Photo of the described remembrance

A couple days ago I mentioned that my mom talked me out of a long term relationship with a turtle. She said something about if you love it let it go; if it was meant to be it'll come back.

The turtle never came back.

Street hockey

Our temporary place, a furished apartment, had more floor than furniture. Without all our stuff with us there was plenty of room for Finn to run and play. The apartment also had cable which meant that I could watch the Capitals play hockey.

That is a big difference from Cincinnati where the "local" team was 2 hours away and would rarely win. The Caps are doing great and are leading their division. Finn has gotten charged up from the hockey on TV and begun to revisit his old hockey stick.


Finn has some technique improvements to make, but is pretty good with stick handling and has a wicked slap shot. Sometime soon we'll get Finn back out on the ice.

Embassy Suite Fish

The Embassy Suites where we stayed when we first got into town was nice which we knew since we had stayed there before. They have a giant fish pool in the breakfast area that Finn liked, but now goes crazy for.

This is probably a preview of all the fish tanks, terrariums, turtles, hamsters, and the like that we'll have to have with him. I know I had (and still have to some varying degree) those things.

A smart move was when my mom convinced me that in late summer we needed to return to the pond the painted turtle I caught and brought home earlier in the year. She said that she didn't know what would happen when winter came and it couldn't hibernate in the cage. At the time it seemed completely reasonable, but in hindsight I know she saw it as the last opportunity to get rid of it without tears and trauma. It was a brilliant manipulation of the situation and I hope I can pull something like that off too one day.

Until then, I set myself up by showing him how cool big fish ponds are.

Alexandria's Scottish Christmas

Own new town has deep Scottish roots and celebrates them each year with a parade of the various clans through the city streets. The procession is filled with baggers from tip to tail and has a massed bagpipe concert at the end.

In addition to the bagpipes, there were Scottish terriers and wolfhounds in the parade. It was quite a sight for Finn and gave him a touch of his Scottish ancestry

Fixed link

The for the Thanksgiving pictures wasn't working. I think I fixed it in the original post and will try again here. Can someone let me know if it works now? thanks.

Nomadic life

We lived in four places in three weeks so Finn became very used to moving everything we had from one place to another. Here was many of the may trip son the luggage cart that Finn was able to take.


We've finally settled on one place. It sure is nice to not move around, haul things in your car, or pack every few days.

Last Good-byes

As we packed up the car, Elena came down to say good-bye. Finn misses her as much as we knew he would. We got their Christmas card in the mail and hung it on the refrigerator. Every time he sees it, Finn says "Elena".

Hopefully it won't be too much longer until we see them again, but whenever it is, it'll have been too long.

Christmas or Thanksgiving?

It's Thanx-mas of course. Since we're here in DC on Christmas day, we combined both holidays into one during our trip to Wisconsin for Thanksgiving.

Finn got to play in the snow, which is fortunate since we're missing the snow that is giving the rest of the country a white Christmas.

The food was great as always. Finn got to eat his meal first and was quite impressed by the holiday spread in from of him. See all the pictures here.


While we can't be back for Christmas, we were able to see everyone and have the same cheer a few weeks ago. I am sure the food was as good yesterday and it sounded like everyone had a good time. Enjoy your Christmas Day too.

Chatting on the phone

Finn really likes talking to the grandparents on the phone. I can only imagine how boring it is for them, though they say it's great. I figure they have to. I can't figure out what he's saying most of the time, so I know they don't know a word of it.

However, Finn clearly understands what he's saying and thinks he is hilarious.

He's getting better at pronunciation, so the calls may get more interesting. Until then I admire their patience as these calls go on for half an hour. He would say "thank you" if he could. Until then he'll just say "tank ou".

Saying goodbye to Mr. Michael and Ms. Toni

In addition to saying good-bye to Elena and her family, Finn had to say good-bye to Mr. Michael and Ms. Toni. Ms. Toni would watch him from time to time giving us nice nights out. When we wold be out back grilling or relaxing, Finn would see Toni on her balcony and run over to say hi.


Mr. Michael always said he didn't liked kids, but watching him, Finn and Elena you would never guess it. He even taught Finn how to use a Blackberry.

Although the Christmas tree got as much attention as the people, Finn was able to stop by late one night and say goodbye. I think that Toni had plans to come out for the inauguration, so we should get another chance to see them again soon.

Movers came and took our stuff

The overs came and went in two days. The condo we picked out and watched through the old lawyers' offices being demolished to becoming the perfect place for us is now a part of our past.

It' always sad to close a chapter, but the new one is promising.

Final Play-date with Elena

Finn and Elena had a last big day together. They spent all evening playing together and when we went up to get him, we started talking and ran out of time for the baths. To save some time, Sarah and Eliza decided to bathe the kids together.

There was a lot of splashing and laughing. Toys were flying. Afterward we got the kids ready for bed together and the kept playing up until the point when we had to leave.


I'm sure that the two will get together again before too long. They always get so excited each time they saw each other. I know that Finn will miss Elena as much as we'll miss Elena's whole family. Hopefully it will be soon that we'll all get together again.

Wer liest?

