Gardening

Gardening has been so fun this year because we have actually grown a handsome bit of food. Here I am with one of our homegrown zucchini. Yum! Haven loves to come with me, as long as she is in the Ergo. Have I told you all how much I have enjoyed the Ergo? Oh my! It is FABULOUS!!! It makes the Baby Bjorn seem like trailer trash. {I say that in a non-condescending way, as we do not own a dwelling of any type.}
*Lydia's Gardening Tip: For maximum flavor, pick zucchini when they are about 4-6 inches long. If, however, no one told you this, they are still edible and delicious at a much, much bigger size.
And, who can resist a picture of this tiny hiney on her way to the bathtub?

Back to the Grind

Elijah is slightly obsessed with lining things up/moving things to new locations/hiding things around the house. We like to say he's "working." Well, work he does. All. Day. Which is one reason we have little piles of miscellaneous things throughout the house. I took a picture of these because it looked like Elijah was trying to build a semi-circle (which he has done!).

Since Daddy was back at work and inspired by Panda Cake, we cooked.

Then I put mousse in Elijah's hair. Doesn't he look so big here?

Haven, snug in her pajamas and waiting patiently for someone to interact with her~:-)

Happy Days!

Guess Who?

Staycation: The End

Our photo shoot with Haven could have gone a little better, but we do the best we have with our lowly point-and-shoot~;-)Good thing she is so cute!Look at this little bottom, perhaps my favorite thing about a baby! *Outfit courtesy of Connie or Aunt Abigail.We took Daddy to meet Clyde, our local pony, for the first time.
Elijah went with apple treats for Clyde. Unfortunately, we neglected to educate Elijah on proper feeding techniques for animals, namely, that one must LET GO of the apple when Clyde's mouth gets close. Alas, Elijah was bitten by huge pony teeth.
Nevertheless, Elijah and Clyde remain friends.
We finished off our staycation by eating at Woody's Steakhouse. [Coupon again.] (Note: this was >24 hours after starting our antibiotics; we were supposedly out of the contagious zone.) I ambitiously ordered a whole rack of ribs. I think I ate one before getting a to-go box~:-) Mmmm, leftovers.
It was a very happy vacation. We got to do lots of things around Nashville, but the most fun thing was just having Eric home with us.

Outtakes

Staycation Day Four

Ewww! And then we got the pinkeye! So, we remained at home on a Momma-directed quarantine. (You're welcome.) Eric built a fort using all four pieces of furniture in our house. Elijah occupied himself for an entire half-hour by dragging all his toys into the fort. Daddy was also permitted to come in and read books. We attempted kite flying on this hot day, but mostly just stayed inside combatting the eye goo and wearing glasses. Gross.

Staycation Day Three

We started the morning at Mason's Efficiency Restaurant. There is no website for this restaurant; we were glad we had cash. It was super fun to go there. It is an old, old restaurant and motel (that's right, motel) and has some super, super inexpensive food. There were all these local people eating there. An old lady runs the cash register and serves as a waitress. She offered to hold my baby while I ate AND I LET HER. That's the kind of restaurant it was. Awesome. And, I'm pretty sure our total was well under $10.
Next we headed to Two Rivers Park so Elijah could play on the fabulous wooden playground there. We headed over the pedestrian bridge to utilize the greenway along the Cumberland River. This is a great trail for stroller use, even the spur trails are fairly stroller-friendly (although they aren't paved). I had to include this picture of Elijah because he looks like this a lot. He did have a good time, I promise! Haven loved being able to see. I believe this was the first time we let her sit in the back seat. She likes it much better than the prone position.

Crossing the river is always a fun time. "Boat Momma! Boat!"Happy staycationing family:
We stopped by Papa Murphy's to pick up a Take 'N Bake pizza. It was really good, but didn't work so well for leftovers. I was able to use a great coupon from our Citipass book~:-)...which I won, have I mentioned that?