Summertime and the Livin' is Easy...

It's been a long time since my last post, and I can't decide if it's because nothing important has happened or if it's because I've been so busy with unimportant things. Unimportant in a good way. Like playing outside and going to camp and the park and the farmer's market. These things do not really warrant a blog post (especially the farmer's market...nothing is ripe up here but onions and radishes), but they do distract me from updating my extensive readership on our goings on.
So here are the highlights of the summer so far:
*Levi has so far spent most of the summer about 40 feet up in the air working on our new 65-foot climbing tower at camp. It currently has a climbing wall on one side, and when it's finished, it will have 2 other high ropes elements and a zip line across the pond. He said that his most recent day of working on it (last Friday), was the scariest day of his life. He's also been playing on the church softball team, which has a winning record for the first summer in a long, long time.
*Ethan is talking like crazy! He is very into animals and the noises they make. He also has a (kind of annoying) push-a-button-and-strum-and-it-plays-songs guitar that he is wild about. For some mysterious reason, he only plays it while wearing hats.
*Emmaline is sitting up well, getting into all of Ethan's toys, laughing like crazy when he entertains her, and making it very difficult for me to eat dinner with her on my lap. She smiles pretty much constantly, and she is content to go anywhere and do anything as long as she is attached to me.
*Samson has destroyed my garden twice. The first time, I had just planted it, so I was able to replant with a lot of success. But Sunday, he celebrated the 4th of July by digging up almost all my plants while we were at church. I managed to save a few, but that evening, we had the biggest hailstorm I've ever seen here. That pretty much finished it off. I now have one pathetic lettuce, 2 spinach plants, and about 15 carrots. I can plant some new lettuce, and maybe some radishes, but our 3-month growing season is running out too quickly for much else. Better luck next year, I guess. We decided to keep Samson anyway (although I briefly considered turning him into a rug).
*I have been enjoying lazy days, not cooking lunch or dinner, going for lots of walks, and having a bunch of fantastic college summer staffers here (many of whom like to hold/play with babies for me so I can eat at mealtime). I'm planning on blowing up the kiddie pool tomorrow.

So that is summer so far at our house. 2 months summarize into one post quite well.

Pata Pata Bath Time

Glorious Saturday morning.
Levi is at church for the Men's Prayer Breakfast.
Emmaline is napping peacefully.
Ethan has been in the bathtub for at least 45 minutes, with no sign yet of getting bored.
"Unfortunately," I need to stay in the bathroom to keep an eye on him, so I have a great excuse to not work right now and hang out online instead. We have been dancing to "Pata Pata" by Miriam Makeba.
One lazy Saturday makes up for a lot of crazy days.

Hooray for Earth Day!

Yes, I know Earth Day was last Thursday, but I am still celebrating: City Market (our small-town version or Kroger/King Soopers) has a whole page of organic produce on sale!! It is always a delicate balance around here, trying to feed the kids the best food I can find while simultaneously avoiding the poorhouse.
On a related note, we're going to give the ol' vegetable garden another try this summer, this time inside the backyard fence, to keep the marauding deer out, and probably inside yet another fence, to keep the curious Samson out. The garden is a little hard to imagine right now, since my chosen garden spot is currently covered with a foot of snow. But even up here (I have heard, not experienced), beans, lettuce, carrots, and beets grow well, so I am hoping for the best!
In the meantime, we're headed to the grocery store this morning to pick up some fantastic organic strawberries (berrrs, as Ethan says). I wish it were Earth Day every Thursday...

Always Watching

Whenever I cook something on the stove, Ethan pulls one of my pots out of the cupboard so he can stir too. He asks for a "poons" (spoon), grabs a few handfuls of magnet letters from the fridge, and makes alphabet soup. So I wasn't really watching what he was doing this afternoon while I made sauce on the stove. But I turned around just in time to see him reaching up to the counter for the salt shaker. Turns out he had already thoroughly peppered his pot and was finishing up the seasoning. I was very impressed with his observation and culinary skills (even though he knows he's not supposed to play with the salt and pepper).

Early Warning System

Lately, before he does anything he's not supposed to do, Ethan will shout, "No, no, no!" It's really convenient that he gives me a chance to come running and stop him from pulling all the books off the shelf or sitting on his sister. I am just eagerly waiting for the day when he shouts "No, no, no," and then actually stops himself.

Tiny Thumb

I clattered the dishes in the dishwasher tonight, and the noise woke up Emmaline. When I went in to check on her, I found her sound asleep, sucking her thumb. Maybe someday I'll wonder why I ever said this, but she's just SO sweet when she sucks her thumb!

Moving Again, Moving Again, Jiggity Jig

That's right, folks... camp house number 4!! It seems like only yesterday that we moved into our lovely home. But it's been a good 10 months, and the winds of change are blowing again... back down the street to the "blue house" next door to our last house...confused? Me too.
Apparently one of the perks of working at Golden Bell for quite a while is that we get to sample the majority of the camp's houses, in ascending order of niceness, when they become vacant. So this year, in keeping with tradition, we are moving from a nice 3 bed, 2 bath to a 3 bed, 2 bath with a fireplace, patio, and tool room. We will be closer to the camp Lodge, too, which will be convenient.
So now we just need to move! I'm sure Ethan will be very good at helping me unpack.