Spring has sprung!

Let's Go Fly a Kite

Dancing with the wind...

Easter

eaw's easter eggs were full of dinosaurs and animals from the African plains - he is very proud of his growing collection, and asked often about whether his uncle ghd and aunt khd had seen some of the animals during their recent trip to Africa that are now in his possession.

There are four boys between the ages of 1-4 on our block. The combined family easter egg hunt was a blast (and was brief:) - it's amazing how quickly four boys can find 50 eggs.

The egg hunt was a success, although eaw was still a little unsure about the bunny - worried that he/she might jump out of the bushes at any given moment. He was hunting for the bunny as much as he was hunting for the eggs. Gotta love that honest skepticism.

Visitors!

eaw and cousin c!

We had an eventful weekend visit from New Jersey aunts, uncle, and cousin! By the end of the weekend, our car was totaled (not our fault), eaw had choked at a restaurant (mom administered the heimlich), and mdw decided the PhD program was not a good choice. Disorienting to say the least, but that's what family is for, right - to get you through the hard stuff. We'd love more visits from family, and we promise to tone down the drama (or as our old roommate jmpII used to say, the conflama - confusion and drama).


Here's some pics of the brighter moments from the visit:

S.A.D.

...as in, Seasonal Affective Disorder. I tell you what, there is nothing like a gray cold Ohio winter to take the spring out of your step. Sorry (to our one reader:) for the long absence from the blog - we were hibernating, at least emotionally/spiritually. Winter was long! A friend of mine who is originally from Paraguay, tracked the days that the sun came out from January 2 to March 1 - seven days total - and that's not the sun out all day, but out at all. Whoa - we're glad we made it through another winter. Here's one outdoor, and one indoor shot of my sunshine - who, thankfully, makes an appearance everyday with a smile that melts my heart:

Christmas in Utah - a pictorial

Thanks ama and apa for your generosity and hospitality over the holidays. Many fond memories. Enjoy some visual highlights:

Happy Birthday EAW

We are so happy to celebrate your beautiful life. We are excited for the adventures this year will bring and, like your train, you are going places in colorful style. We love you little man. Thanks to family and friends who helped us celebrate eaw's third birthday. Not sure how to outdo that cake, but I've got a year to think about it.

Pre-Christmas in Columbus

Not too sure about Santa's lap, but enjoyed a great holiday party at our friend Carter's house. Santa showed up with gifts, calling up each child by name. Pretty cool stuff, that...

We enjoyed a overnight adventure with our friend Hathaway at Coco Keys indoor water resort. The kids had more fun in the hotel room bathtub than the actual water park, but give them a few years, I'm sure we'll be making a return visit.

Much holiday decorating and merriment this month - see the fruits of our labor below:

27 days until Christmas

So we’ve started some holiday adventures. We enjoyed a wonderful Thanksgiving Day weekend – very quiet and simple – a much needed theme for our family right now. We missed our New Jersey, Utah, and Washington peeps very much, but enjoyed spending time with new friends and neighbors.

We shared our meal with a new faculty member in the dance department and her husband (who is from Burkina Faso in West Africa) and their adorable 15 month old daughter. eaw didn’t eat much, but he discovered fudge (he’s gonna love Aunt Carolyn this year). The following morning brought the first (very light) snowfall of the year so eaw and I set up a few holiday villages, decorations and stockings to get the holiday season started. On Saturday evening, we took Hathaway and eaw to the zoo to see the lights and even take a gander at Santa Claus himself. There were real live reindeer – and eaw got to touch an antler. Later Hathaway’s mom joined us at home and we were greatly entertained by the antics of two adorable friends.

A side note – eaw is wearing big boy pants and has stayed dry/clean for three days in a row! Granted he chose to celebrate by wearing his big boy pants on his head, but still – we are very proud of him.

Oh, and besides the quiet weekend, we painted our bedroom – “Lunar Eclipse” and mtw updated the electrical in the basement, filled in a cement floor, and made short work of cleaning the house. It’s coming along, for any potential visitors!

Boys and their toys

A sweet moment between my boys, bonding over technology…

Samantha...

…just because we haven’t posted about her in a while. She is doing well – still adjusting to being an only dog. She had her teeth cleaned last week at the vet and recovered without incident. Now we just have to create a new habit to brush her teeth daily. She is as spirited and spunky as ever, although a romp at the park goes a lot further these days.

Performance Weekend

mdw performed this weekend in the OSU Department of Dance’s Resident and Visiting Artist concert. She performed an original solo that she choreographed with original music by mtw, entitled “George Lassos the Moon” for which Frank Capra’s use of shifting symbolism in the movie “It’s a Wonderful Life” served as a frame, although the true content/muse of the piece was her brother ghd3. The piece was very successful and received much positive and strong feedback. A review was published in the Columbus Dispatch calling it “one of the strongest works on the program is a solo choreographed and performed by Meghan Durham. Love surely is a time-tested theme, but Durham finds a fresh, imaginative approach in George Lassos the Moon.”

Flying Trees and a Mountain of Mulch

We had to remove a beautiful old silver maple from our property. It was rotting from the inside out due to long term suffocation from ivy and was just too large and ominous for our property. It was an amazing tree and I miss its presence – as does eaw. We are planning to plant something new in the spring to honor the tree. It was quite a process to take it down, limb by limb, with a crane. Then, the grinding of the stump left a labyrinth of fresh fantastic mulch. It’s amazing how different our house looks without the tree, and it’s still disorienting to enter the backyard and see it gone. I fear several birds have been permanently displaced.

