Last weekend, there was...

Pannetone for breakfast.

A spontaneous, general bursting into song (Lean on Me) with a baby clapping her hands and dancing in her high chair.

A life-size, animated dinosaur expo.

A walk into the Old Port, where we saw a huge Coast Guard ship.

A dinner downtown, just the four of us, full of laughter and good spirits.

A baby who slept through the night three times in a row, as well as a boy who didn't wake up once, resulting in a mommy sleeping for seven hours straight for the first time in... years?

A beautiful drive in the Vermont countryside, including an excellent, impromptu lunch in this cute town we had never heard of.




A reminder that life is beautiful, and life is good. That sowewhere among the current stress and tension and lack of time, our family dynamic is there, intact. That the house will eventually sell. That this real estate market situation won't always take our life and our family hostage, that on the other side there is our dream house, our well-deserved prize, our starting anew and starting afresh. That one day, soon, we won't just drive by while sighing and talking about all we'll able to do there (having giant Christmas trees thanks to the cathedral ceiling, making snowmen in a yard we can finally play in, stroll in the golf course with the sleighs) but we will park into the driveway, put the key in, and open the door. That 24 showings plus 12 couples at the open house, and four quasi-offers that all slipped through our fingers only mean that we are getting closer, and closer, to finding our buyers.