Weekenders!
Oct. 20th, 2003 10:12 amIt was a pretty quiet weekend. Saturday, after the girls had awakened and I'd fed them a fresh batch of waffles Omaha and I headed out with them securely strapped into the back seat to run our first batch of weekend errands.
I drove us down to Carpinto Farms to buy a pumpkin. The weatherman had told us that the day would be overcast with clouds and scattered showers, but that story had changed by one o'clock. Instead, we found ourselves under clear skies and an expected record high of 22 C. We arrived at a farm crawling with kids and their parents, each looking for just the right big orange ball. For the privilege of doing the hauling ourselves, we paid a higher price than at a neighborhood supermarket, but the kids had fun. Can't complain. ( Photo: The kids pick a pumpkin ) We also did the corn mazes again this year. Last year, Kouryou-chan made it through both but by the end she was dead tired. This time, I took Yamaarashi-chan and Omaha took Kouryou-chan, but we went through only the smaller of the mazes before Kouryou-chan became intractably cranky. We were at a bit of a loss to explain why; she was, after all, well-fed and well-rested. I suspect it was thirst; we didn't bring bottled water with us, and each maze takes about an hour to complete. But both girls got good at navigating. Once she figured it out, Yamaarashi-chan got really good at choosing the correct path out of left-right choices.
We also stopped at a stonemason's yard and picked up four corner pieces for the retaining wall's north edge, only to discover that the pieces we'd bought didn't quite mesh with the wall we'd built-- the pieces in situ were a quarter-inch too far to the north. Time to go buy a stonemason's chisel and whittle down some facing stones to make them fit. Since we couldn't make that work, we dug the drainage pit (a good idea to do before the winter rains settle in) and filled it with gravel and recovered loose stone. The girls played on the monkey bars. Yamaarashi-chan tried hard to keep up with Kouryou-chan, but Kouryou-chan has been doing those bars so much her hands are callused. Yamaarashi-chan managed to give herself blisters trying to match her sister's prodigious monkeying.
FallenPegasus showed up about that time for a quiet weekend dinner. We made salmon, boiled new potatoes with mint and olive oil, and fresh roasted corn that we bought six ears for a dollar while we were at the farm. Absolutely heavenly. At one point just before we sat down to eat Yamaarashi-chan said, "Oooh, fire!" It's not supposed to do that; the salmon grease left on the grill had caught. I took care of it, and we ate. Then we went downstairs to retire for the evening, catching up on some TV that Tivo had caught for us. Since I have no time to watch it on the weekdays, this was the best opportunity. "MI-5", "Teen Titans", "Queer Eye For the Straight Guy" (which I'd never seen before but immediately grasped the amusement value!), and the last episode of an anime called "Gatekeepers 21" which was utterly incomprehensible.
Sunday was slower. We went food shopping and stopped at a thrift store for some Halloween dress-up stuff for Kouryou-chan. I studied some more. The kids played outside while Omaha and I calculated out the week's dinners: who would be cooking what when, what leftovers would we have for lunches, and so on. I took Yamaarashi-chan back to her mother's house. Dinner was a delectable pasta-and-savory-chicken dish that Omaha found in Cooking Light. Yamaarashi-chan and I drew while we watched an episode of Investigative Reports. I faced the terror of a disaster kitchen while Omaha put Kouryou-chan to bed.
Kouryou-chan did not want to go to bed. She kept crawling into bed until 10:30. I awoke at 2:30 with a full bladder. At 4:30, Kouryou-chan has a freak-out because she's wet the bed (only the third time since we stopped buying diapers six months ago). We console her and head back to bed. Again.
The alarm goes off at 6:50. This is not the alarm to go swimming. This is the alarm that it's time to head out. I'm over an hour late. I sigh, get out of bed, and drive into work. I'm a bit of a vegetable today. I hope I get something done.
I drove us down to Carpinto Farms to buy a pumpkin. The weatherman had told us that the day would be overcast with clouds and scattered showers, but that story had changed by one o'clock. Instead, we found ourselves under clear skies and an expected record high of 22 C. We arrived at a farm crawling with kids and their parents, each looking for just the right big orange ball. For the privilege of doing the hauling ourselves, we paid a higher price than at a neighborhood supermarket, but the kids had fun. Can't complain. ( Photo: The kids pick a pumpkin ) We also did the corn mazes again this year. Last year, Kouryou-chan made it through both but by the end she was dead tired. This time, I took Yamaarashi-chan and Omaha took Kouryou-chan, but we went through only the smaller of the mazes before Kouryou-chan became intractably cranky. We were at a bit of a loss to explain why; she was, after all, well-fed and well-rested. I suspect it was thirst; we didn't bring bottled water with us, and each maze takes about an hour to complete. But both girls got good at navigating. Once she figured it out, Yamaarashi-chan got really good at choosing the correct path out of left-right choices.
We also stopped at a stonemason's yard and picked up four corner pieces for the retaining wall's north edge, only to discover that the pieces we'd bought didn't quite mesh with the wall we'd built-- the pieces in situ were a quarter-inch too far to the north. Time to go buy a stonemason's chisel and whittle down some facing stones to make them fit. Since we couldn't make that work, we dug the drainage pit (a good idea to do before the winter rains settle in) and filled it with gravel and recovered loose stone. The girls played on the monkey bars. Yamaarashi-chan tried hard to keep up with Kouryou-chan, but Kouryou-chan has been doing those bars so much her hands are callused. Yamaarashi-chan managed to give herself blisters trying to match her sister's prodigious monkeying.
FallenPegasus showed up about that time for a quiet weekend dinner. We made salmon, boiled new potatoes with mint and olive oil, and fresh roasted corn that we bought six ears for a dollar while we were at the farm. Absolutely heavenly. At one point just before we sat down to eat Yamaarashi-chan said, "Oooh, fire!" It's not supposed to do that; the salmon grease left on the grill had caught. I took care of it, and we ate. Then we went downstairs to retire for the evening, catching up on some TV that Tivo had caught for us. Since I have no time to watch it on the weekdays, this was the best opportunity. "MI-5", "Teen Titans", "Queer Eye For the Straight Guy" (which I'd never seen before but immediately grasped the amusement value!), and the last episode of an anime called "Gatekeepers 21" which was utterly incomprehensible.
Sunday was slower. We went food shopping and stopped at a thrift store for some Halloween dress-up stuff for Kouryou-chan. I studied some more. The kids played outside while Omaha and I calculated out the week's dinners: who would be cooking what when, what leftovers would we have for lunches, and so on. I took Yamaarashi-chan back to her mother's house. Dinner was a delectable pasta-and-savory-chicken dish that Omaha found in Cooking Light. Yamaarashi-chan and I drew while we watched an episode of Investigative Reports. I faced the terror of a disaster kitchen while Omaha put Kouryou-chan to bed.
Kouryou-chan did not want to go to bed. She kept crawling into bed until 10:30. I awoke at 2:30 with a full bladder. At 4:30, Kouryou-chan has a freak-out because she's wet the bed (only the third time since we stopped buying diapers six months ago). We console her and head back to bed. Again.
The alarm goes off at 6:50. This is not the alarm to go swimming. This is the alarm that it's time to head out. I'm over an hour late. I sigh, get out of bed, and drive into work. I'm a bit of a vegetable today. I hope I get something done.
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