Sweet Valentine

I finally feel as though what I've been waiting for as a parent is here - the age where it's not weird any more to bring Lucy to different activities (that I secretly want to go to) and where we can do fun stuff together for holidays, etc.  I made kind of a big deal of Valentine's Day this year in the lead up, talking about Lucy being my valentine, buying ingredients to make cookies, looking at heart-shaped things, and on top of that we have Grandma who (of course) sent a package, a card, some stickers, and even some "heart-shaped clothes" for Lucy.

Lucy did some decorating with the stickers that Grandma sent, mainly on the family.  These photos are from about a week ago, and even though I told her not to put stickers on the dog, it was great because one of those hearts stayed on Shorty for almost 4 days.  Baby brother, a.k.a. Buddy, got one too.

 

 

 Daddy wanted some craft supplies so he and Lucy could make Valentine's cards together.  We sat down after a long day to do some crafting and after about 10 minutes, Lucy disappeared, leaving Eric and I to sit and make cards together.  Not exactly what he had in mind.

 

 We also did some heart-shaped sugar cookies, which were a big hit with the two-and-under crowd.  It was my first attempt at homemade cutout cookies, and they turned out pretty good.  I've definitely been on a from scratch baking kick in the past month or so.  Favorite part for Lucy?  The frosting, for sure.

 

 

 And as usual, I had some nude baking help.

 Finally, on Valentine's morning I was really excited to make Lucy some heart-shaped pancakes.  I guess by now that when my feelings start off with "I was really excited" that I shouldn't necessarily expect anyone else to follow through with the thrill in my plans.  I worked to get these three reasonably heart-shaped pancakes and presented them to Lucy who was wearing her "heart-shaped clothes", took pictures, talked about how she was my special valentine, the works.  Then I cut them up with butter and syrup, she had one bite, announced she was finished, and walked away.  Umm, hello?  Don't you know that this was supposed to be a special breakfast?  So I ate my pancakes and hers alone at the table.  Happy special Valentine to me. 

 

 Likely sensing my disappointment, Lucy kindly offered to do the morning's dishes.  I bought her a step-stool a while back and it's opened up a whole new world of possibilities, including, apparently, household chores.  (Do I sense a window washing in our future?)  It was hysterical to watch her mimic how I wash and rinse the dishes, even finishing with a vigorous wipe-down of the counter next to the sink.  Totally worth re-washing everything in that drainer to see the show.

 

 

We hope that our heart-shaped friends also enjoyed every moment!

Friend Silas

So here in Iowa, Lucy has 2 good friends, Friend Gabe and Friend Silas.  Silas's mommy, Sara, joked that she thinks of the three of them as one big happy couple.  We decided that Lucy is either the luckiest or unluckiest girl in the world.

We had the pleasure of spending most of the afternoon with Friend Silas today, while Sara played violin in DSM and Jane saw her concert with their neighbor (and believe it or not, then got to have dinner and a drink out.  Mommy what?)  We believe that life is always better when you've got friends, and today was no exception.

It's more fun to ride in the car and sing songs, especially when you both know the words.  Some singing, some dancing, some good old-fashioned noise making.

 It's more fun to stare out the window at the .... sunset?  traffic?  trees? 

 It's more fun to take a bath, especially when there are plenty of toys and matching towels to dry off with.

 Finally, it's more fun to drive in the car after having picked out complementary pajamas.  Actually, this adorable car squeeze only lasted for about 10 seconds.  Right after I snapped the photo, Silas stopped the coupe and kicked Lucy out.  Typical man, Silas had to be in the driver's seat.  Typical woman, Lucy got behind the car and pushed him wherever she wanted to go anyway.

Fun day friends!

Reflections on a Journey

20 days, we took from December to January to drive to Maine (home to Maine? back to Maine?)  Eric and I had decided that given our present circumstances - short on money but long on time - a drive with an extended stay would be our best course of action for a Christmas with families.  When we decided this, sometime in early November, it seemed far enough away not to be daunting, but as our expected departure date drew close, we began to think we were a little bit crazy.  It's one thing to get in the car and drive 1500 miles once, as we did to move here to Iowa.  It's another to look at the prospect of driving the same 1500 miles both ways in a relatively short stretch of time.  Crossing fingers that we wouldn't hit any winter weather and armed with the new DVD player Grandma had sent to save us from our older and tempermental model, we loaded our gifts, luggage, aging dog, and Lucy into the car.

Trip Statistics:

20 days away from home including
4 days traveling
2 days snowed in at Grandma and Grandpa's

4628 total miles including
1542 miles Iowa to Maine
1544 miles Maine to Iowa
1596 miles driven while in Maine
     (10 trips between Waterville and Bangor and 1 trip from Waterville to Portland)

165 gallons of gas
$495 (at $3/gallon) spent on gas
231 miles averaged per day
$25 average gas cost per day

I contemplated going online and looking at the pounds of carbon each gallon of gas burned puts in the atmosphere and trying to compare that with the carbon released per passenger on a commercial flight as to look at how we did on overall environmental impact, but decided against it. 

What really surprised me while we were in Maine was that the number of miles we drove while there exceeded that of our cross-country trip.  We worked hard to coordinate seeing all the people we wanted to see with as few trips as possible, but no matter what we did the snow or people changing plans on us seemed to thwart our efforts.  Next time we go home, we'll park ourselves somewhere nice (hopefully at camp this summer) and let all our friends and family come to us. 

All in all, for the amount of time we spent in the car it didn't seem too bad.  After 5 years will this drive be just another - ho hum - couple of days in the car?

Maine Fun

 The last of the fun we had while we were in Maine was a super art project with mommy and Grandma.  Auntie Crystal was kind to give Lucy some finger paints for Christmas and boy, was she excited to try them out.  Quite the artist, too, if I may say so.  I'm just not sure if Lucy liked the paint better on the paper or on herself.

 

I do have one more fantastic picture of Lucy playing piano with her backside wearing nothing but some socks and a smile, but in the interest of her future dignity, I'll leave that one to the imagination.