An Interesting Week

This week has been interesting. Really interesting. It seems as if I've won some kind of sweepstakes through Redbook Magazine. It is my "grown-up" magazine that I get, though I am suspicious that my HC also reads it when he's bored. You didn't hear that from me. April was it's Sweepstakes Every Day month or something and I entered everything. I guess I was bored. Well, I got an email saying that I won April's Work It Out sweepstakes and I cannot for anything remember which one that was. I remember there was one for workout videos and one for athletic shoes and a few more that has something to do with 'Working It Out'. I guess I'll find out when it gets here in 3-6 months, like the email said.
Another interesting thing that happened. We opted out of Ebay and decided on CraigsList for selling our Xbox stuff and for the Kelty Kids Child Carrier (which we only used once for Hiking Devil's Den and then my HC was so sore from toting Erin around he vowed never to use it again! And we didn't.) Yesterday we got an email about the xbox stuff. Then came a flurry of texts resulting in a sale last night! It only lasted 8 hours before it was sold and we are very pleased. Now we are waiting to hear about the Carrier. Please, Lord let it sell!
These things, of course, will go into our Florida Fund. We are hoping to make a vacation-type trip sometime this summer. And my HC will be coming this time, too. Woo hoo! It was so bleak without him in January. Everything is always funner with Daddy around, as the kids will attest. And Mommy is a little more fun with Daddy around, too.
There are 26 days of school left and Ian is becoming increasingly difficult to get out of bed and to school in the morning. Sigh. At least we have the weekend to look forward to. Relief! Another Friday is almost over.
I am watching Gosford Park right now and finding it hard to do with Erin crawling over me like I am her personal tree/trampoline.
Everyone is almost better, just some lingering coughs.
The garden is doing very well. Some peas showed up, as well as a couple of watermelon and cucumber. The morning glories are sprouting up as well. Now we'll see if they get big enough to actually climb the fence. We'll see.

Fried Ears

The weekend was an incredibly busy one for us. Do you ever get those [incredibly rare] days when you just feel energized and actually get a whole list of stuff done? Then you spend the rest of the week wondering why you can't feel like that all the time and have a Donna Reed-esque life? Well, last weekend was incredible. We put our entire garden in, ironically the biggest one to date. We had said that we weren't going to do a garden this year, but we are forgoing the weed mat (waah!) and got the seeds very cheap at the local farm store. We did spring for chicken wire to put a barrier between the yard and the garden, to signal the dog to stop (it doesn't exactly keep her out).
We also changed our garden menu a bit. We are not doing corn this year, since it has been set upon by Japanese beetles every year and we only get a 1/2 gallon baggie of shucked corn total after they've finished with it. And we didn't plant anything that we didn't like this year. In the past, we've always planted okra since we love pickled okra. But there was never enough ready at the same time to pickle. And this year I am not making cucumber pickles because we have approximately 27 jars from last year that no one will touch. I am trying, but there was that one mushy jar....yuck. And I have discovered, by a majority vote, that no one else likes zucchini. And no one wants to eat any more zucchini bread or muffins. Ever.
So that saves me a bundle of work right there. So I get a break from pickling, harvesting gigantic okra that is inedible and shredding pounds of zucchini to freeze that no one will eat. I feel better already. Am I REALLY the only one that likes zucchini?! Really?!
I was outvoted again when I suggested opting out of the tomatoes. Phooey.
So this year's garden menu is: (drum roll)
Early Alaska Green Peas [along the whole back fence]
Maxi Beans (green beans) [3 short rows, bush style]
Carrots [a short double row]
Tomatoes (100 and Rutgers) [5 plants total]
Strawberries (Quinalt) [2 plants]
Crookneck Squash (yellow) [3 hills]
Cucumbers (burpless) [3 hills]
Cantaloupe [a short row]
Watermelon [4 hills, with 3 plantings in each hill]

Keep in mind that half of our garden is watermelon, since they need a lot of space.
We are hoping that the peas will shoot up and cover the whole 6 foot back fence, since the lot behind has been turned into a gravel parking lot...whee.
Personally, since we are not doing weed mat this year (bigger garden = more weed mat= too expensive...), I am hoping that a mulch truck will stop at our house and ask us if we need a ton or 2. In the meantime, we'll be out weeding....

So we spent all weekend outside, with the kids going in and out, depending on how many flies they wanted to let in. My HC got fried around his tank top and then burnt weird the next day, so from the back it looks like he was wearing a sports bra. It's a really good thing he can't see himself from the back. Try to smother a laugh or he will find you.
So all my lotion has been used up for the Greater Good (translation: HC). Erin's little pigtail part got red and she has a nice farmer's tan. Ian's nose is a bit red and my ears are fried to fire engine-like proportions. And I am sore all over from raking and shoveling and hoeing. My HC only had to do the rotor tiller, don't know what he has to be sore about. (I am only pouting a bit; watching him till with that thing was enough for me.) Erin also loved a few earthworms to death and pulled one apart ("Mommy! Wum boke!")

