Boys and baking

I've got a house full of boys! C's best dude and his brother are here. There are Legos e.v.e.r.y.w.h.e.r.e. They are playing video games and I'm about to feed them dinner. P and I spent the day in the kitchen cooking up a storm. I made my favorite cornbread (made GF now), cowboy beans, and a GF pumpkin cake with cream cheese frosting. Mmmmm! K is on his way home from a day of tattooing. Can't wait to hear how it went!

As you may know, we had some crazy October snow on the 15th. It wasn't the earliest snow we have ever had, but it's still pretty rare!

It's pouring right now, and at one point today, the house windows were fogged up on the outside because some weird warm air pocket went past.

Chair Re-do Results in Missing Kitty

I've been trying to get things done here and there from my list in the last post. I've got the costumes done (sneak peak at the end of this post!), two of the coasters sewn up, getting ready to do the binding on the Halloween quilt, and appliques attached with fusible interfacing. Just needs sewing up now.

I also spruced up a $4 chair! I needed a chair for my make-up table in the bedroom; I knew what I wanted, but couldn't find it. I wanted to do a makeover a la Design Sponge, so I was hitting the thrift stores. K and I were having lunch at Pho Boston a couple months ago, and while he finished feeding P, I ducked into the Salvation Army next door and came out with my $4 chair! It was just a brown dining chair with an old avocado and brown striped cushion. One can of Montana Gold Red Orange paint (you know how I love this stuff!), new batting, and a little Patty Young Secret Garden fabric, and voila!




Now, while I was painting this chair in the front yard, P was napping so I had the door slightly ajar so I could hear the monitor. I didn't realize until last night that I hadn't seen Molly since. K and I went out with the kitty treats and flashlight, and we finally found her under the deck. I went through the overgrown, dying perennials and dragged out the terrified little kitty! She has apparently become more spiritual since her ordeal.


Sneak preview of the children's Halloween costumes!

Busy

Sometimes when I'm feeling overwhelmed, it helps to make a list of what I need to do. But it also helps to make a list of what I have done, so I can see that I do indeed get things done.

Lying in bed last night, I started to have another anxiety attack about bills and things that I have to do. The laundry was beginning to take over the upstairs hall. It was all clean and folded, but I really needed to sort through the dressers and closets before I put anything away.

So today:

1. P's teacher was here for more than an hour (we always run over with all her therapists because we just like each other and end up chatting).

2. Had lunch with My Darling Husband and then...

3. Went to sign the paperwork for the lease buyout of our van (we had gone so far over our mileage because of hospital visits and subsequent therapies for P that it was cheaper for us to buy it)

4. Put away clothes. Realized need for a serious dresser purge.

5. P would not take a nap, so she and I went to Whole Foods. I thought surely she would sleep on the way. Nope. Not on the way back either.

6. When we got back, helped My Darling Husband make dinner and unload dishwasher.

7. Paid bills.

8. Started laundry.

9. Took P up for bath and bed.

10. Went through all of C's clothes in both dresser and closet. Sorted out the too small and the too icky. Sorted short sleeves and shorts separate from long sleeves and long pants.

11. Did the same for P's clothes. Doing both kids' clothes took less than 45 minutes. Yay!

12. I am drying the fourth load of laundry right now.

I have lots of sewing I need to get done: C's costume, P's costume, coasters, Halloween quilt, dress, appliques on some of P's shirts, another purse for Brazen Betties. And that's not even counting Christmas presents to get started. Fun, but still all a lot to get done!

(The picture on this post is a little visitor we had in the herbs this summer -- the summer that is gone for sure as we are going to have nighttime temperatures near freezing next week!)

Reviewing Summer

The calendar says it's Autumn, and the weather agrees. Today was a bit spoogy, but we have had some chilly nights and downright cold mornings (37 Friday morning!). I love this time of year (and it's not just because my birthday is this month), but I do get a bit melancholy. We didn't have much of a summer, which was good for the electric bill, but a little sad for the psyche. C was still wearing long pants almost until the end of the school year in June, we only went swimming twice, and only used our inflatable pool once -- and it was kinda cold then too! When it was hot, it too hot to want to be outside!

As the leaves change, the pumpkins ripen, and we start drinking cider until we can't drink anymore, I thought I would review the summer. Short as it was, we packed it full!

C went to California again this year with our niece and nephew to spend time with their grandparents. We dropped him off in Indiana and then went on to Iowa. Neither of us had been in a while, and we wanted to see Kevin's aunt and uncle and grandma.

Here's P sitting in her great grandma's chair. It was her chair when she was a little, little girl.

P and her cousin Wesley playing so sweetly together.


Uncle Roger took us to the Corning Winery. We bought three bottles of really great wine. The guy has only been in business since December and has already won awards!


P and Daddy at Uncle Roger and Aunt Janet's


Watching the deer in the back field after another night of making a big dent in the Iowa sweet corn crop






Wesley taking a ride in Uncle Roger's tractor


Cousin Abby and Wesley came up from Independence


I love this picture. P at age 2 with her 93-year-old great grandma.


Kevin relives his youth at Maid Rite. I was a Maid Rite virgin until this day. It was yummy!


