Things I've Lost Count of This Season...

1. the number of times it's snowed
2. the number of times we've been to the doctor
3. the number of times we've been to the hospital
4. how many times someone in this household has been sick
5. how many times I've been to Walgreen's
6. how many boxes of tissues we've gone through
7. how many boxes of tea we've gone through
8. how many times people have asked if we're all healthy yet
9. how many times I've thought "we're finally all healthy"
10. how many times I felt like I was fighting off getting sick myself....only to have finally succumbed

Please, please, please let this be the end of it!!!!

Stop the Insanity!!*

Van, now living in Ohio, sent this jersey home with Liz for Henry. It's from Notre Dame, because that's where he's getting his master's. We sent him some photos to say "thank you"....and also...."don't buy him an OSU jersey, because he won't be wearing that". Henry loves it and spent yesterday afternoon playing football with Bampa.
Today Clara and I finally got to take our trip to Papa's office.
After hugs and oohs and aahs all around, we went out for pho. I didn't take any photos until we were all finished. You can see the gigantic bowls, the array of condiments, and the remains of my "salty lemonade". It was delicious and filling and great company all around. Sorry not to have any photos of Jim, John or Ellen....
When we got home there was a large package outside the door. It was from my childhood friend, Olivia, with whom I recently reconnected after about ten years of being completely out of touch. Here is what was inside:
Holy lord. The girl lives in St. John's Newfoundland (Canada) right now and this is a sampling of local candies, t-shirts for Henry and Clara, about 8 cds of different things, a couple of books and postcards.... Don't miss the giant Kinder Egg. Henry is going to be very excited for that one.

Olivia....don't think that don't know you chose some of these things based purely on their names.....

One of the CDs she sent is the Juno soundtrack, which I've been wanting since I saw the movie. I have an instant love for Kimya Dawson's music.

*Alternate post title: Too Much Cute, Too Much Food, Too Much Candy

It all started out innocently enough...

Yesterday it started with a pan full of lovely eggs....
and then the shenanigans began....


Oh the silliness. We ended up with several beautiful symbols of fertility and rebirth. Or, Easter eggs if you're so inclined...
Then Henry took a break to do this:
This morning the table held our masterpieces, as well as a few chocolate treats and a pretty little Bunnykins bowl for Clara (purchased at our favorite Evanston antique shop).
Henry found his basket and immediately began his search of the living room...
Then we all ate an egg to fortify ourselves for the sugar-filled day that we knew lay ahead.
Here is Clara in her stages of dressing up:


Isn't she lovely?
I can't stand it!
I'm pretty sure hers was the only bonnet in church today. So sad.
I can't help it. My kids are the most beautiful things in the world.
Here's Clara and Dad, right next to the "Eat, Drink and Be Merry" window. That's all I will say about that.
Henry decorated an envelope with Easter stickers, took a walk with Bampa, and waited patiently through the sermon so that he could have a bunny-shaped marshmallow.
Back in Deerfield we posed for a family picture.
There was much discussion of the traditional lamb cake. Notice the hole in its head? When we arrived, there was a giant steel skewer holding the whole thing up. Bampa referred to the hole as its lobotomy scar. Then he 'repaired' it with his finger. Henry added the jellybean face.
There was also the traditional photographing of the traditional lamb cake.
Henry sat down at the table 20 minutes before dinner was to be ready. He really wanted to eat those three jellybeans sitting next to his plate. He knew he couldn't have them until his dinner was finished, so he was ready to start dinner!
He also got to eat the head of the lamb....
...which Mary happily sliced for our after-dinner enjoyment.
That last photo may or may not have been posed with help from my husband.
I hope everyone out there had a happy Easter/Celebration of Spring/Rites of Fertility and Rebirth/Four More Weeks Till Passover/Regular Old Sunday.

Images from our day...

Because today it is (again) doing this:...we decided to take a trip to the zoo.
Henry was the zoo keeper. He had his keys and his walkie-talkie. How about a close-up of that hat?
Here's the penguin house (Henry's favorite exhibit):
We created a "North Woods" exhibit for the moose, bears and loon:
I am a big fan of the African Animals exhibit.
Here are the ocean animals, which originally included a duck...
....which later moved to the farmyard animals exhibit.
Of course, there's the monkey house:
We also have a lovely ticket stand and snack shack (which serves animal crackers). We're anxiously awaiting Dad's arrival home to see if he'll fork out a real dollar for his ticket. If he does I told Henry he could put it in his piggy bank.
Now....here's a cute picture of Clara going to sleep under her beautiful new blanket from Aunt Joyce:
And here's another gift Clara got today. I knew it was going to be good when I saw the packaging:
The contents, quite literally, brought tears to my eyes.
Oh my gosh-I can't wait till these fit her! Thanks Bruce and Ellen!