In addition to the garden success, my HC mowed and weed eated the front and back yard. We scrubbed all the winter muck off of the siding (as high as I could reach with the scrub pole), cleaned out the yucky corner of the house/yard, cleaned out the tupperware cabinet, cleaned out the shed, cleaned up some stuff to sell on Ebay, did all the laundry, etc. Still can't believe we did all that. Boo yah!

So you'll have to forgive me if I don't have any pictures, because I left my phone inside while I was performing all that manual labor. There's not much to see now except for dirt and hills, anyway.

But as with soreness, the after-effects remain. Now I have garden fingers, because my left hand is all scraped and rough from planting and there's dirt stuck in my nails that will just have to wear off. But I got me a garden, man!

How Does My Garden Grow?

With blister, sunburn and aching muscles. And there's not even a guarantee that it will. But at least there's one unpleasant thing that I will be avoiding. This year, there is an abundance of WeedMat. Yay. There almost wasn't, due to the 30 mph wind gusts that kept ripping through the yard. And there might be some missing pieces tomorrow, due to the 30 mph wind gusts that will be ripping through tomorrow, but please Lord, let them stay!
Our garden this year is twice the size that it was last year, and that's not counting the hills on the other side of the yard for pumpkins, watermelons and canteloupes. Now comes the hard part....waiting for results.

We have all recovered from our illness and for those wondering, my HC never got sick. He didn't get sick the last time the stomach bug roared through either. He says he has an iron stomach. I say he's ingested so many toxins from all the soda and junk food that nothing can survive in his bloodstream. We agreed to disagree.

Yesterday was the first day of the year that it was 80 and sunny. We were tilling the garden and shovelling out rows. We all got sunburnt. Erin is fine, she just got a wee bit of red under her eyes. Ian came home with burnt arms and neck and nose. And his little lips were all chapped and cracked this morning when he woke up. I keep chasing him with Herpecin, a medicated lip balm. He doesn't mind, but he likes the other stuff better, that tastes like mint. We don't have that kind anymore. Erin ate it.
Today my HC and I got even more burnt. Tomorrow we will rest. And then it's supposed to rain for 5 or so days, so I guess it doesn't matter that much.
But in the meantime, my garden plot looks goooooooooood!

Cheese and Salsa

Tuesday we had the kids' pictures taken. We were late for our appointment and it was given to someone else who walked in, so we had to wait until they called us. I was aggravated about that; I hate being late, but sometimes it just cannot be helped. Especially when you live 20 minutes from anywhere.

When we got down to business, it was...educational. Erin wasn't so sure about all the fuss and cooing and coaxing to smile. She thought the photographer (can you call them photographers when all they do is punch a button??) was weird. I think she was in a bad mood that day (the photog, not Erin, she was just sleepy, I think). Either way, it was a good thing her assistant was there to play with the kids while she stomped and sighed and took crooked pictures. Hopefully the photo printer person will fix it.

It's a good thing we have photogenic kids. Erin was quickly fussy and wanted to get off of that podium. Every time we let go she tried to crawl off. She didn't like the positions she was forced to hold and didn't like not being held. Ian, on the other hand, is a ham. And no, I don't know where he gets that from. He thought it was funny if he made faces and stuck his tongue out at the last minute. There were a lot of retakes for him.

And then there were the packages. The cheapest package is $80. Or you can get the CD for $99 and print off as many pictures as you want. Sorry, give me a couple of backgrounds and I can do just as well with my own camera. But we were happy with what we got; now we have to wait until the cows come home to pick them up (they will being coming August 13 unless they come early. ?!).

Other news of the week: someone is interested in buying our house and is currently trying to get a loan. We don't want to get our hopes up, but the people in question keep calling us and asking us questions that make sense. We are happy to help, if it sells our house.

I did a lot of canning today. Well, it felt like a lot of canning. Only 6 jars of salsa this time, but I dejuiced and seeded tomatoes for hours today. My fingers are still a little pruny. My HC says that this skill is useful just in case I ever get sprayed by a skunk. Naturally, this made me feel oh so much better.

Ian had a friend over to play today. His friend, G, brought over a couple of toy trucks to play with. After an hour, he asked that they be put on top of the refrigerator to keep them safe (he is 5). Ian told him to leave them here when it was time to go home. G did not feel that it was necessary for him to do so and took them with him. I think Ian missed the toys more than he missed his friend, who has the tendency to choose watching tv over playing.

We are counting down to the "Meet Your Teacher" day at school. It is the same day that Uncle Steven will be going back to Florida. I'm sure he will be glad to sleep on anything other than the couch, especially if there's an air conditioning that works in the house.

We are in a heat advisory for the next several days. It has been topping 100 and is nasty outside. We are staying as close to our not-so-cold air conditioner as possible. I keep telling Ian that if he would sit still, he wouldn't be so hot. He does not agree.

