How we spent last weekend

Miss Miri got to go grocery shopping like a big girl, sitting in the cart instead of the car seat. She was in heaven, being able to see things better. And then, of course, while checking out, she was reaching and touching everything she could. When it comes to that sort of thing, she's definitely challenging Mommy more than her sister did.


Daddy fell a few old, dead oak trees in the upper pasture. We love our tractor!!


Cool tree formation. The cross-bar on top is an old fallen limb from a different tree.


We have hosted a darling little bird in the barn all winter long. (I tried taking pictures of it, but they didn't turn out worth a darn with my cell phone camera.) I was moving a few bales of hay the other day, and lookie what I found! I was worried these 4 eggs might be abandoned, but last night while feeding the animals, mommy bird was on the nest. YAY! We'll leave those bales of hay alone for as long as we can, in hopes she can raise her babies.


Aleaha and her friend Sylvie attended a birthday party in lovely party dresses. Aren't they darling?


Here's a shot of Miri as she was waking up from a nap in the swing at school. Love those rosy cheeks!

How do you like your eggs?

Aleaha, while cooking in her kitchen tonight, says,

"Mom, how would you like your eggs: scram-boiled or porched?"

Forgot to post these

Aleaha uses her "turry tomb" gently on Jake's cheek.


A giant, aging manure pile makes a great thing to climb. We had lock Spiffy in the barn, though, because he kept wanting to knock Aleaha over like a bowling pin.


Miss Miri doesn't need a driver. She can do it herself. She loves this thing and all the noises it makes. Aleaha's quite fascinated too, and I can't keep Aleaha off of it. I kinda remember doing that as a kid myself....younger sister's playthings become interesting for a while, I suppose.


Horses under the cherry tree. (And Chloe is such a Dirty Girl!!)


Aleaha has been dressing herself recently, and this is the kind of outfit we get. She says, "The stripes in the shirt match the stripes in the skirt (or "stirt", in her lingo), and the black in the tights match the black in the shirt, and the white in the shoes matches the white in the skirt." Look out, Project Runway.

Watching the Drags, Playing, etc.

We've had some fun times lately (exhausting, but good). Here's a photographic catch-up...


We went to the track to watch Daddy's first race of the season. It was loud, stinky, and a little tiring, but good to see the Chili Pepper team in action. Here's Aleaha and Daddy in a special moment.


Miss Miri is a Baby Driver too. She knows what steering wheels are for!


And here's a shot of Aleaha from three years ago, the same event (Woodburn's Tulip Festival Drags). Have you got dejavu yet??


Miri has a little yogurt smoothy snack.


Miri was loving the whole thing ('cept Mommy covering her ears, of course). She stayed awake as long as possible, and then just couldn't hold out any longer.


Aleaha pushes Miri on the swing. Mommy's lovin' it!!!


Miri enjoys the heck out of ho-ho. Oh yes, the girl knows treats.


Aleaha didn't take a nap at school one day, then fell asleep in the care on the way home. We tried to wake her for dinner, but she was behaving like an alien. So we put her in her bed, and she stayed asleep the whole night. Her lesson: Make sure you take a nap at school, or else you might miss dinner!


Miri is not exactly liking tummy time. She's on the edge of crawling, but she gets pretty frustrated.


Aleaha cuts strawberries for breakfast one Saturday morning....


And of course she has to sample a few along the way.


Aleaha wanted to learn how to wash dishes. "Uh, sure, you can do that!," Mommy exclaimed. Of course, it's a bit o' work to get her set up, but she did a nice job. And it kept her occupied for 15 minutes, so Mommy could run up and down the stairs to put in some laundry. Sheesh, these chores are exhausting!

Gimme my ravioli!!

Most days, it feels like the gods are against me. But every now and then I have a little win. Today was my day!

I have been panicky in the last few weeks because I couldn't stock my pantry with the requisite amount of Gerber Graduates Pasta Pick-ups (aka baby ravioli). Here's what I'm talkin' about:

These things are super for Miri. They are easy to grab, don't have to be heated up (although I think they are better that way), and they make a great lunch for her at school. It's not that I am obligated to provide her with her own food for lunch (well, I do still go there to feed her twice a day, so you could say I bring her snacks all day long!), but Miri is more advanced when it comes to solids, and her classroom at school is just not really set up for this. They have a regular lunch for the kids each day, but for a tiny tot like her, it's just not usually the sort of stuff she can eat. Like most kiddos, she loves pasta, and these little jars are perfect for her. Yeah, yeah, I know they are totally processed, too much sodium, etc. But hey, you do what you can do. She digs 'em, she needs to eat, and so there you have it.

