Caption Contest

Flora and Fauna

We have been practicing with the new camera today. We have a few shots from when it was still wet from the rain this morning, and several more from after Wiggleworms, when the sun came out. Henry is busy trying to catch an ant, so I'm taking the time to try to upload several of the images. The new camera is a Canon PowerShot A540. (Henry has just captured the ant and brought it over to me, all pinched between his little fingers "bug!")
Here is the first picture from the morning. It was an attempt at catching the little baby bunny who's been nibbling about in our yard. This is a super zoom of him in action, fleeing the scene.



This is the part of the yard by the back fence that I worked on yesterday. The first picture shows how it looked before, and the photo on the right is of the transplanted hostas and the wildflowers. I'm not sure what the deal is with the bricks back there...


Here is my rain-dappled gingko.


And the pretty yellow Asiatic lillies.



Okay...I"m having problems with Blogger....so I'm just going to throw the rest of the pictures up later. Maybe I"ll let you write the captions...

Nothing too exciting...

First pictures with the new camera...







Henry helps sort the already folded laundry.












Pete tries out the zoom.












The dog does his doggy thing.












Self portrait.












Dinner with Marni and Alan.












Henry making Henry faces at dinner.

Apologies to the Bunnies

Moss roses. Of course. Thanks Joyce. We also have them in red.
So, lately I've been thinking that our camera has been a little haywire. It's been eating through batteries like nobody's business. Then Pete sends me an email this morning that he just read the owner's manual again and it says not to use alkaline batteries, just to use the rechargables. Because it will eat through alkaline batteries like nobody's business. We hadn't been using the rechargables because they seem to be at the end of their life. Plus, I keep misplacing them. In any case, we have ordered a new camera (not because of the batteries...Pete just had a burning need) and it should be arriving today. Stay tuned for a flurry of blog activity. I spent the morning planting the redbud and the dwarf Korean Lilac, and also digging up and moving more hostas. We had a very shaggy overgrown grassy spot in the back of the yard (behind the ginkgo) which the local wildlife referred to as Bunny Haven. Sadly, for them, I turned all the soil, tossed the grass aside and relocated some hostas to that spot. Also put in a last few flowers Mom had brought....a Columbine and a couple others that I'll have to find the name of again.
Henry's napping. I should be finishing up my homework and calling Marni to firm up dinner plans. I should also be showering, as I look like a total mudball. Stay tuned for fancy new camera photos!!!

Wizzo with update!

Last night Van hosted a barbeque. That's Van there, showing off his wireless thermometer to Pete's dad.

Van is Liz's boyfriend.

He hired Marshall Brodien to perform at his party. Marshall Brodien is also known as Wizzo, from the Bozo Show. Try as I might, I couldn't find a photo of Wizzo in his makeup. Here he is, however, in his real-life self. Henry is peering on in wonder.

Henry was also interested in the little skunk statuary in the yard.

Van suggested to Marshall/Wizzo that I would be a good candidate as magician's assistant. Here he is, either making my ring disappear, or making rabbits multiply in my hand, I'm not sure which.

Here he is about to pull my bra out of my shirt...at least, it appeared that way...

Again, Henry was mesmerized.

On our way out we couldn't resist getting a shot of Wizzo's car...

And a close up...

Kudos on a fun party, Van! A magical time was had by all!

Update: Wizzo! He's the one on the right.

Beautification

I'm not sure I'd ever heard my mom say "beautification" before this weekend...but there it was, popping out of her mouth about each median and bare scrap of land we seemed to drive by this week. Finally, this morning, we were able to do some beautification in my yard. Mom had purchased several trees and plants for me at the Project Green sale in ICIA. It took me a while to sort out which plants I wanted, and where they might go, but we finally worked out some good solutions.
First, Henry had to check out Mom's handiwork in protecting the peppers.


Then I had to plant some friends for the peppers...what do we call these? Rock roses? Something like that...I have some in yellow and in red now.


Then Mom had to take some really hot pictures of me digging a hole for the Gingko tree. How about that angle?!?!?


And some sweet pictures of me giving the sapling a little tlc. If we stick around here long enough, Henry will be able to climb this tree and find a secret reading spot like I used to do as a kid in my front yard. Gotta love the Gingko!


Mom moved a few day lillies from the middle of our circle of bricks. Tomorrow I will plant a Redbud in there. She planted the lillies out front along our driveway. She also cleaned out a space where the hostas were going wild. I'll put a little dwarf Korean Lilac in there.


In the meantime, Beth fed Henry a little snack. Henry loves Beth. He calls her "Bah!" They're favorite game is "I'm gonna get you!"