Erin is getting that other top tooth in, finally. It is taking forever to break through and she is fretful. With the arrival of August, we are finished with her First Year calendar. I had so much fun writing everything down as she learned to do things, as well as big days for our family. I guess I'm going to have to figure something else out. :D

(Don't you just love the Tigger hat? We got it from Disney when Ian was 3 months old; they both look so cute in it.)

I don't feel as interesting today as I normally do. I spent a lot of time in the kitchen today with those tomatoes. I really hope the salsa turns out to be yummy. I'm not sure how I'll feel if it's nasty or no one wants to eat it. Oh well, we can always use it for Christmas gifts. Is it tacky to ask for the jars back?? Probably, but man, those jars are expensive!!

Now that it's August, I'm finally figuring out how to do things around the heat. Baking and cooking are best done in the morning, when the house is still cool. Unless you are canning, then there's no good time, it just makes everything hot. I am glad that our garden is not going to waste though. But now I am out of canning jars! Now, of course, is the time for someone to give us 10 lb of okra. I have everything but jars and hot peppers. Our local grocery store is not carrying them until the salmonella ? scare is over. I guess. I think. Because what other reason do they have not to carry them. We live in OK! There are ALWAYS peppers. Until now.

Another thing. My birthday is a week from Saturday. I feel like I need to make a list or something. My friend Rachel is a compulsive list-maker. Neat, right? No, the neat thing is that she actually DOES the things on her list. Crazy. I love to make lists too, but I end up doing other things and then putting them on the list so I can mark them off. Does anyone else do that?

Anyway, when you start not making sense it's time to go to bed. The best kind of people take their own advice. The End.

I Can Can

Canning was interesting. I didn't expect it to be so hot in the kitchen the WHOLE time. I guess all that brine and that big water bath canning pot boiling and the dishwasher and boiling lids and the 90 something degree weather outside all combined to make one wilted Mama.

And the crying baby/needy preschooler/curious-but-I-have-to-go-to-work husband was a factor as well. We started our Saturday by going to the Farmer's Market, a new institution in our county, part of the state, etc. We drove all the way to the town that has the Other Walmart (very small and not much selection; we kind of stopped going there) and through small, somewhat sloppy homemade signs, found the library whose parking lot housed the FM. There were 4 or 5 trucks with people sitting on tailgates with tables set up in front of them. Some had little tent/awning things set up. They all mostly had the same thing I have in my garden. No okra. That's what I really wanted, since my garden won't produce enough at a time to pickle. 'Next week,' said one farmer (he had the John Deere hat, the suspenders and the straw in his teeth; he was a farmer), "I'll have enough next week; Got a handful yesterday. I got 16 rows of okra. You come back next week." I assured him I would. To cut it short some, I got some zucchini from one lady who informed me that I needed to start growing my own food and asked Chris what branch of the Army he was in (???). After a puzzled pause, he said he wasn't. She nodded and said "Guard?" Before he could respond, she busied herself with my zucchini and change.

We were heading back to the car when we passed one last table with a mound of cukes. I buzzed over and asked the fateful question: "Are these pickling cucumbers?" "Uhhhh," said the husband. "Let me get my wife." He did and she assured me that they were. Obviously she scented an eager but somewhat naive wannabe canner, and told me that even the big ones would be great for bread and butter pickles if I sliced them up. (I ended up chucking the big ones because of the huge tough seeds, so that was all right.) I bought two cartons of beautiful cukes for $4. She gave me more from the u-pick box for free.

We headed to Walmart to get some pickle mix. I was relieved to find a mix that did 8 pint jars and not 16 quart jars, like the other recipes I had seen.

I went home and stuck my jars in the dishwasher and started slicing. (see pictures!)

Chris had to go to work before the real work got started, so these are the only ones we have. His camera phone does all our candid pics. The other camera is still collecting pictures for developing and has some cute 4th of July pictures on it, including Ian wearing a long black, curly costume wig. Hahaha.

Anyway, I sliced the cukes and put them in the prepared jars. I fixed the bread and butter mix (5 cups of vinegar, 5 cups of sugar!, and the mix packet) and ladled it into the jars of slices. I stuck a knife in the jar to remove air pockets. I wiped the rim of the jars and magneted the lids out of the boiling water. I stuck the lids on carefully, screwed the rings on and waited for the water in the canner to boil. And waited and waited and waited and waited and waited.

I went to Harp's to get some dill pickle mix, since I had some cukes left (and 3 jars; they didn't carry jars or I would've gotten more of them too). I came back and the water was still not boiling. Eventually it did and I stuck the jars in the wire rack and lowered them into the water. Whoops, not enough water. Added some more and waited for it to boil. It did and I timed it, took them out and added the rest.

The dill mix made my eyes burn something fierce! The bread and butter mix was like pine sap. Wherever it dripped, it stuck. The spoon had to be pried off of the stove. Erin stuck to the floor and screeched. My foot got sappy spots on it (what can I say? I'm a messy cook). Ew!

But this morning when I got up, I had 12 beautiful jars of pickles on my counter, each one sealed. I got out my Snoopy labels and now they are on my pantry shelves.

