In the merry month of May

Hello, friends! And welcome to another blog where we post pictures with short explanations of what we've done in the past few weeks in lieu of recounting stimulating stories or funny anecdotes. Writing that kind of stuff takes effort and, frankly, we know you just come here to see pictures of our cute and folliclely-challenged children and would probably gloss over any discussion about current events or our jobs or how much we like living in NYC anyway. 

So here come some cute pictures of our kids!

It was a stiflingly muggy day - probably the hottest day of the year so far - and we were in Southern Virginia, only miles from Virginia Beach, known as one of the nicer beaches in the mid-Atlantic (and a place that actually has no-swearing signs. I swear (or I attest). Look it up.). So we thought, What better way to spend a hot, sunny day than in an indoor water park where we could:

Splash in the pee pee pool

Teach our children games of chance

Drive frighteningly happy hot dog cars

And frighten our children with animatronic robot puppets

We then drove up to be in DC for the week, where Elizabeth:

Perfected her bouncing skills (she did go into the bounce castle, we just have no proof of this)

Was exceedingly cute on the playground 

Tried to be exceedingly cute while eating a chocolate-and-sprinkle-covered rice krispie treat but was too overloaded with sugar to control the muscles in her face

Tried on every outfit at the Playseum in Bethesda, as evidenced by the above (Exhibit A) 

Exhibit B

Exhibit B with a wig

Exhibit C

Exhibit D

I forgot what I was saying. Anyway, here's Kate's slacking on the job. What is that, a doll clothing magazine? 

So Henry went shopping for oranges

And Elizabeth went shopping for orange juice (hmm.. . seems like we're denying our kids something)

Exhibit E

Elizabeth also made two very special cupcakes (guess which one she made for herself)

And got a side job at Dominoes, where she was the 'president of pizza'

We then spent a very fun hour at the National Arboretum on our way to Uncle Edward's house. Here we:

Visited the fairy forest (which is much easier to explain to kids than what it actually was)

Tried to pierce fishies with food pellets

Visited the sniffing garden

And stormed a bridge, scaring off all the nearby wildlife

 We also went to a park (Fort Ward) by Opa and Grandma's where I took too many pictures of the kiddos:

Finally, on our way back to Gotham we stopped by the College Park Aviation Museum, where, for three dollars, the kids got to explore the museum all by themselves (seemingly; there was actually another person or two in there at times)

Hope you enjoyed the photos!

Spring sprang

Back in the beginning of time, aka April, Randy and Gillian came for a visit. During their visit we went to the American Museum of Natural History, 

enjoyed lunch in Central Park,

and checked out the water views in Bay Ridge.

After they left, Elizabeth built a towering tower,

and celebrated her half birthday.

In early May, Henry explored his artistic side,

Elizabeth showed off her posing,

both kids caught up on their reading,

Elizabeth and I started a new workout regimen,

we ate at the new and improved (post fire) Casa Calamari,

and Justin finally cut those front hedges.

We also took a trip to the Brooklyn Botanic Garden for the cherry blossom festival (the trees were post blossom) where Elizabeth was amazed by the beauty

and the soft leaves,

Henry showed off his new "sniffing" skills,

we failed at taking a picture of me with the kids,

and Elizabeth was thrilled to catch sight of a bridal couple.

Cookie of the Month: month 11

For the eleventh month, Elizabeth made oatmeal raisin cookies. They were tasty!