I ended my portion of the gardening today by putting some wildflowers in this barren little spot by the porch. Actually, the Asiatic lillies are blooming quite beautifully there right now, you can just catch the corner of one in this shot. I put in some yellow foxglove, a forget-me-not and a couple other things I can't remember right now.



I love my yard so much. It's so much fun to decide where things should go, and to get in there with my hands. I can't wait to see some of these things flourish and grow!

All about the boy...

We've been very busy, but not with many things that are photo-friendly...mostly shopping and lunching and whatnot. Here's a picture of Henry getting washed up before bed. He had dusty knees from playing at the playground when we went to the Velodrome yesterday.

Henry, as always, enjoyed watching the bikes Go Go Go, but Mom and Beth were a little worried about the speed of the racers. There was one accident involving a couple bikes, but there was no ambulance involved.
Tonight Henry is up late- due to a late late nap. He just got out of the bath and Mom brought him in all bundled up in his towel...I tried to get photos where you couldn't see all his junk...

Morton Arboretum

Interesting fact: Morton Arboretum is not only founded by the man who made his fortune with Morton Salt Co. He was also a man named Joy. What a happy name for a man! What a happy time when a man could be named Joy.

Mom and her friend Beth are in town. So yesterday we drove out to the arboretum. It was a lovely day, except when the rain came through...but that cleared everyone out so that we had the tram to ourselves.
Here are some photos of us enjoying the wading pond. We couldn't actually wade because there was a batch of teeny tiny tadpoles trying to make their way in the world.


Grandma is pointing out the sites....

Henry checks out the tadpoles close up.

Don't step on the flowers!

And here's a close-up cutie on the tram.

I highly encourage anyone to go spend some time at the Morton Arboretum. I really wish it were not such a long drive to get out there. We are considering buying a membership, since we may not be giving our dollars to public radio this year. That's a whole other story.

Anyone?

Is anyone else having problems with Blogger? I can't post photos...I've been trying for a couple days...
I'll update again when I can add the photos...

Fun in the sun...

We weren't sure what the weather would do last night, but we braved the drizzle and were rewarded with a lovely night at Ravinia. Liz and her boyfriend Van drove up to our house* and we went together to meet Peter and Mary there. They had staked out a good spot. We all brought a little bit to add to the picnic, so we enjoyed a feast and some wine as well. Later we tried to go for the traditional Dove bar dessert, but the entire park was SOLD OUT! How lame is that? I think a letter of complaint might be in order.
I wish I had some photos of Henry dancing. He had on his new fancy pants from Aunt Carrie, and cut quite a rug out on the dancefloor. Usually Ravinia doesn't have a dance floor, but they had set one up on the lawn for this special big band night. He made pals with a little guy named Arthur, who, we found out, is only 3 days older than Henry. Once you meet a little guy named Arthur, it doesn't seem like such an odd name for a baby anymore.


*It was a good thing they stopped by. It was Van's first visit to our new house and it was marked by having to kill the most gigantic spider I have ever seen just roaming around inside a house. Pete jumped back (which was okay, since it was Father's day. I didn't change diapers on mothers day, he didn't kill spiders on father's day.) and Liz and I weren't going near the thing as long as there were men around....so it was Van to the rescue. Thanks, Van. I don't know where that creepy thing came from....but at least I know it's not coming back. Hopefully it doesn't have siblings.

June 18th

A very happy father's day to Pete, Dad, Peter Sr. and all other great Papas out there!

(Friday and) Saturday in the Park

With the hot weather we've been trying to get all of our outdoor time in in the early morning. Yesterday Henry and I took a walk to find some ducks to feed. I know it's not supposed to be the healthiest thing for the ducks, but it's an experience children just need to have. We found a couple little ducks swimming up the North Branch of the West Fork of the Chicago River...(or whatever this creek is that runs through town). Earlier in the season they had had some ducklings, but they must all be gone by now.
Henry was more interested in eating the bread himself.

This morning we spent some time on the playground equipment. It was fun to have it all to ourselves, being that it was only 7:30 AM. Well, the park clean-up guy was there with his leaf-blower for a while, but he was very apologetic and didn't stick around too long.
Franklin did not enjoy being tethered to the park bench while the rest of us played.

Henry is very much into the slides. Do you think my boy wants to stick around on the nice "toddler" equipment, though? No no. He likes the big, tall, scary equipment with the slide that makes Mom and Papa a little nervous...










We had fun on the in-between-sized slide.

Henry likes to ride side-car on the motorcycle.


Teeter-tottering is very serious business.