Washington List

In order to complete our Washington list we are sometimes forced to make some odd couplings, this weekend: Teddy Roosevelt and strip mall Lebanese food.

Teddy Roosevelt must have been fairly important as he has a whole island in his honor, or maybe they put him out there in the middle of the Potomac as some sort of punishment. Hard to say, not many tourists around. The statue is dignified, magnificent and some what Leninish? See for yourself, I am beginning to think he might be banished to Roosevelt Island.
However we enjoyed his island immensely, quiet, foresty and very close to Georgetown, just my kind of outdoor pursuit. The girls spotted butterflies, salamanders, some crazy big beetles and a plethora of sticks.

Next, Raouche Cafe in Falls Church, VA. The second last stop on the Orange Metro Line, which means it is very, very far from our house. Raouche was worth the Metro Ride and hike into no man's land suburbia. I will let the pictures speak for themselves. Liam was a very happy camper on the march home.

In the same strip mall there was an Asian grocer-simply call H Mart. The name seemed more elaborate in the Japanese script but why translate for the silly white people. I have greatly missed the Asian, Italian, Indian, etc....markets that are so easy to find in Edmonton. H did not disappoint, as soon as we walked in you could smell the deals (Liam describes it as concentrating more on produce then good air filtration like those fancy grocery stores). Ngila inquired as to what the odor might be, I just smiled. Yummy food my dear, just waiting for us to find it (or perhaps the half-dried shrimp (yep, that's the real name) sitting in an unrefrigerated cardboard box near the chicken necks in the "special deal" (yep, that's the real name) section of the meat department.)

Green Curry with Shrimp and little girls

Ngila and Beatrix are more committed to blogging than their mother. While we ate supper the other night they demanded we take pictures for the blog.

Which got me thinking that something happened in the last few months at our house; we have moved to the next stage of parenting. I am now the mother of two little girls. This is very exciting. (I mean babies are great, cuddle them, rock them but then? Clean them, feed them, clean them, feed them, try to figure out why on earth they are still screaming when you have cleaned them and fed them).

But little girls? Well, cuddle them, rock them, throw them around, fall over laughing at their witty remarks, receive their hand made gifts (try not to fall over laughing), tuck them in, read to them (books that are actually entertaining - the ones without pictures), draw with them, sew with them, march with them, etc.

Ngila is 5 and 1/2, desperately waiting for her first tooth to loosen, playing chords like a pro on the piano (or like Auntie Doris as she likes to say), drawing people with no sticks features, guiding people around on the DC Metro system "No I think the red line goes to Metro Center, doesn't it mom?", and generally growing into a lovely human being.

Beatrix is 3 and 1/2, constantly making up new rules or guidelines for our behaviour, taking up a genuine interest in cooking, marching like a machine from museum to monument and beyond (3 miles the other day), dressing herself (most trying (on mommy) of her new interests) and showing gratitude without being prompted!!

This may be what I should have posted on mother's day, if some one hadn't beat me to the blog with that lovely picture of the green pepper shooting up my nose.

Best. Mother's Day. Ever.

In 2005 Janelle spent her first Mother's Day driving between High River and Wetaskiwin. Her special Mother's Day lunch happened at Wendy's in Red Deer. The situation in the car was frosty.

We've sharpened our game since then. For a while we bought jewelry, now we buy fancy cheese. But today we decided that we should re-incorporate fast food into our Mother's Day activities. We hit Five Guys for dinner. The pictures speak for themselves.