Anna Grows

Social Distant Mom Meet-Up  We are counting down the days until spring!  Actually, we are counting down the days for a lot of things, including the return of in-person school for Anna on March 2.  Theresa was counting down the days until the weekend for a brief, socially distant meet-up with her friend Pauletta (Anna was probably counting down too for a break from her mom).  Here are some highlights from another pandemic week: Theresa finished her latest 1,000 piece jigsaw puzzle (yes, this is now considered a highlight for the week). Joe's efforts on the phone system continue.  In short, it is complicated. Anna continues to spend her days between a combination of virtual school and YouTube (more of the later than the former).  Her parents are hoping that she will be inspired to come up with something in which she can become a YouTube star and make millions. Theresa met up with Pauletta for a mom get-away.  In keeping with tradition, they checked out a Virginia winery ( Early Mount

  First photos from the Mars rover What can we say about this week?  It is cold.  They skies are gray.  We had more ice.  Anna had a snow day on Thursday due to ice (yes she is doing virtual school.....no we don't know why they had a snow day).  As we continue to plod through the long winter months, here are some highlights from the week: The mars rover landed.  A great week for NASA! Joe is hyper focused on a project to change our phone service.  There is a lot of details and it may require a chart to explain it, but stay tuned to see if he can pull of replacing our land line AND keeping the phone number (this is not an exercise for the faint of heart). Theresa made progress on her latest 1,000 piece puzzle.  This has been one of her hobbies during the pandemic.  There is much puzzle trading going on with the neighbors, of which she is a participant. Anna signed up for Jammers Tech - the latest class from Vienna Jammers.  In another creative move, the instructor is offering a clas

 It has definitely been the longest stretch of the pandemic so far thanks to the winter weather.  This weekend saw an ice storm, which necessitated staying in.  The weather has limited hiking (too muddy) and there is not enough snow for skiing.  We continue to find ways to occupy our time and are counting down until March 2, which is when Anna will return for in-person school (for two days a week only). We celebrated Valentine's Day with some flowers from Joe (he beat the ice storm on Saturday morning for those) and a very romantic "Chicken Bible" cookbook from Theresa (nothing says I love you like roast chicken).  Anna and Theresa made some valentine cookies to share with a few neighbors.  We managed to get a walk in after the ice melted.  Other activities for the week included: An ice storm on Saturday - everyone stayed inside that day. Completed an on-going Monopoly game, of which Joe won.  If you've ever played Monopoly with Joe, you know he takes it seriously. An

  Our favorite Bernie meme  The long winter months are in full swing.  After a week of cold weather followed by warmer weather and melting snow, it snowed again on Sunday morning....and then melted (this is Theresa's favorite kind of snow).  Since it is Super Bowl Sunday, one of the neighbors arranged for a pizza food truck in the neighborhood.  Anna joined in with one of the other neighborhood girl scouts to sell her remaining cookies next to the pizza truck (Theresa was very excited about this).  This may be Anna's most efficient cookie season ever. Note - we did not order pizza from the truck but rather Joe made pizza.  No reason to risk another option when we already know we have quality in-house pizza. In other highlights of the pandemic week: Fairfax County schools announced a return to in-person instruction beginning March 2.  Anna will go two days a week (Tuesday and Wednesday).  We are crossing our fingers right now that this will come to pass. The girls high school sw