Adventures in Babysitting

Adventures = Me

because

Babysitting = Grandmas and Grandpas

It's time for our Annual No-Kids-Allowed Adventure! As we've done every summer since moving to Americaland, we've shipped the munchkins north for two weeks (one week with each set of grandparents).  They get spoiled, G&G get their snuggles on, and we get to do whatever we want!

Which, when you are PM & Husband, equals a strange mix of detox and indulgence. Detox in that we're both filling the extra time not spent breaking up fights over the computer and driving kids hither and yon with various workouts. The Husband's been getting his running on and I signed up for the one-month-unlimited-yoga deal at the studio around the corner.

(Aside:  It has clearly been awhile since I've done any downward dogs. I think I actually groaned out loud when I was getting up from my chair at work yesterday.)

We're cleaning out the ol' insides too since our CSA box is filled to the brim with veggie-tastic-goodness. It's greens for lunch and greens for dinner and sometimes we shake it up with some radishes.

But then again, we're maybe undoing all of our good behaviour by eating out fairly often. Also, my supper on Thursday may or may not have been a bag of chips. (If I don't need to cook for all four of us, my planning goes a bit awry and I end up eating whatever I'm hungry for at the store.)

I had to promise The Husband I wouldn't do any projects during these two weeks since apparently I wrecked last year's child-free weeks with a painting project that went much, much longer than I thought it would (note:  stucco on the inside of the house makes less sense than you might think it does). So my paint cans are staying closed and my cookbooks are shut.

Instead, I'm getting my hair done and reading and strolling into work late because my bed was cozy and going to yoga and eating greens and drinking wine and walking around the lake. Which is awesome.

But also already missing my babies a teensy bit and knowing that the teensy will grow into a HUGE by the end of this next week and that in seven days I'll be willing to trade the fanciest romantic dinner out for a sweaty, sunscreeny, barefoot wild child hurling into my arms yelling MOOOOOMMMMMMM!!!

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Garden Update!

Wanna know how my garden is doing?

Of COURSE you do!

We've had major rain lately, so it's astonishing that it all hasn't drowned. And I will admit, my lettuce and spinach aren't looking entirely amazing:

I'm not terribly surprised; it's my own fault for trying to grow cool weather crops in the middle of a super heat wave.

My zucchini and summer squash are looking pretty good, much to the shoulders slumping excitement of my children:

And my two little pumpkin sprouts are looking quite sprouty. This bodes well for pie-making.

The Girl's garden is kicking some serious butt. Her peas have crawled up the fence and her dill is leafing away. The garlic and onions don't look too fantastic, though:

My little tomato and pepper patch is making me salivate for salsa. Look how much it's grown! I need those tenty-wirey things already.

And there are peppers growing:

And wee tiny tomatoes:

But the garden that is doing the best right now is The Boy's:

We found beans today!

(Of course, no real surprise I suppose. He's got that tried and true magic-mushroom-sheltering-gnome action going on.)

Now I honestly had no idea how well any of this was going to work. Who knows how Statesy seeds behave? So I hedged my bets, and I still signed up for my CSA. Which came on Thursday for the first time, hooray!

I'm very determined to use everything up this year. Last year was a bit of a bust seeing as how I was getting bushels of veggies delivered to a brand-new-moved-in-kitchen that I didn't really know yet plus I was too busy worrying about clogged sewer drains and carpenter ants.

But this year will be different, I promise! The strawberries are long gone, and the radishes are well on their way. The kale made its way into salad tonight and that lettuce is still looking awesome and will go into another salad soon. There was kohlrabi which I think I'm going to try to roast (anyone ever tried it?). And I've been snipping chives into everything this week.

The only thing I didn't do enough justice to were the pea greens. They were awesome the first day and I had about half of them, but they're now wilting away, waiting until tomorrow (which is the day The Husband gets his hands on whatever's left so he can make fancy green juices).

Oh, and in other exciting outdoor news, we gave our deck the Randolph Rink treatment tonight:

Isn't it fancy? You're all invited to come and sit under my patio lanterns and sip the beverage of your choice while we listen to Journey. Because it's a Steve Perry deck like that.

