Odds and Ends

I took this picture from our front porch this morning! So beautiful!

We've had a fun week. Last week was the girls' Spring Break, but since it was not Daddy's Spring Break we didn't really have too much planned. We had some fun playdates, the girls and I visited the Children's Museum of Richmond, and later on in the week went up to D.C. for a few days to visit Grammie and Grandpa Ward. We loved the time with them! We saw the tail end of the cherry blossoms and went to the National Zoo. The girls especially loved Grammie's abundant supply of chocolate chip cookies and Grandpa's "Hillary and Hank" stories. I vividly remember him telling them to me and Jennifer when we were little. We loved to hear about the brother and sister who lived in a treehouse in the forest and had all sorts of adventures with the animals. The girls really eat them up, too.

The girls are so full of life these days! They say such funny things which I always tell myself to remember, but then end up forgetting. Jane is so, so, so busy (it seems I have sounded this refrain before)! We returned from our house-hunting trip to find that she had learned to climb. My first realization of this came when I walked into the kitchen and she was sitting in the middle of the kitchen table. She is gradually saying more words, but is a little careless -- okay, very careless -- with her articulation so we still have to ferret out what she means. Three things that keep her most occupied -- being outside (royal tantrums if she can't go out and again, when she has to come in), plunking away at the piano (she'll sit on the piano bench for a half an hour at a time, turning the pages of the book, and "playing" and then she'll perch at the end and yell "Mama!" until I come and lift her down), and "reading" books. She loves to sit and look at the pages and has just started jabbering as she "reads". She refuses to sit in a high chair any more and desperately wants to be one of the big kids. I'm amazed at her daring on the trampoline. She is growing so big!

It's been so much more fun around the house now that Daddy is home so much more. We are reaping the rewards of his front-loading his second year at Darden and are glad that he has only one class a day. He is also glad that this allows him a little more time on the golf course :).

As for our house-hunting trip, it was a pretty stressful trip, but we had quite a remarkable experience. We found a house that we think will work well for us nicely, but things are still in the works so I'll post more about it and some pictures when it is finalized. Hopefully it will all come together this week! It is amazing to think that we could actually own our own house :). We wouldn't trade the experiences we've had for anything, though, and are grateful for how things are working out.