Big Al?

It was crazy hair day at daycare.
Ray sees a certain resemblance to a much more famous image.
Wishful thinking?

...Won't you be my neighbor?

(heh, anyone see what I did with those titles? No, just me? Never mind...)

One of the things I love about this neighborhood is the number of little kids. Recently E and I went back down to the dinosaur park (so named for the dinosaur skeleton E that is the only item is uninterested in, and there were four two-year olds taking over the park. (E is in the red shorts here. The stunning hat is a common fashion statement in this age group.)
However, we don't even have to walk as far as the park- we've got fun kids right in our cul-de-sac.

And, E would point out, their moms stock things like popsicles. And make them share their soccer balls.
You know it's a good neighborhood when the block party includes a two-year-old dance party. (Huh, E has another borrowed ball in this pic. Magpie.)

A beautiful day in the neighborhood...

Have we mentioned our view?
Can I add to the long list of reasons I need to use a better camera than my phone?
Bonus points if you can name the peak (looking a little northwest from our house). Or if you can come remove that streetlight.
The next set was while we were affected by the fires south of us. The light wasn't this sienna-esque, but it was pretty dramatic.




Yeah, the view is pretty good.

Lil... angels?

This is the first year that we've contemplated buying the school photos. We opted not to and swore to get some from Jen instead because we know she can do better. So I'm probably violating something about copyright (all pics here courtesy of Lil Angels), but here's what you didn't get in wallet size.
This one is actually pretty cute, if a little old-school.
But this one...
It just makes me laugh every time. I love the tongue.

Belated....

.. like most everything around here lately.

Happy Father's Day to our fathers and all the fathers out there. I'll post E's "gift" to Ray at a later date, but didn't want to miss sending out the love to you all!

Thanks, Cheryl!

Cheryl gave E a gift about a month ago. It was much more fun for me than her last gift.



I can get a lot done while E plays with his bubble fan. Awesome. Thanks, Cheryl.

Early May

April and May are a busy time of celebration in our household. Our birthdays kind of slipped by this year without comment, but Ray did it up right for our anniversary and Mother's Day.

I already shared this one, but it makes me smile, so here's how E greeted me on Friday.

Before that, Ray met me at Avery Brewery. With flowers.

He also made cards for me, which was an incredible act of persistence against all Bill-Gates-inspired odds.

For mother's day weekend, E gave me the gift of finally being willing to go out on the playground without me following him every step of the way.

The morning of Mother's Day we walked down to the playground at the other end of the subdivision. E made a new friend there, a little boy who lives right across from that playground and comes out to join us whenever we're there.
He'll let me get off the playground, but he'll still pose. Not everything about two is bad.
With or without his friend, he didn't really need me, though - which was nice, it was 90 degrees and I got to sit in the shade. And E got to experiment with alternate ways to go down the slide... can you find him?

Yes, that's his back coming down the right-hand slide. Going down face down. Growing up fast.


It was a good weekend.

Let us entertain you

Keeping three two-year-olds entertained through a wedding and shopping is... a challenge.
 Bob pointed out that an iPad, Cars, and a minivan is a good start (thanks for the pic, Bob).
A restaurant with a big pond setup and fish helps, too.
It would have been more helpful it weren't thirty degrees and humid out, but the kids had fun.
While you're trying to sign the older kids into Smaland at IKEA, may I recommend the storage lockers for the short set?



No paparazzi, please!

Travel

A few shots from our last trip to Minnesota. All off of the iphone, I am hoping Jen will post her pretty shots of the weekend....

(sense a certain theme? It's hard to be short. This is, of course, Clark's pool table. E and Nick had a lot of fun, which is not photodocumented, although I think there is video of hockey here somewhere.)

If you're having a group event with a decent number of kids, I recommend a hotel with a water park. E wasn't a fan of the train noises, but he did like the water park, as did Ray. (Thanks to Ken for these shots)
The real reason behind all of this.
One of the pics I want to see Jen's version of...
Why I need a better camera. This was adorable. E loves Miss Q and keeps asking for her and the twins.
Also, these two looked quite good. Emily was gorgeous, not nearly this blurry (darn iphone). But the happy comes through even here. It was a good weekend!

Photobombed

At least a couple people have noticed that we actually got a picture of all three of us to replace the year-old one on the sidebar. Thanks to Dan B for that! We need to get up and see Jen soon. Still, I have to note the other options I could have put there.

Like this:
Me: good, for once. Ray: okay, doing his camera smile. Eamon...wha?
Then there's the picture I used:
Seems decent, right?

Wait, let's check the original:
Heh. Nice leg band, E.

Dear (Oh Dear)...

Dear Mom (and Dad, but it was totally Mom's idea)-
Thank you for the food processor. It makes it really really fun to shred zucchini.
Perhaps too much fun. You just put the zucchini in the top and WHOOP it's gone. I had to do it a second time. Four cups of shredded zucchini.

On that note, thanks for teaching me to always have lots of staples in my pantry.

And thanks to both my mother and my mother-in-law for supplying us with lots of bakeware.
(This loses something in scale...that would be two loaves of zucchini bread (well, one and nine-tenths loaves) PLUS an 9x13 pan. I needed one loaf for the block party this weekend so, yeah, too much fun.)

And mom: thanks for the cinnamon chips. I probably should stop making bread for today, but... soon.

I'm going to go eat some zucchini bread now. And look for some other reason to shred vegetables.

Love,
Laura

PS- The recipe is a 1996 Cooking Light recipe that I can't find online but will email at request. It's yummy and makes two loaves (if you don't have a zucchini-shredding fetish and double the recipe), one of which can be frozen. If you don't eat the first one before they cool.

A Boy and His Hose

E is growing in so many ways. All of a sudden, he can do so many things (like open some doors, eek). The ability to pull the trigger on our hose? Probably near the top of his list of new favorite skills.

Determining which pots are planted and which are weeds? Still working on that.
Along with not drowning the basil.


But the joy? He has that in spades.