I have always loved New York, but when you have a kid living there – it is even better!
Gabe and Shannon spent a year in Florida where he completed his first year law school. And while Florida for winter beach getaways and Disney is good, it was just not for them.
We were also thrilled when he said they were headed to Brooklyn Law School to complete his degree! Shannon works virtually so it doesn’t matter where she lives (although since being in New York she has also picked up some in person work which is fun!).
He started 2nd year law in September and is loving it. Looks like they want to make New York their home!
Shannon was heading to Australia for her brother’s wedding and Gabe had to stay back for school, so we decided to head to NYC to spend American Thanksgiving with him.
We were able to spend a few hour with Shannon before she left, then spent 3 more days with Gabe, It was like his 16 trip all over again!!
We also got to have a real American Thanksgiving dinner with some of my cousins and family who live in Brooklyn (and other family came from Princeton and Ottawa). It was so nice!
Gabe “showed” us around. As I have mentioned, Rob and I have both been to NYC multiple times, but it was so nice to see it from Gabe’s eyes now that he calls it home. He already has figured out some great local places, knows the subway like the back of his hand and was a perfect host.
We were exhausted walking so much – but we had beautiful weather, enjoyed some good food, lots of good discussions and all around enjoyed spending this time with him. We are excited that they are living much closer to us and in fact, we are hearing down in January again after new years with some of the other kids to see them!
I’ve totally slacked on this blog? Now just keeping it up for big trips, birthdays and special occasions. But I noticed even little trips are being forgotten so I am including them here!
But I was looking over my blog books (I print them out! Some years it has taken two books but I was able to do one book for both 2020 and 2021 so that shows how my blogging has taken a dip) and noting how it is so nice to have all the year pictures in it – even the everyday in between moments.
There are a lot of everyday moments that I don’t to forget. Although it is quiet around here so photo wise so a lot more of Reggie and Rob and me!
Our prized child:
Date nights, drives, walks and birthday
Mishmash of kids
Night away with friends and the old cars…
Zach and I went on a Ted talk date
Lots of randomness throughout the summer!
Weekend with the our friends at their cottage:
More randomness
I joined Rob on a business trip to Boston – visited my old stomping grounds at Mass General and then we went to visit Harvard and headed to Ogunquit Maine for the weekend! We had the BEST Mac and cheese in Boston too:)
I went to California to meet with my Mastermind that I am working with this year – and coach Jody Moore. It was so fun, and such a brain workout sprinkled with overwhelm:)
Josh and I celebrated Thanksgiving on our this year – he was the only one home!
It is so nice that they got to get married and celebrate on one day with family and friends, and then focus on their temple sealing (the religious ceremony of our faith – a sealing of their unity for time and all eternity).
Although we were all a little tired, we were very excited to go to the temple.
(And I’ll just add that we all managed to have decent hair – since it was the morning after the party (early morning!) and no one had time to get ready!)
No photos are allowed in the temple – so my heart took lots of pictures. Rachael’s mom and I were the witnesses so that was special too.
Following the ceremony we did family photos (but I’ll put those in a separate post). Everyone went and enjoyed the charcuterie board (Rachael made the actual wooden board! We all prepped the meats and cheese the day before)
Dinner was salads and schwarma poutine!
Speeches:
We had to take a break from speeches to go take sunset photos!
Then came the first dance, dance with Rachael and her Dad, Dance with Zach and me – and then they DANCED and partied! They even had Rachael’s Dad arrive
There really were thousands pf photos – these are just a smattering of them representing the whole night!
I’ve already posted some of the snaps I got from the wedding – but I want to make sure I include here some of the official wedding photos.
Sara (Light and Love Photography in Kitchener, Ontario), Rachael’s sister, did a phenomenal job. She also had a second photographer there to shoot – and I think between them they took over 5000 photos! Don’t worry I won’t post them all here – although I have to say, it is super hard to decide what to post – never mind what to frame as there are so many amazing ones!
So here are some of my faves:
Zach getting ready:
The first look…(and Rachael giving Zach a gift of a journal she had kept every day since their engagement..)
Most of our kids have done a humanitarian trip with an amazing organization (previously called HEFY) HumanitarianXP.
