My Fall Fashion Preview

It's time to pull the fall and winter clothes down from the tubs in the attic. This is a perfect weekend for it because it rained all day yesterday and will continue through tomorrow.
It took me about 20 minutes to pull out Toby's summer clothes and fill one drawer with his winter clothes (most of which are too short)--that includes packing away the clothes we're hoping will fit him next spring.
Now when it comes to Norah it's a whole different adventure. She's got several bags of clothes that I'm going through to sort out what she can fit in for the winter, not to mention the adorable clothes she's only worn once that are now too summery or too tight (the 6-9 month size snuck up on me). I am so thankful that we haven't had to buy Norah any clothes due to the generosity of others, both in gifts and hand-me-downs. So I'm not complaining about it in the least. It's just funny to me how different this routine is now that there are girl clothes in the mix.
I always like bringing out the new season of clothes because it feels like I have gone shopping without actually having to set foot in a store. This season it's even more fun because last fall and winter I didn't fit into any of my regular clothes because I was pregnant. Hooray for "new" clothes!

My Scapegoat

I have taken to blaming the squirrel family living in our yard when things go missing. They tend to throw nuts at the house and when we walk to the mailbox or put out the trash cans we sometimes have to walk through a hail storm of nuts. I'm not kidding. So I thought when Toby's running shoes went missing (they are one of two pairs of sneakers he has: one pair has lightning McQueen on them so those are the "race car shoes" and the other pair are his "running shoes") I thought that the squirrels had gone to new heights of annoyance. I kept waiting for sneaker pieces to rain down on the yard. However, I was a little too quick to judge the rodents and I should have blamed my poor organizational skills: the shoes were under my bed. Go figure.

My construction site

The guys at the boat yard were tearing down some old broken boats the other day. You should have seen Toby, glued to the window, with diggers in his back yard. He must have thought that Bob the Builder was coming to his house. I'm kicking myself for taking a picture of the diggers and forgetting to snap a shot of Toby drooling over the diggers! They've had the forklift, the loader, a dump truck, and a bulldozer all out working on clearing up the boat yard. It's been great entertainment for him!

My day without coffee

Do I even need to blog about how this day went? Doesn't the title speak for itself?
Toby has an ear infection. I got an appointment with Dr. B. at 10:45. But I am supposed to work in the church nursery until 11. What do I do? "Hey, BJ, why don't you swing by the church, pick up Toby and bring him to the doctor? Then I can meet up with you after I'm done at 11." Sounds simple. But not really. I gave BJ the wrong directions to the doctor's office and I ended up beating him there. Oops. I keep forgetting that neither of us really know where we are going and at any moment we can take a wrong turn and be 5 miles out of the way. It's messed up. And it just got worse from there, so I won't go into details.
I should have known better than to embark on this day (or any day for that matter) without a cup of coffee, even if it's just decaf and I'm just fooling myself into thinking that it will wake me up. At this point I've been drinking decaf long enough to believe that it does have some effect on whether or not I can function through the morning. And I would consider myself a morning person. So excuse my while I drag my 30-year-old joints to the kitchen to make tomorrow's pot of coffee. I've learned my lesson.

My OD on carrot cake

Yes, you all know that I turned 30 on Tuesday. A big celebration was had by all. I spent the better part of the day wiping runny noses and eating carrot cake. Our family got together on Sunday to celebrate my grandmother's 88th birthday and my 30th. BJ bought a 1/4 sheet carrot cake, my favorite. We ate about half of the cake on Sunday and, lucky me, the rest came home with us. Between Monday afternoon and today I have managed to eat more than my fair share of carrot cake. When we brought it home I scraped off a cup and a half of excess icing (and froze it for later consumption), so at least that's not going to my hips just yet. But, really, this birthday will be memorable to me because of the massive amounts of carrot cake I have ingested. It's quite sad.
BJ had class all day yesterday (he left at 7:30 am and got back at 10:15 at night) so I just spent the day with the kids, just like every other day. Toby wasn't feeling great so we watched mass quantities of tv while snuggling under blankets. We ate Wendy's for lunch at a local park. (I opened my birthday gifts from my parents in the drive-through. Who was I kidding thinking I could wait until we got home to open them???) I chickened out, yet again, on asking a mother of young children for her number to arrange a play date. What is my problem?? This has to be the worst one yet because she had three year old twin boys--how perfect would that be for Toby to play with?
Now I'm 30, probably 5 pounds heavier (an unintentional side effect of the gift from my husband I'm sure), and I feel like my joints are creaking and snapping every time I walk. Good thing I still have a 20-something husband to keep me feeling young.

