Last week we spent our Thanksgiving in Massachusetts. Because of the colder weather, we decided to stay busy with various indoor activities that didn't just include eating.

On crazy Black Friday (the first day of holiday shopping, which drives people into such a frenzy that a worker got trampled to death at a Long Island Wal-Mart), we steered clear of any stores and hung out with David's nieces Jessie & Trish (with husband Jay and kids, Nathan, Nolan, Makenna and the babe, Brendan). Trish and Jessie are technically Ruby's cousins, which means that 3-year old Makenna is her second cousin. Family titles notwithstanding, Ruby and Makenna had a great time playing together while Nathan and Nolan timed themselves over and over again while scooping toy cars into their bins (with huge improvements in speed which just delighted the parents present to see such diligent attempts at increasing cleaning up productivity).

In the afternoon, after failed attemps at napping (it's the mom thing--when we're all together, she won't let David put her down, but she doesn't nap when I put her down, sigh), we all reassembled at a huge indoor playground at a local MacD. After a momentary hesitation Ruby climbed up multiple platforms, with the help of cousin Elllaina, and spent a good hour crawling through tunnels and playing up in the ceiling or sliding down, to start over again. She is still talking about that playground.

A happy and relaxed trip. Although our ride back was slightly disrupted by a David-Ruby conflict over his can of soda. Ruby requested a sip and then told David she didn't want to give it back. Huh. Thankfully the mood lifted when David turned around a little while later and calmly asked Ruby to remove the lettuce from her nose, to my sheer delight.