Friday, July 29, 2016

I had two big deadlines on Friday (annual report stuff), and Selah June spent the day with Satie and Bastie for Friday fun day.  They played really hard, and then she napped for FOUR HOURS!!!!!  I knew she was spent, but I was still impressed.

When she woke up, I was there to pick her up.  We sat and chatted over a snackable, and then called Daddy to coordinate dinner with Nana and Papa at Zacksby’s. Booths are the only way to go with kids in public restaurants.  You can box them in and then contain the wallowing.

She’s really cracking me up these days because she’s purposefully trying to make people laugh.  And her humor is pretty gross – which is AWESOME!  We’re going to have so much fun making each other laugh with our disgusting humor.  Granted she’ll probably turn off a few dates, but they don’t deserve the presence of the Selah June anyway.

Her latest “joke” is to say “Yummy!”  When you ask what’s yummy, she says “booger” and picks her nose. This child isn’t even 2 years old yet.  She also thinks it’s super funny while you are trying to change her diapers for her to pat her privates and say “yummy poo poo.”  And then she squeals with laughter and yells “funny!!”

Wednesday, July 27, 2016

We decided to do something different and a little crazy for a modern American family of two working parents (working outside the home, that is) and a little one.  We signed up to be a part of a CSA – community supported agriculture.  We pay a weekly fee to receive farm-fresh produce and eggs every Wednesday (with the help of Jessica who is also on this crazy train with me).

Our bounty included a huge watermelon and some mystery gelatin.  I HAD to make breakfast dinner.  Luckily I had one russet potato and was able to make some fried potatoes. Jeremy was a fan and said they tasted like the ones at Lambert’s.  (SUCCESS!!!)

The mystery dark orange jelly was actually cinnamon peach marmalade. Delicious on biscuits!! I told Jess to eat some of hers, but she was a chicken. So I told her to feed it to Satie, but that didn’t take either.  Oh well!  Snooze you lose on the ooze!!

This is what the bounty looked like when Jessica loaded it into her car.  You can’t really tell from this picture how big the watermelons were. They were ginormous and DELICIOUS!!!  I ate on mine for four days and took it to a party at Ab’s for a bunch of people. There is still watermelon left…which is shocking because it was DELICIOUS!!!!!

Here’s came in one bag.  You can see that those are some huge carrots, a beautiful head of cauliflower, and a perfect cantaloupe.  It was the best cantaloupe either of us have had all season.

The mystery containers included marmalade, diatomaceous earth, and bath salts. And yes, that is fresh ginger. I made lentil soup, topped with cilantro and a big dollop of sour cream.  Yummy!!

Somebody is excited over some veggies!

Monday, July 25, 2016

Selah June went on an adventure to the zoo!!!  Jessica took the kids on a church family field trip.  They have annual passes, but SJ is still young enough to slip in under the radar.

Here she is with her “feed.”  She came back talking up a storm about the giraffes.

And they also had a GREAT ride on the train.  She told us all about it.

After a very hot zoo adventure, everybody needed lunch!

Heres the whole group of them.  It seems like a lot of boys!  We counted, and it was about a 2:1 ratio.

And here’s the little monkey on the ride home.  She was completely wiped.

Sunday, July 24, 2016

We took this little monkey to church in the morning and then picked up some Panera for lunch.  It was our first experiment with buying her a kid’s meal.  Jeremy ordered a pb&j, and it came with an apple.  Sounds yummy, right?  Not right.  The bread was their bakery white – each slice about an inch thick.  No child on this planet can easily take a bit out of this sandwich. It might taste absolutely delicious, but the kid will never know it because the whole thing is too intimidated.  These are things you don’t really process until you’re parenting and laboring at every meal to get the kid to eat something other than fruit and chips.

I’m sure she ate something, and then it was nap time.  We left Grammy and Grandpa in peace so that everyone could get some good snoozes.

These pics are just her being cute on the way to church.

Saturday

Daddy came home from Cleveland!!!!!!  We picked him up from the airport, and Selah Juney wanted him to sit in the backseat right next to her.  Here is her reaction.

Isn’t your first reaction to show off your “stinky feet”??

We made a quick stop by Sonic to get a good drink and fries, and then went home for everybody to take some much needed naps (except for me, of course).  

When we got up from our nap, we tried out our new cup and had a “delicious” lunch of “butter sandwich” and chips.  Real healthy, I know.

Here is our attempt at making sad faces – “happy!”

July 24, 2016

While Daddy was in Cleveland this week, we planted a little garden in the two boxes next to our greenhouse.  It seems to be the perfect size for us.  It’s big enough to plant a mix of flowers and veggies and herbs, but it’s not so big that it’s a handful.  I was able to buy one big bag of Miracle Grow and rejuvenate the good soil that was already there.

