Well, I've been on call several weekends. That's why, when my family dressed up like this to go to the School of Learning Art (SOLA) end of year picnic, I got home in time to take their picture afterward:
Before school can be out you have to attend multiple end-of-the-school-year assemblies. The first was in Sellers's kindergarten class, where he got to wear a paper mortarboard (not until high school can he wear one made of real mortar). Here he poses with his teachers Mrs. LaGrange and Mrs. Brunt after being recognized for "Best Verbal Expression." Everyone in his class got an award, and he was a native English speaker. I love public school.
From there we joined his classmates at a nearby bowling alley where we proved yet again why there are no famous bowlers named "Hill." (It's not just because "famous bowler" is an oxymoron.)
A week later it was back to school for the final awards assembly. Faithful blog readers (Mom) will recall a few months ago Abby was in tears when her brother won Principal's Award and she got nothing. This time Abby got her Principal's Award. I didn't even have my camera ready when Sellers' name was called for Citizenship. When has a Hill ever won that one? What are we doing wrong?
Afterward I stuck around for Abby's class party involving ice cream. I also had a chance to explore the fossil pile, a heap of shark-tooth-rich rocks the gym teacher hauls in annually from a nearby quarry. It turns out the kids are much more adept than I at finding shark's teeth. I suspect it's because unlike me they don't have sweat pooling in their sunglasses.
Turtle Hall Farms continues to produce at a rate that would leave Kate Moss begging for a saltine. But it's not about quantity, it's about quality! Our raspberry was among the best I've ever eaten a quarter of. We've now harvested a good dozen blueberries, each of them juicy and pleasantly tart. Both our plums were sweeter than any I've ever bought at a store. Sellers's favorite product to date was a cicada, which he discovered just molting. We haven't tried eating it, but I have been surfing the web for recipes.
The kids have just discovered the wonderful world of blanket forts. They've built some structures of Trumpian proportions, using every spare blanket in the house. On a few occasions we've even allowed the kids to sleep in them. They actually sleep better under a table in the playroom than they do in their own beds. I wish we'd known this before we shelled out for the Stearns and Foster pillowtops. I wish we'd known this before we signed our mortgage.
Two weekends ago Margaret left us for four days to attend a nephrology continuing education course at Harvard. I pride myself on not being one of those burnt-toast, shrunken-laundry, randomly-dressed-kids helpless dads, but I'll admit some trepidation at the shear duration of her absence. Fortunately we were fine. Did I beat the children? I'm not saying. But if I did, it was never to the point of senselessness. We had lots of company from the neighbors, and Father's Day was, if not relaxing, very rewarding. We ended the day at a party down the street where everyone sang Happy Father's Day to the dads and we played dads-on-kids no-rules soccer. The kids, of course, won.
Abby, Izzy Vogel, Mary Michael Weaver, and Megan Vogel form an ad-hoc committee to investigate paranormal activity in the back yard. Who ya gonna call?
Julian made me a card. The big head is me.
Some guys got sports cars. Some guys got boats. I got a Ripstick. And a helmet. And wrist guards. And knee pads. And disability insurance.
With Margaret safely back from Boston our family was able to return to our version of normalcy. This weekend that meant finally creating the raised vegetable garden I'd meant to start in March. Thursday I went to our old haunt, Home Depot, and staggered out with big boards and all the dirt I could pile into the minivan. Jeff Weaver helped us screw the lumber together, and we spent Saturday painting it so as not to create an eyesore for the Fennels in back of us.
We have a bunch of old bricks, and I got the bright idea of creating a foundation so the garden would stay square and level. I know nothing about laying bricks, and Jeff Weaver had the gall to leave town, so we made it up. But when Margaret saw what I was doing she felt a connection with some long-lost masonic ancestor, and she took to setting bricks like it was her life's destiny. By nightfall we were able to lay the garden border on its perfect foundation.
I spent all day at the hospital again today, but that didn't keep Margaret and the kids from putting 650 pounds of soil into the garden (minus what the boys got on their clothes). By week's end I hope to hear our poor root-bound tomatoes and bell peppers breathe an audible sigh of relief as we sink them into roomy seas of loam. Hang in there, Kate, food's on the way!
We did get a bit of rain yesterday, which gave us time to watch the movie Elizabeth in five-minute segments between answering to the children's needs. The boys caught some of the PG-rated snippets and were inspired to chivalric battle. As you can see, the outcome was tragic.
And that's it for now. Below you can check out the videos I did for Livestrong.com, shot at midnight in a local organic grocery store. Lance couldn't make it. Apparently he had a date.
Feeding Your Newborn
Feeding 4 to 7 Month Olds
Feeding 8 to 12 Months
Peanut Allergies
Milk Allergies
Egg Allergies
Eczema and Diet
The DASH Diet
Diet for High Blood Pressure
Anemia Diet
Toddlers Snacks
Feeding Your 1-2 Year Old
Healthy Foods for Teenagers
Diet for Hypoglycemia
Diet for Diabetes
Diet for Osteoporosis
Diet for GERD
Diet for Pancreatitis
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