all that's past is prologue...

Someone who is far more erudite than I, on one of my pet peeves: http://chronicle.com/article/Sorry-Im-Late/49148/ Enough said, because I don't like to get rant-y.

My friend Kelly opened her new store, Play by Play Books today at 1771 Selby (between Snelling and Fairview). It's a fantastically funky shop, with a wide variety of theater books, unique gifts, and did I mention the free coffee and wireless? Start your holiday shopping, she has great stuff. Or buy art! The incredibly talented Krista Kelly Walsh is having an art sale at her place this Sunday. I own several pieces from Krista, and they always make me smile. Oh, and les Beaujolais Nouveau est arrive!

So this morning, after we got our wills and such notarized, we had a little time to kill before we had to leave for the airport. So we decided to head over to the Tyson's Corners Malls, which were right across the street. One of the malls is extremely high end, and we had window shopped there over coffee that morning, so we hit the other one, which is enormous and runs the gamut from Claire's to West Elm. We walked through Macy's to get to the mall, who was having their big one-day sale. The racks were filled with cute things, including innumerable little floaty cardigans with ruffled edges, many of which I really liked. I noticed similar styles throughout the mall, including many separates that would go with said cardigans, but there's sales tax in Virginia on clothes, and we were in a hurry, and Beatrix can lose patience if we shop too long, so I didn't stop to try any on. But I thought about them a lot, and after a delicious dinner (Thanks to a Twitter specia...

We've been out in Washington, DC for a few days now, and it wasn't until a day or so into it that we realized how badly we needed a vacation. Just spending time together as a family, doing new and different things, has been incredibly fulfilling for all three of us (turns out that toddlers need vacations too!), despite obligations and various things that we've been doing. It's a lesson that we need to keep in mind. We've also been amazed at how toddler-friendly everything and everyone has been. We'll save the "educational" things (museums, White House, monuments, etc.) until Beatrix is older, but other activities are right up her alley. We spent the morning at the National Zoo with some of my secret online friends, and had a wonderful time. We also spent almost two hours at the National Building Museum, which has a great kids play area. We spent a beautiful afternoon walking around historic Leesburg, and another in Tauxemont , which is a very int...