Meet The Kirks

“Aaaasshhh!,” Ester says as we walk into our favorite bakery, Eileen’s at The Chimney’s.  Ashley is working behind the counter, and Natasha finds hereslef tempted to pitch in since she used to work here as well.  The goodies are just as we remembered them, and the company is even sweeter.  We’re truly enjoying our stay in Fredericksubrg, our “East Coast Home.”

The last few days have been times to reconnect with friends.  On Friday, we walked around town and visited some of our favorite shops, seeing people we know along the way.  Friday evening our good friends, the Liptraps, joined us for dinner.  We always have a wonderful time getting together with them, as they played a particularly important role in our life after leaving the church here in Fredericksburg.  We talked and talked, and everyone enjoyed playing with the kids.

Yesterday, we headed to Kenmore park for a picnic lunch and some playtime.  This is the park where Ester first discovered the strange apparatus called a swing some ten months ago.  She didn’t know what to think about it then, but now she’s a playground pro.  After an afternoon of rest, we went to dinner at our favorite Thai restaurant and had ice cream at the legendary Fredericksburg  spot, Carl’s.  The guys finished the evening with a trip to the hookah bar as the kids and ladies slept.We have a couple more days to spend here and plan to enjoy every bit of them.  Tonight, we have Sunday night dinner at the SoPo house, a tradition that continues since our days in the Charles House, and tomorrow we celebrate St. Patty’s Day, which among other things is the one-year anniversary of the discovery of Justice’s impending arrival.    He sure has come a long way in a year, and so have all of us.

In 9 hours, we’ll load into the Prius and head to KC to catch our morning flight to Virginia.  This will be our first jaunt back to “the Burg” since we moved in June.  Our bags are packed (mostly), and we’re eager to reconnect with our east coast family.  For now, we’ve got dinner to make, kids to put to sleep (not in the humane society way), and prayers to pray (that the Southwest Airlines planes are in better condition than the FAA seems to think they are).   Check back last this weekend for updates on the trip!

Today, our week with Ashley came to an end. We took her to the airport and said our goodbye’s. It was a great week having Ashley here, and only made us look forward even more to our Spring Break trip back to Fredericksburg! It’s only 58 days away (yes, we took time to add it up).

With Ashley around, Ester got lots of practice on the key songs of childhood as evidenced by the following video clip. Note, the frequent usage of Ester’s new favorite word: Ah-Kay (Ah-Kay has a narrow lead over Uh-Oh in Ester’s current dialect) Singing is provided by Natasha and Ashley with commentary by Bill and Tyra (a.k.a. Papa and Nana) Enjoy!

Today, we took Ashley on a road trip to one of our favorite places in the known world: Lawrence, KS. Home to the Orange Bowl Champion Kansas Jayhawks (sorry Virginia friends), Lawrence boasts a tremendous, historical downtown with, little did we know, the awe-inspiring Sarah’s Fabric Store (see video above). We ate lunch at a delicious little joint called The Global Cafe and wheeled around Mass Street taking in all the shops and sights. On the way home, the orange sun was setting magnificently over the Flint Hills. Another wonderful day!

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