Too Quiet

So it turns out that too quiet isn't always bad. Fiona had been having quiet time in her room after a busy morning and afternoon visiting with the neighbours, making paper egg decorations for the bunny, reading, singing, being willful etc. It had been a bit quiet for about 30 minutes, so I dared to look at what was happening in the back of the house...Fiona has put herself to bed and is snoring currently. If I could find the camera I would document it to look back on with joy some other day but for now she is covered with her soft blue blanket snoring away, blinds open, bright light int he room, sweet as can be.

on another note: The latest parenting tack we are taking is in pointing out when she is being a "bossyboots." She denies ever being such a thing...hopefully a little disdain for bossing will help with our home life.
Love Louise

What We've Been Up To...

Spring has taken over our hearts and minds here...no time for computers and inside stuff. We got to go for a sail last Friday, Just Devon and I, which was relaxing. We are also building a cubby house for Fiona in the back yard as a birthday present. Our rule is that we can't buy any new materials, It's made on pallets and I bought some shelves and things from the thrift store for a few dollars. Hardware samvaged from the tool bench int he garage, means that the hinges won't match but its all good. Its fun to be creative and work on design and building together. My hammering skills leave a lot to be desired, but I muddle through and my thumb will feel better soon I'm sure. Here are some pics:
Love
Louise

Sailing day

Cubbyhouse under the cherry plum tree
Devon installing the front wall

Fiona working on framing the door. (Note the outfit)

Daylight Savings

I have spent way too much time this week convincing Fiona that it doesn't need to be dark for bedtime to happen...about 7-7:30. We've been having a lot of what we call "call backs" lately anyway: Need a rub, massage, drink of water, to pee, to poo, door not closed right, the dog is in or might come in, sweaty, hungry, have a sore throat, booger, gravel in the bed, the list goes on.

Here's hoping you sink in for a sleep tonight without a call back.
Love
Louise

The Hill We Died On

I found my thrill
do do do do do do do do...
On Blueberry Hill
do do do do do do do do...
And we both got killed
do do do do do do do do...
On Blueberry Hill.

We, actually, we made it back alive, but we have to report that train ride back was not nearly as trouble free as the ride up. I think 6 days of new excitement and play had taken its toll on Fiona, and maybe the rest of us too, making us all a bit punchy and overtired. But whatever the cause, after getting settled into her top bunk, and after climbing up and down several times to do another pee, poo, and because she was thirsty, she decided that she was hungry. And not just any hungry, but hungry only for the delicious home grown blueberries that Liv had packed for her. And while they are scrumptious, Devon decided that they were not an appropriate snack for 9 at night, and that if she was truly hungry she would accept an alternative snack. And thus the battle lines were drawn.

To make a long bloody story short, Devon ended up spending a significant portion of the night on the top bunk, while Louise consoled Fiona on the bottom. For her part, Fiona eventually accepted a few bits of apple before passing out, and around 3am Devon snuck down and put her back into the top bunk, where she snored while the parents huddled, shell shocked, below.

But now we are back in Sunny Santa Cruz (forecast this week: Sunny 70/50 everyday), and while residual tiredness continues (Fiona napped on the shuttle bus, in the car, and in her bed at home a total of over 3 hours yesterday!), I'm sure we will all be settled back in shortly with only good memories of our Oregon travels.

D

Homeward Bound

Walking in feather coats

Our last day in Oregon today. We woke up to a bit of blue sky, wonderful rhubarb muffins, and relaxed kiddos. Off to the farmers market in the rain on our bikes lots of things to see and do on the way; We are soooo tough, hopefuly all this riding in the cold rain will get me on my bike in more inclement weather in Santa Cruz

Devon and Brian did a bit of work to boot.

Tomorrow afternoon we will be back home or near there. We'll have to start planning our next adventure.
Love
Louise

Checking Lyle's creek

At the farmers market

Liv's Tub

Fiona and Lyle

Lyle at play

Portland/Vancouver

A small nap in the car

Salmon Spotting

Dina and Fiona on Safari

Being a bear

One for Nanna Jane

We had a wonderful time in Portland staying with our friend Dina and her lovely dog Georgia. Visited the Oregon Zoo, ate sushi...AND ethiopian food, went to Powells books Which was a fantastic book store that had almost every book in print (I think).

We were expecting inclement weather so we had lots of rain gear and layers with us but the first two days were mixed sun and cloud for our wanderings around Dina's neighbourhod in Vancouver Washington. Fiona was a great traveler with our solo train ride from Albany to Portland and then we took a taxi across the Columbia River, Fiona was nap free for the whole weekend which meat that there was not always sweet and loving behaviour but there were no tantrums that would have had us ejected from either state.

