Secret Garden

Friday was heavenly. Blue skies and 75. We have all been living outside. We returned to the scene of the vintage tea party and brought our across-the-street-neighbor friends along for a picnic. We ended up staying for nearly four hours. (Which explains our sunburns...not prepared with the sunscreen yet.) The kids were having so much fun exploring and running and playing and we were having just as much fun watching them. And discovering all the signs of spring. I had fun playing around with the new camera and took over 400 photos.




(Everyone watching a helicopter.)















When Ben got home on Friday evening, we couldn't bear to go inside so we had a backyard BBQ, complete with cold bottled soda.

St. Patrick's Day

We don't usually do much to celebrate St. Patrick's Day. Amelia had a big party at school the day before. When the kids arrived, they discovered that leprechauns had completely destroyed their classroom and left a big mess, some gold coins, and lots of green footprints. Amelia thought this was so cool. She wondered what the leprechaun would do to our house on St. Patrick's Day. So we made a last minute decision to toilet paper her room during the night. She was VERY excited in the morning that the leprechauns had struck again.




Sporting the hat and treasure box she made at school.

These boots were made for puddles...

While this weekend is shaping up to be unbelievably beautiful and warm and spring-like, last weekend was filled with rain. Four straight days of rain. We made the most of it with puddle stomping in the front yard and a Sunday evening walk in the rain around Fort Hunt Park.

You do what now?

Whenever the frequent question "what do you do?" or "what does your husband do?" comes up, there is never an easy answer. There is no one-word answer like lawyer (the more typical response around here) or engineer that will at least elicit a bit of understanding. Each time I hear Ben answer this question, his response changes a bit. And whenever he tells people he works at the World Bank, they usually assume he's an economist. Or they think he's a banker which indicates the questioner really has no idea what the World Bank is. (And in full disclosure, I really wasn't sure before we moved out here.)

So, what DOES he do? I know he spends a lot of time in meetings. And he forgets to eat lunch sometimes because he's so busy. And his coworkers often schedule meetings at 5 p.m. on Fridays. And he gets paid. And I know there is a really delicious international-themed cafeteria at the World Bank. I guess Ben should be writing this post.

He was asked to speak at an InfoComm Conference this week which is pretty cool. Here is the link to his official biography on their website, where his job is described this way:

Ben Black is an audiovisual project manager at The World Bank. He is responsible for an in-house AV design and integration team that provides service to World Bank offices in the Washington, D.C. area as well as offices in other regions around the world. Prior to working at The World Bank, Ben produced and directed video telecourses and educational media for the State of Utah. Ben holds a Master of Business Administration degree and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Mass Communication.

The World Bank actually has 10 different buildings in D.C. and 300 conference rooms. Ben is responsible for the the audiovisual design and integration in these conference rooms and he sometimes produces live events. In a nutshell.

To the birthday girl go the spoils...

I had a perfect birthday. Week really. The weather was beautiful all week. I avoided the birthday stingray this year, so things were already off to a good start.

Ben had warm chocolate croissants waiting for me in the morning. Elsa and I spent a delightful morning in Old Town while Amelia was at school (see separate post below for photos). Elsa slept for 3 hours in the afternoon while Amelia played at a friend's house. I loved getting cards, phone calls, emails, and Facebook wishes all day.

My birthday dinner was at Ray's Hell-Burger in Arlington. The kids were so well behaved and loved the food. The burgers were fabulous. And gigantic. I went a with a pretty straight-forward burger with cheese and bacon. Ben got all kinds of crazy toppings on his. The sweet potato fries were excellent. And the Dominion root beer.









Because it was still so nice outside and we needed to work off some of those 10 ounce (yikes!) burgers, we stopped at Gravelly Point on the way home to watch the airplanes land and play freeze tag. This was a highlight of my day. We all just had so much fun running around and being silly together in the dark.




Plane landing in the dark.





I have been talking about wanting a DSLR camera forever and I think Ben was finally tired of hearing me whine about it. He and my parents really surprised me with this beautiful new Nikon and I am thrilled. My siblings got this fantastic camera bag for me.


Yes, Elsa is about to lick the metal ring on my camera bag.

The evening ended with one of my favorite desserts, strawberry shortcake!

Lunch with Elsa

On my birthday last Thursday, Amelia was in school all morning and the weather was beautiful. I decided to take Elsa to Old Town and treat myself to my favorite salad at Cosi and a picnic on the waterfront. Elsa had so much fun watching the ducks and the airplanes and the dogs. She loved playing in the grass and chasing the birds. We had such a fun time together.














She almost fell over this little fence trying to smell the flowers.

Afternoon Tea: Vintage Edition

On Wednesday afternoon we headed to one of my favorite places, River Farm Garden Park. Amelia set up a little tea party and we just had fun running around together and being warm.

A friend gave me this fantastic software for my birthday which puts fun effects on photos giving them a vintage film look. I have spent so much time playing around with it. So pardon the many photos and the array of effects, but I had to sample everything. I could have spent a lot of time and done all of this in Photoshop, but this software does it in one simple click. It's very addicting. I'll try to refrain myself a bit in future posts.