dante's inferno (or, the winter that lasted forever).

i haven't blogged much at all lately, partially because i've hit what some people call a rut but what i love to call "stability." ever since we moved to our new apartment and settled in back in december, aside from holiday travels and such, it's really been more of the same. i like it that way though. some people like to constantly mix it up but i'm happy to have a solid consistent routine. the only downside of the routine we've had the past few months (and it's a big one) has been the whole horrid winter aspect of everything. i can safely say this has been the worst winter of my entire life. before, there was the snowpocalypse of 2011 that held the title but this winter, which we easterners  have affectionately named snowmageddon, takes the cake. it has been the second snowiest winter in the history of philadelphia. i hate snow. words really can't describe how much i hate snow. i hate being cold, i hate being wet, i hate staying inside. so combine that with trying to keep a one year old (who is also stuck inside and stir crazy) happy and you've got a pretty nasty few months. but i think we made the best of it that we could. we got a children's museum pass, mommy got a gym pass, i got out the happy light, and we basically just hunkered down from december until, well, now i guess. except we still can't get out much. for every nice "spring day" we've had so far, we've had 5 or 6 miserably cold or snowy days. we're not out of it yet. i used to look at the crocuses blooming in our yard as a sign of hope but now they just mock me. "see? it's spring!" they say, and then i go outside and it's 20 degrees, and oh look it's starting to snow! it's like a really mean joke. i spent all of february looking forward to march but it was all for naught. it's still horrid outside. i think we're in for one more week of it and then maybe, JUST maybe, it will stay above 40 for good. i don't know exactly why dante's inferno is always associated with fire and burning. the innermost circle of hell according to dante is actually solid ice. and i would totally have to agree with that.

to avoid completely erring on the side of negativity, as i often do in the winter time, i will say that i've made some great friends in philly who have suffered through the winter with me. there's something about the cold (and hatred thereof) that just brings people together. also, the past few months watching my own personal ray of sunshine morph from infant to toddler have been splendid. she started walking in february and now runs pretty much everywhere, which results in a lot of falling and a lot of bruises, but she doesn't seem to mind. she can say several words in sign language and has recently figured out that nodding means "yes!" she loves reading books and still dances to anything from hold music to movie credits to me just tapping my hands on the table. that girl's got the moves. she still can't seem to finish a meal without sticking her foot on the table. can't say why. she does this hilarious little look-over-the-shoulder shrug when she thinks she's being cute. she loves to facetime with grandma. she loves it when daddy comes home. she has this new thing where she grabs your clothes and pulls you in for a kiss. it is A-D-O-R-A-B-L-E. she FINALLY sleeps in a big girl crib (if i ever feel like telling the saga of the crib maybe i will) and loves it. she plays with her toys in her crib every morning for like an hour and if i come in to get her she dodges me and crawls to the corner of the crib and points to the toys she's thrown on the floor so i can pick them up so she can resume whatever game she is playing. i love that her imagination is so elaborate. i can hear her through her monitor every morning jabbering and giving what i thought were her stuffed animals kisses until one day i went in and caught her and she was actually kissing her blanket. i about died laughing. she loves her little swaddle blankets. i like that the blankets we used to wrap her up in are now the blankets she likes to snuggle with. it makes me feel like she is still that teeny baby who loved to be snuggled up like a burrito.

bradley works a lot, and i love that about him. but it makes me feel a little bit lazy. because he also helps out around the house a lot. so most of our evenings, after bea goes to bed, while he is working, our housework is essentially done and, if it's not a gym night, i really have a lot of free time. so i decided to put some of my tv watching to good use and pick up knitting again like i did back in the dorm days for service hours. i forgot how hilariously bad at knitting i am. like terrible. i was imagining myself knitting the cutest ever infinity scarf and making a few for abby when she goes on her mission..... and then it took me like 3 hours to re-master the basic knit stitch, and you can forget any other kind of stitches, and also i somehow keep accidentally adding rows to it so it just grows into this cancerous yarn mass. i bound it up and took it off the needles and bradley and i cracked up. it looks like a tank top for a homeless troll. i told bradley i would give it to a house elf for his freedom and bradley asked me if it really counted as clothes. so there's that. i'm going to keep practicing and see where it takes me. maybe i'll have that scarf by next winter.

we are really. trying. to like philadelphia. i'll be honest, it's a struggle. we absolutely love the people we have met here. we love our duplex/apartment, we love our neighborhood and how we're surrounded by the park. look:

we are in that little pocket of streets in the middle of all that greenery. it really is gorgeous, even in the winter. and that park continues all the way up (and down), the entire length of the river.

i consider that park my backyard. there are endless hiking trails and a paved bike trail that leads 7 miles all the way to the art museum in downtown philly. that, i love. and also, philadelphia has great food. but as far as cities go, it is not my favorite. while our friends are great, the people you meet on the street are undeniably grouchy. and this isn't just east-coast briskness. i've lived in new jersey and connecticut and worked in new york. i know east-coasters. and philadelphia has the meanest of the bunch. this also applies to its drivers. man oh man. it is filthy too. i can't understand why the biggest city in the country (my one and only new york. *wistful sigh*) can keep their streets so clean and why the 5th largest can't keep it together enough to get the freaking garbage out of the street. it is a riddle and a mystery. the colonial architecture is lovely and the downtown skyline is pretty but that is about 20% of philly. most of the rest is the eyesore that is urban sprawl, with the exception of several secret pretty neighborhoods like my own. the more i think about it, the more i probably realize that i don't love it simply because it's not new york. i should probably just get over it. i'll be back someday. which brings me to:

bradley is getting geared up to apply for grad schools this fall. there are several contenders, our favorite of which is a new cornell program that is a one year tech-focused MBA program in manhattan, which would be a dream come true. the others in the running are all out west, to bring us closer to family, whom we miss so very terribly. i hate living far away from my mom. i don't know how she did/does it (live far away from her mom, not me). maybe i'm just a baby. but i hate it. one day, once bradley is done with school, maybe we can get a little closer to our parents (who are both in utah now).

anyway. what was going to be a quick update turned out to be way longer than i'd expected. but that seems to be the way of the blog.