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Wednesday, March 02, 2005

YAY

IT. IS. HERE.

pictures pictures pictures:

oh yay. Now I'll go read the manual for the next TEN HOURS. Holy cow the thing is huge.

Monday, February 28, 2005

our weekend in pictures

Well, it's 3 a.m. and I'm at the computer. I have a good reason to (still) be up -- honest I do! T was called into work at 11 p.m. because, it turns out, a power outage caused some problems with radio transmission thingamabobs, and since he works in telecommunications, radio transmission thingamabobs are his job. (You can see by my extensive use of technical terminology that his knowledge has rubbed off on me a really whole lot, can't you.) He just called and said he's heading home, so he should be here within an hour or so. I just hope he doesn't have to turn around and go back in at 6AM like usual.

We had a really nice weekend up until about four hours ago. ;-) Yesterday we went with my parents to pick oranges at their neighbor's house. She is an elderly woman whose ranch, including the orange orchard, has been in her family for a hundred years (literally, this year). She can't pick the oranges herself anymore, so it's become tradition for our extended family (and a few others we drag along each year) to go do it for her when the oranges are ripe. Here are a few of the last pictures I'll be taking with my dinosaur of a digital camera before my wonderful anniversary present arrives this week:

This picture shows not only a very good reason why I need a new digital camera, but also the view from the top of the orange tree I was picking. It's harder to stand fifteen feet up a ladder and take a picture than you might think. :)

The person who finds the smallest orange each year "wins". We're not sure exactly what the person wins -- bragging rights? The first turn in the lunch buffet? (mmm, fried chicken this year. It's a good deal for all concerned -- the neighbor gets her orange crop in and we all a lot of exercise, enough oranges to last us quite a while, and five extra pounds apiece thanks to the fantastic lunch she cooks up for us.)

Cows in the road. How often do you encounter that on the way to work?

Back at my parents' ranch, we spent some time splitting wood, because we were nearly to the point of burning our furniture at home. Here are LT and C helping my dad drive the tractor into the shed to get the splitter.

We recently made a very important discovery at my parents'. Namely that straw on a steep slope is just as good as snow for tobogganing. Visits to Grandpa's will never be the same again.

C tied her shoes by herself for the first time after dinner on Saturday. That screeching sound you heard at about 6:00 Pacific time was my daughter running around to everyone in the house (and that was a lot of people) shrieking about her accomplishment.

Wednesday, February 09, 2005

recap of our "mini-break"

We just got back from two nights and three partial-or-full days in paradise (also known as Morro Bay, California, for the uninitiated). Everything was fantastic. At least four or five times in the three days of our trip, T and I looked at each other and gushed, "I am just so glad we are here!" Exclamation point inclusive; we really were gushing. The kids didn't fight. T and I didn't fight. The weather was perfect. T injured his back and was in a little pain from that from time to time but even that didn't dampen our spirits for long; we were having the best mini-break (one of my favorite Britishisms and I have shamelessly stolen it even though I've never been anywhere near England) in the history of the world.

And then we came home.

That's the thing about fabulous vacations; they tend to end. And as soon as you get up on the first morning back home, and the kids are sniping at each other and the parents are doing their fair share of the same thing, and the inevitable heap of laundry threatens to smother you, and the search for socks in the unmated socks bin seems as head-explodingly frustrating as it ever is, there's this tendency to think, "if only we were still on our fantastic vacation, how wonderful everything would be." Conveniently forgetting, of course, that in order to stay longer you'd have had to pack more which is an added stress, or else do laundry which is distinctly un-vacationish. And eventually we'd run out of money and have to come home or take up a life of vagrancy -- which for a family with kids is rather irresponsible.

A year ago this week we were coming home from Florida, experiencing the same set of post-vacation symptoms: wallowing in happy memories, wistfully wishing we hadn't had to come home, being thrown face-first back into a life where clocks matter and so do messes, and three times a day there are all these overgrown baby birds with their beaks open clamoring for me to FEED THEM (and clean up after them too, while I'm at it). And with all that I'm still very, very glad we went. I'm even glad we're home; I just don't know it yet.

