Christina at Feisty Repartee (a fellow Munuvian) has prepared an awesome Carnival of the Recipes and has gone the extra mile and other interesting blog entries from all the entrants.
It took me almost thirty minutes to get The Baby to fall asleep for her afternoon nap, because she was more interested in what her siblings were screaming about than she was in nursing and falling asleep. As soon as she was asleep, I tried to get her sister upstairs for a nap, but first she needed to take a potty break and get on "naptime underwear." Then she yelled loudly about something while we were on the stairs -- right outside The Baby's bedroom. The one who was asleep woke up screaming and now the other one won't fall asleep. I want my well earned and much needed break.
And how come there is never chocolate in the house when I need it?
You have my sympathy. The saddest day in my house was when Max and Rebecca at age three decided that they no longer needed naps. They might not need them, but I do!
Oh hon, can I sympathise!!!I've had so many days like that! (p.s. don't you know you are suppose to stash chocolate all over the place so no one can find it? You didn't finish reading the mother's manuel did you. (sigh) this younger generation! :-) )
The time may come some day when the 1988 Volvo, the first car I ever owned, will cease being useful. Or the time may come when it shudders itself into a heap or when there is more broken about it than there is worth fixing. As much as I have loved that car, it has reached the point where we don't care for it like we once did. That day may come when we don't want to care for it at all, and in the meantime, my husband is rattling around in it and hoping none of his clients ever see what he drives.
So now and again we talk about what kind of car we might like to get next. We want something that can, in a pinch, hold the whole family, and more frequently can haul lumber, mulch, and other diry, messy or big stuff. Justin misses our Subaru Outback, but compared to the 240 wagon, the Subaru could carry very little. He's drawn to the thought of a pickup truck, but ones we could afford could probably not carry the entire family.
I suggest perhaps a second minivan would be the most practical option. My husband, however, recoils at the thought. He's willing to drive ours around when the family is in it, but to be by himself in a minivan -- he claims that's more embarrassing than driving a 17 year old station wagon that's lost a few pieces of trim and one of the door handles. He's thinking perhaps we need a newer Volvo wagon when the time comes and since he won't consider a minivan, I think that's what we'll look for.
And so I ask all you men, is a minivan really more humilitating and emasculating than a station wagon?
What y'all need is a '77 LTD Country Squire station wagon. With a 460. My brother drools at the mention of such cars. Then you need a LOT of gas money. But the headlight covers are worth it. http://www.cardomain.com/ride/821360
I do not know if minivans are emasculating. In general, I think most minivans border on the craptacular both in design and safety. I know. I know. The new minivans are reportedly "really safe", that is, the brand new ones are really safe; there's no real market for retesting older vehicles.
My vote doesn't count but, BUT, I think you should embrace you natural side and buy the family bicycles (or maybe tricycles). It's good for the body. It's good for the environment. Win/Win.
I think Birkenstocks, a baby sling and hippie German school are as far as I'm going to go down the Earth Mama route. A minivan is hardly the automotive love of my life, but it is one of the few vehicles in which 3 carseats easily fit and since the kids have to ride in carseats until age 8 by law, we've got a few years to go in the oversized vehicle.
As far as using bikes all the time -- well, I've never tried hauling three children and 500 lbs of mulch on a bike but I can pretty much say with authority that I not only wouldn't, but couldn't. Biking and walking are both lovely options, but not terribly practical. We live relatively close to most places we go regularly, but not so close that bike riding would be easy or safe.
And besides, I can't even get places on time driving a car.
I like the fact that we can get the lawn tracter inside our minivan, but I think my hubby would not be up for a second one. So we just stick with one minivan and one sedan. Not much help, but that's what we do with our household of 6.
We aren't really needing help choosing. We'll almost certainly get another old, but not quite as old Volvo wagon when the time comes. I just don't see how a minivan is more embarrassing to drive than an ancient station wagon.
The ancient station wagon has an air of obstinant individualism about it - a very manly quality.
On the other hand, a guy driving around by himself in a minivan may as well have the words, "I am WHUPPED" tattooed on his forehead. He can get away with being seen in a minivan with the wife and kids - there, he can just pass it off as the "family car". But by himself, uh-uh.
'Course, I say this as someone who wouldn't drive a minivan under any circs, so perhaps I'm a wee bit biased.
Ha! I agree with Robert. My husband drives HIS old Volvo wagon with a feeling of smug superiority. However, I keep finding pages of crew cab trucks bookmarked on the computer. Hmmmm.
Get a cheap car (large enough to seat 5....try finding vehicles that seat 8! I drive a Suburban)
and a smallish trailer.
We bought a trailer that was my father's because I didn't like using the large one my husband uses for his business.
I LOVE it.
It hooks up easily (have to have a trailer hitch) and you don't even know it is there!
You can get one for a few hundred dollars and you can haul all those great yard sale/antique store finds!
My kids laugh at me because I tell them I am counting down until I can get my dream car.
A red Volvo Station Wagon Turbo.
A fellow teacher at the preschool I used to work at had one and during a field trip out of town one day, she pulled out and passed me. She was a blur of red.
