March marches on.

It's funny how you blink and a week has gone by, and you blink again and a month has gone by, and....etc.

Todd's parents were here from Thursday evening till Tuesday morning, and then there's just been the other everyday type of busyness, too. Todd's dad helped him put in our new bathroom floor, and Todd's mom sewed me up a gorgeous shower curtain--but the bathroom's not quite complete, and I'm not sharing pics till it is! It's looking nice, though! Just a medicine cabinet and a couple of things to hang up yet.

I've been wanting to share these pics for almost two weeks and just haven't had time to sit down and put them in that way I wanted. The "mystery man" in my last post was my brother Jeremy, who came down weekend before last for a church men's retreat in Williamsburg. He came down a day early, and he and I spent a Friday doing some geocaching, which is his mania--I mean, hobby.

We found 17 geocaches here in Newport News and across the James River over in Smithfield and Surry and in Williamsburg.

This is St. Luke's Church in Smithfield, which is the oldest English church in the U.S, built in 1632. Some friends of Todd's and mine got married there five years ago, and it was a very neat place to attend a wedding.

This was a virtual cache, which means there wasn't anything stashed there--you just had to take a picture and answer a question about one of the signs, I think.

Some tombstones in the graveyard:

On the road into Smithfield...we had lunch in town and found a couple of caches:

Daffs are blooming:

This was an odd spot on the road to Surry, a very old church that burned in the 1860s, but the ruins have been maintained:

Inside the structure (which is held together by a steel band running around it) are these piles of old bricks and some tree trunks. Like I said, it's all very odd.

More tombstones:

Then we rode the ferry back over the James River, which is always fun:


Here I am, with my arm on a birdcrap-encrusted railing, which my brother didn't bother to warn me about:

And then we ended up on the campus of the College of William and Mary, where all the students were happily anticipating their spring break:

And we strolled around Williamsburg, where Jeremy gave Thomas J. some pointers on the Declaration:

This was the last cache of the day, as the sunlight faded:

It was a really fun day--my brother is one of my top five favorite people in the world, so it was special to get to spend a rare day hanging out with him.

Looking at these pics, I'm marveling at the sunshine! It was a warm, sunny, windy day, and so nice--we have literally gone a week without a speck of sunshine. Today the sun finally came out around 10 AM, and the last time I saw it was last Wednesday. Crazy! My poor in-laws, coming down to Virginia from Ohio for a taste of spring sunshine, were totally denied. It could NOT have been more gloomy and wet and awful while they were here.

Last night it dried off long enough for Todd and me to go see Carbon Leaf play at the Newport News St. Patrick's festival. The festival was supposed to be Friday, but the weather was just too wet. It actually worked out nicely to have it on St. Patrick's Day itself, and the crowd was smaller, too. I staked out a spot right at the rail so I could see the stage, and it was awesome! As a five-foot tall person, concerts and parades are usually an unsatisfying experience for me, so I was glad we got there early and I could be right in front and watch the guys playing their instruments.

Other than that, it's just laundry and other boring stuff here. I need to do the last bits of touching up on the baseboards in the bathroom and then I'll be moving on to the trim in the master bath. I have a plan for that bathroom, wherein we'll get it done in 3-5 days, instead of 3-5 weeks. Wish me luck on that!

I found something cool at the thrift store on Monday, I'll share that later.