And now a few (ha ha!) pictures:

One of the long-standing Morro Bay vacation traditions, since we first took the kids there four years ago, has been the bicycle park.





Which means that the "sale pending" on that sign is bad news. :(





It is when it is windy that we most realize how badly he needs a haircut. All he needs in this picture is a time machine and some eye makeup and he'd be a headline tour.





The shell crop was pretty measly this year, except for the sand dollars (and of course the ever-present butterfly clams, the kind whose shells crack if you touch them). Here are two of the smaller ones in T's palm. And LT's shadow.





I think Morro Rock is much more photographable than its Yosemite equivalent, Half Dome. (better watch out that I don't get struck by Park Service lightning for that one).





C, champion of the climbing wall.





LT at the top of the spiral slide





C bought herself a unicorn at Albertson's (Albertsons' toy aisle being yet ANOTHER MB tradition. Not to mention that it was in that Albertson's that I first saw -- cue heavenly chord -- DIET CHERRY COKE. And my life changed forever). She named it Bright Bright White and didn't put it down for at least, oh, ten hours.





This time instead of camping, since we were only staying two nights and we weren't sure of the weather, we stayed at Motel 6, whose signature utilitarian-but-bright decorating style is seen here, as the kids play Uno in their jammies.





One defining physical feature of Morro Bay is the sandspit that encloses the estuary. Last summer T, my dad, and my brother boated out to it. On this trip he took us to see it -- by a land route, however. Here are the kids looking for shells on the seaward side of the "spit". Which I hate to call it, because I am a dork, and I wish it had a different name.





At the "fish park" (as it is called because one of the kids named it that, after the large fish-shaped ladder thing which features in its play structure, and as anyone knows who has kids, you eventually end up adopting untold numbers of their sayings as your own without even realizing it), there is a really bizarre swinging/spinning sort of thing. It looks so simple and yet the physics of it defy anyone to make it go without much, much effort. Usually the grown-ups end up hogging it until one of the men gets it whirling around, usually standing on it rather than sitting. Here is LT taking the easy way out, being spun/swung by someone else.





the Rock again, this time with a flock of birds taking their baths in its reflection





This was actually the sunset on the first night. We watched it through the windows of the restaurant where we ate the best restaurant clam chowder I have had in years. We'd have said that about the fish and chips, too, if we didn't know of the glory that is Giovanni's Fish Company, just up the street, where we had lunch the next day. OH LORD I NEED TO GO BACK. NOW. *sob*





We decided to take the ultimate scenic route home -- that being Highway 1. Anyone who lives in a place without Highway 1 near it simply doesn't know what s/he is missing. Anyway. This is NOT one of the famous views of that often-photographed area -- it's part of a colony of elephant seals who winter just off the highway, just north of Cambria. Very bizarre to look at, yet interesting. And smelly.





There have been many pictures taken of this bridge, almost all of them better than this one. But the thing about scenery like this is that even an utter amateur like myself has a hard time messing it up. Wow. (I made T stop nearly every time there was a pullout so that I could take pictures. I won't inflict them all on you, however).

Thursday, January 27, 2005

feeling snippety

I feel snippety. All these little journal-thoughts keep skittering through my head, but nothing long enough for a whole entry. So, here; I'll nail a few of them down long enough to type them, as I do other stuff online:

Today's Lessons had not one but TWO concepts I wanted to steal today. One was blogging every hour all day long about what had gone on in the previous hour (which is much, MUCH more interesting in that particular author's house with her five children than it would be in mine) -- and one, which I may actually go ahead and steal since she OFFERED it like that, is "Before and After Thursdays" -- where I would take a picture of a room in my house before cleaning it, then clean it, then take a picture after, and blog about the whole thing. Oh good Lord that could get a little embarrassing though. Maybe nevermind on that one.

You know what motherhood smells like? It smells like VapoRub. We were not a Vick's family when I was growing up -- I did not even know that there was anything you could do about a stuffy nose besides drink hot tea and wait, until I was a nanny and was introduced to the wonderful world of Dimetapp Elixir -- but when I married T, I found that any time he was stuffy he'd use VapoRub. I still don't like to use it myself, but it works wonders for the kids so anytime we all start getting sick, I smell like it, from spreading it on their sweet little narrow chests. Sometimes as I'm applying it I think about the change that ten more short years will make to those knobby little kid chests, and I just want to grab my kids and take them someplace where they will stay young until I'm tired of it and can let them proceed with growing up.

Henry (the cat, remember?) is sleeping on the chair near me. He wakes up and sneezes periodically, and it startles me. I am such a worrywart about pets (kids' illnesses, I am familiar with; animals are a whole different world) that I have to work hard to stem the fear that he's going to get sick and die. Because he sneezes.

I was tucking LT into bed tonight and I put an extra blanket on him; it was the Toy Story one he got for I think his second birthday. One side features Buzz and the other Woody. When I put it on him I remembered that I used to ask him, as I made his bed each day, whether he wanted Buzz or Woody showing. He would almost always say Buzz, but occasionally would relent and choose Woody because he knew that Woody was my favorite. I reminded him about it, and we laughed. I had completely forgotten about that little ritual until tonight. It makes me wonder how many other things I've forgotten. While I was clearing out our dresser so that I could move it to paint our room (I AM DONE PAINTING), I came across a little note from myself to T from the first year of our marriage and it contained an inside joke of which I have absolutely no recollection. There was a time when I thought that could never happen. That's thirty for you, I guess. :)

Since the other snippets have skittered away, apparently never to return, I present:
11:05 PM At Rachel's House

A Photo Essay

Henry, asleep on C's coat. (now he is coughing a little bit too. Must not panic.)

Mary, in her favorite sleeping position (although she does often get more contorted than this).

DO YOU SEE THE EMPTINESS? I walk into this room and the shock is, well, shocking. It's unrecognizable. Laundry has been my let's-return-to-sanity-now-shall-we occupation this week. I am not sure HOW sane it is to obsess about getting to the bottoms of every single one of our hampers, to the tune of about 20 (small, because our new-to-us washer and dryer were apparently made for single people, or something) loads of laundry washed, dried, folded, and put away, over the course of three days, but oh well. At least I made it all the way through "Pride and Prejudice" while I did the folding.

Me. Man, I look tired. And also, more like my dad every time I see myself. Dad, in turn, looks remarkably like a Caucasian version of Bill Cosby (which is not, you understand, a bad thing for HIM, being male, but oh goody, just think what's in store for me in about 20 more years).

In between loads of laundry this afternoon, since P&P had long since been finished, and, well, because I am the kind of person who likes this sort of thing, I rearranged my living room. The atrocious couch used to be on the left, and the computer and ugly loveseat on the right, with the computer nearer the camera. I also switched positions of the stereo cabinet and TV. The reason for this (other than just my love of change) was so that I could wire the computer sound through the stereo. Which I did ALL BY MYSELF, and I also fixed it so that the DVD player's sound can go through the TV or the stereo or both, instead of just the stereo as was previously the case. This is all thanks to Dawn and her Go Girl Power inspiration, dating from early in our diaryland acquaintance when we were both so new at it that we were using the stock templates. Or I may have been in the fuzzy duckling stage by then; I don't remember.

Notice the little container of VapoRub sitting on top of Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH. Now please avert your eyes from the rest of the clutter, especially the one basket of laundry which I swear I am folding as soon as I post this, I SWEAR, and also my shoe, which is sticking out from the edge of the coffee table, even though I am always scolding the kids for leaving their shoes in the living room. Because I am the world's best mom, that's why.

Monday, January 10, 2005

Yosemite pictures

Today the kids and I went and had lunch with T and then headed to Yosemite Valley for an hour or so to take pictures. (oh goody! pictures!). It was GORGEOUS in the Valley today -- still snow on the ground in spite of the fact that it rained there all day yesterday, and so empty of tourists that I felt almost like we had the whole place to ourselves.

These are thumbnails; rather than resizing the images, I cropped them, so you're only looking at a little piece of the picture, and you can click on that to see the whole thing in a new window. I stole this idea from something that dooce used to do.

Yosemite Falls	the kids at Yosemite Falls	Upper Yosemite Fall
fancy a swim?	Bridal Veil Fall

The following are just a very SMALL sample of the gratuitous little waterfalls we saw, which were actually the reason for the trip today. When the ground is saturated and it's rainy, and especially if it's been snowy and THEN turns rainy, you see hundreds (and I am not exaggerating) of these little waterfalls along the highway on the way into Yosemite, ranging from a little trickle to a roaring, well, waterfall, with more water in it than Yosemite Falls has in September.

Wednesday, December 22, 2004

another late-night ramble, with pictures!

It's past midnight and I'm comfortably sleepy, but the fire in the living room is so nice that I am sitting here for a while just so that its glowy warmth won't go to waste. Also, I'm hoping that I can relax the sewing-machine-induced tension out of my shoulders, and furthermore, I just finished off my can of diet vanilla Coke (just for a change of pace, that's why), and I know that if I were to go to bed now, then just as soon as I was about to drift off to sleep, I would inevitably have to get up and go to the bathroom anyway.

I am making a purple dress for C. Purple is her favorite color and it is just right for her coloring. It's just a simple, plain cotton dress, with a little pinafore over it. Of course, there's a complication, in that it's supposed to be a Christmas gift and I started it, um, today. And just for kicks, I've allowed the situation to become complicated further by putting off for MONTHS starting to sew LT's bathrobe. Which should be really, really simple to make. I hope. Since I also decided to make it a Christmas present. And now you see, in a roundabout way, why every report card I got from fourth grade on up had "Not working to potential" printed on it somewhere. It's because I am a consummate professional when it comes to procrastinating.

Did I mention the scarf I'm crocheting for C, also for Christmas? Hey, at least I have the hat done that goes with it. And that one, I can work on while she's present, because she thinks it's for her aunt. (I would say that that was clever except that I did start it out as a project for my SIL, but changed mid-stream -- or mid-hat as the case may be -- when I realized that for an obscenely small amount of money, an adult can go buy a hat that is precisely what s/he wants, and probably more fashionable than a crocheted one in bright colors. C, on the other hand, will love the one I'm making. Aren't kids grand. ;-)

And we're having Christmas dinner here, and I have pies and cookies to bake and all sorts of fun things, and the Christmas dinner crowd keeps on growing and now it looks like it's up to 21 and where the heck we're going to put 21 people I have no idea. Yet I am remarkably calm. I think I am in denial.

And now, before I ramble on even further and this entry degenerates into complete incomprehensibility: some pictures.

Here's C wearing the green dress I made for her last spring, probably for the last time, as she's nearly outgrown it. This is one of those pictures where her resemblance to me is startling, in my opinion, but it's also bewildering because she is (and I am not fishing for compliments here) so much prettier than I am. I mean, just as an example, look at her skin. Oh, what I would do to have skin like that. Except that I wouldn't go back to being five again -- no, not even for that beautiful pale English-looking clear complexion -- which, honestly, I never had anyway. I was browner than that.

I'm putting this up just because he looks so handsome in it. And honestly because his sister seems to dominate the story-and-anecdote portion of my journal, and I didn't want you all to think I loved her more than this gorgeous boy who made me a mother. ;-)

This is a pretty little spot near where T works. The kids and I were up there taking a walk today while we waited for him to get off work, and I'd brought my camera, to try and capture some pictures of the most slanted light of the year. Because you know how I am about slanting light. I did not succeed overmuch -- I really, REALLY want a nice new digital camera someday, one that's capable of at least zooming -- but I did like this picture.

And now I think my shoulders are sufficiently relaxed, and I can go, um, take care of business and get into my nice warm bed. My eyes are drifting closed just as I sit here thinking about it. mmm.

Sunday, October 03, 2004

injured T, cute 5-year-old pictures, and Turkish Delight

You know what isn't fun? When your 8-year-old son walks into the kitchen and says, "Daddy fell down and he wants you to come." No, fun isn't what I would call that. It turns out that T was working on a carcass of a car on a trailer, and stepped down backward forgetting that he was four or five feet up in the air. He landed flat on his back and his head was a little whirly for a while. We called the nurse hotline provided by our insurance company (a couple more incidents and we'll be exchanging Christmas cards with those nurses) and now I have a long list of faculties to check, every two hours for the next 24 hours. Fun times. But it could have been much, much worse.

and now for some astoundingly cute C pictures*:

That's the nightgown I made her for her birthday. Because having a daughter is so darn much fun.

*I need to get some pictures of LT up here too. Not that he has ANY idea about what is here... oh please God let it stay that way... but I just feel guilty that the vast majority of the pictures are of C.

Watching "The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe" (or more specifically, being in the room typing at the computer while T and the kids are watching it) has reminded me of one of life's greatest disappointments: Turkish Delight. I've read that series over and over, starting when I was seven or so, and up until a few years ago I pictured Turkish Delight being a sort of cakey, fudge-consistencied confection, tasting sweet, and with the flavor of coffee and spices. (I can hear non-North-American readers laughing already). Imagine my surprise when a European friend sent me some, and I found it to be exactly like if I were eating my grandmother's rose-scented hand lotion, thickened and dipped in chocolate. Another of life's little disappointments...

Tuesday, July 20, 2004

back from vacation

We just got back from our ten-day camping vacation at the beach. I know you are all (all, what, two of you who read this?) eagerly awaiting the details of all the stupid things I must have done in ten whole days. Well, I am not one to disappoint. I did two monumentally stupid things, and such is my Internet addiction that I was fully aware as I was doing said stupid things that they were going in my journal for you all to snort at. Unfortunately I forgot the second thing, I really did. But the first one makes up for it. Picture a BMX-style bicycle course, dirt made into bumps for riding over. Are you picturing? Now, picture me, freshly arrived in town with my family, stopping at the bicycle park before heading to the campground because we were too early for our site to be ready. Picture us parking in the dirt lot which is pretty much an extension of the bike area. (and now you totally just guessed what happened, didn't you). Picture the family deciding to ride their bikes straight to the park, while I drove the car. I don't think I even have to finish. I will just say, when you high-center a big old 1991 Buick Park Avenue on a packed dirt bump, so that you have to be pushed off backward, it makes a very interesting scraping noise. And lots and lots of laughter from onlookers (who, fortunately for me, were all related to me by blood or marriage). And lots of jokes at the driver's expense for the NEXT TEN DAYS.

I also did a lot of minor stupid things, like constantly (constantly!) hitting my head on the two lanterns in camp which were suspended in the air so that their bottoms were precisely five feet and eight inches off the ground, and don't tell me nobody did that on purpose, just for my five-foot-nine self, either. I also scrupulously used sunscreen every time we got out of bed for the first five days of our vacation, which was not the stupid thing; the stupid thing was behaving as if sunburn were a virus to which we had all become immune, and forgoing sunscreen for a few days, and getting myself burned just as badly as if I'd never used it in the first place. Fun.

While we're on the subject of camping, I'll explain something. What we do, according to my husband, is not actually camping. We "camp" at a level campground with fence partitions, clean bathrooms, hot showers, and a little store. This campground is between Highway 1 and the ocean, well within easy reach of such things as pizzerias and fish and chip shops and grocery stores and libraries. We even (ssshhh) sleep on an inflatable air mattress in our tent. I have, seriously, slept in EconoLodges that were less accommodating. No, if you're going to call it camping, it has to involve backpacks and extremely light sleeping bags, and tiny little one-person tents (or no tents at all), and water purification tablets and dehydrated food and, if possible, at least a few injuries requiring trailside first aid, bonus points for use of parachute cord in binding open wounds shut. You must hike to a place inaccessible by cars or even trail motorcycles, and brave bears and snakes and poison oak and emerge from the woods after a few days, filthy and triumphant, grunting like Marines in boot camp. This is camping. I never, ever, ever do this. Ever. I like my hot shower and at least a water spigot at my campsite with potable water. This is why for the first few years of our marriage, T and I did not camp together. He would do his manly hiking-in routine with his buddies once a year, and I would stay home and try not to think about rattlesnakes and mountain lions. Finally we reached a compromise. He'll camp my way; he just prefers to think of it as staying in a very inexpensive motel.

We had a great time, but it was so good to get home. We missed our cats (who didn't demolish the house as badly as we feared while we were gone); the kids missed their toys; I missed having my own toilet within fifteen feet of my bed. I never realize how many times I get up in the night for the bathroom until I spend a few days having to put on sandals and walk twenty yards through the cold foggy night to get to one.

I could keep going, but instead I'll just post a few billion pictures for the benefit of those few souls still in the Dial-Up Dark Ages.


the kids and their daddy in the ocean


C, just too cool for her training wheels, which she shed before the end of our trip (so did both of her cousins)


LT, also looking very cool


The infamous bicycle bumps. This isn't the one I drove onto.


We went to a GREAT rummage sale and got a ton of things (because it was just so easy to pack ten days' worth of our lives on the way there; we wanted a little more excitement. Or not). One thing we got was a shoebox full of Playmobil and Lego stuff for a dollar. C made this diorama of Ma, Pa, and Carrie in their covered wagon. And if you don't know who Ma, Pa, and Carrie are, I feel very sorry for you.


We hiked up this smallish hill where we got a great view of the surrounding area. This is Morro Rock with the power plant (which we actually like, it says vacation to us as loud as the rock does) with a fog coming in from the ocean. Worth the hike. My SIL and I decided that the top of the mountain, with its not-quite-accidental-looking dirt, rocks, and shrubs, looked like a set from a TV show; we kept expecting Hoss and Little Joe to show up and fight some bad guys or something.


Me in the Bonanza set.


Minas Tirith made of sand


I usually would take a book and sit at the laundromat while I waited for my laundry to finish. C was copying me, and then her cousin came along and they were looking at the book (another rummage sale find) together. Too too cute.

Saturday, April 24, 2004

santa for a day

I won't bore you all with a long post about my day today. It was a lot of fun; I took my two nephews and my two offspring to the city for an all day zoo/picnic/Storyland/Playland extravaganza. It was all free because it was the once-a-quarter free Storyland/Playland day for zoo members. Also, everyone was very well-behaved, and as an added bonus, I got to feel like Santa Claus all day because the kids had such a fantastic day. This was great for my mood and I'm all relaxed and cheery now. Especially now that my caffeine-addicted self has imbibed a bit of Diet Coke. Aaah.

I am the mother of the epitome of the four-year-old drama queen. She just fell down outside and got one of those scrapes that's visible more because of the dirt than the injury; I sent her to the bathroom to clean it off. Soon her shrieks of "It's blooding!! It's blooding!" filled the house, and if I hadn't been her mom for four and a half years now, I might have been naive enough to do something besides saunter in her direction, practicing keeping a straight face. Sure enough, she had maybe three microns of blood at the end of one of the barely-visible-once-cleaned scratches. Oh dear. I think she'd have loved it if I'd run in a panic to the phone and called the paramedics. She seemed quite disappointed when the blood went away and she didn't even need a Band-Aid.

Pictures from today:


It looks like she's doing a "talk to the HAND" kind of thing, in a four-year-old sort of way, but I think really she was just reaching for something. And the real reason I posted this picture was so that I could show off the denim jeans quilt I made.

PLEASE DO NOT FEED THE CHILDREN

If you didn't know this was a ferris-wheel sort of ride, it would look like a really inventive and abusive form of child containment. Not to say that there's never been a day when this would have a certain... appeal*. ;-)

*please don't call CPS; obviously I am so totally kidding. It would absolutely have to have padding before I'd even consider it.

Tuesday, April 20, 2004

not QUITE Carrie Fisher

I almost feel witty tonight but it's like when a word is "on the tip of my tongue" -- the witty thoughts just keep slipping away before I can quite catch them. So instead of witticisms, here's something we inflicted on C today (well, she DID beg me to do it):