Boston. Hundreds of people were killed.  Also in Concord, we went to Walden pond and the cabin site where Thoreau wrote Walden.

 

The area all around Concord was so beautiful. I would absolutely love come back here in the fall. After Walden Pond, we went to Louisa May Alcott's home, Orchard house.

Little women was one of my favorite books growing up and it was really interesting to visit here because the book was largely based on her life and everything in the house is almost exactly how it was when she lived there. Our last stop in Concord was the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery.

 

 

We walked up "author's ridge," where Thoreau, Emerson, and Alcott are all buried. It was a really interesting cemetery. On Friday, we took the subway to Harvard University. We took a tour of the university and learned a few interesting things while we were there. This is the statue of John Harvard.

 

 Supposedly it is good luck to rub his toe. Our guide told us that one of the things every Harvard student has to do before graduation is to pee on the toe. All of the freshman dorms surround this statue and I have no trouble imagining them watching all of the tourists touching the toe and laughing. Needless to say, we did not touch the toe. This is the Widener library.

 

As the story goes, the mother of one of the student's donated the money for the library after her son died on the Titanic. She was convinced that he would have lived if he had been able to swim 50 yards to the lifeboats. One of the conditions of her donation was that in order to graduate, all Havard students would have to be able to swim 50 yards. This rule was in effect until the 70's when the Americans with disabilities act struck it down. Of course, while we were there, for lunch we had to pay a visit to Mr. Bartley's Burger Cottage. The onion rings were delicious!

 

 Later that day we walked around Boston Common, walked down Newbury street, and went to the Boston Museum of Art. On Saturday we walked the Freedom Trail with our friends, the O'Farrels. It was so great to see them again! As we walked through little Italy, we stopped at Mike's Pastry and Modern Pastry.

 

I guess there is a big debate about which is better. Kind of like the debate about Pat's and Gino's in Philly. We got dessert from each. I think the consensus was that Mike's Pastry was better. The specialty in both shops was canoli, which i discovered I really do not like. Give me a cupcake any day. We also visited Paul Revere's house, Faneuil Hall marketplace, the North Church and the battleship USS Constitution.

It was a great trip...good food, good friends and history for the nerdy at heart, couldn't ask for better!

Landscaping Project

Before:

Our lawn was in bad shape upon moving in (in contrast to the house which was in great condition). The above picture is a pretty good indication of what we inherited (with the exception of the marking paint). After drawing up a plan and soliciting a quote to get the work done, I decided that I'd do it myself as a learning project. Scroll to the bottom of the post for the 'after' picture if you want to skip the boring stuff.

I quickly found out why none of the previous plants had done well--our "soil" was actually a combination of rocks and clay. Part of this project was simply amending the soil with compost. Additionally, I wanted to extend the beds around the front, so I started by removing the sod in these areas. If you look closely, you'll be able to spot the elusive wildlife of the Kuhre's front yard.

The next step was to install the stone edging along the perimeter of the sidewalk. This gave the walkway a more 'framed' feel and also allowed me to raise the beds. I set the stone edging in about an inch of sand to minimize future movement. What's the trick to getting your course to start and end in exactly the right spot?--prayer. But seriously, it was difficult to match a multiple of the 6" width of each stone to the various lengths of sidewalks.

After that, I backfilled the areas that were excavated. I don't have a good photo of this, but I actually brought in a couple yards of screened topsoil to raise the beds. The last step involved choosing a few plants that were either native or adapted to life here in Pennsylvania. We ended up going with a couple of blue junipers, a nandina, a holly, and another I can't recall at the moment. Whenever I teach a class about greenbuilding, I always pose the question: "Who watered plants before humans came along?" It may seem like a bizarre question, but even more bizarre is the answer--No one! Water hungry plants aren't good for the water bill, my health, or our local water source.

After:

And there you have it! Melody is planning on planting annuals such as flowers and mums depending on the time of year. The grass even looks better now after some much needed rain. You'll have to visit to get the whole picture--our cherry tree had beautiful blooms this year.