Sam left for 2.5 weeks to go to Kenya to build a school.
He had to fly to NYC to meet his group. We were a little nervous given all the flight cancellations happening , but it all worked out!
He had an incredible time. Had great leaders, made some great friends, worked hard, went on several Safaris in the Serengeti (although he said he preferred the safaris we did in South Africa!), and got to experience and learn about a different country, culture, way of life and people.
They are not allowed their phones on the trip but the leaders post every day on instagram, so I make sure to screen shot every day when I see Sam. This is what we got!
When Josh took a gap year last year I was kind of happy bcs even though he would be gone working and travelling, it delayed the university drop off which seems so much more permanent.
This is it – the point of no return. There is no turning back the clocks.
We planned to drop him off at Carleton University in Ottawa Labour day weekend right before school started. Unfortunately, Rob found out that he had to be in Milan, Italy for work on that Monday. We tried to get creative, but it ended up that he would have to miss drop off and catch a flight to Milan on the Saturday,
Which meant I would be doing drop off solo.
Luckily, Josh is going to the same school as two of his best friends, so I knew that their parents would be coming as well. It was great that the boys ended up getting suite style residence too – so the “high council of mothers” as the boys call us got to work purchasing things they could share (primarily kitchen and bathroom). There ended up being a lot of stuff piled in my front room for a bit as Amazing boxes kept getting dropped off.
We went out for one last dinner in Toronto – got to try an Indian place that we both had been talking about trying – and it is not disappoint!
Then in the morning we headed out:
Oops forgot to give Reg a big hug… so Rob went in and brought him out…
We headed to Ottawa and went straight to my aunt and uncles (who live 5 minutes from Carleton) and they had a really nice lunch for us with my aunt and cousin as well.
We then headed to Carleton – they had a car check in (I got video of it but this is the only snap I got of Josh – he was trying to search where we were supposed to go after to meet his buddies. It was cute, as you drove in, they had all these students cheering to welcome you to Carleton!
We made it to his residence – he has a “suite style” which means that they have a small kitchen and can make some food. He is with 4 guys – two of his best buddies from high school and one other guy they just met. His actual room mate is one of his friends (Ethan). Ethan’s parents were there as well as Ben’s (his other buddy). All the parents got to work to help the boys all set up their rooms and the kitchen.
Josh has the window side. I didn’t get a picture of the closet but it’s a decent size and we got a set of drawers to go at the bottom and there is a set under the bed – there is actually a decent amount of space.
After setting everything up, we headed out for dinner.
My typical “follow you” picture
Sadly, no pictures of the actual dinner. But we had a nice meal with all the boys including his new roommate. We totally got soaked on the way home – it was a wicked thunder and lightning storm! I then headed back to hang out with my aunt and uncle while the boys had their first night !
The next day I went shopping with Ethan’ s parents and Josh and Ethan. We stocked them up with everything you can imagine! They are set for at least this semester if not next:) We grabbed a quick burger and then took them back to their res where we unpacked groceries and then it was time for good bye!
Then just the guys from high school:
And that was it. I dropped my baby off at University.
I thought it would be easy since he had taken a gap year and was away for a good chunk of it. But there is something more final about dropping a kid off at school.
And it certainly didn’t help to have to drive home in an empty truck and then arrive back to an empty house. My heart hurt and I had a good little cry (in Josh’s bed – shhhh).
I am excited for Josh and his future and know he will do great things, have fun, build memories, go on adventures – just like all my other kids are doing. And I am excited for all the things that Rob and I have planned for our future too! But… my heart still aches for those days when it was just our little world. When I would lie in bed and sing the boys to sleep (and Josh would hold me in a vice grip to make sure I did not sneak out of his bed when he drifted off). Or when we would practice the Invictus poem (which happy to say he still remembers – as I checked to make sure as we drove to Ottawa, lol).
When they all piled in my bed to read at night; when I would pick lucky winner for Zach; when Sam would pray the house wouldn’t catch on fire; when Gabe and Zach would yell down for our ETA and play mini sticks and be giggling and running around trying to scare Zandra… and of course the thirty two thousand times Zandra would get up to say goodnight and go pee…
So many memories that were created in what seems like a fleeting moment.
