The following day we headed to Fairfield. I'm amazed by how many people we were able to visit! We started at Aunt Beverly's house and had a nice morning visit with her and Uncle Bob. Then we followed her over to Jason's home to swim in his pool - meeting Christine and her 1 year old boy, Alexander! Uncle Mike met us there for a nice pizza lunch from Pepe's Pizza! Brock showed off just a tiny bit of his elite swimming too.
When it was time for Alexander's nap, Brock and I headed over to visit Marilyn and Aunt Theresa - my 101 year old Aunt (who's technically a cousin, but whatever)!!
My Grandmother lived 4 houses down from Aunt Theresa and very close to the Fairfield beaches - any opportunity I had in my childhood, I would walk down the street to the public pathway leading to the beach and just explore. Many, many memories, so I had to ask Marilyn and Theresa if I could leave my car there and take Brock to do the same.
The playground went up sometime in the early-90's.... it's also looked like it's been updated since. This is close to the marina, so I asked Brock if he wanted to go look at the boats or go walk down to the marsh. (then I had to explain to him what a marsh was)
I forget my "beach" experience was so different than his. Connecticut beaches don't get big waves because they're shielded by Long Island. Our beaches and surrounding wetlands have amazing tide pools to explore and a considerable greater interval in high and low tides.
Well, Brock chose the marsh - and I think it was perfect. He loved watching all the crabs and I loved watching him. It's funny how a person's perspective changes.
But oh the crabs! There were so many of them!!
I tried to capture them, but they were too fast every time I got near. I just stood back and let Brock explore on his own - capturing him in the moment instead.
Ever tried to lean your camera phone on a tree branch for a timed picture? We did!
The next part was hard. We met back up with Aunt Beverly, who took us to the cemetery. My Aunt Marsha, Grandfather, Grandmother, and daughter are buried on one side of this headstone and my mother was cremated and buried on the other (where Aunt Bev will rest with her first husband). This was the first time we had returned since the funeral.
I can't and won't put into words everything I felt...and feeling as I type this. It was tough being there... but at the same time being very glad I was there with Brock.
We brought Kensie a teddy bear and I let Brock leave it for her. We've been talking about our first baby to both boys, in the most basic way - answering any questions they have. I don't know if Brock understood entirely before seeing the gravestone, but he seemed to understand more after.
The stone had sunk in a bit and Aunt Beverly was so sweet and thoughtful to put a call in to the caretaker.... it has since been lifted and cleaned.
Brock got his choice for dinner. All these options in Fairfield - old restaurants, new restaurants, good seafood. Aunt Beverly asked him what he'd like - he could have anything.... he chose pancakes. So off we went to Cracker Barrel. He's my good eater. He polished off the adult size 3-stack pancakes, bacon, with a side of fried apples, and still had room for ice cream dessert. Alas, no Duchess hot dogs this trip.
I did take a nice picture of Aunt Beverly, Uncle Bob and Brock after dinner that evening.
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