Day Ones

Another year has passed, the Earth has completed another race around the sun, the air coaxes goosebumps on our arms, and the 2010-11 school year is off with a bang. Last week, Leah began her year as a first grader, attending the same Spanish Immersion program as she started with Kindergarten last year. She exuded confidence and, thankfully, lacked any sense of that "Yeah, Mom, I knoooooow" attitude that I expect many of her peers have by now. You can sense her enthusiasm in her porch photo here:

This week was Natalie's turn for a first day. She'll be attending a half-day pre-school program a few days a week. Starting "slow and easy" is probably more for my sake than hers. She is my baby after all. She was very excited, super prepared, and quite thrilled to be able to use my old backpack from college. I washed and dried it the night before and left it on her chair for her to find in the morning. According to my morning report, she had it on since 6:30 a.m. She even picked out her own outfit and dressed herself head to toe. This girl was born ready. Check it out:

Am I ready? I think so. I will make really good use of the time she's playing, and hopefully be able to enjoy more of the time we share. Knowing she is so adroit at fitting in and playing well helps a ton. Now if only I could do the same. ;)

How to Age your Kid in 5 Minutes

I finally cut Natalie's hair. Maybe it's because she's the baby and I don't want her to go through any of those rites of passage that signify aging, maybe it's because I had hopes that she would be the kid that didn't mind having her hair brushed every day, or maybe it's because I didn't want to risk marring her innate "cute" factor, but I haven't cut Natalie's hair at all. Not even to get gum out.

By this age, Leah had been having her bangs cut fairly regularly and was nearing her first major haircut. But, and I sadly admit this, Natalie does not have Leah's hair. Incidentally, Natalie's fingernails, ear wax and hair grow slower and less abundantly than Leah's. So, on a bit of a whim last night after dinner, I asked, "Natalie, would you like to get some bangs tonight?" To which she giggled and cheered in approval.

Out came the good scissors and a comb, and we set up a makeshift salon on the back deck. A quick "Before" shot...


And we dug in. Look at how much these long bangs pain her. They have got to go.


And go they do! And already smiles and laughter from the little one!


And here's the "After:"

Who is this bright-eyed three-year old? It couldn't possibly be the same little tyke sitting in this chair five minutes ago! As soon as I'd cut it, I kicked myself a bit for not doing this sooner. It is such an improvement to be able to see her face!

This past week, we also rang in Leah's birthday. We rode through the rain in the Tour de Tonka before heading up to the cabin for the lake association's annual picnic and games, as well as some delicious homemade pizzas for dinner. It turned out to be a very busy and beautiful day. A week later, Leah had her friends join her at a nearby community farm for a belated birthday party. A fun mix of small farm life, amazing cupcakes, and mega crazy kids.


I also tried to recreate some scrumptious and substantial corn flake crusted, french toast that I enjoyed at Wishbone in Chicago years ago. Using this kid-friendly recipe, the girls and I putzed through the steps and turned out some rather tasty dippers. By themselves, they're not that sweet, which is fine considering we drowned them in syrup, but I'm tempted to try different, more sinful cereals to coat these bad boys. Coco Roos, perhaps? :)

That's it for this post. Go Twins!

G-bye, June. HiYa, July!

Once again, I've left you with a sizable gap in time between blog posts. I did this so you could fully absorb the awesomeness of the last post and prepare yourself for still more awesomeness in this one. Yeah, completely planned this out to the minute. Yeah. ;)

Enough of that. On to the goings on!

Natalie has recently taken to drawing little people with great big eyes and heads, and little bitty arms and legs. Here, she's posing with one of her creations on the big Magna Doodle.


We all took a trip up north to visit family and take in some nearly perfect summer days. We enjoyed the newly renovated park by the lake:

Natalie on the springy sea horse:


Leah, halfway up the swirly slide:


Then we returned to my folks' house for some outdoor sightseeing of Mom and Dad's hard-earned gardening efforts.

Mom de-weeding between the brick border:


A peony with salvia in the background:


A clutch of boldly bright dianthus (my camera couldn't seem to grab the color as it was):


Yellow, evening primrose:


And a monarch foraging in a huge lily blossom:


Of course, no June tour of the gardens would be complete without seeing some bug pornography. These nasty little buggers are the dreaded rose chafers, or what Mom calls "f*ckin bugs." When they hatch from the ground, they swarm the plants, eating and mating, mating and eating. I still cringe when I see them:


Soon after we returned home, we welcomed some of the up north crew to our place to gather and attend a Twins game. Before the game started, my brother was honored in a ceremony for his outstanding commitment to keeping DUI-ers off the roads. He was in an elite group of officers from across the state and we cheered like obnoxious children when we saw the group emerge onto the field. I was too zoomed in at the time to make it clear, but this is my brother on the gi-normous t.v. screen at Target Field:


And here he is making small talk with T.C. Bear (mustachioed in honor of pitcher Carl Pavano that night):


We are so stinkin' proud of you, Lyan! Keep kickin' butt out there!