She had MANY speeding tickets to show for it but man was I impressed!
(I was driving our first Minivan...Mazda MPV.
Mary, the trailer would be a thought, but for the lack of driveway, large yard or garage in an old home built when people were commuting to work on street cars.
And yes, Justin could ride the bus, but it isn't going to happen. When we eventually replace the lumbering tank we'll almost certainly just a newer Swedish tank.
Mr. Possum was driving a minivan for a while and it didn’t seem to hurt his masculinity. However he’s just a character in a blog and not a real person.
PS
He went in reverse and traded his minivan for an old Volvo.
It's hard to beat a minivan for hauling large quantities of junk and people while not drinking that much gas. They generally haul more and seat more than all but the biggest SUVs.
Having said that, it was quite a chore for Reba to make the move to driving one. And me too, which explains why our now-departed '94 Plymouth was special ordered with the handling package and alloy wheels and guage package and towing package. It was about as butch as I could make it. It served us well, and I never felt particularly unmasculine driving it. Then again, I always had a backup masculine vehicle should I ever start getting too dainty.
It got old and became the backup to the '01 Honda, which is a fine vehicle and I don't mind driving it at all. But it is definitely less macho than the Plymouth was.
After I sold the old pickup and started driving the old van, I really felt the urge to have something again that was really mine, thus the switch from the 10 year old van to the 20 year old Volvo. But, it's fun to play with, mainly because I know I have a backup vehicle.
AS FOR THE ADAMS FAMILY--three kids makes it hard to find something large enough to hold them all and their stuff, yet find something small enough to not be a gas hog, AND boy enough so that Mr. Adams doesn't feel too swishy whilst driving it without the family on board.
Mercedes? Jaguar? Terry, he may be a lawyer, but he has three kids and a wife to support, debts to pay and all that. We have to park on the street and besides Justin hasn't won any big class action suits, so no fancy, super expensive cars here.
I would think a Volvo wagon is far more threatening to one's masculinity than a minivan, but real men don't care what they drive as long as it runs. We have an Odyssey and an old Buick for family of 5 (3 car seats) and it works out fine. Note: the minivan is far more agile and has a tighter turning circle.
And there's only one station wagon: the '72 Vista Cruiser with 455 V8 and moon roof.
I had an old Volvo once; it sucked so massively that I haven't bought a foreign car since. The tank-like nature of Volvos is an investment on the order of buying lottery tickets. The people who get killed in car accidents are the sort who buy Camaros.
A truck-based minivan - Chevy Astro or Ford Anystar - are perfectly ok for a man to drive alone. Especially if you swap a V8 into it. For that matter, there are turbo-converted Dodge Horizons running 12 second quartermiles.
I drive the family minivan on the weekend because my two year and a half old twins' car seats are in there. I like it almost as much as my '99 Grand Prix that has muchas poweras.
The minivan has a nice steady ride, lots of ac, and a good stereo. Who cares what the pumk in the the rice rocket thinks of me when I pull up to the light. My ride doesn't sound like a crow's mating call.
I drive a Dodge Grand Caravan SXT and I'm no puss.
It's a pity that vehicles are viewed as 'necessities' rather than 'luxuries'. If only our ((great)*X) grandparents could see us now. We're doomed. ;)
The words Otto (inventor of gas engine) and Benz (inventor of (practical) gasoline powered automobile) should be curse words. Instead of, '$...', we'd have, 'Otto' or, 'Benz'. :)
I'm not a car guy, so I shouldn't contribute. But a Honda minivan is not emasculating as far as I can tell. No more so than the Civic I drive regularly.
Since I managed to get entire sheets of plywood in the back and close the door on them, I would say there's plenty of haulability, which makes up for the lack of machismo.
But so much for The Boy's friends. I got to meet another "Internet stalker friend" as my husband calls them. Meredith from Like Merchant Ships and I met up at the library for story time. She brought a snack for the kids to share and they ran around while we talked and discovered many mutual acquaintances and even a shared ex-boyfriend! Nashville really is a small town. It's fun to make new friends and so far I've only had good experiences meeting up with various people I've "met" first on-line. Hooray for new friends.
At first I was a little surprised by our mutual ex-boyfriend, but then I realized it only means we share the same good taste. He always did like the smart girls ;)
Wow, that is funny! Of course, I only have one real ex-boyfriend. There were a couple of other guys I dated for a while, but not long enough to attain "ex-boyfriend" status. So that might freak me out.
My son's best friend from last year in preschool won't be continuing on at the same school. He'll be going to a much higher end private school, which, of course, pleases my son not one bit. "But you told me he was going to be in my class!" he complains whenever he thinks about it. It is rather sad, but fortunately his friend lives pretty close by and we might be able to get the boys together sometimes outside of school.
The Boy went to his friend's birthday party this past weekend. It was just your average party in a nice but not at all lavish or fancy house, with a game or two and a pinata that would not die, several (but not an overwhelming number) kids running around playing with regular toys and an ice cream birthday cake. This was the kind of party I was used to and felt comfortable taking The Boy to. It wasn't like the one we attended a while back with caterers, musicians, magicians and expensive toys for each of the huge number of children invited.
