The Many Faces of Elliot James

A bunch of the cutest Elliot photos from the last few months. The only one that needs any introduction is this one:When my cousin Nate and I were about 3 years old, we sat in this exact spot under the old cedar tree and had our picture taken. Now, 30 years later, it's Elliot and me! What a special spot.

Go Fly a Kite

Recently (as mentioned in a previous blog entry), we acquired the most awesome of all kites. A large orange goldfish that contrasts nicely with the sparkly blue sky.

The other day it was particularily blustery and so the three of us trudged down to the local beach to fly ol' Goldy. I was adament that I was going to start the kite off as the last time the kite was flown I didn't even touch it. So, I threw it up in the air...and it dived back to earth. I threw it up again and tugged on the string a few times to get it to catch the breeze. It floated back to earth.

Finally, I threw it up in the air and at that exact moment a huge gust of wind carried it up...up... and away! It was flying! It sailed high above the bluff, dancing with the baby seagulls. (Here Jeremy gets the glory.)

Elliot couldn't stop talking about how cool it was and asking how it all worked (ok, I made that part up, but it sure seemed as if he was saying that). So, Jeremy decided to help him to fly it. He handed him the spool and viola!

Here's a picture of the bluffs overlooking the ocean that day.

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.