Saturday, May 31, 2008

Granna & Pap are here!


Hanging out with my Granna on the porch and Pap in the kitchen. I couldn't have it any better...


Momma gets a kiss - they are so good, they hurt (really)


Daddy and Pap won't come out of the shed, until the Guzzi runs again (that's the motorcycle, in case you don't recognize what it is)
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Pizza, pizza

Having a fancy time at the woodburning-oven, thin-crust, snazzy pizza restaurant West First in Hendersonville. Gus stuck with Cheerios, but he made a show of it.
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Friday, May 30, 2008

Curious Gus


Just a sweet, little snapshot of one of those priceless, crazy busy moments.

Gus is constantly on the go-and-look-and-touch, nothing is spared, no corner left undiscovered.

Here it got suddenly all quiet in the house and so I grabbed my camera suspecting something good was about to go down...while I looked for him everywhere, I suddenly heard guitar music from the corner behind the couch, where my guitar is stowed...he found it and he loves to play it.
Here's to many more good discoveries, my darling Gus!

Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Ladies who brunch

A snapshot of my dear friends (from left) Margaret (holding Gus), Elizabeth, Hillary (with daughter Mariel), Heather and Eatherly.

Heather, our newest inductee into the motherhood club (she is 3 months along), invited us all over for a decadent, mid-week brunch on her idyllic porch. A great way to celebrate motherhood and part-time employment.

Tuesday, May 27, 2008

A New Dawn

This is my other baby these days, actually I have two...beautiful, diligent climbing rose bushes on the front of our porch. It's the New Dawn variety, an old-fashion, lightly scented Southern Rose that is simply gorgeous, with just a hint of pink, otherwise all cream and sugar...I've been fertilizing it and spraying it with soapy water and have just otherwise happily fussed over it, and this summer I think I will reap the harvest of my care...just this morning the first buds opened up and there are hundreds more to go...summer is here to stay for a while in Brevard.
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Monday, May 26, 2008

Two of a kind

Together we have fun.
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Sunday, May 25, 2008

Tub Time

Cooling off after a day playing in the sun.
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Roughin' it

Welcome to Lake Forest Reunion '08, from left: Drew, Boone, Jacob, Gus, Drew, Yara, Ashleigh and Emma Kate and Leah.
Breakfast a la Jacob...

New friends made
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Saturday, May 24, 2008

My buddy Boone!

Our friends, The Drews, Leah, Ashleigh, Emma Kate & Yara are finally all here in town, spending Memorial Day weekend with us. We are so excited! Gus & Boone seem to have an awful lot of fun together with their respective Daddies and on their own. We're roaming the streets of Brevard during the White Squirrel Festival, eating Gelato, listening and dancing to live music and making big plans to play in the forest this weekend.

Waiting for the next heat during the box car derby.

Cooling off in the fountain next to Kiwi Gelato.

Together we are EXTRA cute!
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Friday, May 23, 2008

Great Expectations!

"I want out! Dadda is out there! With that loud, incredibly interesting machine he pushes (lawnmower)! I need to inspect the wheels! Please, Mommie, I need to go out there!"

"OK. I'll help you make a mess of this big machine, which you keep loading and unloading. I think I'm channeling my Grossbape when I try to fix it. This is the most interesting machine we have in the house."

"Why buy really expensive 'safe' baby stuff? What about baby fun stuff?"
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Thursday, May 22, 2008

Lolligagging















Lolligagging is one of my favorite words in the English language, somewhere ahead of laksidaisy and effervescent ... it makes me taste a smile when I say it and it sounds of peace and sun...

...anyways... that's what we did today: we lolli-gagged all morning long under my patched-together-ugly-as-sin backyard sun screen (made from my laundry tree and a tarp, it is so backyward-backward, Jacob frowns and starts apologizing to the neighbors whenever I put it up). We took up camp and decorated it with sippy cups, quilts, snacks, dangly toys, babybath tub, lots of sunscreen, my breakfast and my knitting.















Lolligagging is a wonderful thing...too bad, we commonly equate it with laziness and wasting time, because now and then, just watching time go by is a wonderful "activity" - it's life. Right. There. Happening. Pouufff. Gone. Next.

We sat and saw and thought things. We watched two squirrels build a nest for their young (I thought about laboring in a tree and didn't like the thought of it). We traced the goings of two funny bugs. Graysen smiled at her paci hanging from the fly-swatter and smiled at a story I spun in the shade. Gus splashed a lot in less than two cups full of water, licked my cereal spoon and cruised along the fence at least three times.