I was glad. I hadn't been sure what to expect, because The Boy's friend's dad is a fairly well known musician. The family goes on tour with the dad all over the world. Fortunately, although they aren't probably people we have a lot in common with, they seem to be very nice, not pretentious and their son and mine get along. Since The Boy often relates better to adults than other kids, I'm glad he has a friend and one that I can at least for now feel comfortable letting him play with.
In spite of the evil squirrels' best efforts and a distinct lack of high productivity from our Roma and heirloom tomato plants, our grape tomato is producing abundant, oversized fruit. Add to these a few Romas that I pick at about half-ripe to keep them out of the hands of the squirrels and the amount of tomatoes on our counter becomes overwhelming quickly.
I give many away and Justin and I eat a lot, which is pretty funny for people who only a few years ago would have sworn we didn't like tomatoes. The children still make that claim and we don't push it. Sometimes they have to try a bite or two, but that's not going to go very far towards reducing the summer's bounty. So in addition to adding tomatoes to everything, eating fresh tomatoes all the time and giving away a bushel, I've also been making a lot of spaghetti/all-purpose chunky tomato sauce. We've eaten some and it's delicious, but most of it has gone into the freezer next to the homemade pesto to be eaten sometime next fall when we don't have fresh tomatoes to enjoy.
Here's the recipe I've been using, which has been adapted from a few different recipes.
Spaghetti Sauce
3 onions, chopped
6 cloves garlic, minced
a large celery rib, finely chopped
1 medium carrot, finely chopped
1 small zucchini, shredded
1/2 cup red wine
2 tablespoons olive oil
16 cups fresh tomatoes, peeled and diced
2 tablespoons fresh oregano
2 tablespoons fresh basil
1 tablespoon white sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons salt
1 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 (6 ounce) can tomato paste
DIRECTIONS:
1. In a large skillet, heat olive oil and add onion, garlic, celery, and carrot. Saute about 5 minutes. Add red wine; simmer wine and vegetables for another 5 minutes.
2. Scrape vegetables into a crockpot. Add tomatoes, oregano, basil, sugar, salt, and pepper. Cook for 2 to 3 hours on low heat. Stir frequently.
3. Let sauce cool, taste seasonings and add more basil and oregano if desired. Stir in can of tomato sauce. Pour sauce into quart size freezer containers. Store in freezer.
How wonderful to have that many tomatoes. I had the same problem with my Roma and Beefsteak tomatoes when I planted my garden last year (did not plant this year).
I spoke to my dad who knows fertilizer and he said my soil was poor in... uhm, nitrogen I think it was... I will double check with him and get back to you if you want. I have seen what his fertlizer ideas do to a garden and I must say it is rather remarkable.
The simplest way to keep your soil healthy is to rotate what you plant and make sure to plant peas or other nitrogen-fixing plants every third year or so.
However, your best bet is to speak with a local gardener and ask for the local soil issues; they will know best how to make your soil rich!
It's been about a year since anything other than the painting on the side changed at all and I decided it was time for something a little different. However, I also like the layout I have now and I put a lot of time and effort into it. I don't have the time to reinvent the wheel, so I'm just tweaking a bit.
Not sure the picture fits the blog image. I mean it looks like you could play the main character in about 100 Italian films. Maybe it's just the bw image.
Angie, I have the best list, because my favorite blogs are just that good. The main problem is keeping up with all the good blogs that I find and that find me. I haven't even gotten around to listing all the ones I have in my bookmarks. :)
Jim, if only I thought I looked like Isabella Rosselini, but I think my German/Danish heritage would be a strike against me...
Very nice! I desperately need to redesign my site and move it to where I can have comments. I just don't have the same interest in posting (obviously) since I don't have comments. Maybe this fall... And it's a great picture too. Is it inadvertent that it would also be harder to recognize you at the shopping mall after seeing this photo vs the previous one? Jackie O...
We're in the process of putting up a short piece of fence on the side of the house. Because we have three children to deal with and many other things to occupy our time and take us out-of-town, work has been slow. To catch you up-to-date, the great fence building project is still on going. Postholes were dug and posts set in concrete in May. The rails and pickets didn't get added until June when my dad came for a visit.
Last week we got a jigsaw and that, along with a fairly unscheduled weekend, allowed Justin to make great strides in finishing up the gate. There are still a few trim pieces to be cut, and then the pickets and all will be taken off, sanded, stained with a solid white stain, and then whole thing will be put together and then comes the long and not so fun job of trying to hang the thing, but it looks like a gate now.
This was designed by Justin and my dad. Justin probably would build one for someone else if they could afford his hourly rate, but lawyer hours don't come cheap. Neither do carpenters, of course. I'm glad this job is pro bono.
Throw a two and a half year old in the mix and you can be sure that damage will be done. We found crayon on the walls last night after our barbecue - the first ever in 4 and a half years, so I guess we ought to be grateful.
Desolv-it (sort of like Goo Gone) takes crayon off walls quite easily. I hear the Mr. Clean sponges work well too, but we haven't had any crayon writing on the walls since I discovered those.
