Can I just say that this 365 project works great ...
... that is, until you miss a day.
And then with each consecutive day missed, getting caught up again becomes more and more insurmountable.
Much more so than my "regular" blogging.
I have serious thoughts about abandoning the whole thing.
Because I think I actually wind up saying less
even when I manage to post more.
And I'm not sure I have 250+ days left in me.
Just had to get that off my chest.
(Are you listening, Chris?)
I was at Target about 10 days ago, and I noticed that they had their school supplies out already.
Man, summer will be over before we know it.
I thought Connor would do lots of swimming this summer, but we've only made it to the (real) pool once, and into the kiddie pool just a handful of times.
Actually, I just got the kiddie pool purchased not too long before I saw the school supplies for sale.
So there you go.
The neighbors and we are quite annoyed about the kiddie pools this year, as we both bought a new one, and it appears that they are being made without drain holes across the board.
Gah.
Did I write that we picked blackberries awhile back?
I can't remember.
Got up at the buttcrack of dawn for that.
We had a good time, though.
Anyway, I spent yesterday afternoon making 8 pints of jam, as well as some pesto from of my basil plant
which appears to have peaked this week.
The kitchen ...
holy moly, it was a sticky purple disaster.
Then this morning I made salsa with a whole bunch of veggies from my former brother-in-law
plus the one Roma tomato that I've been able to harvest thus far from our own garden.
It smelled so good,
I wound up having chips and salsa for breakfast today.
You can tell that my former BIL (actually, I think it's his father) either really did something right, or I did something wrong, when you look at all that he's harvested already
and compare it to the current state of our garden.
I mean, we will get there, I think,
but it's still going to be awhile.
We officially have one bell pepper growing,
and it looks like we're going to successfully grow some okra.
And our zucchini plants are starting to take off
after debating about it for about 2 months now.
The yellow squash, not so much.
One plant died right off,
and the other is thinking about it.
Plus I think that squash may be one of those where you need at least 2 plants in the first place
in order for them to pollinate.
I saw the rabbit in the yard the other day
for the first time in about a month, I think.
Alvin had hit him with a tennis ball
- twice -
on the same day that he put some chicken wire up around the garden plants last month.
I'm not sure which one of those things
was the straw that broke the camel's back,
but at least one of them sure made an impact.
Heh.
And the birds that flew the coop?
This has never happened to us before,
but a few days after they left,
two returned.
It was clearly a (the?) mother and one of the babies.
Then the mother flew away
and the younger bird has stayed
and is currently sitting on 2 eggs
which we think may have actually hatched within the last couple of days.
So this summer was a two-fer
as far as our birds have been concerned.
Which is kind of neat.
Because we haven't had many years where we had babies at all
much less two sets (litters? gaggles?) within one season.
So that's what's been going on here.
Connor has been rollerskating and scootering and watching Spongebob obsessively.
And carrying the remote to the TV around with him so compulsively
that we think we might have to buy him a fanny pack
or a tool belt
to store it in. ;-)
He was rooting around in the pantry for a snack the other day
and I later discovered that he accidentally left the remote in there when he was done.
Crazy kid.
I gave him a sheet of multiplication equations on a lark the other day,
and although I already knew he understood the concept,
he was better at it than I thought.
I asked him how he was figuring out the answers, and he said,
"I just know it!"
He has a strange osmosis thing going on where math is concerned.
So here are a bunch of pics that I haven't posted.
I'm not going to bother numbering them.
I'm just going to call myself caught up now.
The sandwich? A brie and granny smith apple panini on italian "everything" bread
that I found at Walmart.
Oh man ... it was awesome. :-)
