As if we needed further proof...

Yes, Calla is doomed to a life of nerd-dom. Whether it's by her own choosing or by default, there's no escape. For one, I'm already out of touch with what's hip with the toddler set. Apparently, there's some show on some channel - Yo Gabba Gabba - ?!?! As far as I can tell, it's a big hit with Calla's peers, but I couldn't begin to tell you what the title even means. She's going to show up at Pre-K and realize how out of touch her parents are and what a disservice we have done to her.

And then there's her parents' latest internet interest. Bird watching on-line. Seriously. It's on the Cornell Ornithology web site. In particular, we're (maybe it's just me) possibly a little too fascinated with the nesting Barn Owl. I mean, she's sitting on a clutch of five eggs and they're about to hatch! Any day now! If you watch long enough in the evening, you might get to see a little barn owl loving and then Papa Owl treats Mama Owl to a nice, delicious rat. Must see TV? Get out of my way.

So you all have been warned. If you care about Calla and want to see her grow up with any kind of pop culture savoir-faire, you might need to take it upon yourself. In the meantime, you can find me watching for baby owls. Oooh. Might be hatching right now...

Weekend Update

After yesterday's long overdue post, I thought I'd try to keep things up with a few notes on our busy weekend. First, know that when I say "busy," I really mean that Joe was running around trying to do the many things on his list, and I was running after Calla. Calla was just running. She does that.

First thing on Joe's to-do list for this weekend was to install our pool fence. We have a concrete block fence around the outside perimeter of the pool, but that doesn't separate the pool from the porch or the walkway. We needed a complete fence around the border of the actual pool to keep a certain someone from exercising her independence. Joe found a place online where you can order the fence and rent the concrete drill and accessories for the installation. After a few minor missteps in the beginning, he got it all figured out and the fence is now in. Just in time, because we're opening the pool the first week of May. Y'all come down!

In between fence post drillings, Joe took a break to go with us to the Southern Illinois Irish Festival at our local park. It was a big to-do, especially considering I had never really understood this area to be all that Irish. But apparently, that doesn't really matter. There was Irish dancing, music, arts and culture. And corn dogs and nachos and all that other good fest food. We played with Calla and then sat down and listened to some music. Calla seemed to enjoy the music - she watched the musicians, danced in the aisle for a while, and then after about 10 minutes, crawled into her stroller and announced "All done!" For a 21 month old, not a bad outing.

We came home and one of us took a nap (well, maybe two of us) and another of our trio finished installing the pool fence, poor guy. When that was finished, he couldn't have any dinner until he had mowed most of the lawn. Calla and I splashed water in the baby pool and paraded her baby in a stroller up and down our drive way.

Today, I went to church while Joe and Calla had a father-daughter bonding time at Lowes, buying dirt and plants and all other good things. Joe finished mowing the lawn, installed a new ceiling fan in Calla's room and after dinner, dug out another 4 x 4 foot garden plot for a tomato plant and a few banana peppers. Impressive, isn't he?

Calla fell into bed tonight exhausted. We're working her hard outside these days - what with the babies needing to be walked in their stroller and the flowers needing to be watered (usually, she just ends up watering herself, but we try). At this point, it looks like she'll have perpetually skinned knees all summer since she just can't remember to pick her feet up when she runs down her sloped and uneven driveway. She's getting tougher about it, and after the initial pain goes away, she's a little proud of her "owies." In fact, she'll gladly lift up her pants legs to show you her scabs and tell you all about it.

Weather report shows that we're due for a little rain this week, and it wouldn't be all that bad to have an excuse to cross off a few of our inside to-dos after our busy weekend. Here's hoping you have a good and productive week, too!

Spring flings

So much going on! After what felt like weeks of rain, the sun has appeared and it's finally really spring. We're spending as much time outside as possible, which thrills Calla, until inevitably, it's time to go back inside.

We celebrated Easter with Josh and Jeri. Since they left right after church on Sunday, our big Easter dinner with them was on Saturday, at a local state park. Josh and Joe fished, Calla threw sticks in the lake, and Jeri and I tried to keep Calla from throwing herself in the lake. At the end of our afternoon there, Joe caught a nice big large-mouth bass. Josh and Calla were impressed.



Joe ended up throwing her back, since she appeared to have a belly full of roe. Calla still talks about "big fish" when she sees this picture.

Sunday morning, we had our last of Calla's three Easter Egg hunts. Josh was a good Easter bunny, and by hunt #3, Calla had figured this game out. She loved that these eggs were filled with goldfish crackers, cheerios and just a few m&ms. So much better than that silly chocolate that was in her other eggs (which I've just now polished away).

In other news, we've had a set-back in our garden. Nearly all of our home-grown seedlings just didn't make it. Probably due to a combination of factors, such as a lack of a good greenhouse space, perhaps poor plant nutrition, and maybe some parental negligence. Joe's plan now is to buy seedlings and just pretend we grew them from seed. You'll keep our secret, right?

