Hunting for Spring

The weather here is mild, absolutely nothing to complain about. But, I think everyone in our house has been affected differently by seasonal affective disorder, and spring here is really quite dramatic. So, today, we went to the Arboretum with our cameras to hunt for the first signs of the changing season. R said you "can feel spring on your skin." I asked what it feels like, and he replied "warmness." True enough. They found all sorts of chutes, buds and blossoms and particularly liked the Okame Apricot tree, and the Arnold Promise Witchhazel. While the Bloodgood Red Twig Dogwood is very striking, I think we were more interested in the name, which is fairly difficult to say quickly.

You can see the highlights here. Also, while you are there, take a look at our frigid (note the Merry X-mas in ice on the inside of the hotel window) but enjoyable Christmas in Chicago, about which I haven't written a thing. Busy times. Good times, though.

More to come.

a walk in the woods

On Sunday, we all took a walk in the GC woods. We sat on a log and talked about the changing seasons as the boys fought each other with sticks. Nice time...

whew!

So, for years I have had a low-level worry about what might happen if, as my children grew older it became clear they did not share my political viewpoints. Of course, I would love them the same, but there is the Alex from Family Ties model.

Well, tonight, H said that there was a girl at his school who would like to vote for McCain if she could because if Obama becomes president, he will "take all our taxes and give them to homeless people." H got a puzzled look on his face and said, "but that's a good cause, right? I mean, what is the problem with that?"

Thats my boy.

More to come

Charlotte

Greensboro is a fine place to live. The locals like to say, "a great place to raise a family," which usually means, it has great parks and no nightlife or culture to speak of... Anyway, we are quite happy here, but occasionally get the urban jones, e.g. nice Italian restaurant, classy hotel, traffic, tall buildings, good brunch, a museum or two... So, this summer, on the spur of the moment, we took off for a weekend in Charlotte. Thankfully, our boys love hotels and all the accoutrements associated with them. So, we hung out in our room in the Omni, watched a movie or two, wandered around downtown, watched a bike race, ate at an Osteria, and went to the Discovery place. A good weekend.

Here are a few pictures.

Facebook ate my blog

So, looking back over my blog, I realize that I haven't posted anything for quite some time. The main culprit is facebook. Not sure why, but I really began to use facebook a lot more this summer — perhaps I hit the critical friend mass... Whatever the case, it ate up the limited amount of computer doodling time I had. But I have a series of posts which have been simmering and which I will get up soon enough.

Lego Platform

This is the platform H+I built for his Legos. It slides (thanks to H's clever design) right under the bed.

these aren't very good pictures...

but people have been asking me what we have been up to recently, and this tells part of the story. We moved — within the house that is. Our friends who were living with us temporarily moved out, and so R graduated to H's old room, H graduated to the larger bedroom, and I got a home office. We bought new furniture for all three rooms at IKEA — 16 boxes / 2 days worth of assembly. L repainted both rooms while I turned assembled. Everyone is pretty happy about the move, except now our bedroom looks pretty lame.

Other things about which I will post in the near future:
- a weekend getaway to Charlotte
- one year in Greensboro and a party to celebrate it
- a new semester, which begins at 8:30a tomorrow.