Goings-On

Robot-building, costume-making, homework-solving.







Daily Bliss: Mario Kart tournaments & a rainy, stormy day

Weekend

Knitting night & poking around in my dad's garage, making some cool stuff.






Daily Bliss: making stuff as a family - everybody sweating in the garage together

More

I thought I'd show you some Father's Day goodies, but I can't stop looking at this sunset. It's much nicer than chocolate-and-peanut-butter-covered pretzels in a duct tape vase.

Seriously?

I thought summer days were supposed to be lazy.

Good Hubby

Having a little freak-out moment.
Hubs walks in.
He asks,
"Chocolate?"

Upon reflection, he further asks,
"Beer?"

After yet another moment, he turns on his heels toward the kitchen and says,
"Ooooo. Chocolate and beer."

Solstice Recap

As most of you know, our family has certain traditions that we honor on the first day of all four of the seasons. Yesterday was the summer solstice and we made our way to the beach to catch the sunset.
It had been a pretty crazy day and we didn't check the forecast or anything - tradition is tradition. We just got in the car and drove like mad, hoping we wouldn't miss it.
Once we got to the coast, though, things were looking a little rough.


In ten years of solstice beach trips, we have never been rained out. I was really hoping it was moving in the other direction, so once we parked the car, I hopped out to survey the area.
Not good.


In short order, it started to really storm. But we'd driven for more than an hour to get there, so we decided to wait it out. Tradition is tradition. This is the solstice. We have to get onto the beach.



Things did clear up a bit eventually. We had a break in the clouds that lasted just long enough to get a little wet,


stick our toes in the sand,


and see the beautiful sunset I showed you earlier.

With the rain and storms, the light turned incredibly colorful. I took a couple of hand-held long exposure shots (read: they are supposed to be blurry). I love the softness of the moving water and...well...just how these make me feel.



There was homemade lemonade (Emma squeezed the lemons this year) and ice cream too. All in all, a wonderful way to celebrate the official start of summer.

Solstice

Happy Summer Solstice! Perhaps a bit of a story will follow soon, when I've a bit more time to throw pictures together.
But here's a peek at the view we were offered on the first day of summer:

Candied Popcorn!

New

It's not finished, but it was super fun all the same.

We've been invited to a "Mustaches and Monocles" party where top hats are also encouraged, as are pretend names. Of course, a girl like me sees that as an opportunity to try making something new. Feel free to suggest any silly, English-y names that come to mind in the comments!

Building, Making, Playing

Finished

Observation

Many times this week, I've thought to myself that I ought to get on this blog and say something. Sure, it hasn't been that long since I posted, but I'm usually a little more wordy. I always have stories to tell and molehills to turn into mountains with my words.
Honestly?
I'm facing down a bit of writers' block.
Life is happening and it's wonderful. Happiness abounds and I am having more fun than ever discovering all that lies in the changes that have come my way this year. Summer is here and my babies are home with me and we have plans.

I sat in my back yard today after planting the last of my sweet potato slips (I honestly don't think I have a corner left out there to accommodate more sprawling vines) and I just decided to keep sitting.

As I quieted myself and sat more still, a mama mockingbird grew ever bolder in her swooping hunt, coming closer to me after each dive as she searched out juicy morsels in newly-turned earth.
A mama cardinal glided silently down under the kids' fort and stole a bit of something bright and pink that I can only presume was left there by Emma ages ago. She darted back up to her perch in the tree and bragged about her find for the whole neighborhood to hear.
The light continued to fade and the breeze grew stronger and a pair of mourning doves started to call to each other across the alley. A pair of egrets soared just overhead, cutting a diagonal line from the corner of my roof to the corner of the back fence.

And I decided that I haven't been listening enough.

I think this will be a Silent Summer.

I have had many summer experiments. Once, I wore aprons in public as much as possible. There was even the No Pants Summer wherein I wore only skirts and dresses. And I think that this summer, I will be listening quite a bit and telling fewer of my own stories.

For the purpose of this blog, I am hoping that this will mean wordless posts, or nearly so - photos of my days with little explanation. I'm sure I will have things to say now and again. But I hope that when I do write, it will matter and my stories will be good. I have so many things to knit and make and build and do and I don't want to spend all my spare minutes on talking about myself.

So.

Silent Summer.
Beginning now.

Daily Bliss: leftover chocolate truffles

A Morning Walk

Emma and I took Mindy and Nolan on a photo walk yesterday morning. Emma has been out of school for several days now and Andrew wasn't yet (he is as of today), so we've been doing a few special, girly things.
We went to a local park and just walked around to see just what needed its picture taken.


There was a brave little moth.


And lots of other pretty stuff too.








This one's my favorite:


Daily Bliss: morning time in the garden with my daughter and nephew

Onslaught of Photos

Our day at Epcot was so fantastic! It's a super-enormous playground for people who love learning and imagining - just like my family! So we felt right at home.
A couple of notes before we begin:
1) I'm not going to write a lot. I am tired. The pictures probably speak for themselves anyway.
2) If I ever decide to become a "photographer," I will probably regret putting unedited snapshots on my blog. But (see item #1).

My favorite people:




Here's Andrew posing with a crash test dummy. He was wearing his Buster (the Mythbusters crash test dummy) shirt. It was a beautiful moment of destiny.



We all really enjoyed the World Showcase area of the park. There was so much to see - fun rides and Disney-tastic sets and replicas like only Disney can do. Plus? Oh yes. Amazing food.
Norway:




Germany:


In France, of course, something sweet from the patisserie for my future French pastry chef. There was even a girl named Emma - from France, of course - working in the patisserie! Le sigh.




I seem to have taken lots of pictures of colorful lights in random places.





Kids doing even more stuff:



Fireworks and lasers at the close of the day:



One last glimpse of the famous Epcot ball as we left:


Lastly, just for my aunt, here is a tomato tree with Andrew's head blocking the view a little bit.

It is nowhere near the size of the one I saw last time, which they specifically mentioned on the tour as being the record-breaking tomato tree. Still, it's pretty impressive!

I'm sure you can tell that we had loads of fun. It was definitely hot out - the heat index was somewhere around 104! But we really enjoyed just being together and roaming through the park at our own pace. We could probably spend three days straight in the park and not do everything we wanted to do. Here's hoping for a timely return.