Summer Recap

Well, our pool has closed. Calla's had her first cold of the season, followed by her annual ear infection. I'm transitioning from my warm weather unfashionable maternity wear to cold weather unfashionable maternity wear. I guess fall has arrived.

In honor of summer's passing, I thought I'd do a quick recap of all the things I meant to blog about this summer, but never quite got around to it. Imagine, if you would, a much longer exposition on each of these blog-worthy items...

Grandma and Grandpa Cheatwood's visit... Just a week or so ago, in fact, they joined us for a wonderful seven days of fun. Fun, despite persistent rainy weather and Calla's aforementioned cold that she nicely shared with Grandma. They were scarcely out of the car in our driveway before Calla insisted she show them her new "big girl bed." Appropriate oohing and aahing commenced. We enjoyed the visit, and the fish of Lake Murphsyboro enjoyed not being caught, even with two outings by Joe and his Dad. Shoot. And I'd been so looking forward to fish for dinner.

Big Girl Room... Completed and now owned by Calla. She only rarely mentions sleeping in the crib these days, and has thankfully gone back to her normal good sleep patterns. Asleep by 7:30 at night, wakes at 7 in the morning. Still takes an hour-and-a-half nap every day. Look at that, I've gone and jinxed it, haven't I? Anyway, there's plenty of space in her play "alcove" for her dolls and purses and books, which really is all she needs. And there's plenty of pink, so it's officially a little girl's room.

Summer Eatin'... Once again, we tried to do our best this summer to eat seasonally and eat locally. We made it to the farmer's market nearly every weekend, but when we couldn't, we found local produce in the grocery store or co-op. Eating seasonally appropriate produce is fun in that it makes us appreciate the fleeting nature of each harvest.... strawberry and blueberry season transitions too quickly to peach season which way too soon was apple season. Still found a sweet watermelon last weekend, but those are probably winding down now too. And not just fruit. We had collard greens and cornbread last night for dinner... a whole mess o' local greens. Which I successfully cooked, to Joe's delight.

The downside to all of this is that when that season is over, it's over. Calla requested strawberries this week and I had to break it to her that strawberry season was done for the year and it was time to be eating apples. She cried: "I miss my strawberries!" I know what she means. Only 4 or 5 months until Florida's strawberry season. Since she's a partial Floridian by birth, perhaps we'll break down then.

Of course, the most local eating was straight from our garden. It was a mildly successful experiment, and we're already noting what we'll change for next year. Green beans and purple-hulled peas were good, but sparse. Bell peppers were also good, despite taking their own sweet time to arrive. Banana peppers were effective reproducers, maybe more than we knew what to do with. Tomatoes were good, although we could have used more. Zucchini were a complete bust. Thankfully, other zucchini gardens were much more fruitful, so I still got to make plenty of zucchini bread, zucchini muffins, chocolate zucchini cake. And still save a few for dinner.

And cold weather spinach is sprouting up now. We have high hopes for some good spinach salads in our future.

Imagination Gone Wild... The most fun this summer has been - as is often the case - watching Calla's latest development. Lately, it's been an imagination extravaganza. Out of nowhere, she'll cup her hands together and announce she has a bear/alligator/whale in her hands, and we'll appropriately shiver with fear. Her babies have been sent to time-out far more than I have been.

Last week, we were walking to our car after a Saluki football game, and noticed that Calla was loudly panting. Joe asked what she was doing. Calla's response: "I'm a dog!" Well, of course you are. Or "Roar!" and she's a dinosaur or maybe another bear. It's a zoo around here.

This will be a busy fall for all of us.... Joe has grants due and a big conference. Calla's busy with school, music, library time and just generally being two. Me, well, I have a little project I've been incubating, due around Thanksgiving. We'll try to keep you posted on all these events this fall.