We planted a variety of peppers that Selah Juney will eat (and that can be used in homemade pico), and we planted marigolds to keep the bugs away.  We’ll see how well that works.

SJ loved being outside for the project, but she wasn’t a huge fan of getting her hands dirty.  This has become a theme.  She doesn’t like sticky, slimy, dirty, oily, anything hands.  It’s a super huge turnoff.

She does like her little pink watering can.

Thursday, July 21, 2016

Tonight Selah June got her first taste of presidential electioneering.  Here we are watching the last night of the 2016 Republican National Convention.

Without a mutual interest in public life, Jeremy and I would have never met.  He’s at the convention, and I’m watching it from afar.

I’ve been thinking a lot while he’s been away. I’m marveling every single day at Selah June’s beauty, her wit, her smile, her spoken words, her laughter, her singing, her tender heart, her fierce will, her loyalty, her joy, her sensitivity, her care for her family, and her adventurous spirit.  She’s not even two years old, and I know her inside and out.  She feels like an extension of me – one I couldn’t help create, one I don’t deserve to call my own, but one who will always have my whole heart.

I’m really concerned about the tough world in which we live.  It feels divided and terrorized.  And it feels like a terribly difficult environment for women.  The choices are seemingly abundant, but they are weighted down with real social determinism and personal consequences.  I want to be her mother first and foremost but also her teacher and her guide.  I find myself listening to Ivanka Trump at the Republican National Convention talk about equal pay for equal work and affordable childcare, and I can’t believe my ears.  This is the Republican nominee’s priority?  None of the speakers have said anything about this issue at all.  The platform is more socially conservative than it has been in many decades.

Its so surreal, and I’m currently so stretched. She is my miracle, and it’s going to take a miracle to be everything she needs me to be in this crazy world.

Sunday, July 17, 2016

After we dropped Daddy off at the airport to go spend time with the other uber elephants, we went on an “adventure.”  I thought it would be fun to go shop for plants for our garden, to buy some foods for us to enjoy, and to get a baby stroller for little doll baby Selah.  Boy was I wrong!

There is nothing beyond the first two minutes that a toddler finds enjoyable about Wally World.  I should know this.  I hated going to the grocery store growing up.  But somehow in my mind this is different.  This is “fun with Mommy time.”  By it’s not.

We did find plants.  We did find groceries.  We did get our new prized possession baby stroller….also good for carrying our French fries, our play-doh balls, and our magnetic letters.  And really good for thrill rides around the house when adults are willing and able to push us around (and around and around and around).

Though it was ultimately a successful hunt, it was NOT an enjoyable experience.  We screamed and writhed and threw things and hollered.  We cried big ole tears so that every stranger passing by would feel sorry for us.  But the more people stopped, the more frightened Miss Selah June acted.  It was a vicious cycle of warehouse terror….the terrorizing being terrorized.  I have never been so relieved to get out of Walmart, and that’s saying something.

We immediately sought the comfort of Aonic good drinks and French fries.  Of course they were too hot, and that was wildly upsetting.  We came home and things got immensely better when we could tear into our baby stroller.

I choose to remember that adventure through the pictures of this happy girl proudly displaying her stroller while saying cheese for the camera to show her Daddy.

Then we went for pot roast and mashed potatoes over to Aaron and Jessica’s house.  She was really excited to see Satie and ate at the table like a big girl right next to her.  And man she chowed down!! When kids are eating, she eats like a champ!  If only I could get her to concentrate that much at home!

July 15, 2016

Selah Juney decided to have a party from 1:00am to 4:45am in the wee hours of Friday morning.  Her Daddy loves her very much.  He watched hours and hours of Paw Patrol and Mickey Mouse Club while she flitted around the living room.  At some point, he couldn’t handle it anymore and brought her to bed.  She continued on her marathon, and he decided to go to work early so that he could come home early and take a well-deserved nap.  Mommy only got punched in the eye once and then woke up for real to this little angel from heaven above.

I’m going to have to spend some time editing these to send one off to be printed on canvas.  I just can’t stand the cuteness of it all.  Oh how I wish I could wake up every morning for the rest of my life looking at this sweet little angel.  But we all know that that requires a lot of shiners and that 13 is coming.

She had a great day with Satie and Bastian, and I had a usual day at work.  For dinner, Jeremy stopped by Publix and picked up a sandwich.  He never counted on this…

Wednesday, July 13, 2016

This summer I’ve been trying to carve out good quality morning time with Selah Juney before going in to work.  Yesterday we spent some time on our new porch.  I enjoyed a cup of tea, and SJ enjoyed treating the hexagon-shaped end table as her own personal jungle gym.  We listened to the birds.  We talked about Buddy.  We looked for “funder.” And we talked about Paw Patrol.  With the fan on and in the morning, the heat’s not too bad out there.

You can tell the pictures in which she was willing to say “CHEESE”!!!!!