Stonehenge

Seven things to do when you visit the Stonehenge replica on the gorge.

1. Gaze in awe and wonderment at the big stones
2. Experience extreme wind
4. Listen to the odd quiet of the whole valley below
5. Play hide & seek
6. Sit on rocks, touch rocks, attempt to lick rocks
7. Pee in the bushes (acceptable for toddlers only)

 

I'd never heard of this faux Stonehenge, but it made a great day trip and luckily Carrie has heard of everything worth hearing of.  It's about 90 minutes away, and it happened to be perfect weather.  Carrie and I discussed all the things that sound cheesy to say, but are actually true, like 'what a beautiful day' and 'this view is amazing' and 'I love seeing the world through a child's eyes'.

We stopped at an art museum after, which I'll post pictures of later because there were peacocks outside, then we stopped again in Hood River for ice cream, and then for dinner at the Edgefield.  There were thunderstorms that evening and as we drove into Troutdale, the rain was really strong and scary and the complete opposite of the clear afternoon.

Potties and other fun things

In a Frog & Toad story, there is a picture where Toad is sitting on the side of his bed with his legs dangling over the edge.

Scar: "When I have a big girl bed, I can sit like that."
Mom, agrees
Scar: "Toad has a big toad bed."

She has said this to me twice now.

The big news in our household is that Scarlett is officially daytime potty trained.  She doesn't wear a diaper on outings or during her naps anymore, which was a big step. We officially put away the cloth diapers about a month ago, and we had some accidents in the undies but those seem to have tapered off.  She's still wearing a diaper at night, but I told her that once the Elmo diapers run out, we're not buying any more.  She's been asking about a big girl bed so I made her a deal: we'll talk big girl bed once you're a big girl who doesn't need a diaper at night.  She also wants a giant bath duck, like Lucy and Ella both have, and I think that's a pretty solid gift.

The good: no more diaper laundry!
The bad: She wants to use every potty, in every store and restaurant, sometimes twice.  Sometimes three times.  It's exhausting, but it's a good kind of exhausting. She gets her little hands all over everything in the public bathrooms, and she's excited to point at the fan and the hand dryer.  I taught her to push the flush with her foot, which she likes. 

Ella, age 3

I remember the phone call I got on the day Ella was born.  I remember first meeting her, she was a couple days old, they came to pick me up at the train station, she was sleeping in a car seat.  She had lots of dark hair.  Suddenly she's three!

There was a bouncy house at Ella's birthday party, but Scarlett was afraid to go in.  There was a sandbox though and a super delicious cake, and even though it poured over the weekend, it was sunny and dry during party hours.

This was also Charlie & Scarlett's first opportunity to meet little Oliver, who is four months old and so cute and super happy, and he looks just like his daddy.  It was nice to hold a little baby who doesn't demand snacks or try to climb over me.

 

 

And Scarlett did something in Tacoma that she's never done before- she asked to take a nap.  She slept a short amount in the car en route, and then after we arrived and had lunch and played for a while, she asked if she could go sleep in Ella's room.  She took a long nap, and I finally had to wake her because she was sleeping through the party.  A big highlight for her was taking a bath in the big tub, "Someday we will have a big tub in our house."  Sigh, I wish.

Home

Panoramic shot of our house, taken by my neighbor Weston. 

Mother's Day

I didn't write a blog post last weekend about Mother's Day, which seemed fine at the time.  But this week I started thinking, what if one day, ten years from now, I try to remember what we did on Mother's Day when Scarlett was two?  What if I can't remember?  Last year, I had the beginnings of what turned into the flu, so we didn't do much.  This year, we had a whole weekend of fun and it deserves to be recorded.

Saturday:
Camping!
Charlie camped Friday night in celebration of Eddie's birthday, but I'm still leery of sleeping in a tent with Scarlett, because I'm not convinced she would actually sleep, and because she's noisy and I didn't want to wake the others at 6am.  And, I don't love camping anyway.  So she and I stayed home for a mom-Scarlett party on Friday night, and came out Saturday for a day camp. Scarlett loved the campsite.  Most of all, she loved 1. marshmallows, and 2. peeing in the woods.

Sunday: 
I went for a 4 mile run on Sunday.  When I looped back to our house, Charlie came outside with Scarlett in the jogging stroller, and we did another 4 miles together.  I love family runs, and we do them so rarely because Charlie runs faster than I do, and because pushing the jogging stroller is the very definition of NOT FUN.  But Sunday's run was nice, and at one point another family out on a walk yelled Happy Mother's Day, which made me so happy. 

We made breakfast sandwiches after that, then Scarlett and I went to Noelle's baby shower while Charlie did a lot of yard work.  Thank you Charlie, the yard looks lovely and I'm excited to have some greens planted!  Noelle is due in less than a month now, and she's really happy to be having a baby girl, which is appropriate as baby girls are the best kind to have.

