We know.

By the way, we know the answer to the previous poll question. In the spirit of not ruining it for all of our family members who did not want us to find out we'll simply provide you with Micah's response when he was asked if he was going to have a baby brother or baby sister: "No, mama is going to have a baby T-rex."

Ouch. This one is going to hurt.

why

It's here. I knew this phase would come and I dreaded it. But so far it's not that bad, we just have to be patient and creative.

"Why are the bakers' nails white?" (in "In The Night Kitchen")
"Why is Harold falling through the air?"

"Why..."
...is the inside of this artichoke not purple like the last one?
...don't I want any more juice?

Why? Why? Why?

Also, cute alert: in Micah's mind, we brought money over to our neighbor Gigi to say 'thank you' for bringing us some Girl Scout cookies.

advances in abstraction

Micah impressed me today with his appropriate use of our names versus Mama/Daddy. Nikko and parents are visiting. Micah calls us Mama and Daddy, but at one point Micah said to Jen, "Nikko touched Amy's computer". Later he said, "Watch out for Zack, Nikko!" He calls us Mama and Daddy, though.

guess who's back!

We left Washington at the same time, but-- despite the airport delay-- we beat the Kujawas back to Ventura by a week.

the long way home

Due to heavy fog, our departing flight was delayed three hours. Fortunately, we brought our own entertainment:







Micah was a trooper. He had a long, long day. Thanks to our delay, we arrived in LA just in time for Friday evening rush hour.

mountains and city

Why did we choose to come here, to Port Townsend, WA, in the middle of the dreary Pacific-Northwest winter? Besides the chance to catch up with our friends, it offered us Olympics, orcas, and Seattle-- all within spitting distance.

On the remaining days of our trip, we drove to Port Angeles, where we encountered some disappointing, Montana-grade seafood and checked out just a teeeeny bit of the National Park:
Another day we ditched our cars and took the ferry to Seattle. Micah enjoyed the ferry ride, both there and back, and was very excited by all the things he could see from the top of the Space Needle: trains, monorails, buses, floatplanes (landing and taking off), construction sites with big cranes, and two heliports and a helicopter flying beneath us and landing on one of them. The grownups, feeling deprived since leaving the Bay Area (especially the Montanans), enjoyed some quality food.

Mt. Walker

After the weekend, we bid Anton adieu and, feeling adventurous, headed with the Kujawas back to the Olympic NF and set out to climb Mt. Walker. The trails was 2 miles to the top with 2000 feet of ascent and the summit features panoramic views (on clear days) of the Olympic Mtns. and the Cascades across Puget Sound.

In my former life I would run up and down this in 45 min., but I'm quite out of shape these days, and our party included two pregnant ladies and two toddlers, with the remainder of us responsible for carrying the post-natals. I decided that our only hope of summitting was to bring lots of food and munch our way to the top. That plan only works if you remember to grab the feedbag as you're leaving the house. Oops.

Luckily, the Kujawas, who were at the start of a 6 week road trip, had one of everything in their truck, including some emergency rations. It was a beautiful day and we hadn't seen much rain, so we were surprised to encounter this much snow at the base of the mountain.We also saw some "machines"...The trail quickly entered the woods, where only a gentle dusting had penetrated the canopy. The forest felt enchanted...and the consistent climbing kept us warm (those of us who were walking, that is).Micah fell asleep and we sped up to the top, where we scarfed saltines and sardines and beheld this:

Nikko!

The next day, Nikko showed up, dragging his parents along with him in their spacious Montana-mobile.
The boys were like two peas in a pod..or tots in a tub.Tots in a tote?


At least I didn't say "brats in the bath/box".

washington

We spent last week in Port Townsend, WA (thank you Nanny & Pop-pop). Getting there involved just about every mode of transportation you can imagine. We drove to cousin Lia's, took a taxi to the LAX, flew to Seattle, took a train between terminals at SeaTac, took a shuttle bus to pick up the rental car, drove our swanky Prius to the ferry terminal, rode the ferry across the bay... ...and drove the rest of the way up to Port Townsend. No helicopter.

Micah got to bring his own bag this time. Thanks, Nanny-Gorgeous!

Anton met us at the Port Townsend Ferry and on our first full day there we went for a walk on the Lower Big Quilcene trail, near Quilcene, WA, in the Olympic National Forest (not park).
Snow! How novel!

portraits

I took this picture of Micah......and he took this picture of me.
And here's Amy the previous night:

sulphur mtn rd

Our current favorite place for a Saturday stroll.

pajamas

Micah likes his new pajamas, both the organic dinosaur PJs from G.G. and the soft blue ones from Bambi.
In other pajama news, we experimented with diaper-free sleeping earlier this week, which means they've been spending a lot of time in the laundry.

Project abandoned.

mountain-moon

After dinner tonight, Micah said, "I have a moon on my chair. I have a mountain-moon on my chair."
He's right, isn't he.

Wikipedia saves Micah's life

As a small child in NY I used to like to nibble on the little heart-shaped leaves off a grassy weed called sorrel, easily mistaken for clover. My mom pointed it out to me as edible and I liked its tangy tartness. Nowadays, we have several weedy bunches growing in our yard. Amy calls it sourgrass and when Micah saw me nibbling it as I picked it out from among our onions, he tried it and developed quite a taste for it.

I vaguely recall hearing that it can be put in soups, so I was excited to see "Potato Sorrel Soup" on page 73 of the Greens cookbook. We had the potatoes and the sorrel, so I decided that Micah and I could make it together.

Amy wasn't so sure about this-- she thought there might be another kind of sorrel, and was worried that our garden weed was toxic. Well she was pretty much right. I checked Wikipedia, which was good for what it usually is: disambiguation. It turns out that both the Oxalis and Rumex genera are commonly known as sorrels. The latter are also known as Docks and are sometimes grown for their edibles leaves. These are what I was supposed to use for the soup. The former are known as Wood Sorrels. Wiki says:

A characteristic of many members of this genus is that they contain oxalic acid, giving the leaves and flowers a sour taste, refreshing to chew in small amounts. However, in large amounts, these species are toxic, and interfere with proper digestion.

The recipe called for 6 to 8 cups. We made potato-leek soup instead.