The Alien Rash

So, I was at Publix (only the best grocery store EVER) this afternoon with Brit and Hunter (and H-man of course). It was a fantastic trip. Shopping truly is a pleasure at Publix. Harrison and Hunter sat side-by-side in one of those race-car carts and seemed to really enjoy the experience. They screamed and squealed like girls together just to see how many looks they could get. They plastered kisses on one another. They each partook in the fabulous Cookie Club. Brit and I were mistresses of efficiency, getting the things we needed in record time, finding great coupons, all the while keeping the boys happy and entertained.

Sigh. Those kind of trips make you feel like a maternal success.

Then something weird happened. As we were loading the boys into the car, Brittany noticed a strange swollen ring of welts on little Hunter's wrist. She said that earlier he'd had a couple spider bites there, so were were alarmed with the bizarrely precise nature of this rash. It was the epidermal equivalent to crop circles. We hurried home so that Brittany could get Hunter into the doctor and have this malady diagnosed.

Is everyone ready for this? How many of you have guessed it? The idea was just too horrifying for us to have considered, but I'm ready to face it now. That's right. My little sweetie had at some point in our excursion tried to bite Hunter's arm off. He was only successful in leaving a red, raised tattoo of each and every one of his teeth. Not a mother's proudest moment. Unless you count the fact that he has great, evenly spaced teeth.

I'm including a picture, but you must believe me that the marks are much darker than the camera showed.

As a bonus, I'm throwing in a pic from later in the evening when we were babysitting our little friend, Jake. Harrison was being sweet and giving Jake a ride down our driveway. Dan was so proud that he decided to capture the moment with his camera phone. Trouble is, there's a little lag with that and we ended up getting the next moment, which wasn't quite as sweet.

Poor kid, he never saw it coming.

Have you finished yet?

Okay, the last Harry Potter has been out for almost 48 hours now. Can I safely assume we've all read it? If you haven't, you're missing out. Sadly, Dan and I opted out of the midnight book release party this year (being parents automatically makes you lame) and so we weren't able to pick it up till Saturday morning. We got our little family all dressed and ready to go and drove up to Cool Springs (about a 25 minute drive) and . . . they didn't open till nine. We had to kill some time, but it was fun to see such a big rush for it the following morning. I guess I figured all the diehards had got it the night before, but there was a huge line that we had to wait in.

I'd recently been talking with my sister-in-law Jamie about all the great "communities" she's a part of or interested in. It made me feel like I didn't have any interests that I was exploring well enough, but seeing everybody at Borders do this up-and-down look as they take in your anxious grasp of your long-awaited copy of the final HP tome and knowing that we'd all be cracking it open before we even got out of the parking lot made me feel a little better. I'm part of a community too. Just one that likes to picture themselves apparating wherever they need to go.

Anyway, loved the book.

We saw a black bear!

Okay, maybe not this particular bear, but on our trip to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, somebody who looked a lot like this ran in front of our car. For an Iowa girl like me, it was a very exciting experience. I had no idea they ran so fast. Our own little Baby Bear had so much fun on the trip--especially doing anything that involved playing in sand. Luckily, that was pretty often. We went to an air show on the beach in Traverse City, climbed up the sand dunes on the shores of Lake Michigan in Leelanau County, and played in the sand in Grandma and Grandpa Gilbert's backyard.

Harrison loved the air show. And whenever he got bored, he'd throw sand in his hair till something big and loud came by overhead.
We visited Tahquamenon Falls up by Whitefish Point, but H-man was entirely too tuckered out to really enjoy those natural wonders.

Gift shops were more his style anyway. Lots of toys to play with.

Other highlights of the trip included Mom taking Jamie and I out for facials, manicures, and pedicures. Talk about pampering! Grandpa, Abe, and Dan took Walker and Harrison for at least half a day for us to be able to do that and it was fantastic. Thank you, Doris!

We also got to see (part of) the cabin up in Paradise, Michigan where Dan spent so many summer days at when he was a kid. I think he really enjoyed showing Harrison around his old stomping ground.

When we got home, we had THE GARDEN to face. It was really jungle-y and kind of scary. Japanese beetles took over some of the corn, and that's just gross. I'm determined to be a little more un-organic next year and anyone who has a problem with it can just tell me they'd rather be sharing their food with all those nasty beasts.

Check out a sampling of our harvest today. Yes, that's a pumpkin. Anyway--butternut squash....any ideas for using huge amounts of it?

Oh! and a big welcome to Mom and Dad Gilbert to the blogging world. Check them out in my list of Cool People.

Garden Pride or Garden Panic?

I love putting in the garden. I could putt all day. Except for the middle part when it's beastly hot. But I like the watering, the light weeding, the picking of a nice little bit of produce. I even like picking beans. Really. And the snapping is fun too. Harrison and I have a system where I take the ends off and then hand the bean to him and he grunts and bends it till it breaks in half. But my pleasure has mutated to something close to panic right now. As I was out picking beans and watching Dan pick tomatoes from our eight plants (what was I thinking) I found myself wording an email to my neighbors in my head asking them to please come relieve us of some of these vegetables. The corn has just come in and it's delicious! But there's a lot of it. As I write this, Harrison is out eating raw corn on the cob and strolling the rows. Don't even get me started on the zucchini and cucumbers. My zucchini bread loaf count is currently an even 20, with enough shredded for the next batch of four loaves awaiting me in the fridge. See how easy it is to get feeling overwhelmed? I've got no time for blogging, people; I'm baking bread with homegrown vegetables here!

So, if anyone who's reading this is within visiting distance...we've got vegetables.