No Place Like It...

I originally started this blog post with a description of everything that went wrong this weekend, from the awful traffic leaving town to everyone getting sick and thusly not being able to enjoy our time the way we wanted. But instead, I'll just leave it with those little details and not go on a big grumping spree. It's easy to grump a lot when you want to live in a place that you just have to visit. Pete and I never seem to have time to see everyone we'd like to. And even when we do see them it's often all too short (like our 5-minute driveway visit with Darcie this morning). When I first moved to Chicago I said I'd be back to Iowa in a year or two. Ten years later....
But back to this weekend. I keep hearing that it's a bad year for illness, and I guess it's hitting our family pretty hard. Dad has been sick since he left here- so we saw him for all of a two-minute wave-through-the-truck-door this morning. Pete kept getting the chills and a fever, so he hardly left the house. Clara seems to be having a resurgence of congestion and other cold-like symptoms, which meant I had very disrupted and abbreviated sleep.
Not to mention, we didn't want to spread our germs to cousin Eleanor. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that that little cutie stays well. I'm feeling awfully guilty already....
So, there, I guess I complained about the weekend anyway. I was just disappointed. I had so been looking forward to Clara's first trip to Iowa City. Nice birthday dinner for Mom and Rob, late-night games, visits with friends, bumming around town....
We did get to spend some good quality time with Eleanor, though. And Aunt Joyce came up for her first meeting of Clara. We finally remembered to take some photos of the three cousins together.
And this one I think is just hilarious of Eleanor and Clara....
We got home at a reasonable hour today, so I fixed up some corned beef and colcannon. Thanks to Amber for putting me on a kale kick, and to Mom for suggesting colcannon. It was a delicious meal, though I think the nitrates from the beef are giving me a headache.
We've had lots of leprechaun talk today. Henry's new thing is to request a story- not a book- a story. It's good- encourages us to be a little creative. So today there were some leprechaun stories and Henry wanted to look at a picture of a leprechaun on the computer. Then Clara decided to try out her leprechaun jammies- lent to her by her growing cousin. She also likes her mobile.
To end on a positive note- I did learn this weekend that I have the potential to be a Guitar Hero. So maybe when that translates into the big bucks, we'll finally move back to Iowa...

Not a great photo of me- but Joyce's expression is priceless.

No Pho (rhymes with No Duh)

So, occasionally, Pete and some of his co-workers will have a Pho-riday, where they go out for a Vietnamese lunch. Today Clara was going to have her first visit to Shure to see Daddy's office and meet the gang and then we were going to have a Pho-wednesday. Clara got all dressed up, but the day didn't turn out as planned.
First, Clara and I went through the drive-through at Starbucks. (It was a little too early to get down to Niles, and I hadn't had any breakfast.) I turned off the car and we sat in the parking lot while I called Mom to wish her a happy birthday. She's enjoying the sun and the Dodgers at Spring Training in Florida with a couple of her brothers, but that's a different story.
At the end of a nice chat, I tried to start the car back up to go meet Pete. You probably caught the key word there- tried. The battery was dead. Fortunately it is a warmish day and Clara had her patient pants on. After determining that we would have to postpone Pho-wednesday, and after much disappointed grumping by me, this happened:
I guess you can't see the jumper cables, but eventually it worked.
Then we drove the car here:
But guess what. Well, I'll just let you figure it out.
So we went across the street: And they said they could fix it within an hour.
There was a Panera right next door, but my tastebuds were all set for Asian food, and I don't know how well you know me, but sometimes I'm a little stubborn.
So we went here: And had to wait a little bit.
Pete did some more schedule-shuffling on his Blackberry. And Clara expressed her displeasure with spit bubbles.
But we did get to eat lunch together.
And Pete, whilst making fun of me for documenting everything, took unprepared pictures of me.
We didn't have any of the $2 mini-desserts. Honestly, what's the point of a mini-dessert? But we did get fortune cookies:
Here's mine: I don't know...all in all, it wasn't a bad day.
Here's Clara at the end of it all- showing off the cute outfit she didn't get to show anywhere else:
How about a close-up?
No?
Oh....that's better...