Shenandoah and D&D

One of our favorite pandemic activities has been playing D&D online with a group of friends we have known for a very long time.  Even the girls have gotten involved with their own game once a week.  Now that all of the adults have been vaccinated, I really wanted to get us all together to enjoy each other's company without worrying about the screen freezing or whether or not we were on mute.  Everyone was ready for a change of scene, so we met up at a "cabin" (it had four bedrooms) in the Shenandoah area.

Since Jeff and I had gotten the cabin, our friends declared themselves in charge of food.  Once we got there, they went into full prep mode, while I got Jeff and Vivian to pose for photos with the view.

Elena was so excited to have other adults to talk to though, that she just followed the cooks around wherever they went.

Dinner was an absolutely delicious grilled fish, seafood, and vegetable feast.  I enjoyed it so much, that I forgot to take pictures, and I resolved not to make that mistake again, especially since the food that weekened was not only delcious, but also photogenic.

After dinner, we had a great round of D&D, with a brief pause in the form of baked apple in pastry dessert, yum!

The girls didn't want to go to bed while we were still playing, so it was a bit of a late night for them, but that meant we all got to sleep in the next morning.  That gave the fabulous chefs time enough to make delicious breakfast omelettes and DUCK bacon, something Jeff and I didn't know was missing from our life, and which we are now in love with.

Since we had had such a wonderful breakfast, lunch was "just" a selection of cheeses, fruits, and nuts which were laid out for nibbling on.  This is only half of the food.

Added to the delicious food was the wonderfulness of other people keeping the girls busy.  They played chess, Scrabble, and had their own D&D session.

They even helped with preparing the dessert for the evening, lemon cakes.

That meant that Jeff and I had some time to actually sit out on the balcony, enjoy each other's company, and read a bit.

Because the girls had gotten so much attention, they also allowed us two, relatively uninterrupted sessions of D&D.  In keeping with the feel of the game, we had pork ribs and a rack of lamb for dinner.  Jeff's character is very into mutton, so it seemed necessary that he get some real lamb during play.

We may have been a band of adventurers, but we ate like kings.  For the second night in a row, the girls wanted to stay up late with us to listen in, but Elena just couldn't make it, so she lay down on the sofa to "rest" and promptly fell asleep.

It was sad to leave the next morning, and it will be tough to go back to meeting online, but despite its flaws, I am so grateful to the technology that allows us to stay in touch with friends, even when we can't be physically together.

Celebrating Spring

We are really enjoying having four seasons this year, and as more people get vaccinated and the weather warms up, there are more options for things to do.  We have been keeping busy inside and outside.  There's been plenty to do at home, and the natural world has given us lots to explore and learn about as well.

Elena is now tall enough to help with cooking on a regular basis, and she loves to help with her favorite meal, shells and peas.

The same week I took the cooking picture, Viv and I heard a loud cracking sound and a thump.  Eventually we figured out that it was a tree near our house falling over.  Luckily, it fell away from our house, not towards it.  Unluckily, it blocked a walking path and one lane of the road.  She and I went out to explore.

You could see the force with which it hit the ground in the way the wood exploded out of the bark.  It was really something.

I've been trying to get the girls out and exploring when I can.  This is us walking to Elena's school to pick up library books.  Of course, I couldn't get both girls to turn and look at me at the same time.

Jeff and I have been taking afternoon walks together most afternoons, and the girls just want to be lazy in the house, but it is fun when we can get them out exploring.  Vivi showed me one of her favorite spots near where we live.

They can also be helpful with retrieving food from the food trucks we now get in the parking lot three times a week.  We don't get food from every single food truck that comes through, but it can be a fun change up for dinner, since we're still not really up for going to restaurants as a family.

Spring has brought a lot of new creatures to learn about.  Elena was excited about the Brood X cicadas before they even showed up, but we found our own neighborhood rat snake to keep her occupied until the cicadas came.  We almost stepped on it a couple times, because it's REALLY long and blends into the grass.

Finally though, the cicadas appeared.  As promised, first there were holes in the ground.

A few days later, we saw one busting out of its old skin.  The empty old skins with the crack in the back are stuck to trees all over the place.

Elena found a mature one and adopted it as a pet for a while.  She even petted it and declared it "soft".  I'm proud of her bravery and have dubbed her Elena the Entomologist. 

It was raining when Jeff and I took our walk yesterday, and we found these guys just hanging out on one of the trees.

Today, we had to walk around two cicadas getting it on in the middle of the path, and the noise was deafening whenever we walked in the more heavily wooded areas.

They are progressing through their life cycle, so hopefully the noise will end soon.  Vivian is also progressing through her stages, and, being the over achiever that she is, she decided to start being a teenager early.  She really wanted to change up her hair, and continues to perfect her clothing look, so I took her shopping for clothes, and my mom took her to have her hair dyed.  We are all pleased with the results.

The same week she got her hair dyed, the FDA and CDC finalized approval of the Pfizer vaccine for 12 and up, so Viv and I excitedly went to get her first shot.  She's wearing her "I got my Covid-19 vaccine" sticker, which is now proudly stuck to her bedroom door.

I may have gotten a little over excited about her new vaccination status, because on Monday I took her to Pentagon City to get her ears pierced.  We had talked about it, but I kind of felt like we were entering now or never territory.  It was around lunch time on a weekday, but there was hardly anyone at the mall.  It's one of the biggest signs I've seen recently of the pandemic definitely not being done affecting the world around us.  The girls still thought the mall was exciting though.

Viv took her time deciding on which earrings she wanted, and in the end she settled on some sparkly ones, which I fully approve of.

Being a mom has definitely been a challenge in this crazy past year, but I was treated very well for Mother's Day.  Jeff got me a new phone and a new computer, so that I can keep being the family's communication hub and historian.  He also got me a healthy and beautiful fruit bouquet. 

My own mom, ever the self-sufficient lady, had bought herself a new car the week before as her own present.  The girls approved.

Because life has been so crazy, I had to spread my celebration with my mom out over the following week, but we managed to have a sushi lunch and a pedicure, albeit on different days.  The move timeline is getting real, and the stresses of managing that while also managing the girls is wearing on me, but they are wonderful, and they bring me much more joy than trouble, so I keep reminding myself to focus on the positives.

Chesapeake Birthday

Last year for my birthday we were supposed to go on a Caribbean cruise.  Instead, we spent the day in our Bogota apartment in lockdown.  For my birthday this year, I knew that cruising still wasn't an option, but I really wanted to get to the water.  The easiest body of water to get to from where we live in Virginia, is the Chesapeake Bay.  We picked the part where we didn't have to go over a long bridge, just through DC and to the edge of Maryland.  We found a lovely house in a town called Deale, and the first thing we did once we got there was go to the water's edge and take some pictures.

The house itself was really special, and it had a lovely wrap around porch, so that we could enjoy as much outdoor time as possible.

The backyard was really cool too. It had a fire pit surrounded by bushes for privacy, lots of grass to play on, and then a low stone wall to sit on. The part between the wall and the water was communal property, so we discovered we could walk on the grass along the water to the public pier.

Stalker Vivi caught me and Jeff admiring the view.

We took the girls and my dad for a walk along the water.

There was an osprey nest with a chick in it, so we had fun checking that out.

For my birthday dinner, we had hired a chef recommended to us by the lady who owned the house.  Turns out, he was the son in law of her next door neighbors.  He prepared grilled seafood, grilled vegetables, and paella for us.

We kept it simple and ate outside on paper plates.  No cooking and no major cleanup makes for a perfect birthday dinner.  It was getting a little chilly though, so we came back in for cake.  My mom had brought all the official birthday cake fixings with her from Virginia, so I had the traditional cake.

It was wonderful to be able to celebrate surrounded by love and next to the water.

Since the house faced east, Jeff and I decided to get up early the next morning to try and catch the sunrise.  He got out ahead of me, but that meant I got to take pictures of him taking pictures.

He got back at me by putting my not quite awake self in a selfie.

I think his sunrise pictures turned out better than the sleepytime selfie.

Eventually, we retreated back to the porch for coffee to warm us through the rest of the sun's rise.

Once the sun was truly up, we enjoyed walking along the water and through the neighborhoods.  Jeff and I took a couple walks, and Elena came with us on one of them.

We also found a really cool Scrabble board that spun to face whoever's turn it was.  The girls had never played Scrabble before, but discovered that the game was a perfect fit for their love of words.

There was a bunny who kept hanging out in the back yard, so we kept the children active by sending them out to run around with it.

We had picked up a yummy lunch from a local restaurant, and we had plenty of leftovers from the previous night's dinner, so we were well fed, but the girls were especially looking forward to s'mores time.

Jeff got into it too, Wolverine style.

My mom had never had a s'mores before, so we made one for her.  She said it was fine, but a little too sweet for her.  We all enjoyed the fire though.

The next morning we savoured coffee on the porch again, took a short walk, and got in some basking in the sun.

Eventually though, it was time to say goodbye to the beautiful water view.

It was a quick getaway, but it was so wonderful to be on the water, even for that short time.  Jeff and I have long agreed that whenever we're done moving around the world, we want to settle somewhere with a view of the water.