new work

a new small collage/painting...
4" x 4"

Eliseo & Eliseo

Gramps and Laurie are visiting us this week for the first time since Eliseo's birth~
Lili warmed to them right away;
and Seo fits snug in Gramps's arm contentedly.
It's really nice.

turning four months old

berries, berries, and more berries...

It takes years for berry bushes to establish themselves, and we are finally reaping the benefits of our berry planting years ago. Raspberries, wine-berries, and gooseberries all bursting out at the same time around our land. We have enough to send the kids out to eat unlimited berries whenever there is a lull in the day or they are driving you crazy.

It was incredibly hot today and the kids were alternating between being in the kiddie pool and eating berries most of the day. (well that, and a mid-day viewing of Germany vs. Ghana)

wine-berries (my very favorite kind of berry)

gooseberries (a little bit sour, juicy, crunching like a grape)

"These be the good ole' days..."

mother-blessing flag

A dear friend of mine is about to have her first baby in a couple of months. I was asked to make a prayer flag to give her at her mother-blessing (or sometimes called a blessingway), and here is what came of it. In the center is a loon.

Summer Solstice

There are so many days that just flow. It will be 9 AM and you are thinking "Wow! I have already gotten so much accomplished! Things are moving along so effortlessly!"

Well, today was the opposite of that kind of day.

Nothing bad, just a continual thought bubble above my head thinking "Wow! that really wasn't smooth!" or: "hmmmm...that sure was a comedy of errors..."

It all began about 2 seconds after I opened my eyes this morning when I realized the baby had a poop explosion that had saturated through the diaper, and pajamas, and sheet, and had soaked into our mattress. (Someone must have a word for this type of poop that squirts up to the shoulder blades right???. )
The next twenty minutes involved trying to clean up the bed, cat barf, pee all over me and a basket of clean laundry, baby barf on my skirt, a second poop explosion that luckily hit the ground outside, pee on the couch cushion, and a weary mother trying to patiently answer a toddler's million questions about what exactly was going on. I know you are thinking "Why wasn't that baby in a diaper for goodness sake? I don't know. I guess I kept wrongly assuming he must be empty.

The rest of the day followed suit.

At the end of the day I went out to hang the laundry on the line. It was incredibly peaceful with glowing orange clouds and the stream trickling nearby. It was the first moment of the day I had stopped to appreciate the first day of Summer. As I pinned up the last sock~ a giant thunderclap echoed overhead. It rained on my laundry five minutes later.

You just have to laugh at yourself and the world on the days like today. You know???

Here is something that has also kept me smiling.
It is by far the best thing that has happened this week:

free music. free hugs.

Every Thursday night in the summertime our local park hosts a free concert; and this week was the kickoff. We ate a picnic dinner surrounded by friends, and listened to the fun, soulful, and jazzy Kat Williams (click here to check out her myspace page). What a treat to be able to hear family-friendly live music for free! So awesome.

At the end of the night Lili had made a new friend. A little girl around her age with bangs and long pigtails and a pink tee-shirt. All the kids were up front dancing and being silly, but it soon became clear that the two of them had formed a special bond. They were doing laps, chasing each other around a group of concert-goers, and then would stop and hug until they fell into a heap on top of each other. Then they would giggle like mad and start over...

How amazing to be young and so open to life that when you recognize a kindred spirit you can be hugging and knowing each other as "friend" before you even know their name.

on the phone with Memere

new work

new work

worry

My friend Katy spoke this quote aloud to me, and it resonated and has stuck with me the last few days. I usually find myself drawn to poems more than quotes, but sometimes a quotation can really capture a thought or feeling in a perfectly direct way. I don't know the exact quote or even who originally said it.
However the gist of it:

"Worry does not empty tomorrow of its troubles~
It empties today of its strength." I know I worry too much. As a mom... as a sister... about the well being of the world... and on and on. But, it is so true that worrying about something doesn't empty it of its trouble at all.

new work

today.

*today was Sunday and it was hot.
*Alex made a nice breakfast.
*I enjoyed my morning coffee sitting on the couch holding Eliseo.
*We broke open the watermelon that has been on the counter all week.
*In the heat of the day our whole family got dressed (Me in my bathing suit and sunglasses, Alex in his boxers, Lili totally naked, and Seo in a fleece diaper and a sun hat) to go to the pool. We all squeezed in the kiddie pool together.
*In the late afternoon we worked in the garden. Eliseo reclined in his bouncy chair contentedly while I weeded for an hour.
*We ate tacos with the Carmonas for dinner. (Ema made a very delicious and tart gooseberry cobbler too.)
*Seo came down with his first fever tonight (mild).
*The kids went to bed early and Alex and I watched a "Law and Order" and worked on some art stuff.

and here is another little collage (4" x 4") that I finished yesterday.

Lili

I took all these photos against the fridge. I've found it to be such an easy and readily available plain background for a photograph... unless of course it is covered in magnets and junk ;)

Bangs.

With each passing hour of today I fell more and more in love with Lilikoi's new haircut. I love how it was sticking up in a tousled mess when she woke up, and how when I asked her if she liked her new haircut she just said "Yep" so nonchalantly (non of the hair drama that comes with age I guess), and how her bangs frame her face just right. Bangs are the practical haircut for a two year old. Before bangs, her hair would fall in sticky tendrils over her face from things like Popsicles or fruit. And now I don't need to fight with her about keeping a barrette in either. Despite all the practicalities I just had an unspoken bang aversion~ and now it is dissolving.

It is just that I had bang trauma growing up.
Actually, when I stop and think about it, it is more like post-traumatic-bang trauma. Because at the time of my bad bangs (grades 2-7) I did not care. I had way cooler things to do than think about fashion sense (although it was the 80's). Only in retrospect was I traumatized by the bangs that started way back on my head and fell to my eyebrows, and dropped off into a mullet in the back of my head.

Anyhoo... I had some serious bangs, and it is high time that I embraced these bangs of the past,let go of my phobia, and revel in Lili's.

Daddy Monkey news

Lili has switched from playing the game "How about you are the baby, and I am the Mommy?" to "How about you are the baby Monkey, and I am the Daddy Monkey???"

So I will say "Lili"
and she will say "No! I am the Daddy Monkey!"
and I will say, "Oh right. Um, Daddy Monkey?"
"Yes, baby Monkey?"

When Alex goes along with this game he does so in a growling, gruff, monsterish voice. Lili eats it up. She loves it. We can get her to do most anything if we just call her the right thing.

In other Lili news, I gave her a haircut today. It is a little severe, and there are bangs involved. Ema and Alex have both assured me that it is cute and fine... but my heart was racing for about an hour after I put the scissors down. Our camera has dead batteries~ so no photos of it now. I will just let you picture the very worst, so when you see it you will think: no, no, Lili looks just fine after all.