My Trendsetter

Toby thinks I was taking a picture of his motorcycle, but really I wanted you to see the outfit he picked out for himself and dressed himself in. He's standing on the plank that is the beginning of our wood pile for winter. (And the sandals are on the wrong feet.)

My Saturday Morning

I haven't even been out of bed an hour. Norah woke up at 6:30 so I fed her in bed while trying to catch a few more minutes of sleep (not successful on that point). Toby came in at 7 and crawled into bed with Horton, Big Dog, and Little Dog. Our whole family piled into our double bed. Somehow the only one who was able to sleep through all the commotion was BJ. So I decide to get to work and run downstairs to the cellar with some laundry. Guess what greets me down there. A dead mouse. What should I do when I come within a foot of a dead mouse splayed across my cellar floor at 7:30 in the morning? I think I should just go back to bed. I surely am not moving that thing! Isn't it a man's job to deal with rodents and bugs--whether living or dead? BJ's already gotten Toby killing bugs in the house for me. Let's hope he doesn't initiate Toby into the rodent-clearing duties just yet. On a side note, Toby made it through the whole day yesterday in big-kid pants with only one accident, and that was at home while playing in the garden. We went to two stores, a restaurant, and a toddler's gym class and he stayed dry!!!! Hooray!

My Desk

If you could only see what's on my desk top right now it would give you great insight into my life (as I'm sure that is true of anyone's desk). There's an airplane and a small race car (both Toby's) on top of BJ's AF Reserve paperwork on top of an iPod that's not working and a picture of Kelli when she was 18 months old (long story on how that came into my possession). There's two coasters and a receipt (for BJ's new phone which we had to purchase when Toby threw his old one into a cup of tea), as well as our digital camera and various cords. Our family calendar is buried somewhere with "to do" lists on it and VA paperwork that BJ still hasn't filled out (maybe this public announcement will be enough to remind him to call them!!!). If I were to analyze the contents of this desk top I would say that I start many projects without fully completing any of them and that since having kids I have resorted to having piles as my filing system. My teammate of 3 years at Bates would be so proud of my evolution: I could never stand having piles on my desk at school and she worked with piles at least 6 inches deep in many places! I should mention that this is a good day for my desk.

My Dinner Club Course

Since I didn't do that much for the last couple of dinner clubs I thought I'd post a picture to show that I haven't lost the desire to enjoy nice food while staying at home. Norah is eating homemade puree of peas on the left and carefully blended infant rice on the right. Mixed to perfection a la Karen Barger (of dinner club fame). Doesn't it look delightful?

My Favorite Month

At the risk of sounding very narcissistic I think September has always been my favorite month. It has a sense of renewal about it with schools starting again after a summer break. The hot weather starts to break off but it's not so cold yet. The leaves start to change colors and yet everyone still enjoys being outside. The insane season of raking leaves hasn't started yet (you rake for about a month straight out here). I love the fresh apples you can get this time of year, and I'm actually going to make it to the Stonington Cider Mill this year for the apple pressing.
On a side note, the last time we lived in CT our friends came to see us in September. BJ and Eric went fishing with my uncle and Amy and I hung out with the kids. We were going to visit the cider mill, we drove by the cider mill, but instead ended up at Starbucks. I still don't know what I was thinking! Maybe it was a bit too crowded for us to go with the two babies (Toby was 3 months and Bekah was 7 months old). Maybe we were a bit overwhelmed with the thought of all the energy it would take to carry the babies around a cider mill... At any rate, I AM going to go to the cider mill this fall. Who knows, maybe the Dales will make it out here for another visit and we can try it again? Here's a picture of me with Toby at the Starbucks--I look really tired. And that picture was taken right before both our kiddos spit up. It was like synchronized spitting.