Weekend Without Dad

Matt left Friday morning for a bike race in Michigan. He was working as the Chief Ref at the US Pro Criterium Championship -- a big role for him.

The original plan was for me to work as usual, and for my dad to come "rescue" the pups in the middle of the day (i.e. pick them up and bring them to their house for the afternoon). But then I heard about an awesome rummage sale a friend was having. Knowing I could pick up some clothes for V, I first thought I'd just go into work a couple hours late. But really? Would I want to go in on a Friday after having the morning off? Nope ... might as well take the whole day off!

Victoria and I scored big at the rummage sale. Clothes and even a few toys, plus a stuffed animal she instantly hugged to her chest and carried all around the sale until I agreed to buy it. True to form, she was not the one who gravitated to the toys. What was she drawn to? I turned around to find her sitting behind me on the sidewalk, taking her sandals off so she could try on all the shoes! Oh, my little girl ... :). Yes, I did buy her a pair of shoes too.

Then we went to the zoo.

We took a train ride (choo choo! said Victoria), watched the nocturnal feeding, and enjoyed lunch on their sunny deck overlooking the tiger's waterfall. She loved the turtles, porcupines, and prairie dogs. She was so exhausted I couldn't keep her awake on the ride home, and even though she fell asleep just three minutes from the house, she let me carry her inside and collapsed in her crib for a nice long nap. The nice thing about being home by nap time was that the dogs were not in their kennels for very long.

After nap time, I packed up our stuff and all three girls, and we went to spend the night with grandma and grandpa. They all love being at their "second home." Victoria loves g & g so much she went to them to kiss all her owies ... Mommy is like chopped liver. And I don't even care -- I'm glad she loves them so much.

On Saturday, after running a couple of errands, Victoria and I went to nearby Solway Town Hall to watch the dog agility trials. These have been held every summer since we moved here, and I've never been able to make it. It was so fun to watch the dogs run over jumps and through hoops and tunnels. V was riveted too, watching every dog each step of the way. A woman actually came up to ask how old she was, and then said, "I have a two year old, and she would never sit this long!" We then romped on the playground for awhile before heading home.

This morning, we capped the fun off by volunteering in the nursery at church. For V, this was like a big play date. We had a blast playing with the other kids and will definitely do it again!

By the time we got home from church, Daddy was here! Victoria was so happy to see him. She seemed to miss him more on this trip than previous ones ... the first morning, she toddled into our bedroom expecting to find Dada, and when he wasn't in bed, her mouth formed into a little "o" of surprise, followed by looking at Mommy in confusion, and then pointing at the bed like "where's Daddy?" The first time we came home to an empty house, she assumed Dada was in his basement office, and she ran to the baby gate at the top of the stairs yelling, "dada! dada!" She yelled for quite awhile before I convinced her he wasn't here. It was bittersweet ... so sad to see her missing him so much, yet sweet how much she loves her Daddy.

Sunday at Grandma & Grandpa's

Last Sunday my parents took all three girls for the day. They wanted play time with Victoria, and said, "bring the pups too!" Matt and I were able to spend several hours working in the yard and on trails, and remarked how much more we could get done when we didn't have to watch for the girls. We could even catch an afternoon matinee before heading to my parents house that evening.

Even more importantly, the girls had lots of fun. They love Grandma and Grandpa's house! For the dogs, there are treats and a big fenced yard and great places to nap. For V, there are toys and this awesome car. She jumped in the driver's seat, purse on her arm and smile on her face (she also was very adamant about wearing her favorite leopard print skirt that morning). I look at this picture, and a teenager with a driver's license doesn't seem that far away.

Matt and I brought pizza for dinner, and we all played in the water in the back yard ... there was one pool for V (the inflatable one that dogs' nails would rip apart) and one for the pups (they could scratch up all they want).

Hannah prefers to treat the pool as a doggie spa, where she can just revel in the water's coolness.

Piper likes to play the "water game," where I run a hose into the water and she scratches and digs at it (making me laugh constantly) ...