Backward, turn backward, O Time, in your flight,Make (me) them a child again just for tonight…
Now I’m off to go have a little cry again…
This letting go stuff is pretty hard, right Mamas?
It was many moons ago that we had a big Busing Family reunion (my mom’s side).
We had a few ones growing up, but mostly we got together for birthdays, weddings, and unfortunately funerals. When Granny (and Papa) were alive, we often came together around their milestones. Like this one back in 2007 – Granny’s 95th Birthday ( I just saw this photo hanging on my aunt and uncle’s wall so took a picture – I’m sure have the original somewhere!)
I had just met Rob a couple of weeks earlier when this photo was taken! Look at how young (and cute) Zach and Josh were!
We had a big reunion in 2010 in Gananoque and then we planned for one in 2020.
Then Covid happened so it was delayed until this past summer!
Mostly everyone was able to make it except for my brother and family (they had just been here for Zach’s wedding), a couple of my cousin’s kids, plus Gabe and Shannon and Zandra and Ilyah. All together there was 58 of us!
This is everyone!Just the (Granny and Papa’s )kids and grandkids (no great grandkids)5 of the 6 – missing Bini who passed away several years ago:(The great grandkids!The grandkids (missing my brother)
We arrived on the Friday night ; we took up two cars as we brought up a lot of food:) Everyone was just hanging out in the games room so we joined them and caught up. We later went out to the campfire and talked with a few of my cousins and their wives and kids.
The next day was a gorgeous day. Everyone was kind of doing their own thing. We went for a hike with Zach and Rachael. The boys later went on the paddle boats and the water trampoline. They played basketball and volleyball. They tried to play tennis but the courts were in bad shape. Rob and I went out on the canoe.
In the later afternoon, my aunts had organized an “International Olympics” which was a great way for everyone to get to know everyone and for the kids to feel included. It was a lot of fun!
That night we had a nice dinner and then my uncle had hired a DJ – so everyone danced ( the little girls were all in awe of Rachael’s dance moves!). The boys played chess, pool and crokinole (another game I had not heard of). It was a very fun night!
The next day the boys went to play golf and Rachael and I went paddleboarding and hung out on the trampoline. The boys came back and went kayaking as well. We had a nice dinner at the dockside restaurant and then the kids played Corn toss. We had a nice campfire, and everyone sat around and talked ….
The next day we spent some time saying goodbye to everyone!
It was a great weekend – so nice to catch up with everyone, do some fun stuff and get out in the sunshine!
When Zandra got married in January she had to then start the whole green card process which meant she was not allowed to leave the country.
We were pretty bummed about that given it meant she could not come to Zach and Rachael’s wedding, and she would have to miss my 50th Family trip to Mexico, in addition to our big extended family reunion…
But I decided to take a few days to head to Hawaii and hang out with her when her husband was away – just to have a little girl time!
We basically settled into a nice routine – we would both work in the mornings then head to a different beach in the afternoons!
Because I was only there for a short time, I decided to try to keep my eastern time zone schedule and was up around 4am to start working (lots of fun creative stuff for my upcoming group coaching program for woman which is going to be FABULOUS – reach out if you are interested!!) . I did manage to do some other things in the morning – like head to the LDS Laie Temple, and go for a few walks on beach too. We also managed to squeeze in some other walks at various time (usually in the morning, but I went one evening and walked and then sat on temple grounds taking in the incredible sunset skies)
We also ate some very yummy food! Every lunch and dinner trying a new place (although the Banzai bowl won three times, lol).
On the last day we headed to Waikiki before my late plane that evening. Waikiki is super touristy, super busy but I wanted to see it! I got to see a bit of Honolulu too and we ate at the Cheesecake factory so it felt all around touristy to me:)
But if you want beautiful beaches, then please leave Waikiki behind and head to the north shore!
We also got to hang out with one of Zandra’s friends a couple of nights and she introduced me to the stray cats that she feeds on campus!
We ate, laughed, talked, walked, read, beached, swam, and sunned – all good things to do in Hawaii! It was so nice to have her all to myself and catch up and create these new memories – definitely feeling a tradition coming on lol.
Here’s our time together in photos (mixed in with food and beach!) :