Beautiful Fall Weather

Thumbs up on the incredible fall weather we've been enjoying– warmer temperatures, sunny days, and lush colors. We took advantage of the weather today and headed to the zoo (a favorite destination chez Wall) with our neighbor and friend, Colby and his mom. Here’s some shots of our cool boys. They are growing up so fast.

monkeys at the zoo


too cool for school

And...we're back!

Like Bob, we've been busy around here - so pull up a chair, and scroll down to catch up on the latest and greatest in the adventures of the Wall family.

Halloween Eve Eve

Yes, I know, Halloween is technically on Saturday, October 31, but remember we are in the land of the O and the H and the I and the O, where everything is just a little bit Stepford. Our neighborhood was assigned to have Trick or Treating (or Beggar’s night) on Thursday night the 29th between the hours of 6-8pm. I’m not sure, but I think you can call the police if some adorable costumed child knocks on your door before 6pm. Other neighborhoods are assigned to Friday evening, and a few are granted the actual holiday itself. If I were an enterprising trick-or-treater, I’d hit each designated neighborhood and really cash in on the candy. Despite my sarcasm, it was a really fun night – beautiful weather, good turnout, and a nice chance to hang out with the neighbors. eaw chose to be Scooby Doo again, and was as adorable as ever. He was still a little unsure of the whole ritual, but Colby showed him the ropes and he hit the streets like a champ! Upon his triumphant return, mtw made sure all the candy was “safe” before allowing eaw to ingest any of it. I think the safety test required taste samples of each piece of candy. eaw helped distribute the rest of our candy to the many “customers” (costume – ers, I think) as he called them. We live very near the Ohio School for the Deaf so we had many trick-or-treaters who used Sign Language. eaw learned the sign for “Happy Halloween” and “trick-or-treat.” It was a fully successful evening, although our last trick-or-treater was an older boy with a very scary mask. Eaw completely freaked out and the boy quickly ripped off his mask to calm him, saying “it’s just me – just a regular boy in here – I’m just pretending, but I’m not really scary.” eaw was calmed, but not convinced and is still asking about the boy in the mask. It was a sweet gesture, but maybe next year, I’ll bring him inside once the older kids start their rounds.

The Terrible 3s?

eaw is amazing and adorable and bright and sweet and charming and fully capable of asserting his needs (or in this picture, telling mom what he thinks about getting his picture taken right now):

My Secret Garden

Happy Birthday Grandpa Durham! mdw returned from Texas at the end of September (on her birthday) to two very eager boys who had planned a lovely birthday celebration. The gift of the day was a “sitting garden” in our side yard, complete with a stone bench, stone walkway and birdbath. mtw and eaw had worked on it (I think mtw did most of the work) during my time away and it is the sweetest gesture I have ever received (and a lot of work - they had to pull out enormous bushes, build planter boxes, make a stone paver patio, paint the foundation of the house, and plant some beautiful flowers). eaw and walk in it every morning on our way to the car as he asks, “do you like your garden mama? I made it for you.” I’m grateful for such beautiful companions with whom I get to share celebrations. We have been enjoying it all season.
ps For the record, eaw has mastered the banana cake batter beater licking, a Durham family birthday tradition.

Movie Night!

Here at chez Wall we have instituted a special occurrence known as movie night. Since we don’t have cable, television viewing happens either on the computer or via dvd and has become a rare activity in our home and lifestyle with eaw. We discovered that by adding popcorn and a friend, the 20 minute video viewing approaches holiday status. It’s really fun to hear eaw ask for movie night and to hear the excitement in his voice. One of mtw’s colleagues lent us the 4-disc series for “Wallace and Grommit” and we have been enjoying sitting as a family under the blanket with popcorn on movie night.

Ama visits!

We enjoyed a lovely visit from Ama during the first weekend in October. She showered us with her grace, generosity, and grandma-awesome-ness. A pajama-clad eaw stayed up late to go retrieve her from the airport (I mean, one of his favorite people at one of his favorite destinations). She accompanied mdw and eaw on Saturday morning to a “Mud and Muck” Toddler workshop at COSI. The workshop consisted of stories and songs about mud and getting dirty, and provided hands-on (literally) engagement with all sorts of sticky, goo-ey, messy, slimy textures and materials. eaw liked the “clean mud,” the flubber, and the cornstarch concoction the best. The adults seemed to enjoy getting messy more than the toddlers. It was really fun. Grandma stayed with eaw and mtw for the remainder of the day while mdw had a tech/dress rehearsal for a performance that evening called “60 x 60” which was 60 one-minute pieces of choreography to 60 one minute electronic music compositions. Cool idea and very experimental. mdw was assigned to three different minutes and one of them involved 7 inch heels and a heavy down jacket. Mom came to the later performance (which was held at a gay bar) – so needless to way, she was a great sport! On Sunday, we went to Leeds Farm, a local farm that opens for weekends during the fall season only. It is fantastic, goats, and donkeys, a huge sandbox full of feed corn, a banana boat ride, zip lines, jumpy pumpkin, large feed tubes, hay barn, homemade pie, and yes, a pumpkin patch. It was so great that we returned the following week with colleagues from work. So fun to celebrate Fall, and to start off our celebrations with a visit from Ama! We love you.