First Position

Charlotte was today enrolled in her first ballet class, which pleases her very much given she's already taken to wearing her leotard and an assortment of ballet skirts and floofy tutus. There's one scary number I like to call "the black swan."

The great excitement, though, was the acquisition of some very petite ballet slippers. They are the real deal, by Danskin, and are sooooooo tiny. My little prima put them right on and proceeded to take her nap in them. Before heading off to bed, I put her in first position for a picture. Unless she ingests some magic growing beans, her stature is definitely more suited for the balance beam than the ballet. Just don't tell her that.

Ciao Bella

There is only one thing our (former) super nanny Roxana can't do, and that's smile for a camera. But on our last play date I cajoled her into sitting for a picture. It's been two weeks without our Bolivian hero. We miss her already.

Enter Talking

Should we ever need tonsillectomies, I predict the doctors will have no trouble locating the pesky organs.

The Little Ladies Who Lunch

Charlotte and her very fashionable friend Reagan went to Tysons Corner yesterday for some shopping and a little nosh at the Nordstrom Cafe. It was precious. It was also an expensive play date (sigh) after stumbling into a blue gingham Ralph Lauren number that I was certain my darling daughter could not live without.

Happy Trails

I had no idea I was so attached to our first family car until she drove away last night. It's like a little piece of our transition from married to married with children just rolled away. But we sold it to a very nice, young couple from Haggerstown who will soon be starting their own family. A happy ending. And one more sliver of proof that we are indeed leaving. I'm hoping the reality of this move sinks in by the time we push back from the gate.

(Husband left on Sunday, for a week, the door closing behind him about 12 minutes before our test drive arrived. Mother juggling two sick toddlers had to handle all negotiations, banks transactions, cleaning of said Bessie and hand-off. "Bitter! Party of One!").**

Drum Roll Please....

Introducing our new playroom!

It's spacious! It's airy! It's got the nicest bathroom in the

house! And we get to use it......for only two months before we surrender it, and the rest of the house, to total strangers (who will trash it, yes, I know).

But until then, I we are basking in the glow of the newest part of our home. The kids have been nearly glued to it since the launch yesterday, prodding and poking me to relocate every toy from the living room to a place where

they can actually enjoy them.

The trains, the blocks, the puzzles...all unceremoniously dumped on the floor....and I was....delighted, at long last, to see a total toy mess! Let the Legos rain

down, let the dinosaurs sprawl from every corner, let the trucks be damned. It's a playroom! And we all love it.

'Moving Right Along...'

"Movin' right along.

Footloose and fancy-free.

Getting there is half the fun; come share it with me.

Moving right along (doog-a-doon doog-a-doon).

We'll learn to share the load.

We don't need a map to keep this show on the road."

-- 'Movin' Right Along," From the Muppets' Rainbow Connection --

So why can't we just haul our stuff to England in this trusty little red wagon? We have just entered the controlled chaos portion of our adventure (solid chaos to follow). The visas are being processed (biometrics tomorrow! not sure if that means fingerprints or eyeball scans), the renters have been chosen, the property manager is in hand, the car is being prodded by strangers, and the movers, uuuuugh, have been scheduled.

So, dear friends (trust me, no one wants to live vicariously through THIS part of the trip), our stuff is set to be taken away in three consecutive visits by the movers the week of May 23.

The house is coated in drywall dust and toys (very cosmopolitan), but the basement remodel is officially complete tomorrow with the installation of some carpet (photos to come). We are hoping our toddler friends will help us inaugurate it soon with grape juice and crushed goldfish. Consider this a standing invitation.

Yes, we are very excited. Kinda wiped. But excited. Just wish the globe could settle down. Between the tidal waves, nuclear catastrophes and missile launches, Alexandria looks pretty cozy right now.

Stop! In the Name of Love....