... and tries to bite the water.

That dog is sure funny! Victoria laughed at her too.

Look at all these buckets and watering cans! Spoiled girl.

She even went and got Grandpa, saying " 'mon," and told him to sit on the ground next to her. They laughed and played ...

... and splashed each other!

Play Time

How could I have missed these? Matt sent these to me several weeks ago and I neglected to post them. In some ways they are the perfect illustration of yesterday's blog post.

Rather than be confined to her (dry) sandbox, V discovered that if she dug near Mommy's vegetable bed, she could find a little well seeping out from the garden house. It filled up fast ... instant mud!

 

But of course, it's an easy transition to doll houses and stuffed animals.

girlie tomboy? or tough girlie girl?

Victoria is a country girl through and through. She asks to be outside in all kinds of weather -- cold, snow, slush, rain, heat. She will play in the sand, rocks, and mud. Bug bites decorate her arms, legs, and face, but only once have I heard her say "owie" to a bite. This summer, she has collected scratches, bruises, and tan lines just as fast as she has collected her piles of rocks, which we find on the sidewalk, steps, and wrapped tight in her little fists. Her daycare provider calls her a "toughie" because she tries to follow the big kids wherever they go. Tall slides, up ladders, into the woods. She was the first one into the kiddie pools they set up one hot day, and has been noted as being afraid of nothing. She loves the dogs, and likes to pet them, help feed them, and give them treats. I like her budding naturalist skills -- always watching for birds, and last weekend she saw a deer down a trail that I hadn't seen. She squealed in delight, yelled "dee! dee!" then came to get me from the other side of the room, waving her hand for me to follow her and saying " 'mon, 'mon."

She can't pronounce the hard "c" in "c'mon," so she just says " 'mon." Which is my new favorite word, by the way. How can you resist a little girl who says " 'mon," waves you her direction, and then adds the hand signal for "please" -- ?? She definitely knows how to get us to do what she wants.

Just when you start to think she is a little tomboy, though, the girl comes out. If she sees her favorite leopard print skirt in the wash, she will pull it out and try to wear it on the spot, even if it's over pants or shorts. She has surprised us with her definite shoe preferences -- not those practical sport sandals. She likes the pink flowered wedge sandals, thank you. She is proud of her new headband and prances like a Hollywood star in her sunglasses. On our most recent shopping trip, I tried to pick out barrettes for her hair. Holding it out to her, I asked, "should we get these?" fully expecting a happy nod of the head. Instead, she surveyed the big rack, gave me a frown, and adamantly shook her head no. I picked a second set. Still, no. Finally for the third set (bigger, more colorful bows) she smiled and nodded yes.

A year and a half old, and already she has preferences for hair pieces.

Now if only she would let me actually brush her hair ... I'd have to get her out of the sand box first!

first bike ride

We took V for her first bike ride. The bike trailer has been here for about a week, and she loved sitting in it, even helping to buckle herself up. We bought her a helmet, which she has worn incessantly around the house and yard (and when she wasn't wearing it, she was constantly playing with the buckles). She didn't quite understand the purpose of the trailer and helmet, though -- tonight when we were going out to play in the sandbox, she insisted on wearing the helmet (backwards) rather than her sun hat. There was no convincing her that the helmet wasn't needed.

As we prepared for the ride, then, she was perfectly happy to sit in the bike trailer and wear her helmet. It was a different story when Matt tried to hook the trailer up to his bike -- she screamed! She had come to think of the trailer as hers, and I don't know -- did she think Daddy was stealing it? She made quite a commotion for several minutes, until the second the trailer started moving. It instantly sunk in that this thing was made for RIDES (!) and the crying stopped. She lounged back in the trailer and watched the scenery.