So we took a detour off the main highway to find this Maid Rite, and we happened upon the absolutely adorable little town of Pella (yes, like the windows!). It was so cute with it's Dutch-meets-Midwest architecture. We found a nice little quilt shop where I bought a cool old sewing machine case that looks like old luggage -- for 5 measly bucks! It is now a home for my fabric stash.

You could buy flour ground by this actual windmill.


This windmill is the information center.


After we got back from Iowa, we were invited to attend Camp Care, a day camp for special needs children that is put on by the place where P has PT. P started having PT without me in the room for the first time during camp. The first day, C and I went to the park for arts & crafts while P had her treatment. When we got back they were using her as bait to get this sweet little boy to walk. We met the most amazing people there and I got lots of perspective on our situation while learning about other families' struggles and triumphs. It was a blessing to be invited. These people are absolutely amazing and have been so kind to us.


We ordered some much needed equipment for P this summer. She got an adaptive chair (she had one that we were borrowing from the EIP, but this one was custom made for her), a bath chair (which can also be used at the beach -- maybe next summer!), and this stroller. It's the smallest size they make, but it will grow with her. We chose purple from all the color choices, and I really like it. We didn't need the foot straps and she doesn't need the chest strap because she has MUCH better trunk control. It was nice to be able to take off all that stuff. I don't think it looks too "handicapped," do you?


We had C's 10th (TENTH?!) birthday party a few weeks after his birthday since school started just two days after his actual birthday. It was a Mad Scientist theme so K and the kids exploded stuff in soda!


C and his friends, including the girls who lived next door to us in our last place.


C's best dude, Caleb, stayed for a while after everyone else had gone home. They hadn't seen each other in a year or so, but it was liked they hadn't even spent one day apart. I want to keep this friendship going even though they don't go to the same school or see each other very often. Caleb is such a great kid and I love his family too.

Now that C is in 4th grade, he got to choose an instrument to play. He had his mind made up on saxophone a long time ago, which would have been fine, but I did talk to him about the difficulty in getting your mouth just right on a reed instrument. I played flute for 8 years, but was occasionally asked to play oboe and clarinet because there were a gazillion flutists. I hated the reeds! I threw that clarinet so many times, it's a wonder it ever played right. Well, then he talked about trumpet, which would have been fine too. I signed the form, but he changed it after he got to school and put violin as his number one choice! I know zero about string instruments, but he was game, so what the heck. He has had two lessons so far and he seems to have taken right to it! It doesn't sound too much like screeching cats at all. Heehee!

I have been making jewelry, purses, and art in my very rare free time. A new shop opened downtown that sells things made only by Connecticut artisans so I was getting things ready for that. The shop sponsored a bazaar to coincide with Torrington Day last weekend, so I did that first. Here is my table all set up. I did a cute retro red and light blue/turquoise theme, even down to the M&Ms I offered (I was popular with the kids!).

And here are just a few of my jewelry pieces on display at the shop. I took everything in yesterday morning, Julia set it all up, and I had already sold my first piece by the time she closed for the day!

Going Gluten Free

So I've had to go Gluten Free. Luckily I have a friend who is living gluten-free (as well as several-other-things-free) and she took me shopping and showed me all the good stuff. It really hasn't been bad, but those mornings when we need to be out of the house PDQ it's impossible to find something quick (i.e, at a drive-through) that is GF.

One morning I decided to tackle the pantry and get rid of all the gluten-laden food so that it wasn't sitting there, tempting me when I was a rush.

This is all the packaging. Wow. Please ignore the Froot Loops box. That truly is not mine. All this went into the recycling bin.

This is the very heavy bag of junk I had to toss. Anything unopened I have in a box to go to the food bank.

And now my pantry is so nice and tidy!

New Hampshire, July 2009

There are many, many things in life that I am grateful for. One of them is the love of friends and good times spent with them. We visited Tim and Bobby at their inn in New Hampshire. We haven't been in summer before, and we also haven't seen them in 2 years so we were so excited to go and introduce P to them. We here in New England have had one chilly summer, though, so we didn't get to swim in Crystal Lake, as we had intended. But the love of our friends kept us warm.

Look at what greets you as you enter through the pub.

Tim & Monty

Mmmmm... Meatballs by Bobby

Me & Bobby, waiting for our Thai lunch. Good food, terrible service.

We (minus Bobby. Boo.) took a day trip to Portland, Maine, and let me tell you, the love of friends was not enough warmth that day! We rolled out of the car to 50 degrees and the fog rolling in! So off we went to buy sweatshirts!

Me & Tim in Portland

In trying to find a place to have lunch, we passed several touristy places, with people in visors and Bermuda shorts spilling out. C spotted some boats and suggested we look down there. There we discovered The Porthole. No Bermuda shorts, looked like a bunch of locals (always go where the locals go), and it was right on the dock. My boy knows how to find a restaurant!

Seriously good eats. See for yourself: lobster roll and fries. There was also a yummy fish chowder that didn't last long enough for a photo. Not a goopy chowder, but a light, creamy broth with big potatoes and hunks of fish.

Here we all are, happy as clams...errr, lobsters.

Look how happy K is!

Because we love retro, neon signs, and lobsters. And here they all are, all together!

Now, we are ones to do what we're told, so we heeded this little fellow's plea...

And we went here.

And bought a few of these, which later that evening were snug in some enchiladas.

I believe the joy of lobster enchiladas may have led to this sort of behavior.

Photo catch up, swimming & fish kissing

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