Quite the Hike

The hike to Timpanogos Cave is only a mile and a half long, but it climbs 1,000 feet. That means it's very very steep.

It's worth the climb though, even without the nifty cave at the top. The scenery along the way is stunning. Just ask Fish.

(Here's what he's looking at:)

We had such a happy hiking party when we trekked up there earlier this month with Grandpa Badger.

I'm looking forward to being back in Utah where I can do more stuff like this.

South Fork

While we were in Utah, we had a picnic with the Badger's family up the south fork of Provo Canyon. There is a fairly new park up there that has fast become a favorite place for family gatherings. It's very picturesque.

We all enjoyed marvelous food.

It was nice to meet Aunt Kaa's boyfriend.

And there was lots of sparkling conversation.

Family, good food, and mountains. Does it get any better?

Sweet Love

Now that I know how to pick them, eating watermelon has become one of the great joys of our August existence.

See that nice yellow bottom on this melon? That's the key. This melon tastes amazing.

I've also had very good luck with the tip in the same newspaper article about canteloupes and other similar melons. When they start to ripen in the field, the stem starts to detach from the melon. This leaves a crescent-shaped scar on the spot where the stem attached to the melon. I'll take a picture next time I buy one so you can see what I mean. I sometimes look through the melon bin at the store now and don't pick any because there are no crescents, even if they're really cheap. Every time I have found one, however, the melon has been nice and sweet, even if the texture is fairly firm.

Baby Acorns

With great delight, I have been watching this fall's crop of acorns develop.

We keep talking about moving out of this duplex, but somehow it just keeps not happening. I think the oak trees on this property are a huge part of that. I think they like me and they want me to stick around.

Whatamelon!

I'm done thumping watermelons.

It's how I've always picked 'em and it's never been very reliable. So I just figured picking watermelons was hit and miss. Then I read an article in the paper last week that suggested you look at the bottom of the melon, where it was sitting on the ground. If it's yellow, the melon will be a lot riper than if it's white. Last time I was at Aldi and they had $3.99 melons I decided to try it. Most of the melons in the bin had white bottoms, but I found one that was quite yellow. I thumped it just out of habit and I thought it didn't sound at all hollow, but I decided to take a risk and buy it anyway. A $3.99 experiment. I was a bit nervous.

It was the best melon I've ever eaten. Talk about SWEET! It was like candy. It was crisp too. We ate near the entire thing in one sitting.

Yellow bottoms, folks. That's the way to go.

My Squid is a Huggable Dear

On our last trip to the candy store (aka the library) we picked up a wonderful children's picture book called "I Love My Buzzard" by Tres Seymour. It's a charming account, in rhyme, of a boy who has so many unusual pets that his mother finally flees the house for the sake of her own sanity. (Then of course he realizes he likes his mother more than his pets so he gets rid of them.) It's a darling book, but the line line that totally tickled my funny bone was near the end where he says:

"I love my buzzard, my warthog, and bat.
My squid is a huggable dear.
I prize my iguana and cherish my slugs.
But I wish that my mother were here."

That's how I've always felt about squids-- that they are huggable dears.

We have an unusual number of squids and octopi around our house due to those feelings of mine. Let me introduce you to one of them. This is my Power Squid.

He serves the same purpose as a power strip: many electrical outlets from one. He's fabulously useful and wonderfully squiddy.

Not quite a huggable dear, but pretty close.

Gotta Have More

Two summers ago around a family reunion campfire, my sisters discovered an old Girl Scout song of mine about chocolate chip cookies. The lyrics to the chorus go like this:

"Chocolate chip cookies
Gotta have more
You can bake 'em in the oven
Or buy 'em at the store
But whatever you do
Have them ready at your door
And I'll love you 'til I die"

I was surprised that they'd never heard it before and charmed that they loved it so much. They sang it again and again.

Thanks to my sister Pineapple, I have the recipe for the very best chocolate chip cookies ever. I only make them once or twice a year though because when I do make them I can't stop eating them. The recipe makes six dozen. I could eat them all. In a day.

