December arrived. But winter did not.
Our maple tree out front just hit its peak color this past week. Can I tell you how excited I am that we have a maple tree? That realization just fully hit me with the turning of the leaves. I know, a bit slow this one. So yesterday we had our first weekend morning of family leaf raking. Olaiya took great pride in her raking, Naomi like messing up her piles, and Kurt enjoyed the homeowner responsibility accomplished via leaf blowing (no, we didn't go hog wild on the outdoor paraphernalia - our neighbor is a rock star whose philosophy is "Use it! It's already here."). Plus it felt great to return the favors our neighbors have done for us (edging, mowing, trimming) since our arrival, as we all share the same big "yard". And for all of you who get to burn your leaves (Don't you love that smell? No, seriously, I love that smell.), lawn mower them into the woods, or pile them into bags, all we do is blow them to the street to await the truck with a big vacuum. Awesome.
So to get into the swing of the season, we went down to the Old Town Alexandria boardwalk to see our first Holiday Lights Boat Parade. Yep, about 40-60 boats cruising up the Potomac all decked out for Christmas, with Santa leading the way atop some yacht-esque schooner (do I even know what a schooner is?). Old Town was all lit up and beautiful - huge old trees with tiny white lights, lining the brick streets.
And speaking of lights, we got our initial taste in Minnesota! Yes, brace yourself for a tri-state Thanksgiving briefing. We were fortunate enough to be home for our 3rd straight Thanksgiving in Rochester. *Everybody* was home! Truly wonderful. Seeing Olaiya hang out with Anna, and Naomi with Hannah (plus Zach and Shelby holding down the baby front) was really fun. And we got to hang with the Danielson clan for the first time in forever. This was the third of three states, working our way up the Mississippi. We flew into St. Louis where my aunt Shirley picked us up and Olaiya got to see her "girl cousins" (my cousins' kids) and great grandma Gentry. One night at great grandma Hauser's and lunch with great aunt Willi and cousin Meghan and we were off to Iowa, Mama chauffeuring the gang in G-Grandma's car. At Grandma and Grandpa's we did Thanksgiving a week early with uncle Clint and aunt Lindsay, Rod and Willi, G-Grandma and our friends the Pankeys. Then I got to have a night out with Anna Pearl that included 2.5 hours at Lowes and pizza at a bar (love it). And lastly, Grandpa and Grandma delivered us to Waterloo for the hand off to Grampa and Gramma (and daddy arrived in Rochester that night!) Our flights were perfect and the girls are super travelers.
Okay, now who wants to see some pictures? Pictures!
The weekend before we left for the Midwest, I got to spend the weekend with the Nordin family in New Jersey during the last of Terri's maternity leave before returning to residency.
Here, Terri dropping me off at the train station in Philly.
And now we skip to a week later (because mama left the camera in DC :( but the papa brought it to MN)
Girlies loving the Lewis day-after-Thanksgiving stringing of the lights
Gramma reading to her two oldest
Zach-man and Uncle Kurt kickin' it Turkey Day
When the going gets tough, the tough get ring pops
Long trip, need taxi.
Basking in the fruits of her labor
Holiday lights in Old Town
5 comments:
I'm so glad you guys had a great time over Thanksgiving! How wonderful to be able to see family again. We, too, have been raking, blowing, and mowing our leaves. We have MANY trees, and I'm sick of it. Josh wishes the trucks w/hoses, which also suck up our leaves, could clean up yards instead of having to rake them:)
So I'm confused as to how this leaf-vacuuming truck works. Is there a designated time/day that everyone floods the streets with their yard waste? Is this followed by a temporary ban on car travel? Am I totally imagining the wrong picture here? I say yes.
Well, at least we got mentioned in the post, seeing as there were no pictures of 1/2 of your trip. Silly Tara.
Oh, and just in case you or any of your loyal readers were wondering:
schoon·er
1. Nautical. any of various types of sailing vessel having a foremast and mainmast, with or without other masts, and having fore-and-aft sails on all lower masts.
2. a very tall glass, as for beer.
EX: I downed a schooner of Zima as I watched the schooner's go by on the Potomac.
Wow, a truck with a vacuum!? Thats a novel thought. Not that we need it here, but where was that when I was a kid? The worst is raking a back yard when you own a dog. Gloves are definitely necessary.
It looks like ya'll had an awesome and tiring trip back. I'll be keeping the ring pop idea in my bag of tricks for our future travels :)
P.S. - I love the picture of your Maple!
I want you to know that Iowa City has those vacuum trucks too. You really could move back at anytime and not skip a beat in the leaf removal area.
Just as Clint cleared up the schooner confusion, I will clear up the leaf vacuum confusion. All you do is rake your leaves out to the curb, and in Iowa City you have to keep them off of the street. The leaf truck drives by on designated days and vacuums them up into the back of the truck. The Iowa City trucks are manned by 4 guys... 3 guys ride on the back (2 with rakes and one manning the vacuum) and the 4th guy drives. They come by multiple days a season to accomodate different varieties of trees as they drop their leaves at different rates. The vacuum nozel is about 2 feet wide or so... it is big and sucks up a large pile of leaves in a matter of seconds. Yes, it is cool.
oh, and yay for Kurt's mini-me picture!
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