Boys

Mother of boys.
That’s how you can sometimes think of me.
I fancy that idea quite a bit actually.

Lunch with Carolyn

Luke and I traveled to Virginia
for lunch with Carolyn.
Carolyn is my sister-in-law
and Luke’s Aunt.
It was great
company
conversation
and
fare.

We will definitely put Carolyn on our lunch rotation.
And not just because the Cheesecake Factory is close to her office.

Fire Trucks

The fire house across the street had their trucks out this morning.

Time Allotment

Leaving the house.
How much time do you allot?

At the moment I allot at least 20 minutes.
We live in an apartment building so we
travel down a hallway,
travel down an elevator,
out double doors,
walk to our car.
At 22 month old pace.
Luke politely greets
every person
he spots with a cheery good morning.
Usually by name.
He says hello to at least four cars he knows the drivers of.
Think “Hi Paul’s car!”
Oh, and we are almost always
carrying
pushing
or
towing
something or other to the car.
Today Luke brought his lawn mower to the car.
He also had to have a necklace because I had one.

Last week Luke brought Faris’ belt, a bag, and another item I’ve forgotten to the car.
Seriously, it takes at least 20 minutes to get to the car these days.
Last week I went somewhere without Luke and was 20 minutes early.

Oh, and he wore the necklace until we went to the pool late this afternoon.

Basil

Public Service Announcement: If a person regularly makes you dinner and they are simultaneously in charge of a child/children under the age of 5, hug them and lavish them with thanks. It isn’t easy. Really, it isn’t. You have to cook, try not to burn the meal, avoid fires, remember to add all the ingredients, and get it all on the table at the same time. All while ensuring small humans do not crack their heads open, impale themselves with whatnots, or cut off a limb/finger/toe. Like I said, not easy people.

Not that ANY of those things happened to me or came close to happening to me tonight.

Back to the basil…
Don’t you love a good bowl of pasta
dripping with pesto in the summer?
Me too.
It’s a summer pleasure.
But I’ve never made a good pesto.
Until tonight.
Usually my pesto is
laced with raw garlic flavor
or gritty
or oily
or something not right.
Tonight it was perfect.
Thanks, Ina.
Any reader will know that my
kitchen would be nothing without you.
Ina’s secret to pesto?
Walnuts.
Find the Barefoot Contessa’s pesto here.
It makes a lot, be prepared to frezze it.

My five cups of basil.















My pesto






















Sadly no picture of the pasta with pesto because in the hoopla of Faris coming home and getting the rest of the meal on the table my pesto sort of turned brown. Like apples do. Still tasted amazing but didn’t look so pretty.

Parking Lot Bunny

There is a bunny
(or maybe a whole family, I can’t tell them apart)
who lives in our parking lot.
Luke loves the bunny.
The bunny is one of the top five things he calls for in the parking lot.
He usually scares the bunny away when he loudly commands the bunny to come to him.
But today we saw the bunny and found a spot on the curb to enjoy each other.
For a l o n g time.

Blueberry Patch, A Second Visit

We traveled back to the blueberry patch today.
And we brought along another picker, Lindy!
Luke is a pretty good blueberry picker…
or should I say a pretty good blueberry eater?
He mostly eats what he picks.
A video and pictures for you to enjoy.

A little blueberry background: We had to encourage Luke to pick out the blue ones to pick/eat, not the green ones. He would scan until he located the perfect one. Lindy in the background says we will have to weigh Luke when we are done.

I caught Luke putting his hand in his pocket
pulling his hand out
placing his hand on his ear
saying hello
waiting a moment
then saying good-bye.Not even two years old and already pretending to have a cell phone.

Suburban Safari

Sometimes Faris and I like to explore our neck of the woods.
I like to think of it as
a Suburban Safari
or
a Driveabout.
We almost always stumble across something amazing.
Amazingly awesome.
Amazingly yucky.
But always amazing.
We thought this house
up on a hill
just yards from the Bay
was amazing.

Just one question.
Who maintains that yard?

Happy Reading

White Man’s Last Stand
By MAUREEN DOWD
Published: July 15, 2009
A gaggle of Republican men afraid of extinction couldn’t root out any sign that Sonia Sotomayor has emotions that color her views on the law.

I Spy

Do you spy the three boats we saw on our Tuesday morning walk?

