Weekly Update 7.11.10

Busy week, trying to make this quick.

I (me, Nemmie) had a business trip this week, to Providence. It was surprisingly hot, and humid, not like they usually have in that area, so the "heat wave" of the low 90s was Breaking News. Like, seriously, they broke in regularly to talk about it. Heh. Several years in Kansas has led me to respond by saying: y'all are a bunch of amateurs.

The most interesting non-working portion of my trip is that even though I was at the Westin, there was a skywalk connecting the hotel to a mall? It meant that the first evening there (all alone because none of my coworkers were getting in until late at night) I headed that way when taking a break from working in my room, just needed a good head-clearing. And I returned to my hotel room with several goodies from JCrew and Childrens Place and H&M. Hey, they were running good sales.

So anyhoo! Got home in the wee early hours of Friday, so I worked from home that day. While I was busy working in the office, Scott kept busy in the yard, bricking-in the lilac bush out front and then planting/mulching around it. Turned out pretty darn nice if you ask me. Next project: brick-in around the oak out front. Our yard doesn't get much sun thanks to that oak (and our neighbors told us no one has ever been able to grow grass around it in front), so we're mapping out a plan. Our front yard needs some curb appeal, so that's our goal for this summer.



Also I just want to include a quick shot of my pots on the front porch - the squirrels ate all the coleus, so I had sad empty pots alternating my begonias. Scott was kind and put more begonias in them this weekend, but I still have a personal beef with those darn squirrels. I shall get my revenge, mark my words.


Friday as usual we made a stop on campus for a quick dip. Peter is getting more comfortable with the fountain, and now insists on climbing it. Lovely.

Then we headed home and had some ice cream on the porch - homemade ice-cream drumsticks, I'll post the recipe another time. Apparently they were pretty good.

Saturdy was gorgeous. Gorgeous! Sunny and not-too-humid and highs in the low 80s. We went out to the Farmers Market in the morning (PS on how that ended: Scott lost Peter's awesome helium balloon. Yeah. Good thing Peter wasn't looking) and, after the morning watering of the plants, we blew some bubbles on the front porch.

We have this giant bubble wand that makes those huge-ole bubbles, and we use it by waving the huge-ole wand around. Peter now thinks that this is how you make all bubbles, so he just waves his wand around, flinging bubble solution everywhere. Needless to say, we didn't have a lot of bubbles this session.

A random note: I can tell that our kid is growing, because I can see the top of his head when he's digging around in my kitchen cabinets.

After Pete's late-morning nap, we headed to the baby pool at South Park, downtown. Now: there is another nice little waterpark-ish children's pool downtown, but there's an admission fee for that one. This one is for little kids only but is free Free FREE so we obviously like it a lot. It's small but is cute, with fountain sprays and a wading area and lots of comfy seating and umbrellas. And clean. So we will definitely be visiting it a lot this summer.

Peter really enjoys it too.

I love shooting water pictures.

Peter likes to strike up conversations with the beautiful babies when we are there. These are not the only girls he chatted up this visit.

After a swim Peter changed back into regular clothes, and we took a long walk on Mass St. We stopped for a quick snack at The Burger Stand - truffle fries and Ad Astra, mmm. They just opened their Mass St. location, so we were excited to check it out for the first time.

Peter loves their fries. Loves them. He took over the guajillo-chile dip. He ate it all.

Then he bogarted the cherry-pepper ketchup, and he got that Hulk-Smash-Garrrrr look on his face if we motioned as if we were going to take it away. So we let him have that one as well.

We headed home and screwed around in the front yard some more, watering plants and such. Peter and I played with the huge-ole bubble maker.

I call this one, "Bubble Monocle".

For the most part in typical Peter fashion: he ignored me and the giant bubbles in favor of holding the hose for his father. Because clearly: yardwork is freaking awesome fun. Yeah, check back with us in approx. 15 years for the final verdict on that one.

Sunday was the polar opposite of Saturday: muggy, hot, and very very wet. Lots of storms all day. We did a lot of the usual chores, plus I took care of a lot of things I've been meaning to do for a long long time. I cleaned out Peter's drawers, I organized closets.

I did a lot of cooking to re-stock our deep freezer, batches of marinara and soups and pizza sauce. I also made chili oil and roasted garlic vinaigrette, and oh yeah the best part I forgot to mention: cinnamon-berry pancakes for breakfast. Mmmmm, pancakes. It has been much too long since we savored some pancakes.

We made it outside for a walk after dinner, and I tried out my paparazzi skills by taking covert pictures of our favorite front yards. Someday when we have more time, maybe we can copy some of the favorite parts of our neighborhood when we work on our own front yard.

Now back to the Madness of Summer, bring it on. Oh, yeah, parting comment: our son thinks he's an underwear model. I figure this is the only time he'll be able to run around in his skivvies without it being awkward, so we let him go at it.

Later gator.