Four Months Feels Like Forever

Hello World! I'm four months old today!

It's amazing to me how quickly life changes. Zoe is four months old today. I know logically that four months isn't very long, but illogically, it feels like forever. It's so hard to remember a time before Zoe and it's hard to believe that she's only been a part of our lives for four months, and yet, I also can't believe that she's four months old already! At the same time it feels like just yesterday that I was pregnant and it feels like its been she's forever been with us!

She's such a little miracle, changing and growing daily and keeping Michele and I alive with all her energy and all our love for her. It truly has been the most amazing four months. I wake up everyday and cannot wait to see what is new with Zoe.

Happy Quarter-Year Birthday, Baby Girl

Zoe is just the happiest, cuddliest baby. It took us a long time to decide to become moms - Michele and I have been talking about it for our entire relationship - 14 years! I'm sure every parent gets the exact right baby for them - I know Zoe is the exact right baby for us. She just seems like the perfectly shaped puzzle piece fitting right into our family. Or maybe it just feels like that because I can't remember how life felt before Zoe. I don't remember feeling like something was missing, but I now feel peacefully complete. These past three months have been full of change, full of happiness. I can't believe she's three months old already; and yet I can't believe I lived for 36 years without her either.

Michele's Birthday Weekend - Part Three: Garden Decor

Now, we did spend most of Michele's weekend relaxing, but we also opened a package we'd received from a delightful stained glass artist in Florida: Glass of Many Colors. I had commissioned this husband and wife team to make a set of four stained glass veggies for our square foot garden. Michele and I spent a fun-filled hour deciding where to put each of the four and then just admiring our handiwork. Aren't they gorgeous! We've decided we'd like six more: a beet, cherry tomatoes, a red pepper, a head of broccoli, an onion, and a yellow squash to join the current corn, green beans, carrot, and beefsteak tomato. When the sun hits these it's like you're in heaven! And, in addition to the beauty they add to the garden, the carrot is a welcome addition to my carrot-themed art collection: glass!

Michele's Birthday Weekend - Part Two: Gardening Edition

All week I've been excited to give Michele one particular, extra special birthday present: the first fruit from our garden! I've been watching and praying over this strawberry, hoping that no one (read: squirrel, bird, ground hog, rabbit, mouse, etc) ate it, and that it keep growing and and be ready for picking when Michele got home. I thought it would be the perfect present for her. And it was! She was so excited to see the very first edible thing (besides basil) in our garden. We weren't sure, though, if it was really ready to pick, so we just visited it a few times yesterday and marveled over it. Then, yesterday evening, we decided it looked ready. I picked it and presented it to Michele - oh, the perfect strawberry! She took a bite and . . . immediately spit it out! It's really too bad that it was thoroughly rotten inside! Well, as they say, it is the thought that counts, right?

Michele's Birthday Weekend - Part One

Michele and I have birthdays very close together, so we're having another bunch of fun to celebrate her 38th birthday! Her actual birthday was Friday, but she got stuck in New Jersey and didn't make it home until today. That, however, didn't stop us from having a ball! I made her a surprise brunch for this morning - I had tried this recipe for the first time for my birthday brunch and Michele loved it so much I wanted to make it for her as well: Overnight Blueberry French Toast. The logistics of getting the french toast in the oven and letting it bake at the same time I needed to go and pick up Michele was a bit tricky, but I just threw it in, drove like a fiend, picked her up, told her I left the kettle on so that she wouldn't be suspicious about my hurry, and made it home just in time to uncover the casserole and let it bake and brown for 20 more minutes! She was very surprised and happy and the french toast was DELICIOUS!!

We've spent the rest of the day just relaxing together. It was so very nice and so very different from my birthday, that's why we work so well together. I love to pack activity into every minute, while Michele loves to relax, have an iced coffee, and spend hours reading at our favorite coffee shop. It's a lovely change of pace for me and it's exactly what she wanted for her birthday, which made the day just perfect!

The Best Weekend Ever, Part 3 (The Final Chapter)

Today marks the end of my amazing birthday weekend. It was just the best weekend ever, truly! Yesterday was the height of  fun. I hosted my first ever brunch with two very good, very sweet friends, Jena and Sarah (Bad influence Sarah of football and sledding fame). It was such a treat having them over!

Then, that afternoon when I opened my gifts from Michele, I got the best surprise! OK, first I've got to tell you the back story: every six months, at Christmas and my birthday, Michele heads to the local Lindt store and buys me six months worth of chocolate. Well, the local Lindt store closed and the closest ones were in Niagara Falls and Syracuse - both about an hour and a half drive from us! And my extra special birthday surprise, you ask? Michele, sweetheart that she is, drove to Niagara to buy my birthday chocolate! I felt so touched and so bad at the same time - I mean, she drives for a living and the day after she got home, she turned around and drove to Niagara just to make sure that I would have my favorite chocolate for my birthday! I'm still overwhelmed! It is such a blessing to have such a wonderful partner and such wonderful friends and family (both here in Rochester, around the world, and in cyberspace) to spend this special birthday with! Thank you everyone for you lovely birthday wishes!

The Best Weekend Ever, Part 2

Oh boy, has this weekend been amazing so far - and there are still two days left in it for me!