This was my first time at the new ballpark, and I think it is GORGEOUS! We found Matthew's family name on the Tradition Wall (a gift to his Dad and uncle):


Took the obligatory "in the seats" shot:


And the obligatory "from the seats" shot (I loved how monochromatic the skyline looked as the sun set behind us):


Back home once again, we've been thoroughly enjoying our CSA share this year -- our first, officially. We also bought a meat share from an organic lamb, beef and chicken farm. One night, we dined on this feast: A huge beef sirloin (most of which we saved for another meal) and a sugar snap pea, potato, fennel and mustard salad. Delicious!


Most recently, we rang in Nat-o's third birthday! She picked out a chocolate cake from the grocery store. It was decorated like a picnic blanket with plastic ants and a lady-finger/pink frosting hot dog. Natalie went straight for the hot dog and it was gone in a flash.


And finally, we leave you with another shot of one of the elusive "Whitey" squirrels in our neighborhood. This one perched atop our short woodpile to munch on something tasty.


Thanks for tuning in once again! I hope you've enjoyed the show! As always, I encourage you to visit my shop blog as well to see what I've been doing there.

Might as well JUMP!

Fewer words. More photos.
Things we learned last week.

1. Jumping is fun.*

2. Jumping is very fun.*

3. My girls fancy themselves budding supermodels.






4. June flowers are purdy.





* Photos 1, 2 & 4 taken by Rebecca. Thank you for sharing!

When you say, "Craftstravaganza," you've said it all!

Last year, I took in my first St. Paul Craftstravaganza as a shopper, in awe of the awesomeness at every single booth (yes! None disappointed!), and taking mental notes for what I might do were I to tackle my own craft fair booth someday.
This year, with a couple of shows under my apron, I will be on the other side of the booth as a vendor, hoping to meet lots of cool folks, hug lots of new friends, and sell lots of my neat-o work! If any of you are in the area, please, please come and check it out. You will not leave empty handed. In addition to all the tempting goodies crafted and otherwise, there will be make & take demos, and I'm giving out free hugs! It's going to rock!

*** this post is cross-posted from my shop blog***

Happy, Happy!

This post is all about sharing some smile-inducing moments from the last week. Enjoy!

"Whitey." One of at least TWO albino grey squirrels in our neighborhood.



Tulip "spears" in the front yard!



Muffin head.



Smiling Nato



Happy girls by receding lake ice.

Girlie Things

In the past couple of weeks there have been some significantly "girlie" things happening. And by "significantly" I mean that Leah and I have actually done *something* remotely associated with taking advantage of our extra x-chromosome.

Two weeks ago, I got to be kid-free for a wonderfully long morning and afternoon to celebrate the soon-to-be (and now current!) birth of a little one that a couple we know and love is adopting. After stuffing my face at a breakfast out, five of us wimmings took over a bank of fancy-schmancy pedicure chairs for some royal toe treatment. It was wonderful and over much too soon. Before we all scattered, I snapped this pic of our pedigree piggies:



Just this past weekend, Leah had her first manicure in the company of her auntie Kira and Grandma Jan. She held very still, and was even tearless and scream-free as the manicurist brushed Leah's snarly hair into a ponytail so she'd look better in the photos.








Now that she's been introduced to the whole procedure, I'm sure we'll have to visit the salon at least once a month, don't you think?

This past month, we also had the chance to get together with Natalie's closest cousin in age. When the two of them realized that they both had a "Woof Woof" it was just a "Woof Woof" weekend from then out. Here they are snuggled in Ellie's big girl bed with their pups at hand:



Taking this picture reminded both Sarah and me that we have a small but special collection of photos of these two monkeys from very early on. Separated by only 16 days, we have a sneaking suspicion that, left to their own devices, these two could get into a lot of mischief together.

About 7 months:


About 2 months:


Just a few days for Ellie:


Anyone who knows me, knows I'm not a very girlie girl. But with these two, I might just change my ways.

Piles o' White Stuff

When assembling the photos for this post, I couldn't help but think of the Showcase Showdown on the Price is Right and the themed collections of "fabulous prizes!" So this blog post features "prizes" that all include piles of some sort of white, fluffy stuff.

Knowing we live in the the arctic state of Minnesota, it's easy to predict that the first set of piles are comprised of white, fully snow. We've had snow that has stuck around since early December and most of it has fallen in relatively easy-to-shovel increments. Our last batch measured just over a foot within 48 hours. I'm always grateful for any balmy blue-sky days after a load of snow like this. Makes all the sweat and back ache from shoveling well worth it. And for the record, nearly every inch of this was cleared, lifted, hoisted, scraped, scooped, etc. without the use of a snowblower. If we get another storm like this one, that fact may change.

The homestead from the road:



View from the front door:



Looking from the front porch out to the street:



The next white fluffy stuff is edible even when in shades of yellow. I made a batch of vanilla meringues, let Natalie sprinkle some red sugar on top, and dipped each into a bit of melted chocolate chips. They make the perfect little sugary treat sometimes, and they look pretty cute too.



The final white, fluffy stuff is in the kitchen sink. Following in her big sister's footsteps, Natalie volunteered to wash a few dishes after I had done the bigger ones. She still had a bit of a stretch even with the help of the step stool, but she was fully engrossed with scooping, pouring, and scrubbing for a good twenty minutes.





Sorry, there's no trip to Exciting Las Vegas and no one will win a mid-size sedan with California Emission, but there's no need to guess the price since this package is... well,... priceless. *cheese*