Garden v2

Very long story short, the retaining wall between our house and the next door neighbors has been crumbling since we moved in nearly 11 years ago. The disrepair finally hit a critical level, and coupled with our privacy fence also literally falling to pieces, we've done a bit of renovation in the yard. As such, we now have some beautiful beds for gardening - the above scarlet rummer beans and Carmen peppers are new this year, but the blueberry has been a faithful produce for many years. It is actually a cluster of 4 bushes that need to be thinned and spread out, but that's work for later. For now, we enjoy watching our food grow, harvesting it, eating it and sharing it!

Last Day of School

The traditional last day of school photo this year features only Amity, as Zara was on a plane to visit Marmee in Austin, and I didn't think to capture her actual last day. Ooops. That's ok. Imagine this photo contains a rising seventh grader as well, and know that Amity both had an amazingly magical first grade year is excited for second grade, too.

Split Banana

We spent the day at the Frontier Culture Museum, and then of course had to top it off with gelato at The Split Banana. Yum!

Amity's 7th birthday (observed)

Amity turned 7, and then a few days later we had a party where the kiddos built crazy contraptions from recycling and then they decorated their own cupcakes. Finally, there was a glow stick dance party to burn off the sugar...

Happy 7th Birthday, Amity!

Celebrating 7 years of having Amity in our lives, which is pretty awesome. Happy Birthday to this incredibly kind, sweet, clever, hilarious, caring, creative, assertive and wonderful kiddo! We love you!

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Resistance!

Amity modeling our Marmee-crafted pussy hat. Vive la résistance!

Happy Chanukah!

Chag Sameach!

U8 Team Green

Coaching U8 soccer (with world's best co-coach, CCC) is one of my absolute favorites. This particular group of not especially creatively named players - I think we probably ended on Green Chilis since they had been the Red Chilis the two previous times - was such a pleasure to coach. They progressed and developed a ton as individuals as well as in their work as a team, playing together. It really is a delight getting to hang with these kiddos. I'm a lucky duck.

Happy Halloween!

Zara was a quarkbeast (see the very excellent The Last Dragonslayer series by Jasper Fforde if you want more background info) and Amity was Murray, a little bat with a very big heart from Cynthia Rylant's Gooseberry Park (and it's sequel). Both kids went literary, and both suggest you read the respective books that inspired their costumes.