Roberta, stick to washable markers. The kids will have more fun and the furniture will be a little less colorful.
My friends and I were recently discussing favorite bands and songs and the conversation reached around to what kinds of things we had in our collections. Many of us had similar tastes, but there were always variations. Some people wouldn't recognize some of my favorites and I would change the radio rather quickly if some of theirs came on.
Today as I was putting something in the car, I decided to bring all the CDs in, since a police officer we had at a recent neighborhood meeting warned us all against leaving them in the car to attract people to break in. Going through the CDs, I decided to make a list of the groups and musicians that I like or liked enough to buy more than one album of. I do have two CDs of Wagner, but those were for a class and never something I was partial to. My list is in the extended entry. What is on yours?
The Beatles
Beethoven
Johnny Cash
The Chieftains
The Kingston Trio
Mark Knopfler
Tom Lehrer
Glenn Miller
Dolly Parton
Peter, Paul and Mary
Tom Petty
REM
Simon and Garfunkel
Ralph Stanley
They Might Be Giants
U2
Knopfler/Dire Straits is always at the top of my playlist. Matter of fact, Passalong is now offering a number of Knopfler live shows for sale from this tour, including the Nashville stop last week.
My Ipod is full of a variety of things, including the kids stuff, fortunately in its own playlist. Runs from AC/DC to Yes, but only because I didn't put any ZZ Top on the thing. There's also some Fats Waller and John Hiatt, so I'm as eclectic as I suspect a lot of people.
We have lots of other things. These are just the things we have a lot of. I left out The Wiggles, but we do have more than one of those CDs.
I'm so old fashioned. We don't have -- and really have no need for -- an iPod. Other than in the car, we just don't listen to music that much. Our house is noisy enough with just the family that I try not to add much more to the confusion.
I thought we didn't need one either, and then I got one. A four hour train trip with one teeny player the size of a small cellphone? Fabulous. I got the 6 GB mini, and it has plenty of room. Mrs. took 30 CDs in the car, and I think I had more music than she did.
I'm not suggesting it's a necessary item by any means, but if you do listen while traveling it saves room for the "extra" potty seat/booster/box of diapers/whatever. Plus the little FM transmitter lets you play through the car speakers, which is cool.
Jim, we have lots of bluegrass, just most of it is in single albums, not multiples by the same artist. Do you have anything you particularly recommend?
I would love to ride with you on a long car ride! We could listen to the good stuff! Esp. They Might Be Giants and Simon and Garfunkel and U2. Our CD case also contains Fernando Ortega, Rich Mullins, Alison Krauss & Union Station, Ricky Skaggs, Chris Jones, Dan Tyminski, The Blue Highway, and pounds of other bluegrass stuff and oodles of kiddie stuff.
I was pretty young, but recalling Miami Vice and the slightly unshaved, t-shirt and sportcoat look, I don't recall thinking it looked like "garish machismo" mentioned in an NYT article today. In fact, wearing colorful t-shirts and spending too much time working on the right amount of unshavedness, really starts looking effette. But not nearly as effette as what the gushing author of the NYT article was comparing the Miami Vice look to -- men wearing dress pants and shoes without socks.
I have no problem with men wearing shorts and masculine sandals, so I'm not opposed to seeing naked manly ankles, but there is a time and a place for such things and any time a man is wearing a suit is not the time to see naked hairy ankles. I just say, ew! Mostly, I think it's way too wussy looking and I don't like seeing hairy legs under a suit period. Extra length executive socks all the way, please!!! Big Arm Woman, from whom I found the article, also mentioned in the stench factor, which of course would be quite nasty.
But, says the article, "For a year or two men have been picking up white cotton no-show athletic socks, once the sole province of women's tennis, as a comfortable and stylish complement to athletic footwear." Women's socks. Women can pull off the sockless look. Men -- not so much. Men, put your socks back on when you got out in suits, anything else is just icky and girlish.
Re: showing hairy ankles...eh...honestly, I do not look at people's ankles so I shall not comment on this except to say: "we are primates and primates are hairy". Actually, looking at my own ankles right now, mine are not hairy, but then again, I am not a hairy person. Hmm. Sharing or scaring?
In other news:
1. Nice site design, a bit minimalist, which is my preference.
2. I read about your 'recent' trip to Pensacola, FL; I grew up in P'cola and my parents reside there even today. My wife and I bought some bluff acreage next to Sewanee a few years back for a vacation cabin. As soon as time and money permit such, we'll try buying to coastal property in P'cola for the development of the same.
Well, enough from my side. It was good to see you yesterday at Harris Teeter. Please give Justin my best.
"Ew" is right, Jordana. The suit and sockless look is dreadful -- so dreadful that I think I'd sooner see a man in bathing trunks with cowboy boots on! So how bad is that? ;)
Course, out here in Colorado there's a fellow in Mr OotFP's office whom you can always hear coming because of his flip-flops. And these are right special flip-flops, dontcha know, because the sole hauls a BEER BOTTLE OPENER.
What would the NY Times know? Real men wear sweat socks, that they buy in packs of six from Target, Costco, or (in my case in Manhattan) from guys on the street corners.
