March Madness

I have had a very busy two weeks, and have neglected this blog.  Here is what we have been up to:

I flew to Washington DC for a week last week for a work conference.   The conference was great, but it was a long time away.  My flight to SF was delayed and I got in early Saturday AM.  That weekend, we had plans to visit our friends Sue and Ben and their kids.  We met at a local aviation museum--here is a pic of pilots Cruz and Ethan in a 747:

We spent the night at their home.   The adults had a great dinner out and the kids enjoyed their sleepover too.

The next week, I headed to Phoenix for another work conference.  Yes, Jason has been towing his weight as a dad recently.  My return flight from this conference was also delayed, almost 4 hours, and I got home early Sunday AM.

Then today, Ethan had a piano recital.  Ethan did a nice job at his recital, but it was the first receipt that he verbalized his nervousness to me, and I could tell that the "stress" made his performance more challenging.   It is interesting to see how that has developed.

Anyhow,  I am tired!   And glad to be home for awhile.

Boys Weekend/Girls Weekend

We have wanted to get Ethan out skiing one more time this season, and this weekend seems to be best for our march schedule.   However, Jason was on call until Saturday am, so we could not leave until early Saturday....A six am departure, followed by a day of skiing followed by the loss of an hour of sleep did not seem like a good plan for Alaina....so we decided to split the weekend.   Jason took Ethan to Tahoe and I stayed home with Alaina.  

Almost every single hotel/air bnb was sold out on the north side of the lake (It has finally started snowing, in March....), so they headed South, to Sierra at Tahoe.   Apparently, Ethan improved a lot over the two days of skiing, and they even got a coating of fresh snow on Saturday.

Meanwhile, at home, the girls also had fun.   I asked Alaina to pick a special activity, and she chose a trip to the zoo.   We brought her friend Keegan, and they had a blast.   Most importantly, she kept her sleep schedule and didn't turn into a crazed cranky girl.   She didn't even seem too upset to not ski.   A win-win.

Fan Mail

Recently at Alaina's preschool, her class did a unit on mail.   They learned about letters, and mailboxes, and stamps, etc.   For the culmination of the project, they each chose one person to send an actual letter to via the mail.   They each composed "letters" and addressed envelopes to their pen pal.  Alaina chose Ethan.   Now, I have to say, when I heard about this, I was highly doubtful that anything that she addressed would actually make it to our house.   But sure enough, several days later, it arrived:

And inside:

 

I have to say, so cute.   I am going to miss this age for sure.