February

When we left off, we were on vacation at Massanutten with Sue. On Wednesday the 1st, Jill and Sue had a spa day, and I stayed in the condo with Nina. Which kinda worked in my favor, as she broke the 3 hour nap barrier and totaled 4+ hours for the day. It did result in a late, screaming bedtime, but it was nice and quiet later, and we had bourbon barrel aged beer.

Kerry & Nina

Thursday we went to Harrisonburg for the day. We hit Clementine for lunch (good sandwiches and good beer) and a knitting shop. Nina even enjoyed the knitting shop as they had baby toys. Friday we headed home in the afternoon.

Sue & Nina

On Saturday Dave came down for the weekend. My mom joined us for brunch (had to make my Eggs Benedict) when he arrived, then Mom watched Nina while the rest of us ate at Ray’s The Steaks (I rarely like to eat at steakhouses because I like to grill, but it’s damn good). Sunday was the Super Bowl (Pats vs. Giants) and we went over to the Jewells to watch it. The problem with watching football every week with your infant daughter is that she thinks football is her God given right. So yah, she refused to go to sleep while the game was on, but was out like a light once we got home.

Nina

On Wednesday the 8th, I got to flash back to 2004 with The Darkness. Nice timing, since frontman Justin had just been in one of my favorite Super Bowl commercials. They didn’t seem to have aged a bit, bringing the bombast right away – it was a great show.

Darkness

The next weekend was probably the coldest of the winter. I thought about wearing my ski gear to walk the dog. On Valentine’s Day, Jill worked late, but we still had a fancy dinner: sushi from Harris Teeter, crab rangoons from Safeway, I made edamame with olive oil, garlic and chili pepper flakes and Sue made lobster tails with a crouton topping. Yum.

Nina

On Saturday the 18th, Chris and I did some decent skiing at Whitetail ’til it got slushy, stopping in Frederick at the Black Hog for some delicious BBQ on the way back. Jill and I celebrated Valentine’s formally that night with dinner at Vintage 50 – decent food and beer, but I preferred lunch. Monday was a holiday, and I had Nina all day. Her longest nap of the day was an hour, I have no idea how the stay at home parents do it – it felt much longer than a workday.

Nina & Kerry

Thursday the 23rd I didn’t even leave the house until almost midnight to see Guns N’ Roses at the new Fillmore, thanks to Twitter being useful and letting me know they hadn’t gone on yet. I missed a couple songs, but I didn’t feel too bad since the show didn’t end ’til after 3AM. Why yes, this was the latest ticketed show I’ve ever been to (not counting late night song circles at FRFF). Still, it was nice seeing Axl in a club – he’s lost a bit of his high end, but his midrange was just fine.

GnR

We took advantage of Sue being there the next Saturday as well, headed to LivingSocial’s new building downtown for a pop-up dinner from Birch & Barley. Unfortunately it got mixed reviews from us (good beer, so-so food, unlike their restaurant). We were hungry enough afterwards to split a small pizza at District of Pi next door. Sunday Nina had her first real solid food with cereal, as messy as I expected.

Nina

Nina started daycare on Monday the 27th; we took advantage of her second day in daycare to head into DC and finally get lunch from a food truck (Korean tacos, very good). Then we got a private tour from Hannah of the Library of Congress, and made it back to pick up Nina right on time.

Kerry & Hannah & Jill