August Album: There’s treasure everywhere

In addition to a tremendous growth spurt by Leo, our August was awesome!  The highlight included spending our eleventh wedding anniversary on Whidbey Island with my brother JP, Meghan and "cousin Carlos".  We met several members of Meg’s extended family, basked in the sun, and boarded along the beach in a quaint cabin affectionately called “the Peanut”.  It was relaxing and joyful!

During hikes along the beach, Dean scouted for treasures.  Our finds: uniquely colored rocks (he seemed to gravitate toward the reddish ones - must be his Oklahoma roots?), shells, and small abandoned beach toys.  It was such a lovely time - great weather, great company, the best of food and music.  There’s treasure everywhere.

My brother has me convinced that crabbing is the best way to catch your meal:  leave a trap in the water, forget about it all day while basking in the sun and looking for treasures, and then return to find your meal waiting for you.  The intimidating part is reaching in the trap to fetch your crabs (throwing out the females and small males per licensing requirement) without being pinched.  And the crabs are feisty!  They draw blood with their claws and they don’t let go.  I watched him do it successfully several times (the day before he had had one unlucky pinch), and finally I took a deep swallow and fetched one out myself!  It was frightening but oh-so-rewarding.  Crabs make such a delicious meal.

Between crabbing and hiking, our agenda was filled with serious beach-time.

    

The last day on the island, we headed into town for a delicious meal and said good bye.

On the ferry ride over and back, Dean and Fiona were fascinated with the fact that our van could be on top of a boat!  There was giggling and clapping.  Such wonder!

We also were fortunate to spend some time in Seattle before our trip with dear friends, Aunt Terri and Uncle Lou and Erin, Ellis and Camille.  Our summer has been filled with exciting adventures, and we are so grateful for the friends and family that fill our lives with joy and give it meaning. 

Some of August was also spent in quiet (well, never really quiet) moments at home and typical days at the park. 

Monkey in fancy shoes!

Brothers enjoying their treasures.

the farmer debriefs the flight

So... just a debrief:  it IS possible to fly on an airplane solo with three children - two on either side plus one infant on your lap.  It's pretty tight, and I don't recommend longer than three hours.  But it can be done.  Both flights to and from Denver were uneventful - my two-year-old and four-year-old told me they wanted to get off about an hour and a half into the air both times.  Um, not an option.  But they tolerated the rest of the way each time, mainly eating their way through it.  The key was providing snacks they could play with:  multi-colored goldfish and animal crackers.  And lots of tiny stickers to count and stick on their notebooks.  Also a calm mom with a flight attendant call button.  No problem.  None at all.

Our visit was awesome, too - I'll post some pics soon.

a fox, a chicken, and a bag of seed

I've been thinking a lot about this riddle and having three kids.

A farmer has to get a fox, a chicken, and a bag of seed across a river.
He has a rowboat, and it can only carry him and one other thing.
If the fox and the chicken are left together, the fox will eat the chicken.
If the chicken and the seed are left together, the chicken will eat the seed.
How does the farmer do it?

If you think about all of these relationships together, it will make sense who is who.  Dean is the fairly sly fox,  presenting no real hazard to baby Leo, my sweet bag of harmless seed.  My two-year old is clearly the chicken.  Something about Fia tempts Dean to ruffle her feathers, so to speak - which is oh-so-easy to do.  And conflict will reach high peaks, resulting in tears and  feelings hurt and yelling that could wake even the most resilient bag of seed. And something about Leo - everything about Leo - requires that we must watch Fiona constantly lest she smother him with doting sisterly love.  Cluck cluck.  "Give him space," I hear myself saying all the time.  And many times they all need to be separated lest the rowboat (my arms? my sanity?) tip over.  It is a tricky balance for a novice farmer.

I am not trying to say that my children will eat each other, but if you remember the way this riddle is solved, I think about it constantly.  Because I am constantly rowing up and down that river.  When I fix dinner or use the restroom or run downstairs to wash a load of laundry or change or feed the baby, or (heaven forbid!) shower, I think about this riddle.  I think about which combination presents less risk at that moment.  I think about whether or not my darling hen has napped yet, or who she is most likely to have a conflict with, since the chicken in this riddle and a two-year-old have the most variables.  I think about my bag of seed as really a bag of jumping Mexican beans, since he no longer (or ever has?) been still (having first rolled over at one week old).

I think about this riddle especially as I am about to embark on a flight to Denver next week.  Matthew and I decided to take advantage of the Labor Day holiday in combination with the kids' school in-service day.  I'll have the opportunity to visit my sister Gina and family in her new house while allowing Matt some time alone to work on the completion of our second bathroom without worrying about the noise and mess.  Granted, it is a nonstop flight - with Matthew on one end of the flight and my sister on the other end.  But three hours inside an encapsulated steel tube with the fox, chicken and bag of seed is a bit daunting.  One successful run to Costco with these three last Friday, and now we're going airborne?  Really? 