Wussy men buy "no-show" socks. What are you supposed to pull up to your knees while wearing shorts when you're 70? Blech.
Some of my blog friends do not care for Harry Potter, but I hope it doesn't bother them too much when I say I was thrilled when I got an e-mail today announcing that my copy of the new book shipped out yesterday.
And so will begin a few nights of shortened sleep, while I read about young Mr. Potter's latest adventures.
We're waiting for our copy to arrive from Merrye Olde Englande.
Mrs. started buying them when you could still get the British versions long before the American, and we've decided to stick with those. I couldn't have bought one in the store or opened a package on Saturday anyway, so I'll survive until it shows up.
The other morning, the two year old looked at me still sitting around in my pajamas and said, "Mom, you need to change your clothes. You can't go out like that."
For the record, I wasn't going out, but I did submit to the little dictator and change my clothes.
My children are losing even more of the last vestiges of toddlerese. Today, the five year old said ambulance instead of amblience and the two year old corrected me saying, "It's not Olvo, Mom. It's VOLVO."
I swore I would never be one of those parents who repeated baby talk, but [sigh] I miss the special pronunciations.
From the Llamas comes a new and exciting (not really) quiz --
I am 19% White Trash.
I, my friend, have class. I am so not white trash. . I am more than likely Democrat, and my place is neat, and there is a good chance I may never drink wine from a box.
Not a democrat and don’t mind wine from a box—as long as I have a big straw.—Mary finally a blogger in my neck of the woods—compared to everyone else New Bern is next door. I’m in Greenville.
You probably didn't get an HP RPN calculator when you became a teenager, did you? It was kind of a rite of passage in my family and did make it nice when someone wanted to borrow my calculator. No one could ever figure out how to use it. Aw...I miss my old calculator. Sniff.
Hey! I got 80%. I guess the math degree has done something to me. I would have loved to have had a HP RPN calculator. I was stuck with the run-of-the-mill TI graphing calc. You lucky girl!
Mark says my nerdiness is evident in that I like to program my cell phone by composing something right out of the hymnal. Can't everyone do that?
There was, however, a spiffy commodore 64 at one point, with a separate floppy drive. I learned how to program a celsius/fahrenheit converter, and then how to make my name and other rude phrases appear on the screen
over and
over and
over and
over and
over and
...
Me too! I made this picture of a duck with a wreath around it's neck for Christmas and it even quacked! Well, not really "quack", but more of a "beep". Hey, that was 1988!
Jim at Unfreezing points to a series of articles on the many variations of American English that describes in detail some of the differences I've noticed over the years in moving from place to place. I would say I mostly talk like a MidwesternCalifornian, but I might could be fixin' to talk some Southern at you too.
One thing they don't mention, though I know I picked up living in California, because everyone else I know from California says it, is my propensity to pronounce the word both as if it was spelled bolth. It drives my husband a wee bit crazy, but then it drives me crazy that he can't hear the difference between pin and pen. What's really sad is that our son says bolth and can't hear the difference between pin and pen -- poor mixed up child.
My wife says bolth. She's always complains that her friends from Salinas say she has a southern accent and people here in SC say she has a California accent. (At least it's not like valley.)
My accent is from all over. My dad was in the Air Force and in Law school when I was learning to talk so I picked up lots of different pieces, but it's predominantly southern.
My husband was raised in Baltimore and I get a kick out hearing him say "radiator". The first "a" is like the "a" in apple. Here, down South at MY house, we say radiator with the first "a" long like in Raid.
Also, he calls a cove (you know where there's not a through street), a court. Some folks say culdesac, right?
1. so Melissa, how does your husband pronounce "ambulance?"
2. I've never run into anyone pronouncing "both" as "bolth," but I have found that a lot of midwesterners pronounce the names Jenny and Ginny exactly the same way.
Steevil, I think it is Southerners that think Jenny and Ginny are the same. It's that pen and pin difference that Jim and my husband can't hear. If only I could figure out how to harness their failure to hear that difference into power that I need to complete my plan for world domination. Bwahahaha!
Back in the '70s I was teaching Kindergarten in Blytheville Arkansas. Phonics was fine till I hit the vowels....
"what rhymes with 'pail'?"
"Bail?"
They didn't mean the handle of the pail, or how to get out of jail (another rhyme!) but one of those things that ring when it's time for church.
Also, the neighbors were telling us about the crayons on their teeth, and it took a long time to realize they were talking about the crowns they had.
We'd just spent 4 years in England and thought we knew it all!
About 10 years ago, in San Francisco's Chinatown, I found myself translating between the Brit-English (East Anglian, to be exact) and the Chinese English, so my friend could actually finish a transaction.
We are fortunate enough to have two vehicles, both of which actually drive and do not sit up on blocks in the front yard, contrary to what some of you may think about people in the South. Our two vehicles though, are very different. I get to drive the 2000 Mazda MPV, which hauls children around very well. Justin is driving the first car I ever owned -- a 1988 Volvo wagon, which though running poorly and ailing in general, gets him to and from work and is a wonderful car for carrying all sorts of cargo.