Now I'm excited about my okra next week!

Today, I didn't feel so Donna Reed. As usual, we waited until the hottest part of the day (when the baby was napping) and went outside to do yard work. I got to mow, Chris did the weedeater and Ian rode bikes, picked up toys, and asked me what was wrong every time the mower turned off. (One time I hit a dirt clump, but the rest of the time, I just needed a break! :)

And announcing to everyone, Erin got her 3rd tooth. A top tooth this time. It is sharp.

Burpless is Bad!

My garden is still going. The squash is on hiatus, the carrots are just weird and the okra is just getting started. So I did some Googling (be proud, Mom and JD and others to whom the answer is always "Did you Google it?") and found a great site that tells you how to can, preserve and anything else you want to do to produce. So I have great plans for my okra and tomatoes (which are all humongous and STILL green). I DID have great plans for my CUCUMBERS, but...sigh. Sigh. SIGH.


http://www.pickyourown.org/allaboutcanning.htm
"Burpless cucumbers are not recommended for use in fermented pickles. This is because at their normal mature size, they produce an enzyme that causes the pickles to soften during fermentation." Mushy pickles? Ewwwwwww.
When asking certain knowledgeable persons about which seeds to buy for my garden, I was advised repeatedly to get "Burpless Cucumbers." So I got them. A lot. And now I can't even can them!!! So we are giving them away. If you are close enough, you can come and Pick Your Own. Please. I shudder to think that I might have to BUY the canning cucumbers to make into pickles. But I may.

First, however, I am going to go for pickled okra. I am going to try a half batch first to see if it worked out (and because I don't have 7 lb of okra ready yet, all at the same time).

Happy for me, I have connections in town. The mayor's mama. She knows all about canning because she did it for years. Now she is a retired canner/gardener and gets her produce from industrial people with big gardens and too many of the wrong kind of cucumber. And her best friend, Millie the Mailperson, has a garden so big she bought a brush hog to till it with. So MoMo doesn't need a garden unless she needs a tomato or two to grow for fun. She has all the canning stuff and know-how, so she's letting me borrow a big vat to make the brine and her canner. She will also be available for assistance when (not if) I call her about how long to boil the lids and is the brine supposed to look/smell/fume like that?

I will be faithful to my readers (all 4 of you are great) and report any and all successes and mishaps. It will be Friday before I go to MoMo's house to get the canner because she invited the kids and I over for her family 4th get together + fireworks. We really love MoMo. She makes us feel good (and she laughs at my lame jokes. Kindred spirit).

We stopped at the fireworks stand today too and got some kiddy type fireworks for Chris and Ian to do together. Ian is really getting into the fireworks, since he had so much fun last year. This year he might even get off of my lap. His favorites are the poppers (sometimes they don't go off and snap. He doesn't always throw it down hard enough, so you learn very quickly not to go barefoot on the driveway unless you want to step on a 'live' one), the smoke balls (pretty!) and the really silly pointless ones shaped like boats, tractors, motorcycles etc that crackle and smoke and don't do much else but cost more. The upside is that when they're finished hissing and smoking, Ian plays with the charred remains until they completely disintegrate. Erin doesn't really care right now. She just likes to be outside and watch Ian have conniptions. He's funny that way.
My favorite are the ladybugs. We got 3. Woo hoo!

Oh, and Ian REALLY likes the parachute ones. We got a daytime one and a nighttime one. We did the daytime one this afternoon and this time, we caught the parachute! Last year it narrowly missed the powerline and got caught in the neighbor's tree. It is gone now, so I assume some industrious squirrel is saving it for emergencies. Or for his Tarzan routine.
But it's so hard to believe that it's July already. Three weeks until my babies' birthdays. Sigh!!

At least they like cucumbers. For now. And just in case you wanted a closer look at that carrot, there you are. I think our garden plot used to be radioactive or something. We have yet to get Just One.


Ian thinks these are hilarious. He still laughs every time he sees the picture. boys.

A Long Few Days

This week has been a busy one for us. It was the last week of the library activities :( and also the week of The Fever. Erin has had a fever, up to 103 for the past few days and nights. Just a fever and crankiness. The pain reliever/ibuprofen has been making her sleepy and gassy, an unthrilling combination. So I have walked a few miles on the carpet the past few nights, in between baking under our Eskimo comforter and reconstructing Ian's homemade tent over his bed at 4:30 after it collapsed on his head. Then he needs a drink, to pee, etc and then the baby cries again. Thus my career of being semi-nocturnal evolves.

Chris has been helping, sleeping like a log through all the disturbances and then getting up at 7 or 8 with the kids and letting me sleep in. Until it's time to get up and go to the library for the 10am shows. So I think my middle name starts with an L, but don't bet on it.

But that's all over now. The fever persisted through this afternoon, but she's sleeping beautifully in her crib now. At least until I get in bed.

