Rock Creek Exploration

Eila is off for a week and we have had more fun time together and did a little exploring of the Rock Creek Park near our home. We went back to see the Rock Creek Park planetarium and museum and found that the horse stables have some fantastic programs for kids. Eila joined in on a part of horse camp for a few minutes. She is already planning for joining next summer. She loves horses! This one that she was talking to was named Roosevelt.

Little summer celebrations

Eila and baby cousin Carla Maxine (born March 31)

Summer garden tromping...

Eila and cousin Keya playing mamas

The new fig tree- celebrating 9 years of marriage :)

Baby Maxine

We have had a busy week of little celebrations with the last day of school, mommy's birthday, our 9th wedding anniversary and now Father's Day. Eila loves it as it is many excuses for fun and sweets. The garden is getting big and we have some baby zukes on the vine and cucumber flowers ready to make their fruit (thanks Lily May!). Lots of little green tomatoes including our favorite- the zebra tomatoes! We got a visit from baby cousin Maxine and Eila was very proud to hold and kiss the sweet dimpled wee one!

Laissez le bon temps rouler!

Eila and Lily with special gate-side greetings from the Mays!

Southern princesses strolling in the steamy streets of Baton Rouge

Louisiana Crawfish

Louisiana catfish

A visit to the fish market in Baton Rouge

Tiger- riding, bareback

Mike the Tiger on the LSU campus in Baton Rouge

Sandra and the girls

Eila in the fountain- Baton Rouge

Lily in the fountain

Eila being the "stomach" at the digestion session at the Children's Museum in NOLA

Grocery Shopping a the Children's Museum in New Orleans

Making crawfish soup at the Children's Museum in New Orleans

A visit with the Masons

Eila admiring the streetcar

Eila on the streetcar on Canal Street in New Orleans

Memorial tree for Leanne

International night- school project: Vietnam poster

Eila took her first visit last week to LOUISIANA to visit her buddy Lily in Baton Rouge. We were treated like royalty by our wonderful friends the Mays and we all had a fantastic and very restorative visit. We also had a blast to the past visit to New Orleans where Kushang and I met and fell in love way back in the 90's :) We had great food (of course) - lots of catfish (freshwater, of course) and Sandra's red beans and rice (Eila loved it!). We played in the fountains, saw the LSU tiger (a real, live, giant Bengal Tiger), sweated a lot!, went to the Children's museum in NOLA (if you ever go with kids, don't miss this!), and visited my dear professor John Mason and his wife for a good catching up on the past years. And a little bittersweetness- I visited the tree planted on the Tulane campus for my roommate who was killed during graduate school. A very special person was lost to violence- a beautiful tree thrives in her memory.