Pest-infested Halloween Costume

I made IJ's Halloween costume yesterday, but the material was seriously infected with pests! I knocked the pest out of the fabric, but she came back! I did manage to complete the Jedi Cape, but the pest is still there... I may have to make a cape for her!

"Did You Know...

...that Pippins and Pippis can be born Thumpacks when they are born on a psycho beam?"

~When IJ's imagination meets Pokemon

My boys discuss Pokemon like grown men discuss politics or baseball. And I have no idea what they are talking about.

Another lunchtime conversation:
S: I wish we had a pig. Then we could feed it our compost.
IJ: I would rather have a unicorn.

Free Gun

Today I left the kids in the van in front of the school district headquarters while I filled out annoying forms necessary for homeschooling. When I returned to the van S asked, "So did you get your gun?" Gun? At school? I looked at the front of the building where a sign proudly proclaimed,

Drug Free
Gun Free
Zone

I asked S if he had read the sign. He said, "Yes. I don't know what the first part means though. Did you get your free gun?"

Beet That! Animal Crackers

This weekend was pretty uneventful. Saturday I made a smoothie out of beets (tops too!) that everyone loved. And do you like my new smoothie straw? I ordered the straw from Glass Dharma just for my own smoothie enjoyment. I'm not particular to smoothie mustaches and chunks of fruit and veggies don't fit too well up the plastic kind. And lets face it: kale doesn't taste good no matter what. Straws help kale go down the hatch a lot easier! When this straw passes the evaluation period and proves that it won't break, I will buy more for my whole family to enjoy!
Sunday I cleaned and organized my pantry out of irritation. I was irritated because the day after I made a Costco run, Grandad went to the grocery store and forgot to bring his resistance. And then my Azure Standard order came in. So I had three giant loads of food to put away and nowhere to put it. I am thankful I have too much food rather than too little food. But I don't think we will ever get it used up unless a major wind or ice storm hits and our driveway is blocked with fallen trees outside the range of our electric chainsaw. At least I'll be able to find things when I need them! This shows only the middle of half of my pantry:And just like the story If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, if I Start to Clean the Pantry I will need a place to put my oatmeal. If I move my oatmeal, I will discover that the floor under the shelves hasn't been mopped for years. I will get my mop to find that the sponge needs to be replaced. I will search for a mop head and discover that I have too many mops and some need to go find a new home. I will start a Goodwill box and remember I have too many drinking glasses. Seeing all the drinking glasses will remind me that I'm thirsty and that I need to use the old juice in the pantry before I use the new juice. When I go to the pantry, I will see that it needs to be cleaned and organized...

And today Little Luna, who isn't the brightest rock in the galaxy, decided that she would become an Animal Cracker instead of just existing as one in My Pathetic Doberman's fantasies. The first time she crawled into this container we thought she was stuck because she wouldn't come out. I had to coax her out with a string and she emerged reluctantly. I was reminded of how A needed to help her mother deliver her into this world. A few minutes later she ran right back into the cracker container. Like I said, not too smart. But she is growing on us.

I Love You Tube

Before I moved down here to Twin Firs, I missed something that the rest of the people with high-speed internet had. You Tube. Now I can watch The Belly Button Song and The Cheeseburger Song.

E and I have been watching the Belly Button Song over and over this afternoon.

Thank Goodness its Friday!

Friday is here and I'm thankful...

Thankful that the kids have worked hard this week and we don't have a lot of "catch up" work.

Thankful that M is home working today and built a cozy fire for me to sit by.

Thankful that I unpacked my sewing machine yesterday and can get to work on IJ's Jedi costume.

Thankful that my diaper sprayer came in the mail today and installed without a hitch.

Hooray for Friday!

Homeschool Day at the Zoo

Today the kids and I spent the day at the Woodland Park Zoo. They had special workshops for homeschoolers; we signed up for the owl class. I of course could not sit through a class that asked the audience members to remain still in order to not scare the owl, so F and I waited outside.

The absolute best part of today was this:The look on IJ's face when he got to see his first live snow leopard.Here is the mama and one of her cubs. And this is the two of them staring at F, who was screaming because I wouldn't let her out of the stroller (what can I say, she is starting those terrible two's):This was E's favorite animal, a komodo dragon:S's favorite animal, a giraffe:And mine, the hippo: I just about died when it made a hippo noise. It sounded like a laugh mixed with a stomach ache.

I did take pictures of my kids, but we always look at them. We had a great time and we only explored a small part of the zoo (each kid picked one animal to look at and we glanced at animals along the way to our destinations). We will be going back for sure!

F is Funny

F is starting to talk really well and entertain her family with the funny things she says. She hears all the things her siblings say and copies them. Here is a quick list off the top of my head:

She was given carrot juice when she wanted orange juice. She grimaced, held her cup to me and whined, "Spicy!" Carrot juice is not spicy, but she hears her siblings whine that their dinner is too spicy.She tried to pick up our swimming bag at the YMCA and said, "Heavy!"

When I hand her something, I always say, "Thank you, Mama!" so she will learn manners. Now whenever she is handed something or she hands something to someone else, she says, "Kyo, Mama!"

In the car over the weekend, F started fussing and saying "Owie, owie. Bo'm owie!" which translates to "My bottom has an owie." I asked, "Did you go potty? Are you poopy?" to which she replied, "No! Pee-pee!" Yay! We can have a real conversation and F can communicate her needs to me!