So, where did I leave off? Friday morning. OK, so I planned to fill the boxes, add the grid, and plant on Friday, but blending the five different composts and then mixing the compost with the peat moss and vermiculate took forever! By the time I was done and realize that I needed just a bit more, it was time to pick up Michele.

Off to the truck stop I went and then we came home and, while Michele took a nap, I mixed up the last batch of "soil" and topped off the boxes. Michele then helped me tack on the grids and the boxes were done! Aren't they pretty? At that point, I only had the seeds I planned to plant and didn't really have time to go buy seedlings, so we called it a very productive day.

Saturday morning we went to the public market (a farmer's market type establishment here in Rochester - very cool) and got about a million seedlings and a flat of the prettiest marigolds (which happen to be my favorite flower tied with tulip). We still didn't have time to plant anything on Saturday because I had a date planned with my very favorite friend, Deb: lunch and a show. We saw the best show, Five Course Love, and I highly recommend it!

Bright and early Sunday morning found Michele and I planting the seeds and seedlings. Oh, so wonderful. We planted tomatoes galore, cucumbers - three kinds, melons, lettuce, strawberries, beets, potatoes - red and white, broccoli, cauliflower, white, purple, and green beans, red, green, and orange peppers, orange watermelon (strangely no red), onions, chives, corn, squash - yellow and zucchini, and, of course, carrots! We planted the expected orange carrot. Plus, I got a pack of seeds that shows a picture of purple, red, and white carrots, but in actuality the carrots will be salmon, white, and yellow (no clue why the purple, white, and red picture is on the front.) [And, inquiring minds: it is believed that the first domestic carrots where purple (5000 years ago)! Orange carrots are pretty "new." There are still purple, red, white, yellow, etc. carrots around, but just salmon, yellow, orange, and white in my garden!]

After planting, Michele and I met our lovely friends Tina, Kathryn, and "baby" Ada for my favorite breakfast at IHOP, after which Michele jumped for joy at the prospect of heading home to more gardening! Much fun was had by all!

Now, tomorrow, my actual birthday will be even more extra special. We're having a barbecue and guess what's going on the grill? If you guessed carrots, which will become carrot dogs, you guessed right, but more on that tomorrow!

The Best Weekend Ever, Part 1

This is the morning of the first day of the best weekend ever. It's my birthday weekend, Michele will be home soon, and, well, what more do I need for this to qualify as the best weekend ever?

Actually the bestness of it started earlier in the week. As I mentioned yesterday, I've been aggressively gardening so that I don't worry so much about my dad. Well, ever since I started my veggie gardening last year, I've wanted to do Square Foot Gardening this year. So I bought my lumber and built my boxes on Wednesday evening. Very fun - I love building things! Then, yesterday evening, I placed them where I wanted them in the yard, layed weed cloth along the rows, and mulched with 100% recycled tire mulch (pretty cool, huh?). I also got all the stuff to make the potting mix to go in the boxes: 1/3 vermiculite, 1/3 peat moss, and 1/3 compost (don't ask me why I didn't use the lovely compost I've been cooking since last year. It's very sore subject!) Today, I plan to mix up the mix, fill the boxes, add the distinctive Square Foot Gardening grid, and plant away! I'll let you know later what all I plan to grow this year. I will give you one hint: carrots...and they are not all orange!

The bestness didn't consign itself only to the garden, either! I came home today to find that my tree had been yarn bombed by my good friend and crocheting vigilante, Karen! What a colorful birthday treat!!

ABOUT YARD BOMBING:

Yarn Bombing is a type of graffiti or street art that employs colorful displays of knitted or crocheted cloth rather than paint or chalk. The practice is believed to have originated in the U.S. with Texas knitters trying to find a creative way to use their leftover and unfinished knitting projects, but has since spread worldwide. While other forms of graffiti may be expressive, decorative, territorial, socio-political commentary, advertising or vandalism, yarn bombing is almost exclusively about beautification and creativity.

Giddy Like a Child

My birthday is coming up and I am just giddy with excitement - just like I have been for the past 35 years and will hopefully be for the next 35! I've always adored my birthday - that one day a year that is solely mine(although I do share mine with my Uncle Logan and Clint Eastwood). A birthday is like a holiday just for you! Which is funny because my birthday often (about every seven years! LOL!) falls on a national holiday - Memorial Day - so it REALLY feels like it's my own personal holiday. I still remember so many fun birthdays:

• My 9th birthday party when we play Red Rover and I ended up getting clotheslined and getting the wind knocked out of me and staining my birthday dress - it was still fun, though! Red Rover is such a great game!
• My 10th birthday when I got a wallet and a purse for my new military ID card - boy did I love showing that off!
• My 16th birthday party that my brother threw for me - such a sweet brother I have!
• My 21st birthday that I celebrated at the roller rink - not drinking, since none of us drank
• My 25th birthday for which all my coworkers gave me quarters since I was a quarter of a century
• My 30th birthday that brought on an "Oh wow, how did I reach 30 without accomplishing any of my goals" crisis which led Michele and I to pick up and move to NY and buy a house

And now I approach my 35th birthday and am so excited to find out what this one holds for me! Whatever it is, I know it will be amazing, wonderful, full of life...and hopefully mouse-free!