Our last day up north was quite rainy but fiona agreed to wear her rain coat with no trouble which was nice. As a child born in drought she has had little call for outerwear in her life so this was fretful for me, "please wear this...you'll be soaked" "you need a coat on" "you must wear boots."

Part of our plan on return from Portland to Corvallis was to go to the snow today, as with the winter olympics our plans for winter would need to have helicopters and trucks bring in snow from afar, so instead we will settle for a swim at the local pool and save our snow day for later in the month in the Sierras.

We are staung with our friends Brian and Liv and Lyle for another day or so and then will roll on back to California.

Life is Good.
Love
Louise

Dispatch from Corvallis

Hi All, We arrived safely in Corvallis, OR, after a WONDERFUL train ride. It is the perfect way to travel with a kid. We took the bus from Monterey to Salinas where Fiona pointed out the vegetables growing along the way and then waited at the station in Salinas for the train.

Our train arrived and we were met by George, the conductor, who had arranged our dinner reservation for 7:30 and said he would turn down our beds while we were dining. Fiona was great on the train and received compliments on her good behavior from all the workers on the train.

Our room was a family room which had lots of options for sleeping we went for a double bed below and a "top bunk" that fiona had been looking forward to. After dinner Fiona was still pretty excited about the experience of being on the train but eventually fell asleep and I started my latest knitting project.

The rocking of the train was gentle and it was pretty quiet when compared with cars and planes. What a beautiful way to sleep. Devon and I weren't far behind Fiona in collapsing into sleep.

In the morning Fiona and I woke up excited to see the snow and volcano's at dawn through our windows. Breakfast was at 6:30, french toast with the sunrise, good coffee, and a wonderful time just being together as a family without the usual morning chores and places to be.

The train was great as Tim Pearse commented in the last post in giving lots of room to walk about, no seatbelts to wory about, constant scenery changes outside, just fantastic! (I'm trying to think of other places we can go on the train, if only there was one to Australia!)

We met some new friends in the sleeping room next door to our room, a little boy Fiona's age and his parents en route to Seattle from the Bay Area. He and Fiona enjoyed playing together and building forts on the top bunk.

Next meal was a morning snack of fresh fruit and yougurt in the Parlour car, lovely company, and some good conversation until Lunchtime...By the end of lunch we were a short distance from Albany and Brian was there to meet us with Fiona's friend Lyle.

So here we are enjoying the beautiful blue skies of Oregon, and already had a wonderful Birthday dinner for Liv with their family and our other Corvallis friends Chad and Claire. Fiona and I are off to Portland tomorrow to Visit Dina and hopefully go to the Zoo. Devon has to do a bit of work this week, two talks at a meeting on steelhead trout. We'll update you as soon as technology allows from our adventure in Oregon.

Love
Louise, Devon and Fiona.

Coast Starlight

Today Fiona woke up and announced loudly, "It's Train Day!!!!" She has been waiting patiently as we have counted down the weeks and then the days. We are taking the train up to Oregon to Visit some good Friends, Brian Liv and Lyle in Corvallis and Dina in Portland. We're expecting rain most days of our vacation but we'll have a wonderful time stomping in puddles.

Tonight we will be sleeping on the train and in the morning we will wake up in Northern California, or Southern Oregon. We're hoping to see snowy mountains and train bridges in the pine trees.

We have heard that other people go to the beach for spring break....how odd.

Anyway, we'll try to post from the road/tracks and we'll be back in Santa Cruz in about 10 days. As we leave we are all in good health, no snotty noses or colds. This is fantastic!

All aboard!
Louise

Making February Count

After blogging for some time it gets to be a bit of a monkey on one's back. I love keeping up with posting our fun days and a few not so fun days online, and Devon and I use the blog as a "baby book" of sorts. But as we come to the end of a short month I realize that my numbers are down so you get this one: a post about posting, so that I can leave February without disgrace.
Lots of Love
Louise

Ear Potatoes and Tic Tac Toe

Well after passing coughs and colds back and forth in our family since November, we have had a week or so of no coughing in the night but Fiona has learned to wield her sick day powers. She was sent home for the first time the other day for complaining of a sore ear, this after I had spend 2 hours at the doctor getting her "sore ear" cleaned out and given a pass medically speaking.

At the doctor's office with the ear cleaning out supplies.

We have been enjoying a bit of spring surf as a family. My advice in putting a three-year-old into a wet suit is to have them wear socks...helps to slide.

Fiona at Cowells Special

And fiona is a wicked tic tac toe player. She likes to know who is to win each game prior but is learning the art of losing graciously and winning nicely. I do throw most of the games but she gets such delight out of drawing her victory line! I'll add in more losses as she progresses.

