Magic Kingdom opening

for those who missed it. Turn on your speakers, there is sound.

Fauquier's 250

Fauquier county's birthday is apparently the day before Widgie's! They had a big, huge parade, complete with the usual array of Confederate soldiers and ladies. Its become so common to see Conferederate officers in town that I didn't even bother taking pictures. The Widge now believes that Confederate uniforms, as well as Revolutionary garb, are just varieties of regular clothing. "See the man in the funny clothes?" I'll say, gesturing to a Jeb Stuart reenactor. "Where?" he'll say, scanning the crowd.

We did, however, have the treat of a private concert fro a local piper: he had just taken his bagpipes back into the Scoti, when we tapped on the door to ask if we could see them. He showed them off, played the obligatoy "Scotland the brave" and posed for a photo.
my favorite car from the parade!! I've seen this one in paradea before. Some of the old cars I see cruising around the county on a regular basis, not this one so much.Foxhunting is still alive and well here. The members of the hunt club came with their hounds. These are leashless hounds! Our hound was never so well behaved.
Our favorite winery, Pearmund, had a float!We also got to experience history hands-on by washing socks using a genuine washboard! It helped that the socks were already clean.

Easter!

you'll note that this year egg-dying did not occur in the bathtub. I stand by that decision, however: for a baby, bathtub egg-dying allows greater freedom of mess-making, and for a mom, it meant that I could clean the child and the area in one fell swoop.
hey, an Easter basket!
hunting eggs s extremely popular. Last year the Widge continued to request that we re-hide eggs so he could re-hunt them. The fact that there are goodies in the eggs is really secondary to the joy of simply finding hidden eggs.of course this year one of the eggs contained a voucher for Duplos!!! Mr. Matt proceeded to build several cool Dupo items and then go home without leaving any sort of directions.

Luray and the Zoo

the Widge's first cave visit!!!I don't know if they do it all the time now, but when we were there the tour was self-guided, using a headset. There was an adult tour and a kid's tour: we did the kid's tour, of course!
I love this picture!

Also in March: a trip to the zoo!
the Widge was being a prairie dog
and communed with some bears. Yay, zoo!

Sheep with Stella, plus, bonus lizard

can you identify this lizard? Its been hanging around our big rock.while she was here, Stella took us to a great little farm to visit the new sheep.

we enjoyed feeding them.
but we liked meeting them up close best of all!yay Ciocci Stella!!!

the last of the North Carolina photos!

from Guilford Courthouse, where the reenactment was canceled due to rain.everyone took a turn in the stocks
we visited a captain in his tent, which was fairly nice, as tents go. He and the Widge talked strategy.the poor reenactors were just milling around the museum.


but this is what they might have looked like, if they had actually gotten to fight.

Catawba Science Center

as promised:
building an igloohey, look! Stan's og has a street named after her!
the stream table, by far the highlight of the Science Center

A big tortoise.it too bad you can't here the sound effects here for the Amazing Mr. Matt Show
Widge discovered that he can levitate his hair. Mr. Matt's hair, sadly, does not levitate.


Science is electrifying!I did actually get to touch a little shark! But that picture is not nearly as identifiable:
and now, a few short films!