a shuttle spotting.

We have terrible traffic here. And uptight people. And high prices on, well, everything. But the good far exceeds the bad and we get to experience some pretty cool things living in the D.C. area. Like today. We got to watch the Space Shuttle Discovery do a lengthy flyover of the area on its final voyage to the Udvar-Hazy Center of the National Air and Space Museum.

I walked out on the Wilson Bridge for viewing and it was great to be at such a high, open vantage point. We were able to follow the shuttle's flight path all around the area for about 30 minutes. On its first approach to the bridge it flew right over our heads! My pictures are less than stellar since I lack any kind of zoom and I was too caught up in the moment to realize my settings were all wrong.

It was incredible to see all the people watching on the bridge and along the water. Traffic on the 12-lane freeway bridge came to a stop as people just parked their cars and got out to watch. 

Approaching the bridge. (D.C. is in the background.)

wildflowers at huntley meadows.

flying kites.

Between conference sessions on Saturday we headed to our go-to kite flying/bike riding spot, Fort Hunt. The kite flying was kind of a fail. We're blaming the kite. It was really good at spinning in circles and nose diving.

Oliver heads for the open road. As usual.

hangin' at the park.

mother and daughter tea.

In honor of Women's History Month, Amelia's school had a Mother and Daughter Tea last month. There was a nice program followed by refreshments. The evening was particularly exciting because Amelia lost a tooth while eating her cookie. We decided to make a whole date night out of it so we went to dinner after the tea, stopped at the library to pick up some books, and then did some shopping. Amelia was very excited to get more Thea Stilton books from the library. She is always asking me to put them "on pause" (her terminology for "on hold"). 

easter egg hunt.

A few weeks ago I hosted the annual playgroup Easter egg hunt. I love doing it and it's always a good motivator for getting some spring cleaning done in the yard. And baking some treats. I didn't count but I think we had around 25 kids. Elsa was so sad when everyone left. Oliver slept through the egg hunt. When I brought him out to the yard he was amazed and thrilled to find spilled eggs and candy everywhere and was quick to put anything from the ground into his mouth.

Peanut butter and nutella cookies!

I'm a winner!

Ben and I finished up the Lettuce Eat Cake weight loss contest (started by my sister-in-law Julie) a few weeks ago. It's a 12-week contest to encourage healthier habits. We did it last year with great results (I lost 30 pounds and came in first, Ben came in third).

I lost 23 pounds this time around and came in first again! Ben lost 22 pounds and was third place. I decided to give up sweets and desserts entirely for about the first 6 weeks. That was a huge help. We also stopped going out to eat for several weeks. Ben started running regularly again and I enjoyed doing pilates. My progress slowed down toward the end. Probably because I started testing out recipes on my sweet tooth pinterest board. And we resumed the DC burger challenge. But we're both hoping to make it to 30 pounds lost in the next month.

Hooray for being healthier and shopping for new clothes with my prize money! And thanks for doing the contest again Julie.

and...we're back!

We just returned from Ben's family reunion in Branson, Missouri. Everyone had a great time and it was especially fun to see the kids reunite with their cousins. Five of Ben's six siblings were there, along with his parents and all 19 grandchildren.

We flew to Kansas City last Wednesday and the kids were excellent travelers. Once in Kansas City we rented a car and drove about 4 hours to Branson. We were relieved that everything went so smoothly. It always feels like a bit of a circus moving kids and luggage and car seats between cars and shuttle buses and airplanes.

We drove back to Kansas City on Sunday afternoon. We were relieved to make it to our gate with 3 relatively happy children and only a short 2 hour flight separating us from home. We watched our luggage get loaded onto the plane as the arriving passengers deplaned. Then nothing. We were eventually alerted to the fact that the airplane lavatory was broken and they were working on fixing it. Not a good sign. Then we saw our luggage being removed from the plane. Definitely not a good sign. The flight was cancelled and there was a mad dash to to the ticket counter to reschedule. The United ticket agent booked us on an early flight the next morning on American. We made our way to the hotel, had a late dinner, and finally got the kids to sleep around 10. Woke them before 5 a.m. and made our way back to the airport. When we tried to check in we were told that United gave us unconfirmed seats and the flight was full and there was nothing they could do. Ben spent the next 2 hours on the phone with United and at the ticket counter trying to get a new flight. We almost got booked on a 7 am flight but American hadn't released our tickets so they couldn't make it happen in time. We finally got booked on a 7 pm flight through Chicago that would arrive in DC at midnight. As we were contemplating how to handle being in the airport for the next 12 hours, a US Airways ticket agent took pity on us and looked into more options. Four seats miraculously opened up and she got us on an earlier flight through Charlotte. We were so relieved. We made it to Reagan around 3 pm yesterday and took a taxi home. Later that night we drove out to Dulles to retrieve our car.

But enough about travel woes. We're happy to be home. But not happy to be back to work and laundry and no cousins to entertain the kids. After I catch up on a few posts from the week before we left, I'll sort through the reunion photos. Because you know I took a few.

Leaving Dulles. The girls were so excited about the trip and their Starbucks pastries.

Driving from Kansas City to Branson. Sleeping, reading, and ipod-ing.

Elsa fell asleep in the airport while we were trying to find a new flight early Monday morning.

date night: liquid architecture

The weather was so lovely last Friday. After spending the morning at the Tidal Basin and the afternoon at Meadowlark Botanical Gardens, I wanted to enjoy the evening outside too. Ben and I went into D.C. and picked up delicious sandwiches at Taylor Gourmet and then ate them at the Capitol reflecting pool.

We walked down to the Hirshhorn Museum to see the new exhibit by Doug Aitken. And wow. This exhibit is amazing. I highly recommend it. The entire facade of the Hirshhorn is illuminated with images that have been seamlessly blended. The technical aspects alone are pretty amazing. The exhibit centers around the song "I Only Have Eyes for You" and it creates this really ethereal feel as you can hear the music echo through the streets. We slowly walked around the museum to get the different effects from different vantage points. The trees cast some incredible shadows. The most interesting part is seeing the interaction between the art and the environment. It was 11:00 at night and this area would normally be completely dead. But there were so many people, all kinds of people, slowly circling the museum or just laying on the grass taking it all in.

Just go see it.

Turkey, prosciutto, pesto, and fresh mozzarella. And it was awesome.