Then, we walked up to the Country Cat for dinner.  The plan was sushi, but sushi places appear to be closed on Sundays.  So I drank sweet tea and we sat outside and Scarlett colored some pictures and we ate, and I was with my family and I was happy.

Pool party

We broke out the yard pool for the first time this year, yesterday.  "There is not a fan by it," said Scarlett.  When I got home from work, she and Charlie were out in the yard, he was weeding and she was playing with rubber duckies in the pool.  Then she helped me empty it, one yogurt container full of water at a time, out onto the grass.

Morning conversation

As she eats her banana,

Scar: Monkeys like bananas.
Mom: Are you a monkey?  You are a monkey!
S: I'm NOT a monkey.
M: You are a monkey!
S: I'm NOOOTTTT a monkey.
M: What are you, then?
S: I'm just.... (thinks)...my Scarlett

My Scarlett, indeed

Let the Wild Rumpus Start

Amber has two copies of Where the Wild Things Are.  She says it's because they owned one, and she saw another one at a thrift store and couldn't pass it up.  I feel that completely.  I will always remember the little bear story, Birthday Soup, as one of the first that Scarlett memorized and 'read' all the way through.   Maurice Sendak is all over this household, we probably read one of his books or see one of his illustrations every day.  I'm sad to hear he died, even though he was 83 and that's a decent run.

In honor, Scarlett is reading some little bear:

Friends

There are several games lately, which were invented out of necessity on rainy days but seem to have stuck. Pretend zoo, when the weather was too cold to be outside long.  Pretend library, where Scarlett made a book drop and pretended to return her books.  Pretend park.  Pretend birthday party (shown below), pretend swimming pool.  Then we have for-reals-fort and for-reals-park, because spring seems to be sticking around.

Scarlett is suddenly extra attached to her teddy bears.  She hugs them close and whimpers 'I love my bear' while shaking her head, and she picks one to sleep which each night, though when I go to check on her, the bear is always thrown to the side and she's holding Arnie tight.  I'm fascinated by her preferences and how they change.  The baby dolls are getting less love, while the stuffed animals see more.  When we're going someplace in the car, she tries to bring all of them, or as many as she can carry.  

What she says

Scarlett was playing in a blanket fort, with a slew of stuffed animals.  I peeked in.  She said, "I'm just make sure-ing they stay in the corner".

Piggy tail

I put Scar's hair into a ponytail most days, otherwise it ends up sticky with yogurt.  But when I ask her to stay still so I can fix her hair, she says 'pig tail'.  Not pony tail, pig tail.  So I tell her to oink.  This morning, she didn't want a pig tail or a pony tail, so I offered her a puppy tail, and she was excited about that.

Bend

We spent a long weekend* in Bend, and it was great, especially since it might be our first real, official vacation as a family of three. We stayed Friday through Tuesday, and did an equal amount of relating and adventuring.

• Friday afternoon, we were greeted by six deer, outside the house.  We sat in the car and watched, then Charlie snuck out to grab the camera, and we got a few shots.  They drank from the neighbor's birdbath and pooped in the yard, then what followed were many conversations about deer poop, and walking around to spot but not touch the deer poop.
• We had some pine cone gathering and pine cone throwing contests.  A LOT of them.

• Bend has awesome playgrounds, like one with a pirate ship play structure and a super long slide, right on the river, with a foot bridge. 

• I visited my dear friend Heather.  Her three girls have a huge playroom with all the toys a toddler could imagine.  Her youngest daughter Samara showed us all her dresses.  Scarlett played up in that room with the older girls, and she really didn't want to leave, but was finally coerced by the promise of ice cream.
• Heather, Cheri and I ran a 10K on Sunday morning. Bend is hot, even at 9am.

• We visited the Bend Distillery.  
• Charlie took a brewery tour while I took a nap. This felt like a winning afternoon for both of us.
• There are some really nice river paths, so we took walks, and played with gravel, and pulled weeds, and looked at geese.

• Monday, we spent several hours at the High Desert Museum, which is maybe the most awesome place on the planet for kids.  In addition to standard museum stuff, there was a porcupine, otters, snakes, owls, and giant turtles.  There was an indoor rock area with a stone slide, and an eagle's nest on top, which Scar loved. There was a dark path through a fake coal mine, which Scarlett did not love.
• Oh, and they let the kids pet the turtles.

On the way home, I asked Scarlett what her favorite part of Bend was.  I thought for sure, the turtles, or Heather's playroom.  But she said 'ice cream sundae!'. 

*This vacation, brought to you by friends with a vacation home, Bert and Cheri.