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70.3

What did *you* do this weekend?

Did it involve a 1.2 mile swim?

A 56 mile bike?

A half marathon?

In a row?

If not, then I regret to inform you that you are *not* as awesome as The Husband.

Who did all of the above in his first (and, apparently last) Half Ironman!

Do you know what's involved in training for a Half Ironman? Lots of swimming. Lots of biking. Lots of running. Lots of lots. He's been doing 1-2 workouts a day since February.

(Mr. Dedicated even sourced local YMCAs while travelling.)

I am definitely not that dedicated. On the morning of the race, I rolled over and snuggled further under the covers at 4:45 am when he left for the race. When I finally got up, I saw the coffee maker clock and thought, "oh, I guess he's onto the bike part by now. Hope the swim went okay."

Eventually the kids and I made it out to the lake where the race was. The kids played.

  (This is the lake that he swam across!)

I chillaxed with Mom Teddy and caught up on back issues of The New Yorker.

At about 1:30, I gathered the cheering section and we headed over to the finish line.

Waited awhile, and then there he was! Far away but getting closer...

And he soared triumphantly past the finish line!

(Apparently my camera does not auto-rotate. Sorry about that.)

It was BEASTLY hot. 90 degrees (33 Celcius in *real* numbers) and high humidity. He was pretty much ready to go home after the bike. Except for that little add-on of a HALF MARATHON. On a breezeless, sun-beating-down course.

So, so proud! So, so amazed!

So, SO glad he's never doing it again!

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We'll Always Remember Our School and Our Song...

...but we've got to be rolling along.

(Any Southwood School kids out there remember that song? High five, Southwood Stars!)

We're officially on summer break here at the PM house, hooray! It is SO nice to not be thinking about homework. The Girl is super responsible with hers, but The Boy takes a bit of dragging. And monitoring. And cajoling. And frustrated throwing up my hands and saying, "fine. Never learn multiplication tables. See if I care."

(This attitude is not serving me well. The other day when I asked him how his test had gone, he said, "I didn't really try." And I admonished, "You need to learn these things. Better learn it now while you're young." And he returned, "Mom. It's not like they'd ever fail me. Plus I'm sure I got at least 50%. That's all I need."

That old chestnut "Cs Get Degrees" ran through my head and I couldn't really think of a good response.)

But we're past all that now and we're in the limbo between school and the summer programs that start next week. The kids BAKED their brains on screen time yesterday. I'm on vacation and had all sorts of Projects planned.

But then I realized that this is the first day of vacation I've had to myself since New Year's Day. And my first Project of the day became sleeping in until 10 am. Followed by a dentist cleaning (boo) with no cavities (yay!). Then taking my kids out for a celebratory lunch:

(Oy! They're off the kids menu. This is gonna get expensive....)

However, celebrations were definitely in order since this was a BIG year for one of us. One of us is OFFICIALLY a MIDDLE-SCHOOLER! From Big Fish in Small Pond to Small Fish in Big Pond!! We had GRADUATION on Wednesday. Superfluous exclamation marks and CAPS all around!!!!

Pre-ceremony reception sugar-loading.

The Green Dress Club.

Class of 2019? For reals??

Rockin' it out on the bass bar with the handbells crew.

And that's it, that's all on the elementary days front. At least for her. Who would have thought it back on her first day of kindergarten:

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Peitricia, Peitricia, How Does Your Garden Grow?

AWESOMELY! With a little help from my friends, of course.

Back it up a bit. The last time I had a for-real-dirt-in-the-ground-hit-the-greenhouse-for-more-than-one-little-flat-of-annuals-for-a-window-box was eleven years ago. I was just pregnant with The Boy, and without my knowing it at the time, it was my last summer at our duplex in Mitchell.

Being newly pregnant plus mommying a barely one-year-old was not the most conducive to gardening. So it was mostly wildflowers that year. And weeds (hey, it's God's carpet).

