It’s hard not to find beautiful things when it’s spring. So today I share three of the ones I’ve stumbled over in the last few days:<\/p>\n
1. Jason and Essia are visiting his folks this week and came into D.C. yesterday to take care of some paperwork at the Algerian embassy. Afterwards they came down to Dupont and met Rudi and me for lunch. When we arrived, they, Nina, and Lylia were already camped out at one of our favorite restaurants waiting. Nina has grown up and is tall and thin, her curly blonde tresses of babydom now brown and straighter. If I were going to cast Ramona Quimby, I would pick her. Lylia is now talking, although she remains understandably shy around people she last saw on her first birthday. Although more little girl than when we last saw her, she is still decidedly a chubby toddler, chasing after her older sister to copy exactly what Nina does. Rudi was in charge of the office and had to get back quickly, but I had told my boss I was taking a long lunch and did, stretching my hour to 2 3\/4. We went to the park and they climbed on statues and slid down plaques. Essia and Jason and I caught up and reveled in a beautiful afternoon outside.<\/p>\n
2. I remembered to take my library book back to the library before it was due this week and took along my list of three books I was hoping to find: Bernard-Henri L\u00c3\u00a9vy’s American Vertigo<\/em> (which I’ve been hearing rumblings about for months), Gregory Maguire’s Wicked<\/em> (which comes highly recommended by Dianna), and Geraldine Brooks’ March<\/em> (which tells the story of The Little Women<\/em>‘s father, Mr. March, during the Civil War and which just won a Pulitzer). Wicked<\/em> and American Vertigo<\/em> weren’t at the main branch, but I did manage to come home with March<\/em>, as well as Julia Child’s My Life in France<\/em>, a knitting book, and a decorating on a budget book. Now let’s just cross our fingers that I don’t amass too many late fines by keeping them past their due dates!<\/p>\n 3. Today was the first Thursday market I’ve had a chance to get to since it opened for the season and I came away with a cherry muffin, the first asparagus of the season, and a bunch of lilacs. Lilacs and lilies of the valley and vanilla are my favorite scents in the world, and I walked back to the office awash in its heady scent. I parceled out the stems, keeping half for me and sharing the others amongst coworkers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It’s hard not to find beautiful things when it’s spring. So today I share three of the ones I’ve stumbled over in the last few days: 1. Jason and Essia are visiting his folks this week and came into D.C. yesterday to take care of some paperwork at the Algerian embassy. Afterwards they came down […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-three-beautiful-things"],"yoast_head":"\n