A tantalizing taste of spring!

This was an unbelievably beautiful day in northern Virginia.

Her look of utter glee, exchanged with her little brother, at having the windows "on" -- a.k.a. open -- when it was 20 degrees yesterday.

The temperature was in the mid-sixties and it was sunny, so we spent all day... Inside.

Oooops.

We try to spend one day a weekend with Michael's parents when everyone's in town. We hadn't been down to their house in a couple of weeks because of various trips and their coming here once or twice, so after Declan's morning nap we all hopped in the car to drive 25 minutes or so to Bella and Poppy's.

My in-laws had a huge plumbing flood at their house two Thanksgivings ago. They spent months and months living in a hotel, and the house is still not 100% put back together, so when we got there we played in their extremely toy-filled playroom for a bit, then had lunch, then when the kiddos took afternoon naps we helped move furniture around and hang a whole bunch of artwork and curtains.

(Including a new-to-their-home Madonna and child print that made me all ::heart-eyes emoji:: that I was tempted to sneak out in my diaper bag... If not for the inherent contradiction that is stealing religious artwork.)

The kids napped long and hard, we were finishing up hanging stuff, and then all of a sudden it was time to go home and it turned out we had never made it to the park.

On a day in the mid-sixties.

In February.

Well, crud.

Keira was actually sweet about it, even though she had been expecting to go to the "red park" all day. We hadn't even made it off their street, though, before I was overcome with my own disappointment that we had missed this whole glorious day (even if it was for a good cause in helping my in-laws get some normalcy back), and so we swung into the parking lot of the playground and got those kids some fresh air. They had a ball! Then since it was already the time we usually eat dinner, we were 25 minutes from home, and I had nothing on hand for a quick dinner -- plenty of stuff for dinner that takes a bit, but nothing quick -- we swung by Chick-fil-a for nuggets for the kids.

We fed the kids, enjoyed some family time, put the kidlets to bed and then had the ultimate rarity: a just-the-two-of-us dinner at home. (Pan-seared scallops and sautéed green beans, if you were wondering.)

Just... A really good day, even if I didn't get a chance to work on my tan.