Painting!

As a kid, I took years and years and years of art lessons (thanks Mom and Dad!).  As an adult, I am making the time to indulge my favorite hobby now that I have kids of my own.  There is nothing better than getting messy with paint!

Look at Amara's concentration.  Who says toddlers have no attention span?  Art brings out the best in little kids.

Two little girls working very intently.

A double-brush technique.

The shear joy of getting your masterpiece to turn out exactly the way you intended.

"No, I have not been eating the yellow paint, Mama."

"That's not yelllow paint on my tongue.  I promise."

"Um, okay, maybe I ate a little yellow paint."

Anticipation.

More hard work.  I think she gets it from her Dada.

Three-brush technique.  Very impressive.  It takes most artists years to master this.

"Alright, I admit it.  Paint is yummy."

Mama's art project.  What?  I own the fence -- I'm allowed.

Canine Picasso #1.

Canine Picasso #2.

Kiran Makes a Salad

Kiran makes a salad.

Economics Lesson

There is no hope that my kids will grow up to be normal.

Tonight we played "Economy" on the driveway!

[This is what happens when Richard is not home to impose an objective standard of fun.]

We had a city, a farm, a factory, a seaport, an airport, and train tracks to connect them all!  We moved goods and people on our train!  We grew agricultural commodities (farm) for consumption (city), domestic manufacturing (factory), and export (seaport and airport)!

Don't you want to play with us?!  Isn't this fun?!

[The kids actually LOVED it.]

Floppies!

The floppies were out!

Our neighbors have several goats (with floppy ears!) but they are rarely outside when we're home to see them.  This was an exception, so we took the time to go pet them.

Wild Strawberries

Today we were hanging out in a part of the back yard where we haven't previously spent much time.  Richard was building a picnic table behind the swingset; the girls and I were hanging out in the grass, waiting for him to come back outside with some tools.  While Kiran conducted an imaginary train made out of the boards for the picnic table, I was chilling out and enjoying the "ride."  That's when I happened to notice what looked like a strawberry in the lawn, right where the grass meets the trees.

I saw one, then another, and another.  There was a whole patch of wild strawberries!

Time to get the baskets and go strawberry picking!

Amara was an excellent berry picker.  She was very focused on her task.

Same with Kiran.

Most of the strawberries never made it into the basket, though.

Yup, life is good with a mouthful of wild strawberries.

Amara takes a taste...

And it BLOWS HER MIND.

More strawberry eating.

More focused picking.

Amara's tiny hands holding a tiny strawberry.

Kiran showing off her foraging skills.

Some of our haul.

Eating strawberries on the new picnic table.

Sharing with Sissy.

Most of the strawberries never made it into the basket, and most of the strawberries that made it into the basket never made it into the kitchen.  :-)

But a few did.  Those got macerated with honey and balsamic vinegar, topped with lemon zest, and served over Greek yogurt.  Life is good.

Spiderman!

Kiran has been REALLY into Spiderman lately.  So when I heard he was going to be making an appearance at a local restaurant, I knew we had to go.  Check out Kiran's "Spidey" hand!

French ponytail

Just like my mom used to do my hair when I was a little girl.