Bears and Baltimore

Our good friends April and Luke recently moved to Baltimore for the summer. They have 2 kids also. The oldest, Ava, is Noah's age and they get along really well. In fact, they are sort of betrothed. Normally they live in Utah so we are taking advantage of every opportunity to see them while they are so close. Since the half-marathon we've been to Baltimore twice. The first time we went to the Aquarium and the second time we went to Port Discovery which is a children's museum. I never even knew something like that existed before. Noah had a great time at both places with his buddy Ava. Here are some pictures.

In the rain outside the Aquarium. Noah is quite the gentleman. This will be a good one for the wedding slide-show. :-)

Those kids would have jumped in and swam with the sharks if we would have let them.

Our little jester.

Yee haw!

The happiest baby in the ball pit. Okay, the only baby in the ball pit.

Allison has hit a major milestone. She's now as big as Buddy the koala bear. Where does the time go?

Easter and Marathon

It's been an eventful few weeks since I last posted. We'll start with Easter. The Friday before Easter we went to my parents house for an egg hunt with the cousins. Noah really liked finding the eggs and especailly opening them to find chocolate candy inside! That same evening we went to the other cousin's house and colored eggs. On Easter sunday we went to my parents house for dinner. It was really fun to see all the kids together enjoying the holiday.


Last week, the kids took their first of many baths together. It is much easier to bath them when you can do both at once. Maybe I can actually start bathing them more than once a week. :-)




On the 18th I ran in the Ocean City Half Marathon. I was so nervous the night before I didn't sleep at all. I was freaking out because it would be a lot harder to run 13.1 miles on no sleep. Somehow I got through it. My goal was to average a 10 minute mile and I pretty much did that. I finished in 2 hours and 11 minutes. Out of 370 runners I finished 224th. Pretty good for my first time I think. I really had a lot of fun. The weather was beautiful. We really couldn't have asked for a more beautiful morning. It was in the 50s when I started and probably about 70 when I finished and sun was shining the whole time. I can't wait to run another one. Anyone want to join me for the Richmond Half-Marathon is September?

This was in the 11th mile. Almost there!

After the race we walked to the beach and enjoyed the scenery a little bit. Then there was a post-race party at a local hotel with pizza and goodies and a hot tub. Man, that hot tub felt so good on my tired legs! Overall, it was a great experience. The only thing that could have made it better would be to have seen my kids at the finish line too. But, we left them with the grandparents (thanks guys!) because they would not have enjoyed getting up at 5 am. I couldn't have done it without Keith's support. He's so wonderful and I'm so lucky to be married to him!

Cherry Blossoms

On Saturday we went downtown to see the cherry blossom parade. It was Noah's first parade and he absolutely loved it. He got to see Elmo and Bigbird and the Easter Bunny. He really liked all the marching bands too. It was super windy too but that wasn't too bad. We all got a little bit of sun (except for Allison) and were quite worn out when we got home. Here are some pictures!





Allison slept for quite a while despite the wind, sun and noise. Babies are amazing.

I was looking at some old pictures yesterday and Allison was "helping". She was pretty much in heaven with so many things to grab.
Keith got out his backpack (he's been wanting to go backpacking lately) and Noah wanted to give it a try. It might not be his size though.

This and That

I have 8 more runs before the big race. Last week I ran 12 miles in the rain around Burke Lake. It was actually pretty fun. There were hardly any people there so it was very peaceful. There were even some pelicans on the lake. It was the first time I've seen pelicans, outside the zoo, except for in Finding Nemo and I don't think that counts. The half-marathon is 13.1 miles so now that I've accomplished 12 I feel like the pressure is off.

I got my hair cut last week. Here are the results. Nothing too dramatic just some bangs and layers.

Keith's second season on the Grumpy Old Men (that's the name of his basketball team) has ended. He is not signing up to play full time for another season. He plans to play as a substitute if they need him which is fine for me. He doesn't have to pay anything to be a sub.

Here's a picture of Noah jumping off the bed. He'll jump off of just about every peice of furniture in our house.



The kids are doing well. Allison really wants to crawl but she's not quite there yet. I think she has inherited my impatience. She can only be on her tummy for a little while before she gets really frustrated. Noah is becoming more willful and independent every day. His latest pastime is opening the fridge and standing there saying "ummmmmm" for a very long time. I find myself constantly telling him to close the door because he's letting all the cold air out. Nothing gets done around the house unless Noah's involved. Today he helped unload the dishwasher. His idea of helping fold laundry involves putting all the clean clothes in the dirty clothes hamper. It seems he doesn't understand the distinction.

I love this picture of Allison because it really shows her pretty blue eyes. Not to mention her smile. :-)



We had dinner with my former college roomate/close friend and her husband. It's been years since we've seen eachother so it was great to catch up. Here we are at California Pizza Kitchen.



My piano teaching business is dwindling. I've just lost 2 more students. I must admit it's a blow to my confidence when I lose a student. As a private teacher-slash-stay-at-home-mom there are many challenges to overcome. Firstly, I have 2 kids to tend to neither of which seem very interested in letting me teach. Second, I live in a condo so there is a noise issue. I have to be careful not to teach too late eliminating the option of teaching when the kids are in bed. Thirdly, I spend all day dealing with my own kids and have little patience left for my students. It is becoming harder and harder for me. Half of my students are adults and I enjoy teaching adults LOADS more than kids. I am considering changing my studio to an adult studio. I just wonder if there is as much of a market out there for adults who want to learn. Where would I even start to market to adults? Sigh.

It seems I need to find another way to earn income for our family. So, I've applied for a job as a subsitute teacher for the Fairfax County Public Schools. I'm thinking of just doing one or two days a week and trying to do a babysitting exchange with another mom who maybe wants to do the same thing. So any moms out there who are reading this and are interested in swapping kids a few days a week you let me know! Enough of my ramblings already. 2 weeks til marathon day!