Tonight is the Annual Westville 'Settler's Day' Rodeo. Yet here I am, home with the kids. Happily ensconced in our house, close to the new dishwasher and the air conditioner. Chris is on duty, happily heckling traffic offenders. (Note: Side effects of exhaustion include speaking nonsense, dreaming about starring in a broadway musical and speaking entirely in alarmingly astounding alliterations)

The garden is doing wonderfully, as is the garter snake who lives there. We thought the cucumbers were starting to die off, but they are still producing cucumbers that could double for javelins. The squash is picked off for a day or two. The okra is picking up and I have been forbidden from picking any more green tomatoes until they ripen. Grr. The peppers are a loss this year. Some kind of exotic beetle has taken over. They gather by the dozen on one leaf to sit, munch and reproduce. If you flick them off, they congregate on the plant next door and continue.

Our family went swimming in our pool yesterday. I am a redhead with a gazillion freckles, so Chris got our beach umbrella out and stuck it in the ground next to the pool. It put half the pool in the shade, so Erin and I sat happily in the shade while Chris and Ian splashed and caroused in the other end. We had fun. I wore a bathing suit for the second time this year, as well as enough sunscreen to spot from space.

Chris got his new boots today, so he is very thrilled. He was in an incident a week or so ago where he got called to a house where there had been a stabbing. When he got there, the victim was holding a rag to his head. When he moved the rag to see if the bleeding had stopped, the blood spurted out in a continuous stream until Chris and the other officer got the guy to keep it on there with pressure. Evidently his temporal artery had been punctured. He almost died in the hospital and needed transfusions. In the process, Chris's pants and boots were hosed in blood, so we had to get new ones. Naturally, they were backordered. But they got here today. Yay.

Also got the kids' birthday presents in the mail yesterday. They are in the closet in the box it came in. I predict that Chris will beg to give it to them early, at least 4 times before the birthdays come around.

In other news, we are checking into pre-k for Ian. Can you believe that school starts on August 7 here???

For some reason, I remember school starting the last week of August, or in the early 20s of August, and ending in June. What happened???

Oh and for an extra charge, "Cruze Night" and burnouts will be on my birthday! Wail of indignation and frustration! Arrrrgh! One more reason to absolutely loathe the Burnouts!

The police department is still chiefless. Everyone is wondering what will happen. We are still praying to get outta here. Also still looking for another job. Moving to FL seems to be another "no." Or at least a "no, not now." We can accept that, but it is still disappointing. All doors seem to be closed, so we're sitting here, waiting on God.

More news. Last night, every car on our street was broken into and change/cell phone chargers/purses/wallets/checkbooks were stolen. We were the only car that was left alone (and the police cruiser). Thank you Lord! Boy are we thankful that we locked everything up last night. We will continue to do so. Police are actively pursuing all leads and stopping everyone walking after dark as they are considered suspects! Just in case you're thinking about walking around here after dark, that is. :)

Oh, and that's me doing the Hokey Pokey at the Library Party "Going Buggy" last week. The first one is me dancing with a group of little girls. The one right here is where Chris tells me that I'm embarrassing Ian, please stop. "Hey!" I protested. "At least I'm dancing in a group!" He didn't see the cute little girls dancing with me. And he wouldn't dance either. The library coordinator/head librarian, my friend Sue Ann, snapped about 4 pictures of me doing it. At least she gave me 4. She could've taken a roll. Hm. She DID mention blackmail. Oh well, it'll take a lot worse than this to blackmail me! See me shake it all around? 'Cause "that's what it's all about!"

Cucumbers and Centaurs

That's what we've been eating a lot of recently: cucumbers. Because Erin likes it, that's why. And Ian does too. I'm glad we planted a lot of garden (even though I secretly think we won't be here to harvest...that makes me want to raise the asking price a little. Maybe $30 or so) because these 2 could eat a centaur out of house and home.

Just in case you're not brushed up on your C.S.Lewis, a centaur has a horse's body and legs and the torso and head of a man.

Courtesy of "The Silver Chair,":

"A centaur has a man-stomach and a horse-stomach. And of course both want breakfast. So first of all he has porridge and pavenders and kidneys [remember, Lewis was British, don't retch] and bacon and omelette and cold ham and toast and marmalade and coffee and beer [there's that British part again]. And after that he attends to the horse part of himself by grazing for an hour or so and finishing up with a hot mash, some oats and a bag of sugar [that part in particular reminds me of Ian, should he ever have his way]. That's why it's such a serious thing to ask a Centaur to stay for the week-end. A very serious thing indeed."

Back to the subject, Ian could clean out a farmer's market and Erin is not far behind him, especially when she finally gets some teeth. She's doing her share as best she can, gumming the cold cucumbers to a mealy, squishy end.

On a more humorous note, let's change gears a little. To me, choosing vegetables at the grocery store is a serious thing for me. Having grown some of my own vegetables, I'm pretty picky about what I eat. I don't like asparagus that's too thick, because it's tough and nasty. I don't like overgrown stuff because it's tough, as a rule. Bigger is not always better, unless you're going to make zucchini boats. Then it seems like you can't find a zucchini bigger than your finger.

