Seriously Summertime

I have actually been relishing summer vacation lately. I hope the kids have too. Since my boss has been out of town, work has been a little on the light side for me. So, I have made an attempt to leave the computer behind and jump on my bike and enjoy the great outdoors.

Our weather has been really beautiful. We haven't headed into the serious triple digit Chico heat yet. So, it's been especially nice to ride around town. Last Friday morning the kids and I rode our bikes down to the creek in Bidwell Park. There is an especially nice little swimming hole just up from the One Mile Area. I wish I had brought my camera. I packed a nice picnic and the kids and I parked our bikes next to the water. Immediately they jumped into the creek searching for pollywogs and fish. Much to their delight, there were tons. There was a half fallen tree hanging over the water that made a great structure. There were the delighted squeals of happy kids, trickling water in the creek, the buzz of insects and the croaking of a bull frog to play our background sounds. Lush vines covered the trees in the area and blackberry bushes lined the paths. Really, I wish I had thought to bring the camera!

Besides getting a picture of Rex lately is like trying to get a picture of Sean Penn back in the days he was dating Madonna.


After tiring of the water hole, the kids and I proceeded to bike downtown to the plaza where there is a water feature spraying up for all to enjoy. I bought them snow cones and watched them run through the fountain for a while. Then we headed back home.

On Saturday we took our annual trek up to Sunsmile Farms in Grass Valley. Our friends Mark and Suzanne go up there every year to help with the U-pick in cherry season. It's traditional for us to meet them up there and squeeze in a visit and pick lots of cherries for ourselves. Mmmmmm!



Here's Mark giving us the review in proper technique of picking a cherry so that the tree will be able to produce more fruit next year:


Here's Elizabeth and Valerie having a picnic under a tree at the farm:



Suzanne and I met in the trenches of video production. And here we meet again in the trenches of motherhood ... in front of a hydrangea at the farm:



I'm pretty sure I ate too much fruit. In addition to the cherries, I bought a box of blueberries/raspberries/black berries. That was finished before we even got into the car. And then we had to stop at the fruit stand on the way home to pick up strawberries and blackberries. There is nothing like fresh off the vine, super sweet berries. I ate more fruit on the way home. (I am not going to document the results of the vast fruit experience ...)

But another fun experience was the kids got to play in the pool at the farm. Here are Valerie, Amira and Elizabeth:


Here's Theo splashing in the shallow end:


Did I mention that we didn't bring our suits? So, the kids had a little underwear party at the pool:



Saturday evening the kids got to hang out with their favorite babysitter while Michael and I had a nice date downtown. (We even rode bikes again). We had a delightful dinner at Christian Michael's followed by a movie at the Pageant Theater. I love that place.

Sunday, of course, was Father's Day. The kids helped Michael clean out the garage and I mowed the lawn. He got to spend the afternoon playing games with his friends Matt & Eamonn. Then we took him to the Bear for dinner and finished off the evening with an Outlaws baseball game.

Those baseball games are a hoot! They play the Imperial March (Darth Vader theme music) when the umpires march onto the field. Then they announced that every time a certain player on the other team struck out that all drinks would be half price. I felt a little sorry for the guy on the other team ... because every time he got up to bat, you know everyone was cheering for a strike out a little harder than usual.

Of course while Michael and I watched the game, the kids roamed the park playing with other kids and getting their faces painted. Well, faces, arms, etc. There was also a clown making balloon animals, hats and swords for the kids. Love those Outlaws games!

Here's Amira with a Heart on her face:


Valerie got this cool alligator on her arm:


Once upon a time it was all butterflies and princesses ... now it's skulls and alligators for Valerie:


What a fun summer weekend! I have to remember to bring out that camera more often.

Lemonade Stand

Well, this week it officially feels like summer. For some reason, we weren't quite there yet last week. And I'm not talking about the weather. But I had the hangover from all the end of school tasks and schedule still looming over me last week.

Today the kids got up and had decided today was a lemonade stand day. Valerie's good friend, Ireland, actually has access to a pre-fab stand. So, since she was coming over anyway, she brought the storefront along.




Now, this wasn't just any old lemonade stand. First, let me say that our lemonade has real lemons and real sugar in it. None of that powdered stuff full of high fructose corn syrup. Next, the kids also decided to sell flowers. After Rex took down half of my hydrangea and headed for the roses, I stepped in to do a little snipping. The kids proudly displayed their blooms in water bottles, cannelloni cans and old pop bottles. It was actually quite attractive.

