Illumination - Passport Diaries

Here’s what I liked about January in Japan: illuminations. They’d open in November or December and continue through the New Year, often until mid- to late-January, when New Year celebrations conclude.

So when I saw that the Bruce Munro exhibit “Light” was open at Norfolk’s Hermitage Museum through January 10, I thought it would be the perfect January illumination. It was! Cold weather almost kept us home—it didn’t open until 4pm—but we hustled our kids out the door after dinner, flagrantly defying our normal evening schedule. Should we try to go Sunday night instead? We waffled. Somehow we got going anyway and discovered we would have arrived Sunday to find it OVER. Whew! Chris had watch Saturday of course, so Friday night was the last possible day we could have seen it!

The Hermitage grounds were really dark. More than half a dozen light exhibits shimmered and twinkled in the blackness, sometimes backlit by the industrial lights of the port sparkling on the river beyond the grounds. One exhibit, called Water Towers, had music floating out of LED-lit towers of water bottles. Another was a field of bulbs waving like poppies over a network of lit wires snaking across the ground. Isaac liked the Lighthouse, which looked like a wall of illuminated water flashing messages in morse code.

It was the perfect final family date before Chris heads out to sea.

It’s been really cold. I finally figured out it’s ok to ignore people’s horror stories of sky-high winter heating bills. We have never had a winter power bill approach Houston summertime AC power bills, so gone are the days we spent shivering in our warmest coats indoors, squabbling over the thermostat. Our house is warm. Feel free to come enjoy our high, balmy temperatures and afternoon tea. The switch to January tea accessories was a success, and we’ve celebrated tea time with predictable regularity for over a month now—don’t they say it takes 27 days for something to become habit? Well, Miss ELOISE can’t figure out her schedule, but afternoon tea is in the books.

Isaac and I found a camellia blooming in the back yard one afternoon we kicked around a tennis ball in 36-degree weather.

We are trying our best to figure out this brief and temporary stage of baby naps. Some days the kiddos perfectly stagger their naps all day. How do we get groceries without having a triple melt down? How do we stay sane and see other humans without getting the flu while Chris is gone the rest of the month? Why did Eloise go from waking up once or twice per night to waking up three and four times per night? I know the double-nap-shakle and sleepless nights won’t last forever, but it makes me SO appreciative of our fun neighbors and close-by friends! And online grocery shopping! And free delivery for big diaper orders!

I accidentally static-shocked Eloise this morning and Isaac said, “Mom! You have to be gentle with Baby Eloise!” He is so much fun to have around. Especially with his new trains. But that is a different post….

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