Robert goes to Seattle

He left this afternoon.  Ten days, with Mike and Barb, going through as much of Jean's house as possible in preparation for an upcoming move to a retirement center.

Love our airport. 

It's about the size of the Sam's Club we had in Colorado Springs.

We came home, and I walked the dog while chatting with my sister on the phone.

Holly treated me and Trev to Starbucks.  We walked around the mall, where we looked at puppies.  We went to Petsmart to look at fish, but they were out (!!), so we looked at cats.  We went to Walmart, and Holly treated us to Chipotle, which we grabbed and came back home to eat dinner and watch tv.

Good end to a great weekend, except for the part about Robert being gone for ten days. I'm sure it's the longest we've been apart in, oh, 25 years, no kidding.

Daylight saving time weekend!

Definitely one of my weekends each year, even worth giving up an hour! And this year was a really, really great one.

Saturday.  Robert and Trevor went off to watch the RVHR basketball finals, where the Rams beat the Flames.  Jason met up with them there and came home with Trevor.  Robert went to the Tap House with the new pastor. I'm so glad they are friends.

Sunday.  Church with Robert.  Schroes were there, Charlie's first time, Erich came before going back to school, Judy, and Kurt.  Jim and Peg slid in 15 minutes late.  Dave Stein gave the message.  We'd heard him before at CCR, and it was not good.  This time was totally different, the spirit of God was moving in Dave, and he was wonderful. What an encouragement and blessing to see him AND to hear him.  Dave and Jen have said this is their "resting place," indicating their stay here is temporary.  I hope not.

Second week in a row we shut the sanctuary down just chatting. Judy invited Jim and Peg along for dinner.  They are a great friends match, which I am SO glad!  I'm too lazy, have no big desire to work on friendships much at this point in my life.  (How terrible does that sound?) Snagged a lemon chess cake, taking that for dessert later.

Came home and made pistachio torte for dessert later too. Warmer weather, getting rid of most of the snow.

To Schroes for dinner, joined of course by Jim and Peg. Such a nice time, and Charlie and Judy and Jim and Peg totally hit it off, just as I suspected.  A somewhat early night, thanks to the time change.

Look familiar? They do this a lot.

Just a great weekend. 

Break for Spring!

I went up to NOVA yesterday to pick up Holly.  Our street gets plowed quickly, which always surprises me--we are at the end of a cul-de-sac.  So getting out yesterday morning was no problem. It was gorgeous out, bright blue sky, with temps in the teens and frozen snow.

It was surreal to see the leftovers from yesterday's storm--the sides of the interstates were littered with overturned semis, a jack-knifed truck, and cars that had gone off the road. Quite unusual, there were also two accidents along the way. 

(I have been very surprised to have few delays for the past year and a half we've been making this drive.  Oh, wait! I spoke too soon.)

Such a beautiful campus with lovely, wooded grounds

A number of different things had us running a bit behind schedule, but not bad, all things considered, and we left school an hour later than I'd hoped. We took a nickel tour of Fairfax, trying to follow map directions to Wendy's, and we were off!

Holly had been terribly worried about her fish, and she'd transferred him into a smaller bowl, hoping he would get better.  She held his bowl in her lap in the car.  It was so sad, and he died on the way home.  :(  He's been such a sweet little fish, just a baby when she got him during Christmas break more than a year ago. It was really something to see him get bigger and full of color.  She babied him and had him quite nicely trained; he was always happy for human attention, and he was a perfect guy to share her room.

We had several, mostly unexplained, traffic slowdowns. It reminded me of Thanksgiving weekend, and it took us almost an hour longer to get home.

Pizza for dinner, followed by Amazing Race, continued episodes as Holly and I watch our way through Friends. Trevor made late night snacks of oatmeal for Holly and tortilla pizza for himself, Robert woke back up, and we all finally went to bed around 2 a.m.  And Spring Break begins!

Annnnd spring snow!

The snow melted overnight. After 16" of snow over the past two weeks, it was finally gone this morning. The rain that lasted all night washed it away, except for the roadsides and edges of driveways where snow had been shoveled. The rain today turned to snow. Quickly. It began snowing at 12:30, and I left work at 1, knowing it would be bad. It was already covering the cars. Temps hovered at 32, so I knew driving should be okay, but it was a slow drive home on the interstate. Better than sideroads, no doubt.

Turning onto Catawba.

Halfway down Catawba, cars were at a standstill.  I could tell it was just half a dozen cars or so ahead, and cars came by from the other direction.  After about five minutes, traffic began moving again, with no indication as to what had happened.

No one had been up or down my street for awhile.  Looking in my rear view mirror, I was leaving some pretty good tracks.

My car slipped at bit at the top of the hill/curve, but I was almost there.  I don't think I've driven on roads like this since Colorado, and I kept reminding myself that this was no different than driving my little Corolla SR-5, which was a wonderful little sled-car in the snow.

Home sweet home.

Four more inches on the ground.  Very wet, completely different than the past few weeks.  It stoppd a few hours later and already was easier to drive in, at least according to Robert.  Nice, because although it will drop another 20 degrees tonight, I'm planning to head out tomorrow morning to pick Holly up and bring her home for spring break.