And last, but not least, they also decided to sell cookies. I thought they were actually going to bake the cookies, but the excitement of having the cut flowers, lemonade and stand took them out front right away.

Anyhow, I slaved away in the kitchen for a while so that their customers would have homemade frosted sugar cookies with sprinkles ... well, the people who showed up later when the lemonade ran out. Those first few suckers had to deal with store purchased sweets.

Those kids raked in $25 today. Can you believe it? I constantly saw cars driving up to the front of the house. And we don't live on a busy street. Valerie and Ireland stood down on the corner with a sign to lure people in. Smart kids.




I'll expect that visit from the Franchise Tax Board later this week!

Hey! I can ride a 2 Wheeler!

Well, Amira has probably been riding a "2 wheeler" for a good month or more. And because she is the third child, I didn't take the opportunity to record the date and mark the occasion the way I did with the first kid. Possibly the first two. Oh, there goes my mind again!

Anyhow, may I suggest to anyone who reads this blog who may have a kid learning to ride a bike, just skip the training wheels. It goes so much quicker and there is so much less anxiety. For Amira we lowered bike seat so she could touch the ground and removed the pedals from her bike. She had to "Flintstone" that thing around for ages. As she picked up speed, she began to balance on the bike without even realizing it. One day, Michael put the pedals on and Amira was off like a shot. It was pretty impressive.

Recently Valerie attended her first piano recital. Our neighbor, Terri Ogden, is her piano teacher. Rex's friend Porter also takes piano lessons. In the photo here you see Valerie playing a duet with Porter at the recital. It has been such a pleasure to listen to her play piano. And I am excited that she will also be picking up the violin again this fall as violin is part of the school day curriculum at her new school. I don't even have to beg Valerie to practice. She just sits at the piano and genuinely enjoys playing.




In other news, today marks the first day of summer vacation for the kids. I am so thrilled to not have to run around to scout meetings, volunteer in classrooms, drive on field trips and generally tour about the town on a daily basis. I have not signed the kids up for any camps either. I'm hoping we can all seriously relax and hang at home for a few weeks before taking up any more activities and projects.

Our lives have also taken on a simpler tone now that we have sent Boo Bunny on to another home. Gosh, we loved that bunny. But apparently she wasn't Turbo Fluff's type. We had some ferocious fur flinging fights around here and two depressed and jealous bunnies. Boo has gone to live with our friends Natalie & Esmerelda. I think they will all be so happy together.
Boo Bunny, we hardly knew ye.

Don't Let Your Mouth Write Checks ...

First, although my lovely husband has provided me with a working camera card reader, the picture of my head exploding is far to graphic to upload here.

So, I was driving Amira to school today on the other side of the park when I had a thought. Well, I had more than one. My first thought was that I had intended to ride bikes to school but that we left the house too late for me to get her there and get all the way back to Neal Dow Elementary in time to do my weekly volunteer work. But I digress. Truly, the striking thought was that this was the last year I was going to have to deal with sending my kids to different schools!

For the school year of 2009-2010 I would have all three of my kids in THE SAME SCHOOL. Granted, Amira would only be there for a half day kindergarten ... but we could all ride bikes and it is so close to the house. Hooray! Simplicity at last.

It's thoughts exactly like those that set the trap ... let's just say that by 3pm this afternoon, it was pretty much decided that Valerie would not be attending Neal Dow next year. She would be attending the Waldorf Charter school we'd been oogling over the last year. And believe me, the people at the Blue Oak Charter school are probably ready to smack my wishy-washy face.

I'm not even going to go into the long road that brought us here ... but now I'm trying to wrap my head around things like two different schools, pretty far apart ... different start and end times (thank goodness) ... and now totally different vacations and start and end days. Oh, not to mention that I am really involved in the Neal Dow PTA and will be required to be in the "Parent Guild" at Blue Oak.

Holy smokes! Oh, and then there are the Brownies ... Valerie had signed up for Brownies. They conveniently meet every other Thursday at Neal Dow just after school. Somehow I don't see that happening anymore.

I haven't even started the next school year and I'm already trying to figure out which days I'm going to volunteer, how I'm going to ride my bike instead of drive, scouts, soccer, PTA, parent guild, book club, field trips, cook dinner, do laundry, keep my job, attend the pets and garden ...