I ain't got nothing on Katie Holmes and her kitten-heel wearing toddler. Here's hoping a few minutes wearing these plastic, fringe-topped mules I bought at a yard sale won't destroy Charlotte's gait (apologies to our nation's pedorthists). In the meantime...I think she looks like one of the Supremes in this pose (minus the pink Pull-Up). Think it oh-oh-ver...

'Curse You Tiny Toilet!'

We rather enjoy the at turns tear-jerking, adventure-packed animated movie Despicable Me ('spicable me' as Charlotte tells it). And our latest family catch phrase, as obtuse as it may be, is 'curse you tiny toilet!' Watch this short clip...you might see why it cracks us all up. (yes, all of us, which has made it all the harder to stop Harry from repeating the phrase ad nauseum).

We installed this new, teeny-tiny powder room sink last week (it's like an evening purse, just big enough to hold a lipstick and a credit card)...and of course it launched us into another 24-hour cycle, cursing the tiny toilet. (like our orange-clad villain Vector, I too got a face-full of water when Paul turned on the house's water main and the disconnected sink valves were also, ahem, in the 'on' position).

Curse you tiny toilet!

Mardi Gras

Being a Californian, not a southerner, I've never paid much mind to Mardi Gras. But this year it's been front and center (in school, in town...at our play dates). So much so that we helped our friend Sabrina and her super-clever mommy decorate a shoebox-sized float...for the Barbie and Ken sized King and Queen.

God Save the Queen!

Big changes, many big changes coming our way. All of them exciting, many of them still unknown, but we are making plans at a breakneck pace to get the Smith Barnes clan over to Jolly Old by the first week of June.

We don't know where we'll be living, but we suspect it will be in the Cambridge area, either in the city or a village just outside. The government will put us up for three months (hopefully less, please God) while we look for a rental that suits us. The kids are enrolled to attend the Cambridge International School come fall. Harry will be entering the Reception class, and Charlotte Nursery school. Their uniform list is precious: Barbour coats and plimsolls (sneakers, people) and for Charlie, gingham dresses from Marks and Spencer. It just oozes British cute.

We took the kids in to the Bethesda headquarters of NGA (National Geospatial-Intelligence) two weeks ago to apply for their Official (red) passports. They got to wear visitor badges and every time we entered a room someone would yell "uncleared!" (as if two toddlers and their mother planned to walk off with our nation's secrets). It was all very Mission Impossible.

So now we wait for the pounds of paperwork to be vetted. Our visas come next (we're told the forms take days to fill out). We should have our orders in the next few weeks, then it's off to the moving office to schedule not one, not two, but three visits by the moving trucks. They will let us ship and store a total of 18,000 pounds. Which really isn't tough, because the rooms in the UK are so tiny. We'll probably leave half our worldly belongings behind in storage.

This experience has only one comparison for me. It's a lot like planning a funeral (minus the dead body and the big buffet dinner). There is so much to do in such a short period of time, we thankfully don't have the luxury to stop and think about what we're going to miss. At the moment we are concurrently renovating our basement to make it desirable for renters, showing the house to prospective tenants and trying to find a new job for the nanny, which is just heartbreaking enough in itself. My friends, bless them, get a bit blue when I talk about our move, and selfishly I can't tell you how much I appreciate that. (Imagine the reverse). I just wish we had the time to sit down for a big group hug and lament the time we won't be together for birthday parties and play dates and summers at the beach and at the pool eating hot dogs with the kids. We love our life here.

There is of course an awesome upside, I remind everyone: visits to Europe! So the next Girls Night Out will be in Scotland...I'm OK with that!

I have ordered my - Christ Almighty I am not kidding - two text-book-sized driving instruction manuals to guide us through the driving test in the UK. And I'm a pro now at vetting the real estate listing from afar. The house, we have agreed, will be big enough for visitors.

So for you, dear readers, I have one assignment: please get our your planners and schedule a visit for next spring. By then we'll surely know where all the good pubs are.