We just went down our road a little ways, and took the dogs with us. I'm a nervous nellie biking while pregnant (I already have poor balance, let alone when a protuding tummy is throwing me off), and neither of us has been on a bike in about three years. Yikes! After just half a mile my butt hurt like crazy. But it did feel good to be pedaling again, and all our girls had a great time. Here's to many more bike rides in the future!

from the garden

Losing Trees

After coming out of the recent flood unscathed, no one batted an eyelash when some small scattered thunderstorms rolled through this week. We put our cars in the garage in the off chance of hail, but didn't really think much would happen. I went to bed at a normal time and slept soundly through the thunder. Imagine my shock when, going to make coffee in the morning, I realized one of our favorite yard trees had come down, taking parts of two others with it.

This group of three aspen provided the only real shade in our yard. While we are surrounded by forest, our yard is generally a wide open expanse, and this has been the only spot we can sit in the grass and not get burnt to a crisp. My hammock was under these trees, and several lawn chairs, as well as V's pool.

Yes, we new that, as older aspen do, these trees were prone to failure. We've been saying we really need to think about what to plant here to replace these trees. (Any ideas or suggestions, anyone?) In fact, we are lucky it didn't land on the house, or fence, or one of our cars.


By the way, don't you love that orange snow fence along the house? Really adds to the pristine nature of our north woods location, I think.


Thursday night was then dedicated to removing the tree. Matt got to try out his new chainsaw.

My parents came up to "take care of V" so we could work on the tree. Or at least, that's all I expected them to do, and would have been thrilled if they had just kept her out of harm's way. But of course -- being my parents and all -- they put on work gloves and had to help too.

Victoria thought we were all just playing. She thought Daddy's chainsaw looked like a cool noisy toy. She loves picking up sticks. And she especially loves the four wheeler.

I wonder how long we have until she realizes that we are really working and doing chores, and not just playing? Maybe I can pull a Tom Sawyer on her and convince her to do lots of chores/"playing" over the course of her childhood.

We hauled trailer after trailer of branches out to the woods. Victoria had to stay behind each time Grandpa brought a trailer full of branches to the end of the field. To make up for staying behind, she got a four wheeler ride around the yard after every trip.

After a couple hours, the tree had been completely removed from the hammock which was -- remarkably -- unscathed. Our lawn chair (which you can see in the below picture) was not so lucky.

We still have lots of tiny branches and leaves to rake up out of the yard, and a couple piles of logs to haul to our wood pile. But we made a pretty awesome team on Thursday night, and my parents are awesome for helping us!

If the bus fits ...

Victoria found a new use for one of our old toys. Wish I could have gotten a better photo and video but she just moved around too much.

4th of July

It's been so sunny and hot lately that by the time the 4th of July rolled around it really felt like the middle of summer. With day care closed a couple of days, I used a vacation day so I had a two-day holiday. First order of business: teaching V to run through the sprinkler!

And of course, the other two girls needed to cool off too.

Uncle Adam had come to run through the sprinkler too, and Victoria ran so hard and so much, she needed a break afterwards.

And again, she wasn't the only one who was tired. Both pups collapsed in the grass next to us.

The next day, we decided to head to the parade. My parents joined us too. Victoria really loved the fire trucks and the horses. After the parade we went down to the park to grab some brats and (numm!!!) mini doughnuts. Victoria loved her first taste of mini doughnuts, and Daddy snapped this pic of us sharing them:

They had pony rides, and V was enamored with the ponies. Although she looks a bit tired here, she leaned way forward in her stroller and watched them. I told her maybe next year she will be big enough to ride (and to wait in the really long line):

In the car afterwards, V and I decorated ourselves with stickers. She is so fun!

After a trip home for an afternoon nap, we went back to town to a barbecue at my cousin's house. Her parents had brought out the slip n slide for the kids. I'm proud to say my little girl showed up the boys and was a little daredevil going down the slip n slide!

What a great 4th of July!

Helping

Last year, Matt bought me a pergola for our deck as a birthday gift. We didn't get around to installing it before winter, so recently Matt has been working on it.

The other day he laid all the pieces out on the lawn. When Victoria saw him, she marched right over to where Daddy was, in awe of all the pieces which probably looked like big blocks to her (adults play with blocks too, right?).