Finn and I went to the Cincinnati Pubic Library one morning to have some fun. We noticed a great book for me to learn some more German. It was a big boook full of nice pictures and Finn liked a couple in particular.


His favorite was "guitar". He would put the book down and dance whenever we got to that page. His other favorite was "train". That was a hint of things to come. His goes crazy for the Metro here in DC and always points out the train that drives by our temporary apartment.

Although he can't really read the book, he has begun picking up letters very well and names about half of them when we play with letters or draw them for him. It sure is awesome to see the kid learn.

Hiding and Seeking Again

Everyone knows Finn loves hidng in the cabinet. He even tried to get Elena to play too, but she was more interested in his toy cell phone. Soon after this movie was taken, Finn lost his hiding spot and became sad and started to search for a new one.

At the Cininnati Museum Center, where the Children's Museum is, we put our coats in a locker so we'd be unencumbered for our visit. He spent a while exploring the lockers, deemed it a suitable replacement and started the game.

To answers all the grandparents' worries, I did check to make sure it couldn't lock, that I could open it, that it was empty, and that nothing dangerous could happen.

Cincinnati Children's Museum

The Cincinnati Children's Museu is a great place for kids. They have a giant ball room, a sand pit, and a water table along with many more cool things to see. Finn enjoyed a long morning there exploring what they had to offer.


The water table has waterproof smocks for the kids to wear. There is a miniature town along the banks of a river that you can flood by building a dam. There are sailboats to make and float across the surface. Most fun is the pipe system where you can make your own giant system for the water, not that I palyed with that much.


The big sand box was also a good time. The dump trucks could be dumped and the rakes raked. We even leared that the dump trucks dump outside the sandbox too.

Packing EVERYTHING

Packing up our house was a wild adventure. We had to separate things into three piles. One pile was of things that would be packed by the movers and not be seen again until we found a permanent place (by the way, we have a better picture of the new place in the post below). The second pile was for things that we needed to have with us before then. The final pile was for the items we needed with us for our thanksgiving trip to Wisconsin.

Finn was trying to find out in which pile he belonged. He saw all the packing and also thought it would be helpful to put himself in a box.



We decided that he would be more comfortable in the car seat and not in the box. We did appreciate his creativity and effort to help.

New Look

We're switching the look of the blog since "Cincinnati Finn" seems a little old now that we don't live there. I'm sure there will be another change after the second babe comes and we need to split the spotlight.

The move slowed me off the usual pace, so despite all the complaints I had last time I made post of the past, I will be doing that again until e catch back up. It shouldn't take too long since we didn't have much time to document things while we were moving.

We have a hose! err, house

After searching all of Northern Virginia and DC we have selected a place to live and have an accepted lease application.

It is a townhouse with a kitchen, living and dining room on the first floor with two bedrooms and bathrooms upstairs. It has indoor parking with a direct entrance from the parking garage, extra storage, 2 work-out facilities, 2 pools, and a tot lot for Finn.

We've caught our breath again.

Reunited

We have moved into a furnished apartment for the next couple weeks until we can find a permanent place. Moreover, Mr. Pibb is back with us after a short but memorable stay at Chuck and Andi's house. It was well-documented here and here.


This pic shows the two frolicking and merry-making. It is courtesy of cousin Chuck.

Now Mr. Pibb is back with us and happy. He is on our lap purring and happy to be chased by Finn. Things are beginning to feel a little more normal again.

Better, closer, warmer...

OK. Today things are looking even better for finding a house. We left early this morning and looked all around Alexandria today having deemed the District proper as too old, small, and expensive.

We looked around near the Metro stops starting out and working our way inward. The ones further out seemed cheap and strip mall-y. They were still too far from the metro and a place a mile from the pentagon seemed like the best choice.

Then we stumbled to the area on the outskirts of Old Town. Now things are looking better. For the same price we found a few options hat are close to the metro for my ease of commute and close to the parks and strolling through the town for Sarah and the kids.

Tomorrow we look through Alexandria and move from a hotel to the furnished apartment.

Finn didn't get to nap until 5 tonight and is still asleep. We need to wake him up so he doesn't wake up at 4am. He sure needs to get out and run around. Maybe if we can settle on a place tomorrow he can begin to enjoy a touch of normalcy that he's missed for the last couple weeks.

We're so relieved that we found a place that will meet our commute, location, and price needs. One more hurdle crossed one this process.

House Hunting

We've been on a mad dash around the greater DC area looking at places to live and in-processing at work. Finn has been so tired he has slept in to 9 the last two days. More he is a hyper crazy kid for the last 3 hours of the day. He is also refusing to eat almost everything.

A notable exception was cousins Chuck and Andi's dinner which we were invited over for. Finn ate a bunch of carrots and red peppers and even tried a pita with hummus which came back out after a little chewing. He grabbed a chocolate chip cookie and ate part of it and hid half in the cushions of the chair. We were a little bit embarrassed by that.

Pibb is staying over at Chuck and Andi's until Wednesday. He and their cat Gato are not best friends. Their relationship involves hissing and stalking. It's great that they are still willing to watching him until our temporary place that accepts cats opens up on Wednesday.

We'll try and give more updates, but with shaky Internet access and little free time it may be tough.