Peter Alborano, 34; Maechele Alborano, 42
Maechele: My husband is big on stuffed animals. We have four girls, and he makes sure we don’t leave until everyone gets one. He likes shooting baskets. Luckily, he’s pretty good at it, so it’s not like it costs us $500. More like $25. You make three baskets and you get to choose a large prize. If you make three more you get to choose a bigger prize. Three more and you get the jumbo. Everyone wants the jumbo.
Peter: We walk by and the kids see these big animals and they say, ‘I want that one.’ I figure either A) you’re going to become good at it, or B) you’re going to go broke.
You have to shoot the ball high, give it a lot of arc. You know the rim is pushed in to make it more difficult. Every year we come back with five or six animals.
Maechele: Every year I say, ‘You’re winning all these animals. How are we going to get them home?’ Last June we got a big Chevy Silverado. That gave us plenty of room to carry the animals home.
Peter: Haley saw a big wolf and she had to have it. I said, ‘If you want it, then you’re going to have to carry it.’ At least for a little while.
Maechele: The picture was taken the third week in August. It was a crappy week. It rained almost every day. I think it was raining that night. I’m a hairdresser, and my kids said, ‘Mom, look how your hair is hanging down.’ We spend a lot of time at the Shore. We try to get down there every two or three weeks. We live way up in northern New Jersey, in Andover, near Sparta, so it’s about a three-and-a-half-hour drive for us. Luckily my little ones are good travelers. All I have to say is, ‘We’re going to the beach,’ and they’re there. We get in the car early Saturday morning, hit the road, and head to the beach where we lounge all day. Then we hang out on the boardwalk all night.
Peter: In the mornings, Alexis and I get up, get our bikes, and ride the boardwalk. We like to be out there by 7 am. We stop, pick up coffee, and go back to the hotel to give my wife her coffee. Then we walk to breakfast, get our stuff, and go right to the beach till 5. Then we clean up, get a bite to eat, and go back to the boardwalk.
You can walk that boardwalk every night and it never gets old. I’ve been to boardwalks up and down the east coast, from Hampton Beach, New Hampshire, to Virginia Beach. But there’s nothing like the Jersey Shore, especially Wildwood. New Jersey is such a hustle-bustle state. Go, go, go. I manage a Lowe’s store. But you get down there, and it’s such a sense of family and a lot of fun.
Maechele: Sometimes after dinner we go shovel shopping. We go up and down the beach and find everyone’s shovels and toys they left behind. I don’t think I’ve bought a beach toy in the last four or five years.
Peter: The girls will bring the stuffed animals home, name them, and keep them in their bedroom until the dog starts pulling at them. Then they go into the trash can. Or if they’re in good shape, we’ll donate them.
Maechele: By the end of the summer I’ve had it with stuffed animals. I get tired of looking at them. I wait until school starts, and they end up in the garbage. I say the stuffing was going all over and I had to throw them out. But I tell the girls, ‘Hey, you’re lucky. You know they’ll always be replenished next summer.’