A Trip to the Farm

We went to see my Uncle Terry and Aunt Phillipa this weekend on their llama farm in Jefferson Maine. We took Larry's big truck and trailor with the intention of filling them up with llama poop. We enjoyed our visit a lot. Makili loved watching the tractor fill the trailor.

He loved sitting in the "Gator."
He loved climbing in the creek in his diaper, and chasing their neighbor Josh's dogs, Flo and Nell.

Of course, he loved checking out the llamas.
Until he found the big shovels and piles of dirt, and then that was the center of his interest.
The llamas liked checking him out too.

It was a short but sweet visit. Unfortunately our return trip wasn't quite as short or sweet. We got lost on the way home in the middle of nowhere in rural Maine. Then when we had finally found our way, the trailor started making funny noises. So we pulled over and realized that we were missing a tire. This was at 11:30 at night. We had to leave the trailor, and Raph and Larry had to go up on Sunday to get, which took 8 hours because they had to find someone who would mount a tire on a Sunday. Next time I think we might just visit my aunt and uncle.

Good Luck and Congratulations

Good Luck and Congratulation to my friend Becky and her husband Nick, who leave tomorrow to go to Vietnam to bring home their little girl.  We're thinking of you!

You can take a kid to the beach, but you can't make him like it.

A day at the beach with a tired baby starts off okay...

but then he wants more of something that we can't figure out?...
which pisses him off...

so we put him in the carrier and he continues to scream and sign more though we have no idea as to what he wants more of...

he tries to get me to save him, but all I do is take pictures.
then he has a full-fledged tantrum in the sand.

can't wait till he's two.

Crops of the Seasons

We spend a good deal of time with my couin Tim and his girlfriend, Tamara. In some ways, they lead totally different lives than Raph and I. They are very career-oriented, which Raph and I would rather not work at all. They work very hard, while Raph and I like to work as little as possible. (Whatever that means for teachers.)

But we share some things in common with them too. When they aren't working, they like to get out and do things, like kayak, which is cool because they bought two inflatable kayaks this year, which we've been able to use on occasion which has been great. They also look to go to the beach, though Tim has a habit of resembling a lobster after such occasions.

These are sun-dried tomatoes from our garden!

But the biggest thing we share in common is FOOD! We all love to eat. Tim recently started a blog about food, called Crops of the Seasons. We shared in the creation of the garden. We shared a share at a local farm's CSA, which for those of you who don't know what that means, stands for Community Supported Agriculture. When you buy a share at a CSA, you are paying a farmer up front for a box of food every week for the entire growing season. In this way, farmers can plan on how much to plant, and also have some money up front to help them start. This year was a very difficult year for Maine farmers, as it virtually rained for the entire month of July. Farmers watched their crops rot in their fields. Our farm, Wolf Pine, did okay, but there were a few times that I thought to myself "I thought there'd be more." Whether or not it was financially worth it is up for debate, but I know the four of us feel good about supporting a local farm, helping to make sure that their land remains farmland, and that we know where our food comes from and who grew it.

And now we've started "winterizing" (as Tim calls it.) But like everything else Tim does, we have to do it big and complicated. So we spent hours last weekend making filling for raviolis and then rolling the homemade dough too. And we only finished half of what we had hoped to accomplish. Poor Makili didn't get to bed until 9:30, when we finally gave up for the night and decided to eat some of our creations. They were AMAZING! A lot of the fillings we had grown ourselves. It was pretty cool. We actually went back there on Raph's birthday to eat some more. I don't think that these raviolis are going to make it very far into the winter, but that's okay.

Tim and Tamara were also our guest babysitters on Raph's birthday. Our first non-mom babysitters. And they did great. So now they can babysit AGAIN!

Raph Joins the Club

Raph turned 30 this week. We didn't do that much. No crazy all night parties or anything. I did bake him some cookies, and we did go to the movies all by ourselves. Tim and Tamara babysat. And now I've thought of all kinds of occasions where we could get them to babysit.On Wed, we had a little party at our house. Raph's grandfather, Rudy came and plucked the corn out of our garden.
We stood outside on what my grandfather would have called "the most beautiful day in the history of the world."

We have known since we moved here that many of Raph's relatives on his dad's side live in Kittery, since this is where is grandmother was raised and she was one of 10. But we never met them until Wed. We met three of Larry's aunts and uncles and a cousin as well. In case you're wondering, yes, that is a LOT of people in our house.

Makili has gotten tall enough that he is trouble with anything on a ledge or a table. He took a chunk out of Raph's birthday cake (though there were three birthday cakes thanks to Ann.)
It's already getting tight with 30 candles on the cake.
But Raph did a great job of getting them all out.
And like his buddy Ethan said, 30 isn't so bad, except for all the old jokes.

On Vacation

I've been on vacation from the blogosphere lately.  The weather has been idyllic, the bugs have started to wane (a bit), the solar dehydrator Raph got me for my birthday has been hot, the garden has been very productive, and so I've been spending my minutes in other ways.  I also got a new stay-at-home-mom job, which has certainly eaten up some more of my internet time.  Things are good though and Makili is terribly cute of late.

Here he is telling me "Don't bother the driver."  I said this to Raph while driving one day.  Obviously I was pointing and Makili started shaking his finger at us too.  Now it's a little joke between the three of us.
Here he is signing "help."  Or "get off your lazy ass mom and come over here and push me."   These, by the way, are the free cars we got at the dump last week!
And here he is just being damn cute.

Summer Eating and Alternative Baby Entertainment

Can you belive how beautiful this yellow heirloom tomator and purple basil are?

And Makili's newest favorite form of entertainment, riding on scooters and lawnmowers. Here we go! Already?

Beach Nostalgia

We've had some glorious beach days, like this one with Lucy and Amy. I met Amy when I attacked her at the caucus, excited to meet anyone in the area with a baby! We've seen each other a few times, but hopefully more in the future. This day we happened to run into eachother at the beach. And we spent some time watching charming Lucy eat sand. Makili tried to kiss her. Can you blame him?



But as I sit here writing this, I am having a serious bout of Hawaii nostalgia. The weather lately, blissful sunshine, cool breezes, quality of light that hurts, has been bringing in on. And then I turned on Jack Johnson on the Ipod tonight and I seriously got teary, missing another life. Another way of life. Water, wind, sun, kids (that could talk), independence, romance, activity. Climbing waterfalls, jumping through waves, surfing badly. Sweating with the fan in your face. Youth. I'm not complaining. I'm so happy with our life here, but sometimes I do feel the pull for what once was.

TaDa!

This is sweet corn from our garden! A miracle! Seriously. I have learned a lot about growing corn since the May day when I innocently stuck those kernals into the ground. Things like corn is wind-pollinated (who knew and thanks Debbie) and sun makes a big difference (which might explain why our corn patch looks like a commercial for a cell-phone company - you know the ascending bars). BUT, it grew, and while we won't get a lot of corn it IS delicious.
Makili saw me walk in with the shucked corn and made such a stink about eating it that I had to go and pick him an ear, which he sucked every kernal off of. The kid knows what he wants.

Kute Kane.

beach days are winding down

sam's grouchy face which made more sense when he threw up on the way home.