Baseball is Back!

It's not quite Opening Day yet, but since Owen had a half day at school on Friday, and the Nats were playing the Yankees for an exhibition game, we decided it was time to take in a ballgame.  The Nats lost, but the game doesn't count, and it was fun to be back at a baseball game.  For a special treat, we stopped by the team store and picked up a Nats flag to fly at home.  Can't wait for the season to start!

Someone is a little too cute for her own good

Sunrise

Owen's new room faces East, so he gets to wake up his Mesozoic menagerie silhouetted against the sunrise :-)

This is Spring?

It's Spring, the Snowquester was a bust, and we haven't had two inches of snow in over two years.  Yet somehow we managed to get a little snow storm.  It didn't amount to much, but it was enough to give us our first accumulation in the new house.  Too bad it turned to rain and melted away before we had a chance to play in it...

Pigeon

A few days ago we put up a post with Nora's first real drawing, and a look back at Owen's first as well.  They really never stop amazing you, Owen has entered a really interesting artistic phase.  His latest work that resonated with me was a Pigeon on notebook paper. His drawings these days remind me of a quote form Six Degrees of Separation (though he's a year early ;-)

Why are all your students geniuses? Look at the first grade - blotches of green and black. The third grade - camouflage. But your grade, the second grade, Matisses, every one. You've made my child a Matisse.

Auction Night

Friday night was the Cluster Rocks Auction fundraiser for Owen's school, so Elaine and I dressed up, and walked over to the Atlas theater for a night of drinking, dancing, and bidding all for a good cause.  The auction was actually really cool, everyone got there own iPod Touch with a bidding app to view items and make bids.  We bid on some cool seats in the City Council box for a Nats game, but they quickly became too rich for our blood.  We thought we might have a better shot at the swim lessons that Ronan's dad was offering, but lost out on those at the last minute.  We did manage to win a $100 gift certificate for Joy of Motion, where Nora takes dance classes (and got it for less than face value!), and a nature hike on the Billy Goat Trail in Great Falls for Owen led by his principal and some of the teachers at the Cluster.  In the end, everyone had fun and we raised a lot of money for the school, way to go PTA.

First Drawings

Just a few weeks ago Nora through a full on temper tantrum because she could only draw "scribble scrabble."  She clearly had an idea in her head about what she wanted to draw, but couldn't quite get it on the paper.  Shortly after that something clicked, and she handed me the picture above, a wonderful picture of Nora (in her favorite color purple) and Daddy (in his favorite color blue). It reminded me of the first recognizable picture Owen drew (also of Daddy, but in orange), and when I looked back to see when he drew his picture I found that it was in March of 2010, just after Owen turned 3 1/2, the exact same age Nora is now.  It's neat how these developmental milestones line up sometimes.

Both of these pictures hang on the wall in my office now, to give me a daily reminder about how amazing it is to watch your kids grow, and that my kids see me as a short guy with a big nose ;-)

The New Digs

Back in November, we started looking for a new house that would accommodate the four of us and Allen's dad. We fell in love with an "urban castle" which featured a turret and exposed brick, and put an offer on it right before Thanksgiving. Unfortunately, someone with a much bigger bank account also fell in love with it, and beat us out in a heated bidding war.

We kept looking, but finding a three bedroom plus in-law suite house in NE Capitol Hill, preferably on a corner lot (in order to insure the in-law suite had some light) wasn't particularly easy. Our real-estate agent early on suggested a renovation a half block off H street, but I, having lived just off Columbia Road in Adams Morgan back in the nineties, was adamant that that being so close to the bars and restaurants was not conducive to a safe and happy family life.

So we forged on. We went to every 4 bedroom open house on the Hill over the course of two months (that sounds more impressive that it really was, as inventory on the Hill is notoriously low). Nothing seemed to fit the bill and interest rates began creeping up, so I relented. We got into another bidding war with someone with a bigger bank account that us, but this time we managed to outmaneuver them. 30 days later we owned a new house and last Friday we moved in (with a lot of help from Aunt Katherine).

And then Saturday, we had Katherine, John, Uncle Pete, Aunt Jeannine, cousin Molly and her boyfriend Tyler over for dinner.

The kids love their new rooms (Owen in particular who's living space has roughly tripled), Owen's balcony, the back yard, and the wide open spaces (we still need to buy some more furniture...). Allen likes our spacious new kitchen and master bath (though we've been having trouble figuring out the fancy new shower) and parking. Grandpa Fawcett hasn't officially moved in yet, but he seems good with it all.

As for me, I'm still trying to figure out how to sleep in our new room without window treatments to block the city lights and some sort of sound proofing for weekend nights. I'm also feeling a bit sad to have left the house we brought both of our kids home to, but I think we'll eventually be settled and happy here (once everything is fixed, we've sold our other house, and used the proceeds to buy some blackout shades).

And speaking of which, anyone interested in 3 bedroom, 1 1/2 bathroom house?