Camping Success

The cape adventure was a success. We felt like this was a trial run to see what we could realistically do with the kids this summer. We had a few glitches (24 hour stomach bugs for both babies. No intestinal discomfort but neon green froth in their diapers every 10 minutes lead to a diaper shortage and sore bums. Our means of cooking failed. Avery whines.) but nothing that we couldn't deal with, well, except for the whining.

The bugs were minimal, as was the rain. Lots of bike trails and kettle ponds. Trails, hills and fun kids at every turn. S'mores and snowballs.

Fine dining the first night in the grocery store parking lot.

This was about 7 am the first morning.



Finley is such a water girl. Cold air and cold water didn't stop her.

Avery fell asleep on Cathy's lap at a different pond in the afternoon.

This beach had enormous tadpoles. We caught about twenty before moving on to new things.

The kids were (are) exhausted but I think will be fully recovered before we head off to St. Louis on Monday or Tuesday.

Another One

Logan now has lyme too. 3 rings popped up last week and I took him in this week. It is very traumatic for him because he is allergic to the cheap antibiotic and our copay is $100 for the liquid abx. I can save $90 by getting the pills, so I did. This is the kid who can no longer eat blueberries (once a favorite) becaue the skin is too difficult to swallow. Only 40 pills left to take.





PS- regarding the post about leaving the kids in the woods. It was only the older kids who know the land like their own backyard. The babies wanted to go and were screaming "Me woods, me woods!" as I drove away. I had a couple friends call expressing concern about leaving an 8 year old in charge of two two year olds in unpredictable conditions with only a 6 year old to help. Nope. Just the older two.

Change of Heart

These are the same kids I dumped off in the woods in the pouring rain just an hour ago.

I attempted to go grocery shopping with all four kids after school today. They get home about 4. We normally eat about 5/5:30, baths start around 6/6:15 and then I am busy, busy, busy with teeth brushing, dressing, changing diapers, reading books, being read to, etc. until bedtimes at 7:30 (babies), 8 (Avery) and 8:45 (Logan). And I stole their precious hour of freedom and took them to the store. They all complained and whined and fussed on the way to the store. Avery and Meryl cried and fussed through the store. The arguing and fighting began as soon as we got in the car again.

About 3 miles from home I gave the "If you can't stop arguing then I'll drop you off on the side of the road and you can walk home in the rain," line. Yikes. Did I say that out loud? It was 6:00, raining and dusk-ish. It is a busy road without sidewalks. The fighting stops for about 2 miles. Phew. And starts up again. Double yikes! I end up dropping them off at an entrance to the conservation land that connects with our neighborhood with directions to "Stay Together." Logan takes off running down the trail. I honk the horn and poor Avery nearly flies out of her skin. I repeat "Stay Together." And drive away with visions of the evening news headlines.

When they rounded into the yard about 20 (very long) minutes later they were soaked, muddy, sweaty and laughing.

Getting Ready to Camp!

Here the girls are "practicing sleeping" for our upcoming Cape trip. Don't mind Logan begging for food in the background.

Good Eats

This is so weird to me. Same seeds. Same soil. Look at the color variations. I get a kick out of things like that.

This is about how many strawberries we get each day. We were able to give each of Avery's Girl Scout leaders a quart. We are just starting to get large ones and each time whoever is eating it points out that even the big ones are a deep red all the way through.

We had our first csa pick up this week. Rather unimpressive but it is only June in New England. Lettuce, snow peas, spinach, scallions, radishes, a potted marigold and strawberries. It will get bigger and better, I'm sure.

Happy Pride!

The parade was long, loud and entertaining. The after events were lousy since they were at government center which doesn't lend itself to lounging and hanging out. I got to go to Haymarket and watch the people hawking produce and fish. I spent $9.5o and bought- 4 packs (1/2 pints?) of raspberries, 2 packs of blackberries, 10 limes, 9 kiwi and 5 heads of garlic! The berries were all eaten before we even hit the T to head home. None of it local or organic, all of it mass produced, but geez was it cheap.

Logan is getting older and is not willing to hold our hand in public so we get separated in the crowds. He doesn't seem to mind but I still worry about losing him. He also doesn't feel the need to sit near us on the T, which is fine. The ride home on the T is always too long and we ended up letting the girls hang on the bars which is going to be a problem the next time we head into town and they want to do it again.

All in all a good day.

Anticipation and hope

The first of the berries are ripe! The kids have thrilled me with their appreciation of these versus the grocery store purchased berries. "These are warm and red all the way through!" And it is very true that they seem to not even be the same berry as those purchased by the pound in little pre-packed containers.

Many more to come!

The blueberry plants look to have the best crop ever (which doesn't really mean much.) The raspberries continue to spread out over the yard. The garden is coming along very nicely- broccoli, cabbage, lettuces, carrots, tomatoes, potatoes, swiss chard, beets, kohlrabi, sweet peas, corn, tomatillos, peppers, cukes, beans, summer and winter squashes, gourds and pumpkins. Cool weather crops will come again later. Everything is protected from the bunnies and the deer. Only one chipmunk seems to have access to the strawberries and I fuss with his holes daily.

It looks to be a good year and I'm wondering if perhaps I made a mistake joining a CSA this year. (This wasn't our first choice, but Stearn's wasn't taking "new members" and we didn't belong last year. Back to the waitlist.) Hopefully we'll eat well and not have too much that can't be easily stored in some way.

Warning!

Don't eat the broccoli soup at our house!