And my really sad news - a death in our avian family. We had a nest of robins in our back porch rafters. The nest was situated so that mama robin and I could see each other through our kitchen window and I watched her feed her babies, with their demanding, gaping mouths. One morning this week, we came down and the nest was on the ground, with no sign of babies or parents. I had hoped that maybe the babies were big enough to fly. Or that mom and dad had relocated them safely to another nest. When I proposed these theories to Joe, he looked at me with that tender face you might use with a child whose sick dog has just been taken "to the farm." Sure, maybe that's what happened.

This theory seemed more and more unlikely when he pointed out some blood stains on the porch and found a few little bird... parts... on the ground. New theory - nest fell down during the night and a nasty neighborhood cat surprised them by squeezing through our fence. I'm just a little heart-sick over my intersection with the cruelty of nature. Sure, we still have our many finches. But they don't greet me over my morning coffee.

So, that's what's been going on in our lives. Lots of outside adventures. Here's hoping good weather finds you enjoying all the best of spring.

Spring has sprung (for now)

A little update now on the natural habitat at the Cheatwood/Sime estate. We're fortunate to inherit the work of the previous owners who planted and landscaped beautifully. And then they abandoned their work for the year the house sat empty, so we've had some pruning and editing to do. We did much last fall (with my mother's help), and have been enjoying seeing what pops up now that spring appears to have arrived.

You can see our front yard below. What you can't see are the crazy vines that used to drape over the side porch, on your left (Calla's right). I initially loved them because they gave a curb-side perception of New Orleans meets The Secret Garden. But those dang vines were a hideout for all sorts of bugs and just started to look really messy once the romance wore off. So we (Joe) tore them down and have planted (again, Joe) climbing roses. They should be really lovely, once they actually start to climb.



The same vines were covering the front trellis, and while Joe chopped out their roots on either side (and replaced them with young grape vines), we couldn't actually pull all the old vines down because they had been claimed by a House Finch nest and by the time we decided to nix the vines, the eggs had been laid. It's a good nesting spot - the front porch is a nice wind break and those vines are really thick and provide a good base. We've all had a few scares when we walk outside without much warning and Mr. or Mrs. Finch dive-bombs us in their urgent attempt to get out of the way. Tragedy still struck during a particularly strong wind storm last week when we saw egg remnants on the ground but Mrs. Finch continued to nest sit. Looks like the eggs have hatched since there are now little fur balls in the nest, although they're awfully quiet. Calla was never that quiet in her first week.

And then just today, we saw a new nest positioned just slightly lower than the Finch nest. With a little research, we think this is for another Finch nest whose owners decided to make our dying vines a multi-unit building. Why you'd want to move next door to a family with multiple newborns is beyond me.


We have a third Finch couple on our back porch who chose to build a nest in our porch rafters. Here again, they were trendsetters since Ms. Robin (she seems to be a single mom-to-be) moved to a next door rafter. No signs of Finch or Robin babies yet, but we're hoping they're as quiet as our front yard Finch family, since these would be closer to our bedroom window.

Meanwhile, bulbs are blooming, the forsythia is golden (except for the forsythia which we perhaps over pruned last fall. It was really asking for it.) and our yard is awash in dandelions and some other purple-flowered weed. We're trying to be green in our lawn care, so have resisted poison approaches so far. Instead, Joe put down some kind of organic fertilizer that had, among other natural yummies, chicken poop. We hope the few blades of grass still left love chicken poop. And that the dandelions don't.

Calla, tenderly examining the delicate daffodil. Actually, she was about to molest it and strip it of all petals. She's not exactly dainty with living things. She's already killed a fledgling broccoli and tomato plant germinating in our guest bedroom. Too bad, too, since she loves tomatoes and likes broccoli. Otherwise, our vegetable garden is going strong, all thanks to Joe. Though I keep saying the spinach looks like blades of grass (would be nice looking grass, too, ironically), he promises me that it will turn into salad eventually. We have lettuce and mustard greens popping out and the carrots just showed themselves. The warmer veggies (tomatoes, the remaining broccoli, peppers, etc.) will go in later this spring. If we can keep Calla out of the guest bedroom.

And although today was glorious (I'm ignoring the part about Calla's first-ever day without a nap - that wasn't so glorious), we're told there's a chance of snow (!) on Monday. So we'll cover our little garden with a sheet, and I'll bring in my flowers (pansies, which apparently are pansies about frost) and potted cilantro for the night until it's safe again. We're learning as we're going here, but don't want to be undone this early in the game.

You'll undoubtedly get more garden reports as the season goes on. And if you live close, you might even find zucchini on your door step. Here's hoping you're experiencing spring too, at least occasionally between the snow and rain and sleet and storms.