More Catch-up and overdue pictures!

I am so behind in my writing that I decided on another long post to catch up on all my pictures.  Perry is getting really big, I weighed him yesterday and he is a whopping FIFTY pounds!!  He is still handsome as ever, of course!

At the beginning of January I went to Philadelphia to take Step 2-CS, my last set of medical boards.  Unlike the computer board exams, this is a clinical exam with actors that play patients and only offered in four locations in the country.  What's nice is that the exam is pass-fail and fairly low-stress, so I decided to make a trip of it to see Emi (a high school friend who was in our wedding), who is now in Philadelphia, and then Lacey in D.C. on my way back.  I stayed with Emi the night before my exam and played with her very cute bulldog, Hatsu.

After my exam (on a Friday) I drove to D.C. to hang out with Lacey (another bridesmaid) and her husband, Jeff (another IMSA alum).  Lacey, Jeff and I met up with Erin (my Wellesley roommate and bridesmaid) in the city to hang out on Saturday.  We went to a restaurant that you would both really have liked, based on classic historic American food (e.g. Delmonico's hamburger, Southern-style shrimp and grits, and catsup, to name a few).  Some of the dishes were done traditionally, and others were a little more avant garde, as was the case for my "sugar on snow" dessert; shaved ice with lemon custard and maple syrup (the maple syrup froze so it had more of a taffy-like texture).  The dish was quite a sight:

Afterwards we went to the Museum of Natural History, and there was a really great bug exhibit - I got to hold a HUGE grasshopper!

We also got to see a cool exhibit about the Chilean miners that included one of the two Phoenix capsules in which the miners were rescued.  I thought it was a little weird that the capsule would be in the U.S. rather than Chile, but apparently NASA made the capsule so it got to come back to the U.S.  There were amazing letters from the miners and diagrams of the disaster and rescue efforts.  

Lacey and Jeff live near Arlington cemetary so on Sunday before I left we took a quick trip over to the Robert E. Lee house before I headed out.   Jeff took this picture of Lacey and I looking out over the D.C. skyline, if you look closely you can see the Washington monument, the Capitol, the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials, and Arlington Cemetary behind us.

It was nice to be home after the D.C. trip - William and I did a TON of traveling over the holiday and it was very nice to be home the next weekend.  A few weeks ago we also got to go have a nice Shabbat dinner at Amy and Anthony's, and we showed them the blog.  They wanted to send you lots of love and good wishes, so we all squished in front of William's camera and took a picture to send you!

Lastly, I have been doing some experiments with baking, and I made some cookies that have hydrangeas piped from icing on top, as well as some royal icing that I painted.

 

We are less than three weeks away from our half-marathon and got up to a 12 mile run last Sunday.  On Saturday we are planning to do the full race distance - 13.1 miles - and then only doing short runs so that we are well rested for the race on March 18th.

Will try to be better about posting more frequently in March!  We miss you and are sending you lots of love from North Carolina and counting the days until Passover! 


Love,
Chailee and William