this land, part i

We started our journey after dark that Sunday night, passing through the Holland tunnel and determined to go as far as was reasonable while our children slept. We made it to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania--the first of five state capitals we would see by our journey's end--where we found a room for the night and woke within reasonable proximity to the town of Hershey. We were tempted to continue west and spare our innocent children the marketing prowess of a multinational conglomerate, but the thought of the two thousand miles that they had yet to endure in car-seats softened our hearts. In the end, the spectacle of our baby let loose in his first candy store was well worth the stop.

We wove southward into West Virginia, making our way to Harper's Ferry, which the guidebook praised as a picturesque town (of historical significance), but which turned out to be a blink-and-you'll-miss-it two hour detour (of historical significance). Lonely Planet's USA was thenceforth stowed deep in the trunk, untouched for the remainder of the trip.

West Virginia is a shirt-optional state, at least for its male inhabitants. Should you sight a shirt on a male West Virginian, it is as likely to be (okay, more likely to be) worn on the head, turban-style, or stashed in a back pocket, as it is to be worn on the body.  This is solely for cultural reasons, rather than to show off a painstakingly chiseled set of abs, as it is in SoCal, another region in which I have witnessed this anti-shirt phenomenon.  Fascinating.  We glided through emerald hills, enjoying spectacularly peaceful scenery, marked only occasionally by human habitation, usually in the form of a single trailer home, invariably sporting a rooftop satellite dish, set by the side of the road.  When we stopped for the night it was at a very nice hotel in Morgantown, home of WVU, a bargain courtesy of our Hotwire app. Go Mountaineers!

What a difference three years can make in the Technological Age.  When we made the reverse trek three years ago, from California to New York, I spent weeks beforehand compiling lists of charming sights along our potential routes, with printed maps of Whole Foods and farms permitting visits in a folder.  Nights in the hotel were spent on my laptop, researching B&B's and historical hotels that we might reach the following night, desiring the flexibility to drive and stop at will.  This time, our iPhones, equipped with apps for the aforementioned Hotwire, as well as Hotels.com, Wikipedia, Google Maps, and Pinterest (to find cool restaurants and sights in tiny towns along the I-70), replaced any need for advance planning. We owe Steve Jobs a big kiss.

On we went to Kentucky, drinking it all in as we went...

graduation

It wasn't until I was removing a scrap of Ogilvie plaid and my grandmother's brooch from Greta's shoulder the night before the movers came that I realized what this move really is. I had been thinking of it as a little break from New York, a chance to explore Europe with our kids and buy us a little time to save up to combine apartments with the neighbors'. But as I contemplated which room in our house in The Hague the dress form should inhabit, I realized that never again would she be shoved into a living room because there was nowhere else to put her. She may not always have her own room, as she will have in the absurdly large house that awaits us now, but with this move we are graduating from young couplehood and early parenthood, the stages when a cozy apartment was our preferred footprint. We and most of our friends now have children, multiple children, in fact, and things like a dining room or the ability to stomp without disturbing the people downstairs no longer feel like luxuries, but necessities. I would like to think we have not graduated from city life entirely, but this form of it, definitely.

With the end of the school year, we have been celebrating other graduations, as well. Violet turned in her kindergarten smock to the school director and sang:

Start spreadin' the news 

I'm leaving today

I want to be a part of it

First grade, first grade!

In the fall, lunch will be in the cafeteria with the big kids, and she will do her schoolwork in a desk. She is sad about leaving her friends here, of course, especially after the backyard movie nights and playdates with favorite friends that coincided with the end of school, but I have been impressed with how completely she understands what we are doing and that she is up for the adventure.

Townes is no longer a baby, but has the cutest little waddle of a run, a keen sense of comedy, and a word for whatever he wants to communicate, which is mostly "fun!" "play!" "bite" "thanks!" and his own name and those of the people he loves. Steve is eating barbecue in South Africa and negotiating with Saudis. I just finished my first (and maybe only) residential interior design gig and am working on a book or two. It's a whole new world out there, for all of us.

 
 And now that we have said our goodbyes, had our last milkshake and pretzel at Cafe Sabarsky and buns at Bauhaus, and done our last load of communal laundry, off we go. Our furniture is on a slow boat to the Netherlands, and our car is packed for a cross-country road trip. I'll post along the way. Goodnight, New York City! We love you!
 

ready for takeoff

So, I have been a little bit...absent...lately. Only from blogging, though, and that because I have been so present in my own life, or should I say lives. As we prepare to exit our New York life for a while and commence a European one, we have a foot in each. Finishing Violette's first year of all-day, big kid school, chasing Townsie, that jolly little elf, up and down and all around (literally), dinners and theater outings with friends, kid parties, Relief Society, all of the things we love about our life here, and meanwhile, hopping back and forth across the Atlantic, house shopping. It's crazy fun. And I do mean crazy.

Steve and I took our first solo trip without the kids, to Holland, and our experience so resembled the above video, sent to me by my friend Cassie, that I had to share. If you haven't already been planning a trip to visit, start!

And thanks to Mom and Danielle for watching the babies while we fell in love with our soon-to-be new home.  Love you!

bookworm

Seriously, could there be anything cuter than that little nose buried in a book? I love a bookish man (or woman) of any vintage, but you really have to be under three to pull off those thighs in a onesie.

snow day

While we were braving the blizzards off the North Sea, our friends in New York were showing off with an even bigger one of their own. Our friend Manahi Taber-Kewene, a talented filmmaker, shot this little "home movie" during the blizzard. He kindly manned the camera at our kids' birthday party a few months ago and we haven't dared shoot any footage on our own since, it was so incomparable. Enjoy!

Snow Day from Reel Story Films on Vimeo.