I have nothing to show for my morning - and I'm not one bit sorry about it!

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Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Gus on the go...

Here...

...and there


...and here

...he is EVERYWHERE!
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Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Heavenly naps

11:26 a.m. - the stars (or sun rays?) are aligned and both of my babies are sleep.

Shhhh....
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Monday, May 19, 2008

94 clothespins

I own 94 clothespins (that's how I bought them, the number struck me as odd, that's why I know) - this is my work of art! - three loads of laundry, two hours of entertainment.

My favorite accessory - aside, of course, from Gus - it's boldly colored and turns heads wherever we go - I don't need Manolo heels or a Kate Spade tote!


My favorite bankteller (we bank at the world's chicest bank, complete with fresh cookies and gourment coffee bar) recently paid me the most wonderful compliment that I have gotten in a long while.No, she didn't tell me my hair looked good (it doesn't) and she didn't comment on my outfit (better not say anything there), instead she made big eyes when I pulled into the drive-through in the still-so-loud Suzuki and greeted me with a "I didn't even know you own a vehicle!"

Then she offered to bring me a cookie and send it through the pipe.

It's with a bit of pride (sorry) that I have come to be known around town as "that crazy lady toting her baby around everywhere in a bicycle trailer" I love our Burley (best baby thing we bought so far) and I love Brevard (not every town is quite as inviting and as easy to navigate on two-plus-two wheels as our lovely little town, where the downhills are few, the traffic is usually benign, and the general layout is pretty compact) and I love this early summer season (rarely do I have a reason not to want to be outside for some extra minutes).

So, Gus and I are out and about most days either in the Burley or in our - also very cool and head-turning - stroller. We run errands that way, we shop that way, we go to work that way and we visit friends and go work out that way, we even see the pediatrician that way...oh, and yes, we go to the bank that way.

Working part-time (I work all the time, I just get paid for part of it) has allowed me to make some changes to our lives that I feel are not just well-timed, but long overdue. In light of increased stresses on our precious environment (whether you believe in Global Warming or not, we ARE hard on this planet) I have decided to make two resolutions to keep this summer:
1. I will not drive my car - unless there is a medical emergency or I have more than three big totes full of groceries (that's about the capacity of the Burley). If the weather is bad, we go another day or bear it - the Burley is waterproof. I haven't filled the Suzuki's gas tank since gas cost $3.29 a gallon and I'm actually thinking of giving the Burgundy Buggy up completely and letting Jacob's Dad have it for the farm.
2. I will not use my dryer - unless I'm completely out of cloth diapers and it is pouring outside. So far we've been able to manage, by watching the supply and checking on the weather forecast. I love my big clotheshanger tree (I have no idea what you really call it), a birthday present from my parents. Hanging clothes is strangly soothing and oddly rewarding as an activity, very brainless, very repetitive, completely undemanding. I just pin and bend, pin and bend.

I realize I'm bragging - forgive me and bear with me (and yes, we compost, recycle, use those ugly light bulbs, turn appliances off, take short showers - if at all, and generally try to be sensitive with our utilities), It's simply that I appreciate having the time and the gadgets to do this - to do my little part to keep our planet a nicer place for the next generation (Gus, Edward, Mabre, Boone, E & G-Man, Emma Kate, Charlie, Flynn and all the babies I'm not thinking of right now, included). The best part - Gus loves a good clothes hanging session (he usually drums frantically on an upturned laundry basket) and adores a good ride around town (he sings to me - the rougher the road, the louder he gets) ...
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Sunday, May 18, 2008

A backyard formal

Saturday evening we had the pleasure of being part of a lovely gathering at 123 (that's what we call a certain house in town, where all the unmarried maidens go to live until they get married - then they have to move out). The theme was dresses & drinks, and the invited females pulled out all stops. It was refreshing to see all the ruffles, flower prints, pleats and bows and I felt special getting dressed up myself (in my favorite hand-me-down dress from my friend, Maia). We had a great time catching up with old friends and making new ones before the busy summer season is upon us.

Gus has developed a new fear of the flash on the camera, hence the pensive look on his face. Here he spends some quality time with our dear friends (and sadly former neighbors - the best neighbors I have had) Nick and Alston.

Yep, still not sure about that flash.
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Saturday, May 17, 2008

A bucket full of water

Life is like a bucket with a bit of tepid water in it - you're never going to know how much fun you can have, until you get in it.
- Gus
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