Anyway, after you find the right size of vegetable, you want to make sure that it's ripe and so forth. So you squeeze it a little to make sure there's not any mushy or bruised spots that will make you throw half of it away when you cut it up.

Last, but not least, it's always good to smell it. That way you can smell any mold or overripeness easily. And that way if it doesn't smell like the fruit or vegetable you're after, you'll save yourself a little more trouble. For instance, if it's an orange that smells weird, it could be sour! Or a strawberry box that smells musty is probably molded at the bottom. Now that we've had our lesson and you're all determined to go and choose produce this way from now on, please finish reading.

I was at Walmart with the kids during our normal grocery shopping trip and finally made it to produce, that last stop before checkout for us.

I was choosing a couple of cucumbers and discarding a few of the larger ones right off because I really hate to get those big tough seeds when you eat a cucumber slice. So I picked one up and squeezed it and it was a little mushy, so I got another one, squeezed it and then smelled it and put it down. I chose another one and was just sticking it up to sniff it when I noticed two guys standing a few feet away with really strange looks on their faces. They did not look me in the eye and I couldn't figure out if they were horrified or laughing or just turned on when I realized that a cucumber is one of those things that guys get a kick out of because they can be phallic symbols, for lack of a more delicate phrase.

I felt my face turn red and burn and quickly grabbed some bananas and left. I no longer squeeze and smell cucumbers, or zucchinis for that matter, in public. I still feel my face start to burn when I pass the cucumbers. I told Chris about this and he about fell out of the car laughing. He still teases me about it. Notice that we never have any of this kind of stuff to laugh about when it comes to men. That's because they don't have the guts to tell the stories. Yes, that has to be why. ;)

I believe! I believe!

It has been a noisy interesting last couple of days. Erin is ferociously teething. She will not let me get more than a couple of feet away from her without crying. She wants to be held constantly--by me. Whenever Chris holds her she reaches out for me. Part of me is all touched and 'aw-isn't-that-sweet'! The rest of me just wants to go to the bathroom in peace and quiet without a sobbing baby sitting on the floor pulling at my leg.

And we've figured out that Ibuprofen does not sit well on her tummy.

On the flip side, Ian is doing tremendously well in the potty training arena. Except now he tells Everybody every time he has a body function. For example, he used the restroom in Wal-Mart (he's still scared of the noisy auto-flush). We clapped and yay-ed and when we were in the other end of the store, 20 or so minutes later, Ian saw an older woman and gleefully announced to her "I went pee pee in the toilet! Want to see?" She handled it very well and said no thank you, but did congratulate him on his success. She was really sweet. But does he have to invite everyone to look at it? I believe, I believe! (Some part of me is thinking of Peter Pan, where we clap and say "I do believe in fairies!" I don't know why.)

There has been another cold snap after the days of horrible thunderstorms and hail (yes, hail!). During one episode of penny sized hail, I went to the carport to pull the Jeep up a bit, in case the hail got bigger. There was some hail that had bounced over so I picked it up and brought it inside to show Ian. I explained to him that hail was just "Ice rocks from the sky". He looked at it, held it a bit and popped it into his mouth. "Mmm. Cold" was all he said. And that was that.

Last night it got down in the 40s. We are cold. It is really weird to be freezing and have the heaters on again and to look out into the yard and see the kiddie pools and the slip 'n slide.

I must take the time to mention that there are large warnings all over the slip 'n slide for good reason. Chris took Ian outside in his trunks (we're trying to get rid of the white pasty legs) and wet the ramp down and put dish soap all over it (just in case it wasn't slippery enough). Ian couldn't figure out how to slide down the strip into the little holding pool. So Chris kind of picked him up and did the old heave ho and skipped him down so Ian was sliding down on his bottom, like you do on a slide. Ian loved this and begged to do it again and again. Eventually Chris got tired and we debated on who should teach him how to go down on his belly. This is where the illiteracy comes in. I volunteered for the first skid and passed the baby to Chris. I took a run and leaped onto my knees (hey, I'm a girl and there are parts that make it painful to slide anywhere on your belly!) and promptly skidded off the edge into the muddy part. Naturally.

My knees and ankles and feet were kind of scraped up.

Well, Chris gave me a towel, passed the baby back and stated that you weren't supposed to go on your knees. Everybody knows that! So he (in pants and boots) backed way up and took a running leap and went down on his belly and skidded off into the same muddy spot (ha). He got scratches all down his belly. Ouch. They are still there.

Then we noticed all the writing at the beginning of the slide. The ones that say "For children between 2-12. Not for adults! Not for anyone over 100 pounds!"

Oh.

For laughs, I'm posting a picture that Chris took last week. He had taken Ian out to help him wash his police unit and then Ian decided that his trike looked kind of dingy, so he needed to wash it too. :)

Oh, my okra has popped up. The squash and cucumbers are growing very nicely, new leaves all over the place. The tomatoes still look peaked, but the peppers look the same size. We got a tiny strawberry off of Ian's plants and split it 3 ways. It was surprisingly sweet and Ian wanted more. He is waiting impatiently for our 2 plants to yield more. He checks it 5 or 6 times every time he plays outside.