The other day I made them for a cub scout meeting. I figured I was safe if I had to take most of them to a function. My family still snarfed up 2 dozen in a few short minutes.

That's the nice thing about having a lot of kids. They save you from eating too much of something yourself. I still ate quite a few cookies, but I didn't gain any weight over the whole experience. For someone with my track record, that's an achievement.

"When I die I don't want wings
A golden halo or a harp that sings
Just give me a book, a fire
And someone to bring me
Chocolate chip cookies all day!"

Dream Job For a Day

Yesterday was glorious.

I'm still marveling over what happened.

When my cousin Michelle announced her engagement a couple of months ago, we were all thrilled, as is typical when such an event occurs. But something else happened too. Everyone who knows Michelle knows that she is sweet, kind, thoughtful, hard-working, and spiritual, and that it has been hard for her since she lost her dad to cancer six years ago. There are many, many people who love her very deeply and would tie themselves into knots for her. When she announced her engagement, people started volunteering their time and talents to help with the wedding. It was truly heartwarming to see the hours and hours of time people put in to do things like make her dress and her cake and decorate for her reception. There was so much love involved from start to finish.

I volunteered to be her photographer. I've always wanted to be a wedding photographer. I was a little surprised when she actually took me up on it. And then I was a little nervous when the huge responsibility of the assignment hit me. What if I totally messed up and none of the pictures turned out? What if she just didn't like the pictures?

I called my sister Crocodile and arranged to borrow the camera that I used as a back up at Heather's wedding last year. It wasn't the ideal camera for a wedding, but it was good enough. Then I spent quite a bit of time researching wedding photography tips and techniques. It was a little overwhelming as I realized that I didn't have as much skill and practice and good equipment as was optimum. But I bravely went forward, knowing that Michelle was grateful for my willingness to give it my best effort.

Heaven smiled on Michelle yesterday, and some of that radiated over to me and my camera. I got some really nice shots. I haven't had time to look at them all yet, let alone process them, but overall I'm pleased so far. I wasn't the perfect wedding photographer and I didn't take anything like the stunning, clever, artsy example pictures I looked at online, but I think I did a right decent job.

For my first wedding, I was so blessed to have such an easy-going, happy, photogenic couple to work with. They were great. They were patient. They were fun. And so was their family. There was always a willing pair of hands to move my equipment and hold my baby. It was the perfect situation for a greenie.

Thanks, Michelle, for letting me fulfill my dream of being a wedding photographer! It really meant a lot to me. I had a great time!

It's That Time of Year Again!

We went strawberry picking this morning. Mr. Eeyore, who runs the u-pick farm, insisted that the crop was terrible this year. However, I still came away with thirty pounds of utter heaven. Okay, they were a little small, but small sometimes makes for better flavor.

At least ten pounds were picked by my two boys, who actually worked constantly and un-complainingly the whole time we were in the field. I didn't have to coax them at all. They just dove in and filled their buckets. Starting them on berry picking when they were tiny tykes seems to have paid off (Fish has been doing this every year since he was ten months old).

Strawberry picking is becoming quite the well-loved tradition in our family. And if it wasn't fun enough by itself, there's the strawberry eating afterwards. My kids and I all had red, sticky, happy mouths and fingers at lunch time today.

Under the Oak Tree

May is the most glorious month of the year. Life has been so beautiful lately. I don't know how many times in the last few days I have thought "I am so happy to be alive!" as I have stepped outside on a breezy green evening or biked along a trail through a new-grown meadow.

And you simply can't help but be in love with life if you take a turn in our freshly-installed backyard hammock.

Pull the string and you will rock back and forth, back and forth, just like a baby in a cradle. (Please click this picture to enlarge it. It's too good not to take a close look!)

It's perfect for snuggling.

An oak tree, a hammock, and a beautiful day in May is just about as good as it gets.

