 |
| We dyed eggs on Saturday |
 |
| Baskets on Easter morning |
 |
| Ready to hunt |
 |
| We did a family hunt this year. We each hid eggs in a different zone of the lawn. The eggs had letters in them to spell out these words. As soon as you found an egg, you had to bring the letter and add it to a word on the table. Whoever added the last letter to a word won the prize. |
 |
| Benji in action adding a letter |
 |
| Easter brunch. Gammy joined us |
She played the Paramount on a Tuesday night as part of her 2025 tour. Tickets were expensive and we decided we did not want to pay that much to go, but then we spied cheap resale tickets on StubHub a couple of days before the concert. We had our choice for as low as $13/ticket, but decided to go with the $22 tickets that were 6th row center - it was an amazing view!
 |
| Before the show, at our seats |
For the first time since COVID, Benji's clarinet teacher hosted a recital for her students (Benji started with her in 2021, so he never participated in one before). Benji had by far the longest and hardest piece performed and he did wonderfully:
Abby sent us some pictures from her first week in Prague -- these are mostly of the group in Czech class, after communal lunches and on a walking tour of the city:
We were back at my cousin's house in Maryland for the first time since the pandemic. It was really nice to celebrate with family again:
 |
| Benji and I getting ready for the long drive to Gaithersburg (Kevin stayed back to help at KFest) |
 |
| With cousin Geoffrey after they found the afikomen. They were the only two "kids" at the Seder (Geoffrey is 24) |
For Benji's AP Language class, the teacher assigned them a ten-page research paper on a subject of their choosing. This is not technically part of the AP curriculum, but it is an important skill that she wanted them to learn. Benji, unsurprisingly, chose a railroad topic and wrote an excellent paper. So they could show off their good work, the AP teachers decided to hold a "Symposia" where the students could present their research findings to family and friends (trifolds required). Benji's topic was 'The Rise of the Suburb and the Fall of the American Railroad," and he cheekily added the extra title "Murder of the Orient Express" for his presentation:
She loves it so much - she sent us some pictures:
 |
| Communal room |
 |
| View out of the apartment's windows |
 |
| Abby's room (she does not have a roommate, but there are two other doubles in the apartment, so there are 5 of them total) |
 |
| The apartment has an old elevator with sliding doors that Abby loves to take selfies in |
 |
| Asiago cheese bagel from Panera to start the day (he also asked for a souffle) |
 |
| Birthday bear in attendance |
 |
| We ordered in for dinner because Benji wanted a quiet night at home and to have a family Nintendo Switch night. He also chose a Princess Cake from Albemarle Baking Company |
We flew back to Dulles on Saturday and spent the night at the Lamy-Petersons. On Sunday, before we headed home, Benji and Soph helped set up an Easter egg hunt for some young friends who were coming over later in the day:
We had a quiet few days in West Palm Beach with Grandpa Steve. We got to the beach twice, once with him and once without. We went out to dinner every night and mostly hung out and read the rest of the time. I did not take a ton of pictures, but here are a few:
On Wednesday, we had a 1:30pm train across the state. We had some time to kill in the morning, so we checked out the Aquarium, which was not far from the train station:
We finished up at the aquarium just in time to catch our train to West Palm:
Amtrak was a great way to cross the state and we got picked up at the station by Grandpa Steve just in time for dinner.
After Ybor City, we made our way to the Henry Plant Museum, which is on the grounds of the University of Tampa. Henry Plant was a railroad magnate who developed the train system on the west coast of Florida, and he built this ridiculously opulent hotel in the 1890s. The hotel served as the US embarkment point for the Spanish-American War and Teddy Roosevelt camped outside with his rough riders. The hotel operated until 1932 and was bought by the city of Tampa in 1933. They preserved the Gilded Age artifacts and turned part of it into a museum and part of it into space for the University (it is a National Historic Landmark):
 |
| I tired to get a panorama to show how ridiculously large this building is, but it was hard to capture |
 |
| Main hallway |
 |
| The rooms just have hundreds of preserved items. These are garden stools which used to be placed all over the land surroundignthe hotel |
 |
| All these gilded age millionaires had a thing for geese |
 |
| This lamp took up half a room |
 |
| Benji on the admissions side of the building, which still has most of the original furnishings even though it is used as offices |
We had a little time to kill after the museum, so we made out way to Sparkman's Wharf. We were not that hungry for dinner, so we had ice cream and decided to go bowling:
We finished just in time to head to the Rays game. The Rays are currently playing in the Yankees spring training field (Steinbrenner Stadium) since Tropicana Field was damaged in a hurricane last year. They totally revamped the stadium to remove most references to the Yankees, but the logo is still on all the seats. It was a pretty night and we all enjoyed the game:
