Family Fun!

The passed few weeks have been filled with family, sun and the big city. My parents were in Berkeley for 2 weeks with my grandmother while my aunt and uncle (My grandma lives with them and is 96) were on vacation, so we went to visit. This is us, above... 4 generations!

Here's a tender moment between grandparents and Elliot... ahhh...

More family! My grandpa lives up in Santa Rosa, so along the way, we stopped in to introduce the now toddling Elliot. Grandpa Harry now lives in a beautiful retirement home with plentiful tomato plants growing on his little deck. He showed us off--ok, he showed Elliot off with much pride!
Elliot and Joel. Joel is my cousin, so that makes Elliot his first cousin once removed. Yes. Really.

Just a few cute pics of the darling boy.

Below are some of the many pictures taken at the million playground visits. The first is Totland; this was awesome! As you can see in the pics below, it was a sand pit with a little bit of grass, a slide and a few swings and HUNDREDS of plastic toys! Honestly, I was quite horrified at the well used, sun faded, half broken plastic toys spread all over the yard. But then to see how much fun Elliot was having driving around in the cars, I soon forgot my germophobia and had fun too!

Grandma and Elliot at a very normal playground.

Another crazy playground in Berkeley is called the Adventure Playground. There are only 3 left in the country now, but in the '70's there were many scattered all over the country. This is a place where kids can go wild... hammering, sawing, painting, running rampant... I was reminded of Mad Max: the sand, the sun, the haphazard structures. See the link to the left for more info.

Before we left the Bay Area, we had a delightful visit with our dear friends Hannah, Mike and Linus who were visiting family in SF. Linus is 8 months old and just a dream. We moved away from them just one month before his birth... tragic!! So, anyway, the timing was great to see them. Here's Linus and his dad, Mike. Thanks to Hannah, I now have a great pic of them.

When we had our fill of Berkeley, we came back up to Northern Northern Cal and rode on the train. It's an old steam train that does a little tour of the old logging communities. It's slow, loud and rickety but so much fun.

Next stop was the beach. Grandma bought Elliot a kite. And a dump truck. We had a great time flying the kite. Sadie barked and tried to catch the kite and was successful a few times. Elliot loaded and unloaded rocks all afternoon.

Below is us and a pear tree after a fabulous vegetarian meal by the sea.

And for something completely different.... Elliot with the world's biggest zucchini. (It is now chopped up and tasting very lovely in a sweet zucchini bread.)

Swimming!

Turning Chaos into... Fun!

Elliot sneakily got into the spice cabinet and ran into the living room with a container full of sprinkles. There, he proceeded to pry open the lid and dump the tiny balls of sugar ALL over the living room. Then, as if that wasn't enough, he found that if he ran his fingers through them it felt really cool! I think I'll be finding sugar balls under the couch for weeks...

The ones we were able to wrangle back into the container were subsequently covered in dog hair and rendered useless, so Jeremy put them on the deck outside. There, he and Elliot could stomp, smash and spread them all over the place without fear of making Mama crazy! (And I do have to admit that they feel cool under hand.)

The Smell of Honeysuckle

During the time we have been here, I haved watched as the flora and fauna has evolved with the passing seasons; sometimes barren other times lush. At this point in the cycle of life, the air is a-buzz with little wings and heavily laden with the perfumes of many flowers.

While sitting today eating lunch, I happened to look out the window and noticed a hummingbird feasting on the fuschia tree out front. Then, he moved on to the honeysuckle vine. Then he tried to get the tiny drop of nectar off of the nasturtium bud (here, I believe he failed!). It not only reminded me to put more nectar into the feeder, it washed a certain calm and relaxation over me.

Our yard is full of small birds, dragonflies, beetles, mosquitos (I'm trying to irradicated those with no success) and many more crawlies that I'm sure I can't see, and it makes me feel like I am finally back to my roots. Back to the nature that bore me, back to what really matters in life: Gardens, children, wildlife, sunny days spent on the beach. Someday I will go back to "real life" and maybe get a job, sit behind a desk, have conversations about last night's tv show around the water cooler, but I will always have the memories of this time.

Spending the long days with my son and husband, contemplating what life is really all about.

Love.

And family.

And hummingbirds drinking the sweet syrup from the vine.

Updates

We've been so busy lately that I haven't had time to write in the blog! So here is a big dump of things...

Firstly, let's go back a few months to my pottery class. I finished a whole bunch of bowls just as the class ended. I'm happy to say we use them everyday! Two of them were an experiment...I borrowed some porcelain clay from a classmate (I had been using Black Mountain which is sandy and rough as you can see in the 4 brown bowls) and used a clear under glaze. Over top, I painted (with pigment, not glaze) floral designs. Once fired, they settled into the clear glaze and blossomed into subtle subdued hues. I'm going to do more experimenting this fall...!

Next, a long overdue Elliot update.

He officially started walking about a month ago as was chronicled in the previous video. Now that he is more sure on his feet, he has started to run. He runs after Sadie (dog), he runs after Nino (cat), he runs up the sidewalk, he runs to the playground. He also falls a lot.

Two of his molars have been coming in for the last few weeks or so. They are still coming in... and coming and coming. Those molars never quit! Poor feller.

We've been doing baby signing with Elliot since he was about 6 months. It didn't pay off until he was about 12 months. Then, it was a flood gate of understanding. He has 7 signs: more, finished, hungry, diaper change, story time, bath, sleepy/nap/nurse. The more obvious ones he learns quickly, but with the more abstract ones ("am I hungry? I'm not sure") it takes a few days. Along with this, he has learned the words for his favorite foods, names of our animals among other things. He also answers questions. His answers aren't always reliable, though, I've discovered. Sometimes it goes like this:

Me: "Do you want some toast?"

Elliot: Shakes head no.

Me: "Do you want some banana?"

Elliot: Shakes head no and points enthusiastically at toast.

Me: "Do you want some toast?"

Elliot: Nods head vigorously yes.

Last week, we took our first family camping trip. We went to a beautiful car-campsite as a trial run to see how it would go. Elliot had a blast playing in the fire pit (no, there wasn't a fire in it at the time!!) and mucking around in the dirt. Sadie guarded the campsite all day and night and only had one mishap with another dog. (The other dog started it by walking by.) We all feel confident that we could go out on a backpacking trip now and maybe stay more than one night?

Then, there's my garden. The zucchini had a rough start, but finally some male flowers have bloomed therefore allowing the fruit to grow, and not get blossom rot like what happened at first.

The beans also had a hard time growing, but seem to be off and running. I also planted another row of beans which is growing rapidly. I have high hopes that this batch will grow better. Also, I think I'm keeping the caterpillars at bay on the broccoli. A robin comes by every night and picks around in there, too, so between the two of us, I hope to get some good broc.

Lastly, if you are still reading this, Jeremy and I did our first 10K race last weekend. We trained for 2 whole weeks for it (!) and did pretty darned well. In fact, I got a silver metal for my efforts. Never mind that there were only 3 people in my age group. I still beat one of them!

THE END

Vegetables!!

This is my first batch of radishes and first harvest of lettuce and arugula. We had a mighty fine salad for dinner that night.

The broccoli is growing very well. I found a small green caterpillar munching on the leaves one day, but otherwise, all is well and thriving. I hope to finally harvest some brocolli-- I haven't had luck in the past.
The best so far are the peas and the arugula. Look how lucious and green they are!

One bad thing (the only thing in trouble in the garden) is that the beans are not growing well. They have been in the ground nearly 45 days, and are barely 3 inches tall. I think they are not getting enough sun, so I decided to dig another spot and plant more beans. We'll see if they do any better with more sunlight. I think everything does better with more sunlight.

The Most Beautiful Shrub

I don't know what it's called. ---Megan identified this plant as the Mountain Laurel. Thanks Megan!!--- It was an ugly little bush this winter. But, in the last few weeks, it has blossomed into a beautiful lacy pink cloud outside the front deck.

It makes me happy everyday... (I love pink!)

My new knit project

For the first time ever, I have decided to knit myself a sweater. Here it is. I'm secretly hoping it will make me look like this girl as soon as I put it on...!
I have yet to decide whether I am going to knit the full neck, as I'm not one for any sort of turtle-type neck. They make me uncomfortable. Anyway, maybe just a smaller cuff at the top so that it's just a plain neck? We'll see. (Any opinions?)

Below is the yarn I am using (I'm trying to find a better picture). The dark grey will be for the cuffs (all ribbed parts) and then a lighter grey (that has specks that bring out the dark grey) for the body of the garment.
The process is very 'picky' as I have to make a swatch to check my gauge, then keep checking it throughout the process and keep measuring and fitting and stuff. Argh. At least it's just for me, so if it's not perfect, oh well.

My progress so far, is that I've gotten 3/4 of the way through one arm. So a ways to go. I'll document my progress as I get farther along.

Weirdo!

My fabulous friend Molly again had a fantastically funny entry in her latest blog; the idea being to share 7 weird facts about yourself. She then tagged me to do my own. Those who are tagged need to write on their own blog those 7 facts as well as the rules of the game. You need to tag seven others and list their names on your blog. You have to leave those you plan on tagging a note in their comments so they know that they have been tagged and to read your blog. (honestly, I think I only have a few blog-ing friends, so I may have to break the 7 friend rule--uh oh!)

1. I consistently, at every meal, spill something on myself. When I was pregnant it was particularly bad. Many of my shirts were thrown in the garbage covered in strawberry ice cream stains.

2. Until the age of 5, I lived in a log cabin in the middle of the Canadian wilderness. I played outside all day in the mud, splashed around in the creek, frolicked with slimy salamanders and went for long treks into the forest with my dogs. Birds, flowers, plants, fish: I love them all. But bugs? To this day, I scream every time I think there might possibly be a small tiny bug anywhere near me. And God forbid that the bug is actually ON ME! AWK! That makes me shiver just thinking about it.

3. I have an uncanny ability to summon people. Living people, that is. If there is someone that I haven't talked to for years, all I have to do is think about them and they contact me. Example: I emailed my old college roommate and two days later, she emailed me. The weird thing? She didn't get my email. The address I wrote she no longer checked. She emailed me on her own volition! Yeah. It freaked me out too.

4. My husband says I'm weird because I don't like hot chocolate. Actually, I don't really like chocolate all that much period.

5. I regulate my temperature through my feet. If my feet are cold, even if it's 90 degrees where my body is, I'm cold. Or, like the other day, there were icy breezes screaming up the coast and I had nice woolly socks on and was completely toasty!

6. When pregnant with Elliot, I was addicted to dairy products. I had at least 8 glasses of milk, a whole container full of cottage cheese and a pint of ice cream everyday. Then, when Elliot was born, he was lactose intolerant. I had to go cold turkey with no dairy at all.

7. I've been inside the pyramids at Giza in Egypt. Not so weird, I suppose, but uncommon right?!

I had a hard time with this (believe it or not!)! I always thought I was sort of weird, but I guess I'm not!

OK, so I'm tagging Hannah and Lara . Maybe some more of my friends will send their blogs to me...

Crayon Color Party!

Recently, Elliot has discovered that drawing with Crayons is the best fun any kid could have. Unless you're coloring with washable, non-toxic, juicy colored markers! Oh and it's great if Dad is there to help you along.

Hmm... Purple Mountain's Magesty? That sounds fantastic!

We're not sure whether Elliot is going to favour his right or left hand. He changes hands depending on the color of the crayon and well, just whenever he feels like it. So far, both hands seem to work very well.

Rumour has it that there are a few people on my side of the family that were ambidextrous. That'd be cool.

Never Too Early to do the Chores

Vegetable Garden

This year, I dug a new veggie garden in our backyard. There was an old raised bed that my grandmother put in probably 25 years ago which I tore out (which, I might add, took me 4 days in itself to get out! There was about 15 square feet of chicken wire and tarp under the ground that was intended to keep out gophers/moles, but I don't think it ever worked.) then I doubled the size. Then, I dug compost into the whole thing (the compost was black and crumbly and had been preparing to nourish my garden for probably 20 years!).

After the soil was dug and fluffy and picked clean of weeds and roots (there's a huge redwood not 5 feet away which may cause problems with its roots invading the area), I created 3 long, wide raised rows. In these rows, I planted beans (thanks to Shelley for the organic heirloom beans!), lettuce, zucchini, broccoli, carrots, beets, radishes, cucumbers, cilantro, peas, chard and arugula. Wow, that sounds like a lot of stuff written down on paper.

There's also an herb garden where I've planted a bunch of yummy herbs, including basil, parsley, oregano and chives. The cats are ecstatic that I've also planted catnip for them. Although, as I've learned in previous years, I haven't let them at the plant yet because last time a catnip plant was left unprotected it was crushed in the first 20 minutes of life. Around the plant are a few bamboo sticks trying to protect the plant from an overly affectionate kitty. We'll see if it works.



Here's how it looks now! Everything is very small and barely poking their little heads out of the soil, but I have high hopes... Soon, I hope to show baskets of fresh, tender produce!

Just Going for a Stroll

Please let me know if you can't see this video. I'm doing some experiments with this.

Outdoors in the Sunshine

At the beach....Elliot loved having bare legs and bare feet to dig in the sand.



In the garden... Our favorite thing is to get as muddy as possible and this garbage can lid filled with water really did the trick.

My Life Every Five Years

Last month, Molly offered her "five year meme" on her blog and encouraged others to do the same. Memories from one's life every five years counting back from 2007. Here is mine.

1977
I was two years old. I don't remember much except for the scent of lilacs, the rays of the sun warming my face as I dangled my toes in the ice cold creek. We lived on the homestead in Clearwater where I ate the rhubarb pie and zucchini bread my mom would make from her plentiful garden.

1982
I was seven. My best friend Codie and I were at Lake Eleanor every day in the summer, "tiger-tiger" ice cream dripping down our hands as we walked the short walk to the beach. I remember picking these little furry red and orange flowers along the side of the road and bringing them home to my mom. For my Brownie troop, we had to sell cookies door to door and I remember running around town trying to convince old ladies to buy the vanilla and chocolate sandwich cookies.

1987
Now I'm 12. I'm very self concious but feel best in my favorite pink and white striped shirt. The best day is when we square dance in gym and I get to be partners with the heart-throb of our grade 7 class. My class and I went on a trip to Vancouver to stay at the UBC campus for a night. Amber and I giggled through the entire night, so giddy to spend a night alone in the dorm. In the morning, we showered in the communal locker room and as I stood under the running water, I thought life could not get any better than this.

1992
17. One more year of highschool. My boyfriend Mike was probably the worst student body president Esquimalt High had ever seen. I sang in the school vocal jazz group and did terribly in a competition in Vancouver. I painted a fantastic wooden chair with bright red and yellow flowers in art class that I still use to this day. I had a lot of laughs and went night swimming in the Lake Thetis.

1997
I was 22. I had just returned from an archaeological dig in Jordan and had decided to move to Seattle to go to art school. Immediately I met Siah who was a sparkly beautiful girl who's first observation of me was "Oh, so you're Aspen! The guidance councellor kept calling me your name so I think we were meant to meet." We never left each others' side. With her I learned to wear glitter on my cheeks during the day, beat the boys off with large sticks and dance long through the night and into the wee hours of the morning. I remember the day Princess Diana died as we were driving home at 7am from my first rave when we heard it on the radio. We had a moment of silence before drifting off into a blissful much needed sleep in the back seat of the car.

2002

I was 27. Jeremy and I had just recently bought our first house and we were starting to populate the place...with animals! And birds. That spring we bought 8 cute, fuzzy yellow chicks. They lived in a cardboard box topped with a heat lamp and lined with wood shavings until their little pin feathers came in. We built them a cozy coop out back where they each layed one egg everyday (that's 8 eggs a day!). They were allowed to run free in the yard when we were home and at night we had to chase them back into the coop. They are fast and furious little things and not easy to corral. A few of them would let us pick them up and "snuggle" and pet them once in a while.

2007

Now I'm 31. My lovely little boy just turned one and we live in a stunning coastal Californian town. Today Elliot and I dug in the dirt in order to prepare the soil for a vegetable garden. We love to sit in the cool freshly dug soil and wiggle our fingers and toes, not caring about the dirt in our pants (and ears and eyes and shoes). Elliot only ate one mouthful of dirt and no worms. It's a record!

As those before me have said, I now tag any and all of you to do your own. I would love to read them all!!

Easter Bunnies and Chocolate Eggs

Easter this year was at grandma and grandpa's house in Victoria. It was Elliot's first (ok, well, technically second but he doesn't remember the first and frankly, nor do I) Easter! In E's basket was a bunny (seen in background cast aside in favor of the more intriguing...), a top and a pound the ball into the hole thingy-ma-bob. That one was the biggest hit, as our little fella is turning out to be quite the noise maker. Anything that makes sound (and loud) is great. And what spring celebration would be complete without some baby goats? Well, none really. Beacon Hill Park petting zoo was chock full of goats, some as young as 1 day old! This little gaffer gave Elliot a kiss.

Also this week, I finally finished Elliot's sweater that I'd been working away at quite some time. Here he is modelling the finished product. Do you believe that it fit him absolutely perfectly?

Good Day for an Outdoor Concert

Elliot and Jeremy decided that on this beautiful sunny day they would go outside, play in the sorrel and the dirt and Elliot would treat the neighbourhood to a glorious outdoor piano concert.