Last Friday as I pulled into the parking garage at the library the check engine light came on in the van. Justin came over from work and checked the fluids and such, which seemed fine. As a side note, I am capable of checking the fluids, but with three somewhat fussy, impatient children in tow, it becomes more complicated than yielding control in exchange for help. We then drove it by the mechanic, who checked it out and said that it was safe to drive home and we should bring in on Monday.
After wedging three carseats tightly into the back of the Volvo, Justin drove off with my van to the mechanic's yesterday. I managed to avoid driving yesterday, but today I had to drive Justin to work and run over to our insurance agent's office to pay some bills that I'd forgotten to put in the mail in a timely fashion.
I am so lucky to have something else to drive besides the rattle trap. The carseats are jammed together and only one kid can get in at a time. The Boy can't even buckle his own belt when his sisters are in there, because one carseat covers the buckle for the next. Also, the automatic locks don't work, so I have unlock and lock each door separately and since the handle has fallen off the outside of the of the rear driver's side door, funky contorsions are required to open it from the inside.
Yes, I know, it is only one step removed in redneckedness from sitting on blocks in the front yard, but at least it drives and gets Justin where he wants to go. It was a great car in its day and has served me well since I bought it in 1997, but I sure am glad I don't have to drive it around on a regular basis anymore.
Any mention on the miles for the Volvo? And are you going to get (or do you already have) one of those fancy badges for the 200k club (like a certain marsupial blogger)?
I can't imagine wedging three carseats in the backseat of a vehicle. I suppose you could ask for volunteers for the trunk ... naah, just kidding.
I can remember when it was just a parent's backhand that kept a kid in his seat, in the "good ol' days". It does make me sad/angry to see kids crawling around the inside of a car while a parent is trying to drive.
Marc, the odometer on our car died at 167,000 miles over 4 years ago. Unlike the previous owner of Terry's car, we were not meticulous about keeping records of our mileage. In fact, we didn't even notice for quite a while that the odometer had died. So while we are probably nearing the 200,000 mile mark, we will have no idea when it arrives.
Before we got our minivan in anticipation of the birth of the third child, some people liked to point out that most people with three kids had done just fine without a van in the old days, but of course, back in those days, carseats were not required and there was a reason those things were called land yachts.
I realize it's not worth it, but have you ever considered getting one of the accessory rear-facing third seats for the Volvo? Again, I know it's really not worth doing, but if you had a couple of hundred spare dollars, it could give the Boy some place to sit without being all jammed up during emergency MPV outages.
And you're right out the reason cars used to hold so many more munchkins--back in the olden times, you didn't have to wear seatbelts, and people didn't think anything wrong about letting babies sit in their lap, or having four or twelve unbelted kids in the backseat. Ahhh--the good ol' days!
My only hope is that your Volvo hasn't actually "severed you well." Unless you got the special Razor Blade Option Package. ;)
Ouch. My typos are somewhat spectacular in their badness, huh. Most I don't worry too much about fixing -- they show the "authentic" me, but that one had to be fixed.
Oh and if we used the Volvo for child-hauling very often, we might need one of those third rows of seats, but that would impede it general use as a lumber/mulch/junk hauling car. Plus, I always got sick when sitting backwards.
One spring at the beach my mother left a cake near the window (it was open, but there was a screen) while we all went swimming. When we got back and opened the door the screen had a huge hole in it and a squirrel was sitting in the middle of 3/4s of a cake.
We are getting lots of rain, but very little strong wind around here. Somewhere around here something more exciting must be happening though, because every since the middle of last night, the power has been going on and off for a couple of hours at a time. It's hard to get much done when you don't know whether to start things requiring electricity or not.
Update: The power has shut off four times today. It's getting a bit old and I'm tired of sitting around in the dark. I can't clean much, because the areas that most need cleaning are windowless and I'm not inspired enough to clean by candlelight. At least our range is gas, so I can cook dinner whether or not we have electricity at dinner time.
In past years, we've lost very few tomatoes to squirrels and rabbits, because our eighty-something year old, next door neighbor grew more tomatoes and didn't actually pick much. With more crops over there and no dog, the squirrels went where the fruit was easiest to get and most plentiful.
Our neighbor died this past March, so we're the only ones growing tomatoes this year. I miss talking with him and comparing notes on plants, and I sure miss his garden being the buffer zone for mine against the critters.
This year we planted three tomato plants, figuring that even that would produce almost more than we could use or give away. So far only my grape tomato plant has produced anything. The other two, a roma tomato plant and a purple heirloom variety keep getting semi-close to ripe fruit and then I return to find the tomatoes ripped off and sitting gnawed on in the yard, on top of another neighbor's fence or scattered here and there.
I'm very annoyed. I'm not sure what kind of barrier or deterant I can put around my plants to keep out the squirrels, but still allow me to fairly easily reach the tomatoes myself. My husband just wishes there wasn't a law against discharging firearms in the city.
It's possible that your problem is with birds. We had blackbirds (and others) eat our tomatoes. I saw a few pecking them. Putting out a bird feeder might keep them off your tomatoes. It's also possible that they will give up (there are much better food sources)after a while.
