four.

we now have a four-year-old in the house! happy birthday, kj! upon request, we repeated the favorite party theme of last year - decorate your own cupcake! then play with friends. one year older, one more (at least) cupcake under her belt. :)

frigid.

even though it was colder than cold (frigid would be the word! 15 below, give or take!) on the day marked for cutting our christmas tree, we held fast to tradition & got the job done. mommy & lj stayed very close to the bonfire in the woods, grasping every degree of heat we could find, while daddy & kj bundled up, covered their faces & ran for a tree. needless to say, it was not exactly the crowning glory of the forest & needed a little doctoring-up once we brought it home... but it is now resides in our home as our beloved mark of this joyous season!

third.

and the word is out! we will be adding another babe to the family in early summer... hurray! the big sister & big brother are thrilled, and mommy is happy to be past the first trimester woes... alright, folks! here comes wild!!

tea.

a friend kindly gifted this sweet little tea set to us this week! and kj promptly set about serving tea, complete with fancy clothes for her & her guest, and a poached egg or two!

hike.

while mommy & daddy went gallavanting off to boston for the national asla conference (aka, working get-away), grandma & grampa happily filled in to take care of the kiddos on the homefront. they managed to have an adventure each day, to cbs, ecfe, the playground, and the ever-entertaining backyard (thanks for raking our leaves!!), as well as plenty of relaxed playtime & read-time. of course there was much bird-watching & playing with the bird app on grandma's phone, as well. luckily, mommy got to enjoy a few days with them, too, and we all went exploring in chester park. the hike along the waterfalls was breathtaking! thanks so much, mom & dad, for taking time to be with our family & care for us. we appreciate you!

bulldogs.

kj & daddy are ready for a hockey game! go bulldogs!

shoes.

kj was helping mommy clean up the foyer. now that's a lot of shoes for one little family!!

seasons.

i think lj was happy to see the water, but sad he couldn't go fishing in it... oh how seasons change! but they will come around again, my boy, just you wait & see...

lab.

we got a sneak peek into daddy's new lab today! it's a brand new lab space for the environmental engineering work of umd... one side for teaching & the other for research. can you tell which space is in use already? he & his research group sure made quick work of moving in there! we know it's been a long wait & a lot of work getting here... we're so excited for you, daddy. a great addition to your department & to umd!

ah-coon.

can you spot the three visitors we entertained this morning? after noticing that gus was literally barking up a tree, we discovered these wee babes way up in the maple by our deck, staying safe & secure until freed to find their mama in the woods again. lj & i watched them for a loooong time & perfected a new word in his vocabulary: 'ah-coon!' here's to hoping they enjoy their woods-home better than ours! :)

pumpkins.

we got to take over a few of the farm chores this fall while nanna & poppa were off biking thru germany. luckily, we landed with the most fun work to be had -- harvesting pumpkins & mowing the lawn! :) of course, the first thing to do was find the 'biggest pumpkin ever' of this year... wasn't too hard. it was much harder to root out all of those baby pumpkins! but we conquered the pumpkin patch in the end, and even found the lawn vacuum for that lush & beautiful yard. :)