Chicago trip

I took Andrew back to the city of his birth to visit friends and help host my BFF Heather's baby shower. The strangest thing about the trip was that I felt like I still lived there, even though we've been in Baltimore now for 2.5 months.

Baby showers are so much fun. Heather's little boy Ari had already arrived by this point (she had him early) so it made the shower even more exciting.

Heather and I joke that I we had baby boys that are opposite in size. My Andrew is huge (born at 10.5 lbs), and her Ari is tiny (born at 4 lbs). Needless to say, we had to get a pic of them next to each other. I know they will be good friends in a few years.

After meeting up with Simbo and Chiara for breakfast (at Grand Lux--my fave with the best views of Michigan Ave.), and Payal for lunch (at Chipotle--our trademark & sort of a running joke)---BTW, I can't believe I didn't get pictures of all of us together!--I went for a walk to the lake with Heather, Alona, and the little ones. The weather was gorgeous.

I think we had too much fun. Goodbye Chicago, we miss you already.

Long time no post

Andrew and I recently returned from our big cross-country trip. Detailed pics to come.

Gelato heaven

Mike & I met up the day before my big trip at our favorite gelato in Baltimore: Pitango.

Weekend trip #2: The beloved Capitol

So we know it may not be far enough away to count as a weekend trip, but we're going to count it anyway. Mom watched Andrew so Mike and I made a weekend of it. It was especially fun for me since I spent so much time here during college.

Of course, we made the obligatory mecca trip to Ben's Chili bowl. Now the sign on the wall says "The only people who eat here free are Bill Cosby...and the Obama family" (used to just say Bill Cosby).


Here is Mike ordering his Chili Half Smoke.

Yes, it's crowded. Since we've been back from this trip, we watched the movie "State of Play" which shot a scene inside Ben's Chili bowl (good movie by the way).

After lunch and checking into our hotel (did I mention parking was $45?), we headed to my favorite place in DC, Georgetown.

We got our early evening cookie fix at Dean & Deluca. I think we picked a Peanut Butter cookie this time. Oh, to die for.

Honestly, who doesn't love Dean & Deluca?

And then our last stop of the night was dinner at The Good Stuff Eatery, the gourmet burger joint owner by none other than Chef Spike from Top Chef.

From there we walked back through the mall at night back to our hotel. It is always a beautiful walk.

As we walked by the Senate buildings, I had all sorts of flashback memories of my intern days: taking notes at Iraq war hearings with Rumsfield, giving tours of the capitol during... I even ran into Senator Reid's speechwriter (who I helped with on a speech or two) on the Metro.

Thanks D.C. for showing us such a good time.

Grandma's visit to Baltimore

Grandma Jillair is in Baltimore for the week. Hallelujah!!!

Here we went to lunch at Teavolve in Harbor East. Yum. We picked up Mike at work so he could join us.

Mom took Andrew to the Baltimore Conservatory and Botanic Gardens while Mike and I took a quick M&E trip to DC. Those of you who know my mom will understand why out of all the places to go, the Botanic Gardens was the first place she wanted to see. She is so great at gardening!


Here is Andrew in the orchid room. Andrew says, "thanks Grandma, I loved it. Maybe some day I'll plant my own orchid." But really, he mostly liked looking at the other kids and the fish.

My buddy

Here are some pictures of me and "the buddy" (as Mike calls him) that we took around graduation time (thanks Mr. Szmurlo). I love my little buddy.

Picking blackberries

We went out to the country to pick blackberries with some new Baltimore friends (thanks Summer and Abby!). Andrew kept wanting to grab the blackberries. I didn't let him until we got home (see next post).

Above is Abby and me, and below is Abby and Summer with Summer's cute kids.


Abby and Jackson.




This is me trying to get Andrew to wave (which he doesn't look too happy about). He really hates having the sun in his eyes.

Eating blackberries

So after trying incessantly to grab the blackberries, I finally let Andrew have at it once we got home. He looked so funny with all the blackberry juice on his face that I had to take a bunch of pics. My thinks he looks like a little vampire baby.

Weekend trip #1: Annapolis

One thing we loved about our time in London was that we went somewhere new every weekend.
We decided that now since we live on the East Coast we should continue the tradition since there are so many fabulous places to see here. Our goal is one new place every month.
We headed to Annapolis last weekend to see the city (but really to get the crab cakes at The Boatyard--our favorite restaurant in all of Maryland.)


Here are some pics of Andrew at the restaurant.






And of course here are the obligatory touristy photos of us in front of the state capitol, etc.




Andrew never wanted to look at the camera. He kept wanting to stare up and all around.

These next two are our favorites of Andrew (in iPhoto, Mike flips through them fast so Andrew's head moves back and forth and we die laughing).

No matter how hard we tried, we couldn't get Andrew to look straight! He just loved the Annapolis traffic too much.
We love Annapolis (but then again, who doesn't)! It's the perfect little colonial city.