Boston

My good friend Brooke is getting married! I am so excited. About a month ago she told me she was planning a trip to Boston to find the perfect dress. Why Boston? There's a crazy event called "The Running of the Brides" where brides go to race for discounted designer dresses. If you want to see some videos of the madness just look it up on You Tube. So Brooke, her mom, Pete's mom, her friend Jen, and I all went to brave the crowd. Several girls go camp outside the doors of the convention center, but we settled for showing up just an hour before they opened the doors. That put us pretty near the end of the line, but we were still excited. Once they opened the doors, we joined the screaming giddyness and ran in with the rest, but lo and behold, not a single one of the hundreds of dresses was left on the racks! There were certain girls we referred to as the hoarders who had brought more than just a few friends and gathered up as many dresses as they could for their bride to try on. The idea was that you would trade dresses until you found the style and size you wanted, but it was kind of hard when you didn't have anything to trade with. So the first 2 hours, which felt like 5, were rather unsuccessful. But after a yummy lunch at the Cheesecake Factory we decided to go back and try again. This time all the remaining dresses had been placed back on the racks and Brooke could actually go through and shop for a dress. She tried on about 20 more dresses until she found the one. Hooray! Pete's mom had to catch a flight out that day, but the rest of us retired to the hotel and all took a nice long nap. For dinner we met up with our friend Erin who lives in Boston and she took us to Little Italy for some yummy Italian food. The next day we took a "trolley" tour to all the historical sights around town and did a little shopping. Erin drove Pam to the airport for her flight and then met up with us to see some more sights. Dinner was at a fun little restaurant on Boylston Street. Our flights were quite early the next day so we tried to get to bed before midnight. After getting a cab to the airport at 4am, we all made our flights and headed home. Thank you Brooke and Pam for planning such a great trip! I'm glad it was a success with the dress and I can't wait for some more pre-wedding fun.

View from Bunker Hill

USS Constitution

Brooke and Erin on the wharf near USS Constitution

On our walk to find a good dinner spot I was fascinated by this church nestled right in the middle of the city, reflected on the modern skyscrapers

Dinner at a windy outside table on Boylston after the trolley tour

Lisa found the lobster hat in my suitcase and had fun wearing it around