She studied the pieces for about 30 seconds, then -- to Matt's and my amazement -- picked up a cap that was supposed to go on one of the long poles. She walked right over to the pole Matt was working on, and slid it over the end. Matt looked at her in surprise and said, "yes, that's exactly where it goes!" How she knew that when she has never seen these pieces before I'll never know ... but we joked about her future as an engineer.

She continued to help Daddy, pounding with the rubber mallet, sliding screws in holes, and even trying her hand at using a screwdriver. Mommy lost her gardening buddy and I had to continue watering plants on my own -- but I didn't mind one bit! It was so fun to see how much she loved helping Daddy put this together.

Garden Lessons

Before I get to the depressing news, I'll share a couple cheery photos of some of the flowers around our yard. My peonies this year were really beautiful and, just like last year, we are seeing tons of wildflowers lining our driveway and random places around the yard.

My vegetable garden hasn't been so successful. It got off to a great start ... I had started tons of seeds in the basement, hauled in some good composted manure, the beds were all set to go. I transplanted my seedlings in May, and one morning when I went out to check on them, noticed that my parsnips had disappeared. Ummm ... how could plants just disappear? Leaning in closer, I noticed the remains of tiny stems. Something had eaten my precious parsnips.

I finally found these little tiny caterpillars, gray with small dots on their backs, that curled up when touched. I went on a rampage, killed all the little buggers I could find, and dug out my stash of Bt (a bacterial agent that is safer for humans than other pesticides).

Still, over the next couple of weeks, they ate everything they could find. They attacked the seedlings first ... not just the parsnips, but my onions, brussels sprouts, and peppers. Here is the sad remains of one brussels sprout seedling.

In doing research and talking to other gardeners I came up with a host of solutions: pick and kill the worms; put barriers around plants (toilet paper rolls seemed to be a favorite, and another web site mentioned drinking straws); and using Bt. One person suggested Sluggo, but I never found some in time to try it.

I raided our (and my mom's) stash of toilet paper rolls. However, rain disintegrated those pretty quickly, and even the ones that remained seemed to allow worms inside.

Drinking straws? Ummm I tried, but those were simply too tiny for seedlings. Victoria liked playing with the straw pieces, though.

The original Bt I had didn't seem to work, but worried that it was too old, I ordered a new product recommended on a gardening web site for cutworms. That may have been effective, but the infestation seemed to be at its end by the time I applied it.

Other gardeners I talked to said they'd never had cutworm problems with crops they planted from seed ... only transplanted seedlings. Well, there too I seemed to be unlucky. They quickly demolished any plant that dared poke its head out of the ground.

I picked cutworms religiously (even got Matt to help) and sprayed Bt after every rain. But in the end, I lost: all my parsnips, cilantro, swiss chard, carrots, brussels sprouts, beets, and mesclun mix. They also ate healthy chunks out of my tomatoes and peppers. They didn't touch the peas (presumably because they were fully established plants), cucumbers, zucchini, garlic, or squash.

I wanted to cry. I still do, actually. By this time in the summer we should be eating salad greens and I should be looking forward to harvesting lots of good stuff. Instead, I'm left trying to think about what I can try to replant. For some things, it is too late to replant, but I've started a few things. This time around I tried to think of a barrier that would cover a larger area so I could plant several seeds in that space. It was my dad who came up with this idea:

I dug trenches, lined them with cut-up cereal boxes that are somewhat parallel to the loops of my drip irrigation system, then filled the boxes and planted seeds.

The cutworms seem to be gone now. I'm hoping to replant even more in the next few days. I've heard they are supposed to be worse next year, so I may spent my winter watching for things that would be good barriers to protect plants.

One thing I love about gardening is that it never gets boring -- there are always new lessons to learn. I chalk this up to being a very important lesson ... although, talking with all sorts of gardeners about cutworms, I wonder -- after growing up in a gardening family and gardening myself for years, how had I never learned this lesson before? Hmmm ...