Back in DC

Last Saturday afternoon, Luis and I boarded a plane to spend eight days back in the MD/DC/VA area - helping Mom get some projects done before her upcoming knee surgery, meeting the newest Rimicci, checking in on the house, and generally catching up with friends. It had been almost a year since our last visit.

Complicating matters was the fact that Diego was in DC the week before on business. We overlapped for a mere 15 hours, between when we flew in to BWI and he flew out of DCA. Sigh. The good news is that we were able to meet up at JuanFe's and RC's newly renovated condo in DC for brunch before Diego flew out. Luis loves loves loves his Uncles JF & RC, and this visit was no different. Luis had a great time exploring the new condo, trying on RC's snorkel & mask, playing with RC's extensive vintage car collection (think matchbox - but from the 60's and 70's), pretending to be a fireman, playing construction in their back yard (complete with traffic cones!) and generally loving and snuggling with them both.

Luis, RC and the snorkel

A mere sampling of the car collection

Fireman Luis, to the rescue!

Back at Bibi Croom & Grandpa Sandy's house, Luis enjoyed his usual activities: feeding the birds with Grandpa Sandy, sitting on the "tractor" (lawn mower), playing with toys that I played with as a child, reading stories, and cooking with Bibi.

Luis and Sandy feeding the birds

In addition, Mom bought Luis his own fireman costume, complete with jacket, helmet, badge, fire extinguisher and bullhorn. Apparently, the bullhorn takes batteries, but Luis will NEVER know that. The costume was a big hit with Luis (no big surprise!). Here, Luis poses with Mom and Sandy.

We spent two days in Northern Virginia, which was great. We stayed with Sarah and her family (always a treat). Luis enjoyed playing with both William (almost 7) and Matthew (3), and was fairly unimpressed with Baby Elinor (1 mo). While in that neck of the woods (Falls Church), we stopped in on my friends at HITT Contracting and admired their new building. While I was admiring how beautiful it was, Luis was appreciating that lots of people who work for a construction company have construction vehicle toys in their offices. We met up with Lopa for a visit and lunch and then swung by our house to check on it and the tenants. We had hoped to also see Aunt Midge (who turned out to be travelling) and Emily Poulin (who had a crazy work schedule), to no avail. Unfortunately, I didn't snap a single picture after the ones of Fireman Luis - not even on my camera phone. :(

The two nights we spent with Sarah were the 4th and 5th nights of our trip, and Luis was starting to miss the comforts and routines at home. The first night, he sat bolt up in bed at 1a (we were sharing a bed) and screamed out BACA!! It was the first time he'd asked about it on our trip. It took quite some time to quite him back down before he eventually fell back asleep. The second night, he again woke in the middle of the night and decided that he was going home. Right Now. He tried to take off his PJ's and get dressed, to put things back in our bag, saying that he was going to the airport to fly home. At 2a. The only way I could talk him down was to explain that the pilots and planes were all sleeping, and wouldn't wake up until the sun comes up tomorrow. Thankfully, he bought that version of the truth and we were able to get some sleep. Needless to say, from a restfulness perspective, it was a rough couple of days.

Jeanette came down from New York on Thursday night and stayed with us until Saturday. We hadn't seen her since August of last year when she and her boys came to Dallas. It was a super fun 36 hours, and I'm not sure who enjoyed Jeanette's company more, me or Luis.

In between all of these visits, Mom and I cleaned out almost every closet and dresser in house, making piles and piles of donation materials (which Sandy carted off to Good Will daily) and piles of trash. I think it was very satisfying to Mom to do so much decluttering. It was satisfying to me, and it wasn't even my stuff!