How do I get myself into these situations? I had a grandmother who always said my eyes are bigger than my stomach (as I loaded up my tray at the Senior Buffet with everything in site). But now I'm thinking she wasn't just talking about the food.

No Camera Card for this Lucky Duck

It's been a long, long time since I've written. I've got lots of excuses. But the main two are:

1. I broke my camera card reader right around Easter
2. Dang! I've been busy!!

It is the end of the school year for all three of the kids. And every class is cramming in a performance or field trip or both. Rex played a scout in "The Pirates of Grammar Island." Valerie played a mail order bride (?!) in a play called "We come from Everywhere". And Amira played herself, an alien and a kitty in the "Day in the life ..." play at Montessori.

But it's not all work around these parts. Michael and I have had a couple of fun date nights. A few weeks ago we attended an "End of the Frost" dinner at the Elks Lodge. My neighbor was selling tickets and talked me into buying a couple. She went on to tell me how "everyone is a winner" with all the raffle prizes they have donated. I protested telling her how I win NOTHING EVER. She pretty much assured that I'd win something. Well, how could I resist? Plus the grand prizes were pretty neat: flat screen TV, tickets to the 49ers, BBQ, etc.

So, Michael and I headed over to the Elk's Lodge where we were surrounded by farmers, ranchers, FFA and 4-H and some more farmers. Oh, and my neighbors (who are NOT farmers!) Anyhow, we were definitely strangers in a strange land. We parked a table with some Almond Farmers. They were a hoot. We chatted with them while Michael cringed at my persistent mispronounciation of the word "almond" ... (if you didn't grow up in the valley here, you're probably mispronouncing it too!) When suddenly my raffle number was called. I was so tickled. I won some leather work gloves, John Deere coffee mug, some honey and a gift certificate to a local deli. I was just so excited to win SOMETHING.

Soon, Michael's ticket number was called. He won a LARGE t-shirt, John Deere coffee mug, baseball cap, almonds, leather work gloves and a $30 gift certificate for fuel (preseumably for the tractor we don't have).

Anyhow, the evening progressed with an auction (with a real auctioneer!) and was about to end with a drawing for the Grand Prizes. Our dining companions began to pack up to leave. Michael and I asked them where they were going since they were just getting to the "good stuff". We were then informed that if we won a grand prize and accepted it, we were then on the committee to put on the dinner next year. Well, we're a bit over worked with all we have going on. We decided we'd sneak out too. We were satisfied with our goody bags.

The following morning my neighbor was standing on my front step with with her hands on her hips and a stern look, "WHERE'D YOU GO LAST NIGHT? YOU GUYS WON THE GRAND PRIZE!! YOU WON THE FLAT SCREEN TV!!! BUT YOU LEFT????!" I laughed so hard. I had to let it go that just knowing I would have won if I stayed was satisfaction enough.

I'd go on about the raffle prizes I won at the Bunco for Breast Cancer event a couple of days later ... but let's just say, I got lucky!

Oh, and then last week Valerie won a gift certificate for $350 toward a new bike in a raffle.

How cool is that?

Now, I don't want to look a gift horse in the mouth, but it would be nice if I could win a camera card reader so I could put pictures back up on the blog!

HOPPY EASTER!

from all of us at Tifftown: Tiff, Michael, Rex, Valerie, Amira, Turbo Fluff, Buffy, Agnes, Sally and Mr. Whiskers!

We have cousins!

Rex, Valerie and Amira were world class travelers on our trip to Portland to see the cousins. They were very excited to see where their cousins live and spend time with them.

Uncle Paul and Aunt Lydia at the beautiful park near their home in West Linn. It is a nice walk with the kids from their house. Not pictured is the tremendous river running through it.
Cousins Maya and Valerie got along famously.
Aunt Lydia & Tiff packing in Anya and Maya to the park. It's nice the cousins are still packable!
Amira got a chance to ride in a stroller for the first time in years. Here she's soaking up attention from Uncle Paul on the way to the park.
Lydia and Anya.
Anya sports a beautiful hat and smile.
Cousins Valerie and Anya 6 years apart.
Rex and Anya get into the scarves and the belly dancing.
Valerie was totally into the scarf collection.
Maya shows us how it should be worn while dancing.
Could Anya be any cuter?
It's hard to guess who this is ... pink skirt is clue: Amira!
Lydia treated all the cousins to a formal music lesson.
Maya and Amira cuddle up on the kid couch.