We celebrated our 8th wedding anniversary this past month. To celebrate, we rode our bikes downtown for dinner and then attended a lecture on researching old houses at the library - dorky, I know. And although it takes a special occasion these days to be on a pair of bikes without a trailer of kids behind us, we have probably logged over 3,000 miles on these two bikes in our 12 year relationship. I think the above picture sums up our journey together so well - we are still leaning on each other even after all of the rough bumps, flat tires, steep hills, saddle sores, glorious descents, and breath-taking scenery.
If trouble comes in waves, we definitely rode the home repair wave this month. At times it felt like we were residents on a rough and tumble farm with animals and equipment in constant need of our attention while the weeds grew up around us. Maybe this is what happens during the eighth year of wedded bliss. All of those items we purchased or were gifted to start our new life together are starting to feel their age. As if to prove the point, when we came back home from the old house lecture on our anniversary, we curled up together on the love seat (so romantic, I know) with our laptop, excited to apply our new found history resources to our house. Our romantic mood was ruined minutes later however, not by a crying child, but by the computer screen going dark and stating in a primitive typeface, "Dumping all data now." The next day we decided to cut our losses and bought a new Mac Book Pro. Despite the price tag and a bit of a learning curve to transfer all of my PC files to my new Mac, I am definitely loving the freedom and efficiency of having all of my technology linked together now with the Mac Book Pro, iPad and iPhone and am enjoying my leap from 2004 technology to sleek, light, and fast 2012 technology.
Our woes didn't end there. Our washing machine broke with a full load of laundry in it the night before we were expecting house guests. Here I am thinking, great, this is not in the budget since we just bought the equivalent to a washer and drier in the form of a laptop. Fortunately, Will was not phased but began looking up part numbers on our new computer. Imagine my amazement when the next morning after an 8am trip to an appliance parts store he had the washer up and running before our guests arrived!
Will's phone has slowly been dying and in true Will fashion, he found a way to keep it working. The screen no longer works by tapping it with fingers, but apparently using a fork is pure magic. I don't know if it's guilt over my having an iPhone or as a friend put it - he looks hungry - I knew I had to find a way to get him a new phone. After a trip to the Verizon store, we left with no phone but plenty of complaints about The Man, contracts and fees. After eight years of marriage, I knew I would have to get creative to find a phone solution for Will, a man who is known around these parts as never saying die. I decided to put a shout out on Facebook and someone generously donated a like new phone she was no longer using to the cause. Will has since put his fork down and no longer has to play his own version of Words with Friends where you have to text without using the letters G, H, I, Q, R, S, or T.
Will may have compromised by accepting a like new phone, but he is still valiantly trying to keep our lawn mower running that he salvaged from my parents garbage two years ago. After ungodly noises erupted from the mower on our front lawn this past month, I was certain that the weeds were going to swallow Emma up and that our mower had mulched it's last blade of grass. But wait! After a quick trip to Home Depot and a new spark plug later, the mower is running again and although I still think it is on it's last leg, we have avoided a citation from the city for unsightly weeds at least this month.
And, as if all of our technology and appliance fails weren't enough, two of our chickens came down with some sort of strange illness. After several YouTube videos and advice from our local feed shop and friends with poultry we have determined that they have Newcastle disease, which we believe they obtained from the robin that built it's nest above their chicken run. It has been very sad to watch and one of the birds died from it already. The second one, Bearded Lady has been fighting it for over three weeks now and it has been a lot of work keeping her comfortable while feeling helpless at the same time. We love our hens and it is sad to see them suffer. We have tried to keep Bearded Lady as comfortable as possible, and have even given her warm baths, fed her with a syringe and dare I say, gloved up and used a tube of Vaseline to make sure she wasn't egg bound.
To say that I am in awe of my husband would be an understatement. I wouldn't even know where to begin in most of these situations and he just calmly takes things apart, assesses the situation and comes up with a plan. I am overwhelmed where as he is challenged and intrigued. Fortunately for us, all of our broken things were either mended, replaced or stable by the time my brother, sister-in-law and niece came to stay with us for a couple of days from Minnesota. We had a blast watching the three cousins play together. Below is Lucy, Emma and Ellen playing at Ellen's first birthday party.
Here are the three girls riding a favorite vintage toy at Grandma and Grandpa Hines'.
Lucy loves her Uncle Mike and Aunt Jenna and while they were in town, Aunt Jenna could get Lucy do pretty much anything. Lucy adores her and had lots of fun bonding time. Here Lucy is below, getting her nails painted by her Auntie.
We also had a brief but great visit from my oldest friend Lindsay who was in town for the day from Chicago. It was so nice seeing our daughters play together. If you would have told me twenty years ago that we would someday watch our daughters grow up together I would have said, "No way, I'm not having kids!"
Finally, we got to spend some great quality time with my cousin and her daughter this past month too. Again, if you would have told me fifteen years ago that my cousin and I would live close enough to watch our kids grow up together, I would have said, "What? You're moving to Europe too?"
Lucy seems to be going through a growth spurt. She has grown an inch since April and is starting to complain that her froggy potty is too small now. It is kind of small when you are trying to go fishing while sitting on it.
Lucy has done lots of grown up things this month. Here she is below running her very first car wash...
Painting outside...
and watching her very first movie in a theater...
...which happened to be Dora 4D at the Detroit Zoo. I think she would have done fine if it was Dora 2D, without water squirting in our faces and the images so close it felt like we could reach out and touch them. She spent the duration of the movie on my lap with my knee blocking the water source. When asked if she liked the Dora movie, she chooses to remain silent.
She isn't silent for too much else though. Lately she has developed quite the sense of humor and enjoys making us laugh by creating funny faces - surprised face, mad face, happy face, sad face, etc. She is the most creative when we are trying to turn out the light for bedtime. She also is developing her comedic routine for all things potty related. The other day Grandma T. asked Lucy where she lived and Lucy responded, "At the corner of Poopy Street and PeePee Lane!" Will related this story to me later on, and told me that he had never been prouder of her. What three year old knows the difference between a street and a lane, and the fact that she lives on a corner? Lucy loves telling us while driving, "Uh oh, I pooped!" in a hilarious voice and just keeps cracking herself up as we try and explain the concept of crying wolf. Her ability to work the words pee and poop into most any conversation truly is inspirational. Here she is below, making us laugh in the garden with her outfit and her expression.
Two of our hens have begun laying this month! It has been a definite learning curve since we first acquired baby chicks back in February, but finally five months later we are starting to reap the rewards. We have an unnamed Isa Brown that is laying brown eggs quite faithfully every single day. Mother Superior, the Americana and head hen is laying about 5-6 eggs a week. Her eggs are a pretty greenish-blue. She has been giving us a run for our money though and refuses to lay her eggs in the coop. Instead, she prefers to literally fly the coop and lay her eggs in cozy and private nests under our neighbors black raspberry bushes or nestled under one of our hostas by the garage. When she is done laying the egg she flies back into the coop and settles down like nothing happened. Every day Will continues to apply netting to keep her in the coop, but every day she still manages to escape. A couple of times Will tricked her into the coop and locked her in until she laid her egg, but this isn't ideal. Lucy thinks it is great fun though, and gets a kick out of going on egg hunts to find where the day's egg has been laid.
Besides eggs, our garden is now producing a plethora of green, yellow and purple string beans, lettuce, green and yellow onions, basil, five mint varieties, rosemary, oregano, carrots, beets, rutabaga and potatoes. The tomatoes should be ready any day now and our strawberries are getting ready for their second harvest. My favorite crop however are the two beauties in the below picture. Wow, do we love gardening!
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