Internal Debate

sunday morning.
before we left for church.
i was in the kitchen making breakfast.
the microwave was microwaving.
the air conditioning was cooling.
the washer was washing.
the dryer was drying.
oh, and i had just finished blow drying my hair.

while all this was going on i was secretly thinking
how great it would be if we still lived in new york city.
our two bedroom, two bathroom apartment would be dreamy by many manhattan standards.
i started to plot strategies for our triumphant return.
then the microwave dinged.
and I realized that in new york it would be unlikely that we could have the air conditioner, microwave and washer and dryer going at the same time.
a fuse would surely blow.
for a spilt second I was thankful for my central air conditioning.

the next moment i started an internal debate: would giving up central air conditioning be worth moving back to the city.

you know what the answer to that question is.
i don’t even need to tell you.

Summer Music

After dinner on Saturday
we went to the boardwalk for a free concert.
Excellent music + excellent weather = fun Saturday night
Luke loved his first concert.
After each song he intensely asked for more until the music started again.
Poor kid only enjoyed three songs until we carted him home for bedtime.
I’m a stickler for bedtimes.

She brought her kids to the concert too.

Market Night

I’ve never seen our Friday Night Farmer’s Market so packed.
It was crazy wonderful.
And our market went high class, there was a fancy wine tasting tonight.
















I love buying lettuce from the lettuce man.
I especially like talking to him about the different leafy greens on the table.
I am learning a tiny bit.














The flower people.
I’m so glad you are back in full force.














And the local farm where I will get all our corn and peaches…so nice.
(And when I say local, I mean the next town over. I drive thru it to get to our home.)















My favorite conversation of the night?
I bought some zucchini from another local farm and mentioned that I always see cows when I drive by their farm. I asked if people could buy part of their cows and she said they are going to start doing that this Fall. I’ll need a house with an extra freezer before that endeavor can become a reality but now at least I know a local place.

The Tally
3 bags of peaches
1 dozen ears of corn
3 boxes of plums
1 small box of blueberries
2 boxes of cherry tomatoes
1 box of zucchini
2 cucumbers
2 kinds of lettuce
1 large flower bouquet

Summer inthemiddleofnowhere is so much better with stuff like this.

Driving

We should have gotten something like this a l.o.n.g time ago.
Sorry about that kid.
But you seem to be making up for lost time.
Now if I could only catch you on it.

Not All Screaming for Ice Cream

We went for ice cream after dinner earlier this week.
A very summer thing to do.
Our first time this summer.
I was excited.
Faris and I enjoyed our ice cream.
Luke would have nothing to do with it.
He does not like cold edibles.
He will not allow them to pass his lips.
A cold drink, yes.
But n o t h i n g else.
Good thing his hand wasn't cold.

Mutual Affection

Luke loved playing with his cousins from Honduras.
And I think the feeling was mutual.

P.S. It was also lovely for me to have four children happy to entertain Luke for hours. Oh, and slightly amazing to me that Luke was happy to let new people hold him. Has my little Luke matured a little?

Fireworks & Family

14 people.
That is how many were at our July 3rd fireworks celebration.
And I’m going to say hosting that many people is why I took so few pictures.
Nonetheless, it was a perfect night for a barbeque and fireworks on the Bay.
Oh, and as a special treat some of Faris’ family from Honduras were visiting.

I took a picture of the most important thing: MY CAKE!
I ♥ Ina.
I made her Flag Cake.
From scratch.
The cake itself was impossibly delicious.
I’m not a fan of frosting so I don’t know how that tasted
but it sure looked good.































Linda made Ina's Pasta with Sun-Dried Tomatoes.
Yum. May I please have more?










































Photo Credit: Joe













Photo Credit: Joe














Photo Credit: Joe

Incident

We had an incident yesterday morning.
An incident with a bottle of nail polish.
If it had been created on paper I would have
proclaimed it abstract art,
declared my child an artistic genius and
picked out a frame for the obvious masterpiece.
I should have taken a photo before I smeared it all over the floor.















As it was, I guess you could call it floor art.
I felt like I was restoring an important painting…
down on my hands and knees
with gloves on
dabbing the artwork with nail polish remover.
As if I were restoring a long lost Picasso that explained it all.

An artist is bound to get a little paint on themselves, right?