But I have lusted after a garden ever since then. Part of this is that I do love gardening. I love the feel of the smooth, dark earth; the shimmer of the unfurling leaves after a rain; the ever-reddening of the tomatoes on the vines. I love the connection I feel to my grandmothers, both of whom were avid gardeners. I love seeing the literal fruits of my labours, and at the same time love knowing that the biggest labour wasn't mine at all - it's like magic how it just comes up.

The other part of it is that I have long said I'm a perennial kind of girl, not an annual one. A garden is all about stability. You don't plant a garden when you've only signed a one-year lease (voice of experience talking there). It's too much effort to get it right to use it for only one year, plus if you move every August 1, you know that it'll be all planting and tending and no eating.

So the chance to put in my garden this last weekend was *way* more than just a love of fresh lettuce. It means that I can see myself staying here for awhile. How long, I don't know. But long enough that it's worth putting down some roots.

I love, love, love raised beds. They're so neat and tidy. And orderly. And easy to maintain. (Pretty much a technical writer's dream.) The Husband's parents are in the process of transforming their large garden into a dreamland of raised beds, so I jumped at their offer (well, her offer of his help) to put together some for me.

Here is a "before." Between the house and the driveway is a bit of an odd place to put a garden maybe. But we've got these *gorgeous* old oak trees - so gorgeous that they block sunlight from 90% of my backyard. So for tomatoes, I get inventive.

I got a big ol' pile of soil delivered and The Husband (bless his "I-hate-gardening-more-than-I-hate-projects" soul) hit up a friend with a truck to go pick up my lumber.

The driveway became a construction site.

Someone had a blast with every part of the garden creation. Someone else is 11.

Both of them had a fab time messing around in the dirt.

But the most fun was the planting. We made our lists and each of us planted the things we like best.

The Boy is doing a Three Sisters garden and decided he wanted some onions as well.

The Girl's got peas, dill, garlic, onions, and a spot left over to do a cantaloupe when we find one.

Here's the "after" to the "before." I've got tomatoes and peppers on the sunniest side of the house. 

And here's my not quite as sunny side, but still sunny enough that *something's* bound to come up.

I'm wildly excited about it all. Of course, I know that excitement does not equal success, so I'm still signed up for our CSA and plan to visit the local farmer's market as necessary. Because just because my boxes look awesome does not mean that my thumb is any less black.

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Home Again

Where are you headed?

Steinbach.

What is the purpose of your visit?

Visit family and friends.

How long will you be in Canada?

Coming back on Sunday.

How many times has this conversation taken place on a Friday night between the hours of midnight and 2 am at the Pembina border crossing? I don't even know anymore.

We've passed those well-thumbed passports into that little window what feels like about a kajillion times. No, no alcohol or tobacco. No, no firearms. Yes, some gifts. No, no large sums of money.

(Do we look like we carry large sums of money??)

When my coworkers ask about my weekend plans, they always shake their heads when I say "going to Canada." They're astonished that I would just head to another country while they're busy mowing lawns and getting groceries. They usually assume that I'm flying but then I say, nope, driving.

They all think I'm nuts, but we've done it so often that it doesn't seem like a huge deal anymore. Plus, it was all part of the deal when we moved.

There were two cities on the list of places where The Husband was allowed to look for work:  Winnipeg and Minneapolis. That's it. I was willing to move (kind of), but I was not willing to go beyond a day's drive from my peeps.

(Am I too old to say "peeps"? Too Menno? Too nerdy? Probably all of the above.)

Do I love driving for 7 hours? No. But do I love being able to surprise my mother-in-law for her birthday? Yup. Do I love hand-delivering my Mother's Day plant to my sweet momma? Yup.

Do I love knowing that if something bad happens, I can be there by the next morning? Definitely.

As much as we love living here, I don't think I'd love it quite so much if I felt far removed from my nearest (in spirit) and dearest. Driving 14 hours out of 48 hours so you can see your family for 10 of them? Perfectly sane. Moving to where seeing anyone that has known you since birth involves searching for seat sales? Now *that's * nuts.

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