For April fools day we did it up fancy. Megan coated the house in sticky note messages.
I pulled an April fools prank on myself and threw a social event.
We had a sweet cookout with our old D&D crew.
We made vegetarian versions of Hemingway burgers.
I am blessed with friends who are good cooks.
In another unlikely development I went to the movie.
Haven did some promo stuff for the D&D movie and in exchange got a free showing for its members.
I love little more than a chance to wear a costume and couldn’t pass up the opportunity to take the family to the spiffy new movie theater with recliner seats and a big menu.
I was going for elvin archer here.
They had a bar and I got David a drink called a rejuvenating potion. It had a glowing ice cube and weird gummies and rosemary and some kind of liquors.
In a first since my in theater showing of Jurassic Park at the Uptown (1993), I went to a movie and did not get a headache.
What an outstanding development.
I think it was just not as ear shatteringly loud as most movies. Yay!
We’ve started going on weekend hikes for Camino prep.
If we are to walk 10 miles every day across the top of Spain we really need to get in some practice miles.
I’m finding it really tricky to balance walking enough to work up my endurance and not pushing my feet back into injury.
I am so happy to be outside and moving again though. We are lucky to live in such a beautiful area.
Kiernan has been struggling with anxiety and school attendance recently. His class had a massive field trip (13 hours) to D.C. and I thought he might not want to go. He was instead super into the idea.
I sent him off a bit before 8 in the morning at his school with a motherly plea to keep me updated.
He spent the rest of the day sending me pictures like this one.
I in turn sent him a picture of me from the same area when I was a toddler.
He recreated it.
These pictures are nearly 50 years apart.
I am happy to say that his chaperone also posted some pictures.
Here is their album cover (clearly).
They got back to the school at around 9:30. He walked well over 10 miles so we’ve chalked it up to a training day for him.
Megan has begun to inhabit her full on artist self. Here she is on the way into school with a guitar a violin and a sketchbook.
That girl is a wonder!
Also all that kit is heavy! She’s going to get some super buff shoulders.
Erena has moved up into middle school.
Krishna has decided to join us in parenthood!
We are so happy for her and Dharmesh and cannot wait to meet their, no doubt, awesome offspring.
Yay!
April brought Easter. Easter brought feasting and egg dying and the end of my Amazon abstinence.
Also Easter hats and dresses 😁
We hid eggs for the kids with colorful matching in the front yard.
Then they his eggs for us in the back.
Meg put one on the roof gutter.
Then we went for a hike.
This time I used my (nearly empty) backpack. David adjusted it for me as we went and it’s now quite comfortable.
I got this exciting picture of a cocoa pod harvest from Dad and Mary in Hawaii.
I kept working on my piano class. I’m now starting to read notes and intervals between notes. At first it was all finger numbering. I’m really enjoying the change in headspace that the classes provide.
I’m hoping to take this class 4 times until I can read music reliably.
Fingers crossed.
The cherry blossoms came out. They were beautiful as always. The place I park for work is under a long line of them.
The base where I work is deeply ugly. It’s old drab army buildings and pipes everywhere.
The cherry trees are such a relief.
Speaking of work. We had a royal visitor to the lab. A princess of Thailand (who’s is also a chemist) came. We cleaned all the things and practiced a receiving line and dressed up.
It was pretty darn neat.
I talked to some of her retainers for a bit about liquid handlers.
One of them came back at the end to tell me thank you and that I was very nice.
My sister says that if a royal retainer says you are nice it means something.
Clearly I need to put this on my resume.
I took a sewing class at haven.
I made a bag and am proud to say it looks and acts very much as a bag should.
I enjoyed the class and hope they do more sewing classes.
David and I both got good work news. It’s yearly review time (oh how I hate reviews) and we did well and both got raises and promotions.
That called for celebration!
It was straight to fancy desserts for us.
Yum!
Mom and I went for a full gear hike. I must say she’s in great shape. She’s both fast and full of endurance.
I know she’s worried about how she will do in Spain but from what I’ve seen she’s just as ready (if not more so) than all of us.
Megan is a marvel. She’s decided to do the school variety show. Here she is with her singing partner Ayra.
They kept yelling Slay and doing poses.
They are doing this song.
Kathryn has gotten a new kitten. He is a main coon so he’s going to be a giant.
His name is ice cream.
I adore him.
My garden is in bloom and I also love that.
This year is the 30th anniversary of our high school graduation.
We didn’t go to any of the official stuff but Ashish organized a get together at Silver Diner.
It was really great to see and eat with these folk.
It’s weird to be with people with whom you share so much and about whom you know such intimate things and who you don’t really know at all anymore.
Above is Lisa. We were together since were were scabby kneed snotty nosed infants. It was comforting and exciting to hear her voice again.
I don’t love reunions. We didn’t go on purpose. I felt so out of place and self conscious at the last few that is was a wonder to enjoy this one.
Weird
I made a super tasty cinnamon bread. I was inspired by my friend Mariam who made an orange cardamom cake for Eid.
So I made cardamom bread and then slathered it with butter and cinnamon and brown sugar. It tasted great but I clearly needed to roll it more.
Megan got blue hair.
We took advantage of a super rainy spring day and took a hike in all our rain gear to test it out.
I have a rain suit, mom has a poncho, and Kiernan is using an umbrella.
There are genuine pros and cons for each choice but they all worked pretty well.
I made very fair papas rellenas but then Kiernan won the day by making tamales.
I have a deep and abiding love of tamales. When I make them they are terrible.
My precious sunshine sometimes send some my way and I treasure them and ration them out.
Kiernan asked me what would happen if he could make them.
I said then I would probably ask him to make them all the time.
And then he did it. I gave him the recipie card and took him to the store and he started heating corn and I am very happy.
This time next month we should be in Spain.
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