off to claremont!

off to reunion weekend at scripps in the morning, with a stop in l.a. with miss sarah lyman.  so excited!  will finish easter post upon my return!

easter in three parts

the easter bunny brought an easter basket for patrick! what a lucky little guy.  after he checked out the beer shaped easter eggs, patrick got right to work on building our traditional easter fare. this was our seventh easter lasagna!

while patrick was making turkey meatballs, i started rolling out sarah mac's grandma's bunny cookie recipe.  but instead of bunnies, mine were ducks. what's the saying? don't put all your ducks in a row?

 

 the recipe said they'd be perfectly puffy, and they were!

the recipe received many, many compliments, thanks sarah!

and just for fun, because the bonkos are dog enthusiasts, i also made doggies.  all the cookies were frost-it-yourself, which happens to work really well with car travel, and also garnered favorable response at the dessert table.  that frosted one in the picture is the floor model. 

eventually we gathered up our little easter bunny ... along with a big ol' pack-n-play, two easter baskets, a diaper bag, a camera, a pan of lasagne ready for the oven, and two plates of cookies.  somehow, the basket that the easter bunny brought for the bonkos didn't make it into the car.  i told that easter bunny he should have delivered it directly.

look how beautiful the bonkos' new place is!

we headed to christine and nikolai's place, and i was so excited to finally see their new home! they even used the table settings they got for their wedding. it was weird, they didn't let us use our knives and forks on the china.

they live in a neighborhood called lincoln square.  and as you can see from their view, they live right on the square!  we unpacked our entire car upon arrival.  however, piper's first reaction was sheer terror in response to badger the greyhound.  not quite the best-of-buds companionship christine was hoping for.  i thought that being scared of dogs was a learned behavior, but piper was screaming and crying in a way i've never seen before.  i've never seen her scared!  but she got over it after we showed her that even though badger is big and furry, he is a very sweet dog!

piper + cell phone

piper + cell = devon's been out of touch...

easter post to come, but for now, the piper log has been updated :)

http://thesmalld.blogspot.com/p/piper-log.html

a few follow up pics on that last post ...

we had lots of fun playing around while aunt amanda was here.  piper's tummy wasn't feeling that great (she was kind of sick the next day), but pipes was a trooper. pretty sure patrick loved showing off piper to his sister ...

... but pipes didn't want to hear any more from her father.

(and to those worried that this was a sign of ear infection, it was not)

(nor was it teething, for those who have heard babes can't distinguish the pain and will pull on ears when teething)

cousin kiira helping piper get ready.

how many people does it take to bjorn a baby?

piper loves accessories.

 

 finally, ready to go for a walk!

what we've been up to ... (photos added!)

seems like i've hardly had a chance to blog since patrick went on his first trip to australia!  have i mentioned that he to go back?  yep! he went for another 11 days! 

since the middle of february ...

• i started back with half-marathon training, but opted to sign up for zero half marathons. still working back to a pre-pregnancy pace, and didn't want to sign up for a race with the way i'm running these days ... but it feels good to be back out on that lakefront path on saturday mornings

with some running friends before a run
• patrick went to australia for two weeks
• les came and stayed with me and piper to help out!
• jen and tara surprise visited!! and piper got to meet them both!

• patrick returned from australia
• i got slam-diggity-slammed at work
• we were gifted an iPad; how fun are those? ... if only i could spend more time with it
• WE CELEBRATED OUR THIRD WEDDING ANNIVERSARY by going to avec while cousin kiira and nate babysat miss pipes

• patrick's sister amanda created an extended layover through chicago, and got to spend a night with us on her way from seattle back to atlanta

• cousin kiira came over for another visit while amanda was here
• i started reading a book, that i full-on expect to take FOREVER to finish (it's called one day), but i am loving it ... patrick was taking the kindle to AUS, so i got a good ol' paperback version. still haven't read anything on a kindle.
• we had dinner with the bonkos

• patrick went back to australia
• i cotinued to be slammed at work, still feeling the remnant effects of falling behind when he was on his first trip to australia
• piper started clapping - so sweet & kissably cute
• piper and jayne skyped with each other :)
• patrick got back from australia, again
• with patrick home again, we took piper to see a band at the empty bottle last weekend - it was a 4pm show, specifically for families; the band consisted of three kids and their dad, doing smiths covers, and the bar was open for all the moms&dads. the kids loved dancing and/or being held by one parent or the other.  and the moms and dads had fun too.
• the weather turned slightly warmer and we finally got to take piper to the swings!
• we also had a very impromptu picnic, which piper slept through

• and that pretty much brings us up to speed on the last 6 weeks!