White Pasty Legs

Well, hallelujah and pass the sunscreen. Uh, make that the sunless tanner. Because we wore shorts today (outside!) for the first time since, sheesh, last September, and our legs are scary! Even Ian's legs were all white and unreal looking. We were outside at the swingset and I was swinging both kids at the same time and mentioned that Mommy's legs were white and pasty. Ian thought I had some sort of cookie dough or something on my legs (who knows what he thought?) because he got off the swing and examined my leg and assured me that I didn't. Thanks. We'll compare in a couple of months when it becomes obvious to the world that Ian gets his tanning characteristic from Chris and not from me. We'll see how Erin does, but she DOES have reddish hair. She also still has her blue eyes (Ha! to the doubters that said her eyes would change!), so she could be the 4th redhead in the world to tan.

Either way, she has little shades and little sun hats to wear. She has started to yank the shades off to chew on the stems, but she still leaves the hats on.

Well, sports fans, we got plane tickets last week and will be heading out in a coupla weeks to see how it goes down South. Ian has been asking to go on the plane every 15 minutes since we purchased the tickets. Luckily, he is distracted by a friend's birthday party, which is tomorrow afternoon, so after the party is over, he'll be asking about the airplane every 7 minutes.

Erin is not interested in either. She just wants to be held constantly and won't go to sleep without nursing/being held. This is not the last time I have wished that someone else in our family was lactating! Wouldn't it be fair if Daddies could do it? I mean, hey, Mommies have to deal with the whole childbirth/recovery thing, which will not be taken lightly, but then our bodies are forever changed. Stretch marks are forever, man! And then things start to sag. Don't worry, I won't get graphic, but give me fur and a tail and I could masquerade as a kangaroo! Wait, maybe that's not a good comparison because they eat kangaroos in Australia. Never mind.

Well, we revamped the garden and put down a whole lotta weed-mat. So this year, since I'm not extremely pregnant, I will be spared the chore of weeding the garden. About a year too late, but it still works. Still, though, the garden is a lot smaller than last year and I am still convinced that we will sell the house before we harvest any of it, but I still can't do without it. I can, however, do without certain dogs (you know who you are) traipsing through and squishing plants. At least have the courtesy to cover your large paw prints. Blame it on marauding bunnies.

Ian has gone through some kind of miraculous transition in the Land of Potty-training. It has been two days in big boy undies and no accidents! No skid marks or dribbles or anything! I could SO get used to this! All Chris and I can do is clasp our hands together and fervently pray, "Please, Lord, please please please!"

And just in case anyone wonders what that is around Erin's mouth, don't worry. It's not Oreos. It's dirt.

To Fly a Kite

...You need:

1) a kite. Check.

2) Wind. Check.

3) A field or an open space sans power lines and trees. Check.

4) An attention span longer than 5 minutes. Uh.....

Well, we got a little kite for Ian for a buck at Walmart and of course the next morning at 7am, he was begging to go fly it. We have a little backyard with a fence around it, dogs, outbuildings (tiny), one tree, and several things to trip over should you look straight up and try to run around. So we relocated to a field next to the park and let it fly. I think Chris and I had more fun than Ian. Even Erin seemed transfixed. I don't know what Ian envisioned, but the wind was very strong and we hardly had to do anything but stand there and hold the end of the string. After a few minutes, Ian started throwing rocks and dirt clumps into the wind and had to be challenged to a race to the tree at the end of the field. He was out of breathe at the end of the race, but not worn out. Sigh. It was time for lunch!

Then we went back to Lincoln, AR (again!) to get more of Berry's pills for his Giardia, not to be mistaken or confused with Ghirardelli, good fancy chocolate. Rachel! :) ha ha.

He is taking his pills like a trooper and there is already a marked difference. (Don't ask "in what?" because I really don't want to go into it and gross everyone out, especially since I just mentioned expensive chocolate. Let's just say that there's no more gastrointestinal distress.)

Ian is doing good in his potty training. Nothing magical overnight, but it is steadily getting better. His sticker chart in the bathroom is filling up a lot faster than the last one (Hallelujah!).

There is still a need for constant laundry, but he is getting it and we are all thrilled and relieved. Even when he wears pullups (like when someone needs to get cracking with the laundry, or at night time) he is still peeing in the potty. Pooping not so much. Okay, only once. In six weeks. So we have at least one accident a day from that alone and have used gallons of bleach and color-safe bleach. Shudder!

Moving on to other topics. The frost of last weekend killed ALL of the plants in my garden. They are all brown and shriveled in the row. It is very sad. But today I snuck some money out of the jar and went to the Red Barn and got some seedlings. We've got some tomatoes, green peppers, cucumbers and straight-neck squash. At Ian's wheedling (and my own whim) we also got two little strawberry plants. It has to be better than last year's attempt which yielded absolutely nothing. I knew I buried the stems upside down. Or something. This time all you have to do is bury the peat pot and voila! We'll see.

