For most of the fridays during lent, we went to our Church's Fish Fry. At the first, Mary Kate spotted her teacher, Mrs. Harhai (in blue with the apron pictured at left) She adores Mrs. H and tagged along with her ... well, Mary is born to serve. I think she'll take care of people in some respect with she gets older, because she works so hard and is so diligent to make sure others are happy.

Grandma Fran came one week, as did Aunt Mel another. But in the pics above you see our wonderful Aunt Robbie, who made adjustments in her schedule to have Miss Fish Fry 2006 serve her! WOW was she excited.

It has kept us busy and kept Mary looking for something fun on Fridays. The last week, Miss Claire got in ont he action, helping to clean up at the end. I figured she couldn't get herself into too much trouble... and she is REALLY good at separating salt and pepper shakers!!! She was so happy to be "big" and be helping.

On Good Friday, there is ofcourse no fish fry as the custom is to "be still" and peaceful on Good Friday, especially in the afternoon. But we went to Stations of the Cross. As we we pulled in... I didn't even realize it was 5:30 and we would normally be going to Fish Fry. Claire seemed visiably annoyed when we parked in the upper parking lot.... "I'm having dinner FIRST before CHUUUUUCH".... and Tim and I got a BIG chuckle..... She was NOT amused to discover that there was no fish!

TOO FUNNY!

WE ARE ON THE TRAIN!!!!!!

TOO CUTE not to publish well.. couldn't get it centered!

What will we see at the zOOO zZOOOOO????

At the beginning of the month, we went to the National Zoo... I had a business trip to MD and thought it would be a great time for us to get away as a family. We had not been "away" in a LONG time, hadn't spent much time together as a family since my dad died, and frankly, needed it!!!!

There were Lions and Cheetah and Pandas, OH MY!
Mary loved the Elephants and the Cheetah, Claire the new baby panda... he is adoreable.. see their site for the awesome Panda Cam.. www.nationalzoo.org the zoo really is amazing... they have improved so much and are presently putting the Asia Walk in... Hope it is done for our next trip next year.

Our family tradition has always been to go to the Cherry Blossom Festival, which was the same weekend, but this year we were stradegic and figured that we ought to hit the zoo whilst everyone was looking at the Trees! And it worked... it was a great day. Its a great time of year for me to be there.. not too hot, as the zoo is on a HUGE hill.

The girls had a ball.. I think more so at the hotel.... hint to all those who travel with children... get a suite... we went to a place called the Woodfin Suites and it was about 40-50 dollars more, but WHAT a great idea... each girl got her own bed, thus they didn't wake each other all night, and there was a full kitchen...next time we'll take food instead of going out to eat. Althought we had a great dinner at the Rio in Gaithersburg. We ate at the "dough place"... the Rio Grande.... they give the kids tortilla dough to play with while they wait for dinner... GENIUS!

I'm going to put up a few more pics... enjoy!

"MOM>>> I'M SWOLLING"

Another ten days of antibiotics after the latest swelling.....

This time she had more pain and puffiness than ever....

We went back to the new pediatrician. We like her very much, Dr. Christine Florendo. She will see her again next week. I am really going to push for a trip to Childrens... watching her in pain this time was really hard. I know we are blessed that it is just a recurrent infection.. .but surely there has to be a way to make it STOP! Her little ear sticking up just kills me. She was so excited to wear her new soccer ball earrings..... This was not the way she wanted to show them off... She missed another day and a half!!!! OYE.