Spring is coming!

This past month has been beautiful! Mid February ushered in temperatures in the 60s and 70s, so H1, H3, and I have been spending every possible free moment outside enjoying it! Other than late September, this is my favorite time in VA....it's not cold and rainy and not blazing hot either. Almost every morning H3 and I take a walk to the Post Office. Along the way, H3 has to investigate every rock, stick, leaf, and dandilion! Though the Post Office is less than 1/4 of a mile away, it typically takes us 20 minutes or so round trip with all of her detours! She's so cute though, and I just can't deny her the pleasure of investigating everything. She has such a curious mind--very detail oriented.

At the end of February I took a quick trip with her to Lynchburg to see some friends. Our first stop was the university I used to work at to see some of my former coworkers, most of whom I've kept in contact with. They usually ask me to stop in when I come to the area so they can say hello and see how much H3 has grown. She loves wandering around the office and saying "hi" to everyone. From there, we met my friend Cate for lunch. Cate is also a former coworker and dear friend. I was blessed to be in her wedding a few years ago. Then, we stopped by another friend's house to help her unpack. She and her husband had just moved in the weekend before and I figured she could probably use a little help getting organized. They have the sweetest little 2 month old (now 3 months, I guess) boy! After spending the night with another friend and letting H3 play with their 2 year old son, we met Cate again at 10 the next morning and I watched her 1 year old, Natalie, while she was in a meeting before we had lunch. H3 and Natalie got along so well! They were playing in an empty conference room and had the best time (see pic below of both girls).




As I mentioned, H3 and I have been spending a lot of time outside! She loves playing the backyard and seems to also enjoy running laps around our house! For the first time, I'm now wishing we had a fenced in backyard, since I'm running those laps with her. She'd pretty fast for having such short legs, or at least I think so.



Last Sunday, we joined another family after church for a picnic lunch in a local park. It's the same park where we had H3's birthday last year, and they have a huge wooden playground called Fort Fun. The other family, whose house we meet at for small group, has a 16 year old, a 5 year old, and twin two year olds, all boys, and little girl due in July. H3 loves playing with the three younger boys. They have as much energy as she does! By the end of the afternoon all the little ones were tuckered out. H3 fell asleep as soon as we got in the car and slept the whole way home, plus another couple hours at the house!

H3 sitting in H1's lap at the picnic table.


Slide!



This weekend has been a bit more mellow. It's a bit cooler (in the 50s) and I picked up a sinus infection or something this past Thursday. Since then, I've been pretty much exhausted and stuffy-nosed. H1 had to work on Saturday (a make-up day from the snow days earlier this year), and when he got home he went to work refinishing the last two dining room chairs. They now have the stain on them, and just a coat of poly-eurthane left before they will be done. That project has been going on in what will be H3's new room, so all of that has to get cleaned up before we start painting. I did purchase the paint on Saturday night, so it's ready to go as soon as those chairs are finished. Hurray!

~H2