And last night I spilled a little milk on the table (I hate Costco milk containers). F saw the spill, pointed to it, and frowned and said, "Uh-oh! Uh-oh! Wha' a BIG MESTH!" Her first sentence!

But the cutest thing is the way she says, "yesth!"

Mountain Men

Today M was able to check an activity off his list that has been there since the day IJ was born. He took the boys hiking to the top of Mount Elinor. He took L when she was just a bitty thing at the tender age of four: He drug me up there on our wild road trip that ended with him proposing to me at the end of the week.

And after a long hike up (with S complaining and M telling him to stop acting like a baby) here they are:On the way home, S said, "On the way up I was a baby. On the way down I was a man!"

Have You Heard the News?

Fishy Fun

Part of the fun of having a fish biologist for a father is... ... fish heads in your front yard. E, like her sisters before her, learned about pulling otoliths. In fact, follow me down memory lane for a moment...

The first time I met M's wonderful Dad, my future father-in-law, I had gone over to M's house to help pull otoliths from bass heads. You know, back in the day when I was also a fishy scientist and I had no plans of ever getting married. I had a career. That day I also had the pleasure of sitting side-by-side with L on the front steps of the old little house and having a lovely conversation about how pretty and long L's hair was while she recorded data for us. Fast forward a few years to our old house that still had the gazebo in the backyard. A and her dad pulled tiny little otoliths from kokanee heads. By this time, A was quite accomplished in the fishy sciences. I was making pizza for dinner and had gone down to the backyard to ask if they wanted Canadian bacon on their pizza, but when I got back to the kitchen, the dog had eaten it all!

What? You don't know? What the heck is an otolith?

An otolith is a bone found in the inner ear of a fish. As the fish ages, rings similar to the rings in a tree trunk are formed. These wonderful little bones can only be accessed by cutting through the fish's head, digging around in the brain with a pair of forceps, and feeling for the hard little bone. Some people who have been pulling otoliths for over ten years have an otolith intuition and don't have to fish around in the liquefied brain. The bone is preserved in a carefully labeled vial and sent to Olympia to be read by an expert in counting- I mean, fish aging.

Sounds fun, doesn't it? For some crazy reason, this kind of fish work doesn't bother me. But PLEASE don't make me handle a raw salmon in the kitchen! Ew! Skin! Scales! Gross!

...and don't leave your work in my compost, dearest husband.

Farm Fun

Saturday we toured some of the local farms. We had a good time and finished the day off at the beach. Some of the quotable quotes (with pics interspersed) on this day were:

S: It would take me forever to get infinity dollars!This is the horse that tried to nibble S's hay-like hair, much to our amusement. He (the horse) is really tall!

S (to his brother): Icky [IJ]!
IJ: No! Intelligent [IJ]!
M: Do you know what intelligent means?
IJ: No...
Here we are making a scarecrow that "looks like Grandad!" (IJ)

E (on a tour of a barn): Is this where the ticks live?Our new favorite beach! Its just a few minutes from our house. The state threatened to close it down with these last budget cuts, but I guess they settled for M's old job instead. Which he still has to do because they (the people who cut him) realized they can't function at all without him. So they call him every few days with questions and asking for help and needing clarification. And the feds want to pay him to finish writing the reports from data he collected with them for many years. But he is not allowed to because it would be "a conflict of interest." Which really makes me mad because they uprooted my entire life and family and forced me to move far away from everything I love and now they need to HIRE someone to do his old job. And my poor husband is working nights and weekends UNPAID. But I digress...

Isn't she pretty?

Mango Sandwiches

I've been experimenting with healthy nut and vegetable based recipes lately from the book Disease-Proof Your Child by Dr. Joel Fuhrman. I'm especially fond of the recipes that use my Vita-Mix! Yesterday I made Carob Avocado Cream Pie. I liked it because I like carob, but I think my kids would like it better if I made it with cocoa. The crust was made out of ground cashews, unsweetened coconut, and dates. The creamy filling was carob powder, avocado, and more cashews and dates. The cream pie is a lot like a pudding pie, but good for you!

Last night I made a heart-healthy coleslaw with mashed potatoes as a creamy base instead of mayo. And tons of veggies. When Grandad claimed that the oils in the mayo were good for him I said, "Don't worry! There is healthy oil in this too! Flax and olive. But no extra weird ingredients!" Score: me 1, Grandad 0!

This morning I made my usual Pumpkin Pie Porridge (a winter favorite), but I added cashew "whipped cream." The recipe in the book calls for macadamia nuts, but I don't have any. So I used cashews instead, ground with soy milk and dates. It was awesome!

For lunch I took the leftover "whipped cream" and added a banana and an avocado. I spread it in pita bread with sliced mango, which IJ gobbled down as "baby martin food." The spread is sweet and will be good to use as a dip this afternoon.

I'm glad my kids are young enough that all food is weird at first and they are not set in their ways of eating. And I'm glad they like green things. F saw me making the sandwich spread and started jumping around saying, "Ah-ca-co! Ah-ca-co!" for avocado!

And speaking of F speaking... and being on my blog... She has a new name for the dog. Dummy. F will point out the window to the dog, proclaim, "Dummy!" and smile. What a good little girl!