It's Just Not As Much Fun in the Microwave

Me and Fred

Okay, so our big plan a year and a half ago was to move here to the prairie and make all our dreams come true by buying a hunk of land and growing lots of our own food and animals. I named this blog in anticipation of the day when it would be full of pictures and descriptions of life in the country with a young family. Sweeping prairie vistas with cute toddlers in the foreground, etc.

Well, the right country property has been very elusive for us, and so here were are still renting our little duplex.

However! I have friends who live in the country so I can still put nifty pictures of rural living on my blog on occasion. It makes me feel satisfied on one hand to see my blog be more what I originally envisioned it to be, and on the other hand it makes me feel a little bit like a wanna-be. Until I consider the animal droppings my Rabbit somehow gets into her mouth when we visit the country. Then I think that perhaps we're where we need to be right now.

But back to Fred.

Fred blew into my friend Shannon's life after the last big storm. A man came to her door and said they'd found this peacock in their yard after the storm and couldn't find who he belonged to. The man couldn't care for Fred, so he drove around looking for a residence that had chickens. He found Shannon, who said "We'll just throw him in the with chickens and see what happens." It was a successful throw. He seems very content and he's very gentle and holdable.

He's a pied peacock, which means he's half white and half irridescent. Love, love, LOVE that vibrant blue color on his neck!

Fred, you're gorgeous. And you certainly found yourself the perfect country home.

Maybe I'll get lucky like Fred and find the perfect country home one of these days. If I do, I'm going to get me a Fred.

Olive Fingers

Absolutely classic...

Absolutely Irresistible

Baby hoodies with ears....

...One of my favorite things about motherhood.

Q. How Can You Tell a Happy Biker?

A. By the bugs stuck in her teeth.



I've really been enjoying biking lately. Now, you must understand that I haven't enjoyed biking since I was ten. I didn't think biking was my thing. But apparently it is because I look forward to my daily bike rides and I normally don't look forward to exercise. It helps that it's a gorgeous time of year. It also helps that I've reached my weight loss goal so I have less to haul around.

Speaking of my weight loss goal, I was supposed to do a before and after picture. Here is the heretofore unrevealed "Before" picture that I told you about but wouldn't actually show you a year ago because it was dreadful.

"Before" pictures are supposed to be dreadful. Yuck. Now, here is the "after" picture. Thirty five pounds gone. Yay!

I often find myself thinking, "is this really me?" I was pretty much overweight and out of shape from adolescence so I'd written on stone in my mind that I was too fat to do anything athletic and I could never find clothes that fit and I didn't think that I could ever change.

Boy, am I glad I was wrong. It's so fun to be like this. It's so fun to look in the mirror and say "hey, I look great!" It's so fun to come home from a long bike ride with Bean and say "Wow, we went eight miles today!" And I realize that THIS really is me and what I used to think was me wasn't really me at all.

I am still struggling with a strong compulsion to eat and eat and eat and eat and eat until I am sick, especially when it comes to sugar. Sometimes I still give in, but overall I am slowly getting stronger. Even when I still overeat I can tell that I stop a little sooner than I used to and I am happy with any little bit of progress.

I hope that I can be an inspiration to somebody. I used to look at people who'd lost weight and think "that will never happen to me" and then it did (starting with a dramatic 100 pound loss after I had Bean.) So when you look at me don't think "that will never happen to me" because I don't believe that. You shouldn't either.

Baby Oak Leaves

It's that time of year again!

The Singing Baby

This afternoon as I was washing dishes I heard a little voice behind me singing "ah ah ah ah" to the tune of "I am a Child of God." I wasn't surprised at first because Roo sings this song all the time, but then suddenly I realized something: Roo was in the other room and it was Rabbit that was singing. Dead on pitch!

I thought maybe it was a fluke and I was imagining things-- I've never heard a 13-month-old carry a tune before-- but then she did it again this evening as she was sitting in her high chair.

So I have a little Singing Rabbit. I am so delighted. She isn't even walking yet and she can only say 2 or 3 words, but she sings!