Does a BB gun count as "firearm"? Mark *frequently* uses one to keep the birds (for some reason, we don't have squirrels) and rabbits out of our tomatoes.
Can you pick the "semi close to ripe fruit" and let it ripen in a sunny windowsill? That's what we would do in the pre-BB gun days. It worked well.
George, we have birds that get into our berries, and may hit the tomatoes some, but I've seen the squirrels sitting around eating the tomatoes in past years and some of the places tomato pieces get left look like thier handiwork.
Angie, I did pick a Roma yesterday that was slightly orange in the hopes of saving one from their evil claws. It's perking up some. Funny you should mention a bb gun. Justin was considering/threatening to investigate the possibility of using one on them.
Since it is squirrels, you could put blood meal around the plants but only if they are fenced in - the dog will dig up anything around the blood meal.
I have a friend that traps them and transports them about a mile away, but this only works if there is no good food supply. (My mom tried this when they were eating the bird seed and gave up after 200 or so.)
There are lots of homemade remedies out there, but the most vegetable friendly seems to be one teaspoon of Lysol or three ounces of Epsom salts added to one gallon of water and sprayed on the plants. (Of course it's got to be reapplied every time it rains.)
I'm pretty sure the legal definition of a firearm doesn't include BB and pellet guns (your husband is a lawyer, he can look it up), but that kind of deterrent usually only makes you feel better.
I'm with Justin on this one. Our offenders are the bunnies. They mowed down our peas, not a single one produced, and the beans look to be in jeopardy. For some reason, we don't have a squirrel problem, but I would gladly blast ole Bugs and his pals out of my garden permanently.
Have you ever used Fox Urine powder? We used it AFTER the bunnies got to the peas and beans and everything else seems to be doing pretty well. I know you have to be careful with mothballs cuz of the kiddies, but we've had success with mothballs as well.
My husband's with you about the evilness of squirrels ... we have a black walnut tree in our yard, and for years his uncle has been asking us to bring him a seedling. For some reason, we could never find one. Then, last year, my husband found a little black walnut with a leaf sprouting out of it, and carefully planted it in a pot to take to his uncle the next weekend. Next morning, all that was left of the nut were scattered bits of shell and the little leaf lying there pitifully on the ground next to the pot. My husband nearly drove us off the road several times on the way to work that day, swerving to try and hit squirrels.
Lyman finally built a cage out of electrical conduit, corner fittings and net. That worked for a while but an enterprising little guy chewed through the net and has had a field day.
Now he's thinking about chicken wire. You and your dad and your husband are creative people. Maybe you can conceive a cage that will work.
We haven't seen a pear from our pear tree in years because of the little rodents.
No plums, either.
In our neighborhood, you'd go broke buying ammunition for using any kind of gun against the little buggers. There are just too many.
I came across this blog while looking for a solution to the squirrel problem in our backyard. After nursing three beautiful tomato plants to maturity, and counting our tomatoes daily (got up to 24), we have been able to enjoy only three pieces of fruit. The squirrels, on the other hand, have had Thanksgiving every day for over a week. They took the ripe ones as well as the green ones. We saw them rush off with our dogs chasing them to the end of the yard. My husband has gone after them with a BB gun, and just wished his pellet gun still worked. We bought a special sqirrel-deterrent spray at the nursery and hosed down the plants. Nothing has worked. Perhaps a electric wired cage? Seems like a lot of trouble for fruit, but these squirrels have really made us mad!
When I was little my parents would take me to Dodgers games. I would wear my older brother's outgrown sailor suit and pretend to be the boy on the Cracker Jack box.
Although I'm not a huge sports fan of any kind these days, if I pay attention to one sport at all, it is baseball. It's more difficult now living in a city with only a minor league team and disliking the closest major league team to get too worked up until the post season though.
Still, we take our kids to at least one minor league game each summer and I've been checking out stories about baseball just to wet their appetites a bit. We've gotten two recently that were especially good and worth reading to yourself or your children.
First and perhaps my favorite of the two is a book by David Shannon called How Georgie Radbourne Saved Baseball. David Shannon's artwork alone is enough to make me love the books he writes and illustrates, from the very simple No David to the very elaborate like Jane Yolen's The Ballad of the Pirate Queens which he illustrates. His paintings glow, whether simple or elaborate.
Many of Shannon's books are set in fantastic worlds where strange things can happen. The setting for this book is a sad, Farenheit 452 style, America where spring can never come, because an unhappy former baseball player has taken over the country and banned all things related to baseball with a secret police keeping an eye on the populous. Without Spring training, winter stays on the ground. Then a child named Georgie is born. A child who spontaneously speaks in baseball-ese and has an amazing pitching arm. Finally, a confrontation with the evil dictator saves the land and baseball.
The second book has a totally different feel to it. The Bat Boy And His Violin by Gavin Curtis is set in the last years of the Negro National Baseball League after Jackie Robinson has already integrated the sport. The watercolor illustrations have a nice feel to them and are very lovely.