My fellow Southwest passengers: please be easy on us.  The farmer must make it across safely with everyone in tact.

milestones for Leo

My three are hams!  It is very difficult these days to set Leo up for his monthly portrait without including his two adoring fans. 

I am amazed each day to see how much Leo has developed.  He is starting to say repeatedly 'ba-ba-ba" and rocking on all fours - even pulling up on his toes at times.  Most recently, he started expressing frustration when toys are just out of his reach.  Usually his brother and sister are eager to retrieve them for him, but since last night, he began leap-frogging forward!  My last vestigial days of control are clearly numbered. 

Leo has been showing an interest in food lately - or at least in upending our meals with his crafty little hands - reaching for my bowl of cereal and spilling it on me, pulling out the placemat from under my plate, trying to grab my cup of coffee...  So today, Leo started his first solid food: avocado.  I think it was a success!  He eventually managed to take over the spoon and smear avocado all over his arms and cheeks.  Leo, you are too cute.  We remembered back to the days of feeding Dean as a baby and how we always had two spoons available - one for him and one for us. 

We are all in love with our sweet Leo!

July Album: The days are just packed

In case my anonymous readers are unfamiliar with the title, it refers to Dean’s newly acquired interest in Matthew’s old Calvin and Hobbes’ books – and it rings true in our case.  My, oh my.  July was quite some time ago!!!  It’s rather busy in our little house – and inside the fort that Matthew just finished constructing outside – so, I’m far behind on blog posts.  (See the reason why I don’t post.)  A few great things happened this month: 

1. Ayme, Matthew’s sister came to visit us and help us take care of Leo.  We had many, many adventures such as picking berries and visiting the zoo.  And we read lots of stories.  Aunt Ayme has an endless amount of energy for reading books (unless it’s the Berenstein Bears and she’s in the back of the van…)

    

2.  Leo turned four months old! 

He has mastered rolling onto his tummy, and he even started to become mobile with scooting, wiggling and rolling.  Our new rule in the living room is:  No small toys!  Leo’s world is expanding with all of his movement.   


Luckily, Dean and Fiona love to play with all of Leo’s toys, and Leo loves to watch his brother and sister.

He has also recently grown fond of his fingers.  Such a cutie pie!

3.  Dean and Fiona started having a great summer.

 
Now I have to geek out and wear my urban designer hat for a moment.  Remember this amazing park from last December’s album?  The same but completely different and incredible playspace transformed for summer (just add water).  In this case, the setting for a five-year old’s birthday party.  Nice.
 

4.  We returned to the Oregon Dunes for a family vacation!

Last summer, we spent some time out at the Heceta Beach with dear friends of ours, who, sadly, live on the other side of the country.  This year, we wanted to share the experience with our friends Scott and Jenn and their three kiddos.  Vacations are so much better with friends.
Of course, to kick the whole thing off, we stopped over at the Oregon Aquarium in Newport.
We walked through the ‘Shark Tunnel’ and we felt sea anenomes and sea stars in the touch pool.  So awesome!

We even took our friends back to the Hobbit Trail – which couldn’t be found if it weren’t for my previous blog post and my iphone.  Oh technology.
These were beautiful days at the beach.  To be clear, the water was startlingly frigid – this is no Gulf of Mexico.  But try to convince my Oregonian kids that the water was too cold for swimming!  (My husband didn’t need convincing…)





Our children had a blast!  Here’s a quiet moment of eating cantaloupe before dinner…

We took sunset walks to the beach.
   
We also visited the Oregon Dunes National Recreation area.  So much sand, so many dunes - this landscape was sublime.  It was perfect for rolling down the hills and well.. simply frolicking.  The backdrop is a wooded upland forest and the might Pacific Ocean beyond.  Incredible.


On the way home, we stopped for a picnic in Lincoln City which happened to be celebrating a kite festival. 


Exuberance!

June album: Strawberry fields forever

The last weekend in June, we headed out to Sauvie Island for our annual strawberry picking.  The berries are late this year, which means the weather was warm.  I am happy to report that it is the first time since moving to Oregon that I did not have to wear my fleece or down vest while picking strawberries.

 

I love love love berry-picking - one of the best activities for a Saturday morning, I believe.  Berry-picking always conjures up the last lines from one of my favorite children's books - "Jamberry" by Bruce Degan.

"Mountains and fountains
Rain down on me
Buried in berries
What a jam jamboree!"

My berry-pickers enjoyed time out in the sun, wandering through the strawberry fields picking and eating as much as they could get their little hands on.  The result - an overzealous 3 flats of berries, or 28 pounds to be exact!  I love picking berries a bit too much.  Our weekend was cut out for us.  We jammed some, froze some, ate some - made strawberry lemonade, strawberries and cream, strawberries and yogurt...

Yum, yum - the berries this year were worth the wait.