Canoeing on the Shenandoah

...is amazing...

Our friend D from grad school came down for the weekend a few weeks ago, and we had the brilliant and wonderful idea of going canoeing on the river. The Downriver Canoe Company dropped us off about 8 miles upstream, and the river was high and fast enough that we barely had to row at all. There are some small rapids and a "ledge" that's reallllllly fun to go down and we canoe past the state park, which means that there are some absolutely stunning views. It was such a perfect, relaxing, fun day to play in the water.







Come visit!

New house?

We put in an offer on a house today! It's a short sale, so wish us luck- while our real estate agent seems to be pretty positive about it, we've been doing some reading and are a little more doubtful...

But the house is pretty sweet. It's an all brick foursquare, with gorgeous craftsman features and moldings, and it's been beautifully maintained. It's on a nice lot in a great neighborhood - hopefully it'll all work out.

I'd put up pics, but don't want to jinx ourselves...

Anyway, while we wait to hear back about this house, we're going to be doing much more fun stuff and blogging about it, since our time won't be spent doing house searches. We've got a quite a bit of stuff already....

Househunting is...

a bit like hunting unicorns. Apparently houses don't exist.

I didn't think we were looking for something so rare. A three bedroom (but 2 is ok) with 1 1/2 bath (but 1 is ok) with a yard, in town, and at an affordable price, without being a wreck, is apparently a bit too much to ask for...

We saw a house on Friday that we are super interested in. It's in the perfect location, big back yard, lots of room for garden and for Shas... but I just don't think we can do all the repairs it needs. I don't even think we could get approved for a loan for this place. It needs a new roof, new electrical, a new heating/cooling system (it has a steam boiler and radiator system now, but it's in serious need of repair, and ideally it should probably be upgraded to a heat pump), a new kitchen, a bathroom renovation, refinished floors, repaired walls, and that doesn't count things like painting and making the house your own... We can do non-critical repairs (moldings, paint, refinishing floors, updated kitchens and bathrooms), but we're not electricians or plumbers!

...

We've been busy lately! My 7th grade and college classes are done, and so I'm just working on a lab manual now (and trying to get data from my collaborators from my phd work... and applying for jobs)! Jim's got two grad classes left to manage, and then he's working on the undergrad semester.

Jim saved a box turtle yesterday from being hit by a car. He is now the hero of turtle-dom.

This poor worm somehow ended up between the double panes of our windows. He, unfortunately, passed away when the sun became stronger.
I built a stool! Jim's teaching me to use all his tools. And soon they will be MINE. We painted this green. Our next project is a bed for our bed. A wooden one. With a headboard.

We went to the Apple Blossom Festival in Winchester. It's a huge festival, with a never-ending parade (two, actually - we only went to one). There were elephants in the parade. I sort of feel like while I love seeing elephants, this is not appropriate for them...

The pink poodles (a standard and a miniature) were among the most popular events in the parade...

Pretty cake. Not as tasty as I'd hope - made this for Easter, which was very nice- Jim's parents came down and it was lovely.

Shasta's now 3 years old. We still lie and say she's about 8 months when she's acting badly. Which is less and less often, now... Here she is, with her birthday present.
Old tractors look like things out of kids stories. This one was beautiful!

It rained and rained and rained. Then it stopped, on Thursday, and the rainbow came out...

Rain, rain go away....

please don't wash our road away...

It's raining really, really hard. We're supposed to get more than two inches of rain today. Poor Shasta, who hates the rain, has been refusing to go to the bathroom while she's getting rained on, so she's been antsy all day. To give you a hint about how much she hates being rained on, her leash clasp slid off her collar while we were taking these pictures, and being the lab mix she is, she took off for the wilderness - we ran inside to drop off the camera and find some treats to bribe her with, and she bolted in the open door behind us. Last week, when it was merely drizzling, it took more than two hours to catch her and bring her in when she bolted out the door I had stupidly left open.

This is why our house is on stilts.

Our neighbor's yard...

Our other neighbor's yard...

This is the border between our yard and our neighbor's yard.

To really show you, watch this:




and this:





Gotta say, though - even though we're probably going to wash into the lake in the next hour or two, at least we've got green leaves, spring flowers, and this rain, while drenching, is taking place in 70 degree weather....

Washington's cherry blossom festival

I'd never seen the cherry blossom festival before, and while I'd heard that it was beautiful, words cannot describe how cool it actually is. There are thousands and thousands of trees- all different kinds of cherry trees - all blooming at once. It's magical, and pictures absolutely don't do it justice.

So pretty

Jefferson Memorial

The Washington Memorial rising out of the fluffy pink flowers...

Sunset over the trees and the memorial

Flowers, flowers, everywhere!

New York, New York

(It's raining so hard we might wash away...)

My friend, R, from grad school and I went up to NYC to visit my brother and our other friend from grad school a couple of weekends ago- leaving warm spring weather for chilly NYC "spring". But it was great! My brother got us onto the ferry to visit the Statue of Liberty without having to wait on that interminable line.

Southern Manhattan from the water

Statue of Liberty!

The museum for the Statue is actually pretty neat. Here we are sitting on a replica of Liberty's foot...

Her shadow is truly impressive....

My brother and I on the ferry...

Statue of Liberty!

The cranes look like dinosaurs

New York, New York......

Rainy Saturday randomness

We're terrible at being lazy. We're taking today to just chill and relax- it's absolutely pouring drenching rain, so inside sounds better than the wine festival we were planning on making it to. So far instead we've slept in (got up at 8:30), made strawberry jam (yum), made cookies (yum), made hummus (yum), cleaned the house, watered the plants, Jim's working on a piece to sell at a silent auction, walked the dog twice, created a menu for Easter (yum), finished two loads of laundry...

Butter almond cookies with strawberry jam (and strawberry jam)

Remember those tiny little seedlings? Well, they grew faster than I thought they would, and now they're way past ready to plant, but it's not warm enough yet, and they're starting to flower....

Bowl o' deliciousness

In other news, a bear tried to break into Jim's car! We had put the trash in there to take to the dump since we don't have trash pick-up, but I guess we should have taken it earlier....

Bears should wipe their paws before crawling all over the truck...

We also caught the biggest spider ever! It was in my laptop bag. Hard to tell, but the body is almost an inch long.

We haven't shown a picture of Guinners in a while - he's still a giant cuddler.

Plus, he's shedding up a storm

Our friend D visited- poor girl, we thought we were going on a "short hike" but it was a 7 mile trek - straight downhill for three and a half miles, and then straight uphill for three and a half miles. But the view was totally worth it! This is Overlook Falls in Shenandoah National Park.

Overlook Falls from the top...

Gorgeous and crazy lichens...

We came up into a cloud. It was neat.