Spring is trying to happen here in santa cruz and I hope the seasons are enjoyable where you are too.
Love
Louise

P.S. Speaking of Wicked... a literary milestone passed in that we read for many nights Vicki's old copy of The Wizard of Oz, chapter by chapter. We saved our place each night with a chicken feather. Now I'm reading Wicked and fiona wants to "read a chapter" with me still. Not really good kid material in there, but a good read for those who otherwise need to know all Dorothy/Glenda/Witch references starting at 7:30 every morning.

Stacking Up

We had a lovely day today Fiona started it out by organizing the toilet paper in a convenient location.Then we then went to Wilder Ranch to visit our favourite draft horses and feed them lovely green grass, a nature walk, an attempted nap, a bit of gardening and just when we thought that we were in the homestretch Devon came home with a Boogie Board before dinner and so we all went to the beach for a surf. Fiona had a lovely time...brave with her swimming skills, even had a wipeout that sent devon running to retrieve her from the wash. She said that the wipeout was her favourite part of the whole thing. Home dinner and now in bed. WHEW!

Climbing the walls

Fiona, as you can see is better. We were out shopping for a birthday present for cousin Charlotte. There was only one small and quiet tantrum the whole time, and there was outstanding behaviour at the post office afterwards.WHEW! Reward: Climbing the wall on the parking garage.

Bugs Will Die

Snowboarding Parents

Mountain Snow

Relaxing in the snow

Louise Enjoying the Steep Stuff

Fiona eating a piece of her snowman in Pacific Grove (a very rare specimen!)

Devon and I ran away this weekend to the snow to enjoy a bit of snowboarding and sleeping in. Fiona was rougning it in Pacific Grove with her Grammy and Grampy, whick I'm sure she much preferred to being dragged around the Kirkwood through her naps and in the cold.
The snow was lovely (though not Utah lovely) and it was fun to play like we used to, we're not even too sore upon returning home.
We have no idea when we will get another snow day but this was enough to last us for a while.
Love
Louise

Below: Devon on my favourite run

Green eggs are just the start....

Too bad for y'all in the southern hemisphere, but our baby chickens started to lay today. The green egg, appearing just today, we believe comes from "butterfly." So that means that winter is on it's way for you and summer is coming to us. When the pears come in to season there ask me for this caramelized pear crisp recipe it's yummy. Fiona loved it.
Just in case you are keeping track in the fiona side of things, she's trying as hard as she can to give up on naps which makes for some rough times at home but we're doing our best to deal with that...wine helps.
Love
Louise

Here Comes the Sun!

After too many days of rain and wind, we took the electric bike down to the beach during a patch of beautiful sunshine. There were lots of people out and even the seabirds looked relieved. Coming up the hill was a breeze with the new front wheel, Fiona says she loves the magic button "because my mum goes fast."

Stormy

So, like, we didn't surf, sail, or bike ride today, like it was soooo stormy. We did go to check out the scene at Steamers Lane though.

Newfangled Bike with Magic Button

I invested in a new toy this week. An electric front wheel for my old beater bike.
The Hilltopper is designed to reuse your regular bike with a quick and easy conversion. I did it in a few minutes. And now the hill with the trailer is a breeze!
Y'all are welcome to give it a try next time you're in town. Or even better, get yourself one and make those quick and easy trips even easier. Check it out on the flat ground too!
Love
Louise

Alarm

Last night Fiona got up to pee at the same time as me about 2 AM...She asked if she could come to sleep in my bed and I answered that "my alarm was going to go off" and so it was better if she was in her bed instead, Her chin started to wobble, eyes filled with tears, and she asked me which ARM was going to fall off???...she ended up in our bed for a while anyway.

Fungus Fair Faeries

Fiona and I attended the Fungus Federation's Fungus Fair at the Louden Nelson center today and thus sacrificed today's nap. The naps are hit and miss at the moment anyway,oe day three hours, then skip the next two days then another day 1-2 hours, then repeat. We enjoyed the fungi though, spent more time in the kids craft room than in the main display room but it was still good.


Face painting, clay mushrooms, candycap cookies, and the thrill of seeing poisonous deadly muscaria, and "witches butter" were enough for us. Ever stylish, fiona opted for her new "princess dress" and floated regally around the place even in the playground afterwards.

But afer skipping nap, (she fell asleep briefly in the trainer on the way home) the whole family was overtired and cranky. Devon and I had gone out to a late movie last night so we were due some extra sleep too. By twilight we were pushing the bedtime idea and fiona was snoring despite the band practice, slap bass going on at 6:30.

Bedtime snack

So the new year is upon us, we are givig up naps, keeping busy, and still blogging in our 5th year (technically) of fiona online.
Love
Louise