Problem is, these little gems suddenly became unavailable at my local Safeway. So I branched out to another Safeway. No dice. After calling the store to learn that they have been DISCONTINUED as a stocked item, I placed an order online from Target for two cases. Yes, I'm willing to pay through the nose for them (between their price and shipping -- sheesh!). Then I got a notice that they were backordered until June. Uuuuh, she'll probably be eating steak by then. I need them NOW. I checked the Gerber website, and best I can tell is that they are in the middle of a switchover to new packaging. Hey, I'm in Marketing, and I know that marcom crap is NO REASON to deny my child via an embargo on her ravioli!

Well, I happened to be at a third local Safeway today, getting prescriptions for my mother in law. I took a cruise down the baby aisle (habit), readying my mental message to Safeway grocery managers about their lack of attention to my needs (hello, I buy every jar they have on the shelf each week!). When what to my wondering eyes do I see?? A whole load of them, in three flavors, right there on the shelf!

I ran to get a cart and raced back to that aisle before some other mommy saw them.

I nearly bought them out. I decided that was just a tad selfish and it would be nicer if I could leave one of each flavor on the shelf for the neighborhood babies and their mommies, who surely must need these too.

Oh, and the other reason I'm feeling a win today....we are getting a tax refund (you know, of our own money). First time in 10 years. I don't mean to get all political on you, but I guess the formula for this "success" (is that what this is??) is:

1) Abuse yourself and your family trying to make as much as you can so you can be a good taxpayer and mortgage holder.

2) Send it all in to the IRS, including some you might not have earned yet. Worry about it every day. Go without so that you can send in quarterly payments.

3) Be happy that your income went down instead of up, even though you're getting closer to retirement, your 401K is in the toilet, and your children are getting closer to college age (OK, so admittedly we have a little time on this last one).

4) Be amazed when they send some back to you. Of course, you'll never get back the time you lost with your family.

And somehow I'm all relieved and happy about this.

Mud and More

We have a wee bit o' mud to manage at the barn. The French drains we put in do a lot to help, but we haven't been able to scrape the barnyard with the tractor for some time, and the water has been pooling and almost runing into the barn. Here is Chris making a moat in front of the horses' stall. He rode the 4-wheeler through first a couple of times to create some tracks, then he cleared them out even more with a rake. Uck!


We cruised over to Henry & Max's house down yonder for Max's birthday party. Aleaha was dressed to the nines, so I lined the wagon with a picnic blanket and gave her an umbrella. Yeah, now she wants to wear her dresses everywhere we go, AND use the umbrella. It's all just a ploy. She's a total schemer.


Sorry Nick, couldn't resist posting the shot of you with the amazing paper mache fish.


The pinata broke (somewhat), so Felice helped distribute the candy throughout the room a little, to the thrill of the crowd. But where's Aleaha? Note the little girl in the purple dress watching from the doorway in the background. That's more her style. But fear not, she managed to pick up a few pieces of candy.



Miri samples some homemade miniature donuts her sister and mommy made.


It looks like a crime scene, eh? It's strawberry goo, used to disguise the horrid flavor of some medicine she had to take when she was sick. She got into it a bit, and I wasn't about to stop her.


She can really clean her plate when she wants to!

Easter!

'
Aleaha coloring eggs.


Aleaha reading a bunny book to Miri.


Gotta be quick to catch this wascally wabbit. (The ears were off in a flash.)


A peaceful moment as Aleaha colors with a special fairy coloring book and water pen. Zero creativity needed -- right up Mom's alley!


Getting ready to make lemon bars.


Henry heads to the swingset to see if there might be an egg or thirty laying around there.


A healthy dose of candy for the crew. Plus an emu egg.


Despite the look on Aleaha's face in the previous shot, she did well -- here she is with hers and her sister's baskets. Next year, Miri can join in the hunt!

Bound to happen at some point

The other day, I was in a local department store, sans children. It was a very rare ocassion -- rare to be in a department store, and rare to be without kids, so this was truly an alignment of the stars. I happened to be buying children's clothing (it's where the money goes, ya know?). I took the items to the clerk and we struck up a friendly conversation while she scanned my items. And then it happened: She said what I knew someone was going to say to me at some point....

"Oh, I'm sure your granddaughter will love these pretty little things."

GULP. My granddaughter!

To be sure, I did correct her, "Actually, these things are for my two daughters." (Afterall, I was purchasing things in size 9 months and size 4T, so it was pretty apparent there were two kids involved, I thought. She could have at least gotten the pluralism correct.)

And after taking a moment to soak it in and maybe do a little math in her head, she apologized profusely. I thought it was just kinda funny.

Kinda.