This is the story of a young boy who dreams of classical music and performing with his violin in front of crowds. His father, though, is the manager of a losing baseball team that has lost its best players to white teams. He is often frustrated by his musically, but not athletically, inclined son. He assigns the boy to be his team's bat boy, a role which does not come easily and soon discovers that letting him practice his violin in th dugout is more productive than his delivering bats. The music starts off a winning streak that gives the ball players hope and excitement in what might be their last year of play and ultimately brings the father and son closer together. I enjoyed the not-too preachy history lesson. My son really liked the fact that the book mentioned both baseball and Beethoven.
Following The Boys of Summer closely or not, these two books are great reads and it's fun to look at the pictures* too.
I forgot to mention that The Wee One got her first tooth on the Fourth of July, just a few days after she reached her eighth month. It's not big enough to photograph yet and I think she is working on two more, but here she is on the day of the first tooth's arrival.
She may be toothed and pulling up and cruising, but she still looks far younger and shorter than all the other babies her age. I'm not sure of her percentiles, but we met a seven month old last night who had a good six inches of length on her.
Yay, Bea! I hope she's been taking the tooth pain in stride. Jay's done pretty well, but I did give him the Baby Orajel on a few occasions. Of course, he liked it and wanted the whole tube. Good thing I'm a meanie ;)
Certain people have been wondering what is going on around the Casa de Adams that has resulted in a longer than usual hiatus from the Blogosphere. Last year around this time, my family and I left for an Independence Day visit with my family and arrived home to find that the plug had been pulled on my blogging space and the whole thing was kablooie. This year we made a junket down to points south to visit my in-laws and I was happy to return and discover that my blog was still intact.
And now for the trip and all that. The drive down was fairly miserable. It began with my waking up at 4:45 or something coughing my head off. That subsided, but I'd planned to get up around 5:30, so sleeping in was kind of shot. After everyone was up, dressed, the car loaded and everyone out the door, we were doing well to be on the way to the kennel by 7:50. We dropped the dog off, got breakfast at McDonald's (discovering later that neither child that can eat such things will eat an Egg McMuffin) and were truly on the road by 9:00. This is the first long car trip we've made with The Girl since she has been potty-trained. We had to visit bathrooms a lot and she still managed to wet the Pull-ups I'd put her in more than once.
Along the road we were entertained by screams of "Get your foot off my carseat," and variations thereon and also too many songs including the word "poo-poo" by the two year old, who has a refined interest in potty humor. Selections included "Mary had a little poo-poo" and "Jesus Loves the Little..." You get the picture. Visions of children gagged and restrained by swathes of duct tape danced in parental heads on more than one occasion.
The whole drive and stops down to Pensacola took us about 11 hours. When we arrived I could only curl up in a fetal position and stare at things. But long before we reached our final destination, there was one highlight to the trip.
As Terry mentioned last Friday, we stopped and had lunch with Papa Possum himself.
Meeting Terry was very fun and I was pleased to discover that he's really just like his blogself, except he didn't exactly sound like the voice in my head. Otherwise though, he's a funny, entertaining and totally sweet gentleman. And I got a hug. He's such a sucker.
When the kids weren't fighting we listened to Kipling's Just So Stories. Those are highly recommended. The Boy loved them and spent a few hours drawing illustrations of the various stories while he listened. I especially liked his Elephant's Child, but can't find it at the moment.
Once we finally arrived and I stopped staring at the walls and babbling, we had a nice time with my inlaws. Justin and I even got to go out on a date one night and enjoyed wandering around the streets of historic downtown Pensacola, which looks a lot like my neighborhood, only more renovated, with prettier gingerbread on the houses and a nice view of the beach. At least my house isn't likely to get blown down in a hurricane.
Sunday there was lots of churching at the congregation where my father-in-law is an Elder and a teacher at the preacher training school they run there. Justin also bought and installed a nice ceiling fan for his mom for her birthday, which was the next day. She's such a popular lady that people all over the country throw parties for her birthday and set off fireworks. It must be nice to be so famous.
Justin and I wanted to take some photos of the gingerbread on the houses downtown for inspiration, so on Monday we dragged everyone down there with us and discovered a neat little Fourth of July festival in the Square, with bouncy things, pony rides, a petting zoo and free balloons. The kids were thrilled and it was a pleasant, small towny way to spend a good portion of the day.
When we got back to my in-laws that afternoon, we started talking about the dreaded drive the next day and after more talking decided to pack up and just leave after dinner, so the kids would sleep instead of fight. The peace, quiet and much shorter (6 hours and 45 minutes) drive were wonderful, but the verdict is still out as to whether the sick and exhausted feeling of the next day were worth it.
I'm only now beginning to feel somewhat recovered and I still am working on putting suitcases and such things away, along with catching up on laundry and all the other things one has to do after a "vacation."
Welcome back! That was quite a savings on drive time, but paying in sleep missed is tough. You must still be a little groggy, since I don't think you meant to spell that word "through" ;)
Pensacola sounds fun! Maybe you can post some gingerbread photos?
Ah yes. The Post Vacation Traumatic Syndrome. We are coping with ours as well. Road trips with small children are the high-point of my summer! Definitely a sanctifying experience. Hope you recover soon!
Jordana Adams, Chief Pontificator