Friday, June 29, 2012

Friday...

On Fridays I feel my thoughts gathering and my plans for the weekend get totally out of hand. I review the past week in my head and start to dream about the myriad tasks I'll surely be able to do over the weekend with another set of hands to help me wrangle the little guys. Ah well, better to go in the direction of optimism, right?!

Here are a few things I'd hoped to share with the blog over the past week:

-- Would someone please remind me to plan for successive plantings of lettuce and other greens next year in May when I'm feeling all plant-ish and over-zealous? I do love salad, but man... we have a lot of salad right now. Not to mention chard and kale. You will recognize me by my green-tinge and iron rich glow.

-- I'd like to add a few of these to my kitchen walls.

-- I really, really, really appreciated this post by one of my favorite bloggers. Seriously. Be kind to each other, ladies.

-- The Birkenstock-wearing, had-my-baby-in-my-bathtub side of me thinks it'd be super fun to visit this place someday. In the meantime, this movie will provide a peek into the place that resurrected a mindset that I embrace and for which I feel very deep gratitude.

-- I am looking forward to the Fourth of July! Bring on the parade and the streamers and the decorated Red Flyer wagons. Have a great weekend, everyone!

Tuesday, June 19, 2012

Three.

1. Sometimes I love email. Sometimes I really dislike it.

2. I acquired a "thing" that I love! It hangs out on my oven door handle and makes me happy. Here it is.

3. Today was a hot, sticky day that was at times hard and at times fun. One of the sweetest moments was peeking into the dining room to see two little boy bodies waiting for their lunches, clad only in colorful diapers, cooling off from a morning outside and giggling together. I snapped a mental picture.

Sunday, June 17, 2012

Happy Father's Day!

We love our resident Dad.***

This morning at 7:30am he was pushing the double jogger in the annual Race Against Hate so that all four of us could participate (I would have been much slower if I'd been behind that thing for 3.1 miles!).

Then he and Christopher zipped over to the pool for the first of their summer Sunday morning swim classes with buddy Wally and his daddy. The post-swim account was enthusiastic and included descriptions of "lots of BIG jumps, Mama!"

We had a picnic lunch outside with a few ticklefests to show him how much we love him and then he took a well-deserved afternoon nap (as did Christopher, woo hoo!).

Post-snooze, we went to Hartigan's for his favorite summer treat: a Cookies 'n Cream milkshake. We all enjoyed frozen yummies... except for Colin, who was asleep on Daddy's back in the Ergo for the whole trip.

We finished up the afternoon with BBQ and waterplay in the backyard. He grilled up some veggies in his new grill basket. We're looking forward to using that a lot this summer.

Super Dad brought the day to a close with little boy baths, singing the ABC's for toothbrush time, and now I can hear him in the other room reading a book about trains and counting.

Gooooo Daddy! You're awesome, Babe. Can't imagine this wild ride alongside anyone else.


***Our non-resident (Grand)Dads rock, too! One is celebrating with BBQ. The other one got to spend a long weekend at the US Open with much of my extended family. Wish we were there... sniffle!

Friday, June 15, 2012

On my radar :: right now

With the season change, I've found myself with less time to blog... being outside in the hot sun zaps our energy, we're trying to stay extra busy during the unplanned summer days, and the toddler isn't napping these days (perhaps the biggest travesty of them all!).

And so, when I think of things I'd like to share here, it starts to feel like a list of bullet points. My Hipstamatic endeavor dried up late last month, so maybe I can manage a few bullet pointed lists as the summer plods along.

In the meantime, here's a prosier update on what we've been doing:

I've been reading in my spare moments. Bringing Up Bebe was very interesting and I'm now reading The Omnivore's Dilemma. I can't believe it's taken me so long to read this one. I'm entrenched in an education on the politics of corn at the moment. It makes me want to grow everything I might ever eat in my own backyard. You can't eat lovely grass, you know...

I'm working on new rep and continuing work with a local composer for a cd recording. When I can snag a few lucid minutes after bedtime, I'm sewing skirts, doll quilts for little friends' birthday parties, and a set of numbers and letters for Christopher.

Speaking of numbers and letters, Christopher's awareness of them has grown exponentially over the last few weeks. His eyes and mind are making a billion new connections each day and he's continually asking us to talk about individual letters and sounds. I'm excited for him. It must feel like he's unlocking a secret code.

Colin is, in a word: scrumptious. He claps and is thrilled with himself. He has just figured out that we've been signing the word "more" to him at mealtimes and now uses the sign himself. He gets a kick out of seeing us respond. (Looks very much like the baby's sign in the linked video.) He scoots and inches himself around the floor quietly and determinedly. I have a feeling we'll discover that he can walk when he just ambles into the room and says, "hey guys," a few months from now.

Mike continues to guide his lab here and to travel around the world, in demand by universities, international advisory boards, companies, and funding agencies. We're all too adept at hearing him sneak out for a 6am flight and help unpack his bags when he arrives home late in the evening a day or two later. Changing The World racks up a lot of frequent flyer miles. Who knew?!

I hope your summer is off to a great start.

Thursday, June 14, 2012

2012 Garden

My garden schematic for this year (click for bigger):
To be honest, much of this has changed. Along the way, I made changes realizing I had too many squash plants or not enough tomatoes (never!) or to just leave room for any other spontaneous veggie acquisitions later in the season.
Also, some of the beds were planted with Christopher's help and as a result, they are a little less organized than last year (read: I'll have to wait until things grow up a bit more to figure out what is where).
Things are growing - we had our first green salad from the garden tonight. Fresh garden lettuce is so tender. It was delicious. And we had a small snack of strawberries from our little berry patch this morning after watering the beds. That's always fun. Amazing how sweet and juicy they were... if I only lived on a few acres... the things I could grow!!!

Monday, June 4, 2012

PB&J Hotcakes

A not-so-subtle hint of what he'd like on top of his blueberry pancakes.


Saturday, June 2, 2012

Taking requests

This morning at the farmer's market, there was a banjo player picking and strumming while people picked out the last of the peonies, sweet snap peas and fistfuls of asparagus.

The banjo player was taking requests, but he underestimated his audience. When he asked what Christopher wanted to hear, he replied with, "Stevie Wonder." (By which, he means his favorite song "Sir Duke.") The banjo player kind of did a double take and commented, "you have very adult taste in music."

Christopher had to settle for a pretty mediocre rendition of I've Been Working on the Railroad. That's okay, though. I think the guy would have had a hard time with the opening horn riff on that little banjo...