My seedlings got drowned in the torrential downpours of last week and then got copious amounts of lime deposited on them, so they are sad and moldy. A loss. So now I feel EVEN BETTER about the $$ I spent on ready-made plants. Next year I'll do better with my own seedlings. Next year we will be in Florida and won't have this weird weather (yes, I know you had a cold front in FL, but boo hoo! It got to 24 here!).

Plans are now nonrefundable for our trip to Florida next month. Chris will be taking that law enforcement review, commuting an hour and 15 minutes and the kids and I will be staying at Mimi and Grampa's house, chilling. I am looking forward to visiting and enjoying the weather and letting Ian and Erin play in the sprinkler in the backyard. I'm also hoping that Grampa will consent to let Ian decorate the driveway in sidewalk chalk, as he will be over the moon when he realizes that the driveway is THAT BIG.

The only downside is that this time, we can't bring the tricycle.

Creepy Crawly

It is so interesting to me to see Erin's progression, day by day as she struggles to end the misery of close encounters with the carpet fibers. Of course if you drool a lot, anything on the carpet tends to stick to it. Yuck. Now we just have to deal with it stuck to her hands. But today she got her first round of chafed knees. She is not crawling yet, but sort of creeping. She can scoot when she is sitting up, but today she has started to get on her hands and one knee and sort of rock. The same leg gets caught up under her, but she is figuring it out by trial and error. The look of determination on her face is so blatant, you can almost hear Chariots of Fire in the background. It really is cute and kind of inspiring. I would be more inspired if I knew that she wouldn't be in every cabinet in the house (and more) the moment she figures it out.

Ian was on the potty seat today and she scooted over there and used his leg to pull herself up. She almost made it to standing, but there were a couple of toes that just like to be used as tippy toes and nothing else, so bloop! There she went and Ian's attention was focused on trying to get her to move, since it's His potty seat. The logic of the 3 year old male mind is truly a complex thing.

On to more aromatic news. I made cinnamon rolls from scratch yesterday and even concocted my own cream cheese frosting. Well, they're gone. All of them. I got a little impatient when the dough was rising (hey, we were hungry!) though, so they weren't quite as huge as they probably should have been, but they were still amazing. I feel so accomplished. I love yeast! It does spectacular things to flour.

Our grill is also a thing of mystery. It does not grill meat so well as it does arms and eyebrows, so I do not even attempt to light it on my own. So Chris does and since he works the evening shift, we only use the grill on his weekends. Which start tomorow. Yay! So we had pizza tonight for dinner. I added garlic powder to the crust mix this time and it was better, I think. The corn meal also gives it a less bready consistency. I like it.

Bug bombs are going off again either tomorrow or Tuesday. Yes, still dealing with the odd flea or two and since it is now spring, all the newly awakened bugs are coming through every nook and cranny for new housing options. No thanks! So I guess we'll have to go to Cracker Barrel or the mall or something to kill some time. Shucks!

We sent off Chris's registration on Thursday along with his registration fee. We sent it certified mail and Chris (ok, me too) has been checking quite a lot to see if it's made it out of the state yet. (It hasn't.) As soon as we get his confirmation, we have plane tickets, baby! Chris is excited. He has never been on a plane before. Neither has Erin and Ian doesn't remember the plane trip to Gramma and Papaw's wedding. I remember that Ian was sick and crying most of the time and had one of the Flood pee pee diapers that made a huge wet mess everywhere and stunk up the plane. But everything is better when Chris is there, so I'm pretty optimistic about it all. Of course there is the tiny matter of clearing his firearm with the airline, but we are going to manage it. It ought to be interesting to say the least.

We had another frost a day or so ago that fried the tiny leaves on my tomato plants, but everything else seems to be holding up very nicely. Ian has sprouts in his tiny KidKit pot. He planted (well, he played in the dirt and Mommy planted) sunflower seeds that came in the kit. He wants to touch the sprout and probably dig it up, but we keep it out of reach over the kitchen sink and try to remember to water it. Still no sign of carrots anywhere, but there are two of my peat pots (got that Mom? PeeeeeaT pots) that have sprouts as well. Looks like one cucumber and one squash. Chris informed me that he likes the yellow squash but does not like zucchini. I don't really understand this, but we did not plant any zucchini this year. Probably moot either way since the house will be sold before harvest, but they might not like zucchini either. I also planted some lavender in hopes of drying some, but there's no sign of it either. The dogs have pretty much taken care of the new flower bed out front. No canine can resist the freshly churned earth without wanting to roll/dig/lie in it. I have replanted a few flowers several times only to see them sprawled forlornly in a different part of the yard 10 minutes later. The dogs do NOT have a fondness for pansies. I read somewhere that if you crush mothballs on the perimeter of your beds, it will keep dogs out, but it will also keep this gardener out. And prospective buyers. And we'll never be able to open the windows again either without gagging. So I guess we wasted our $6 on pansies, huh?