Ahhhhhhhhh.....

Four years ago, on leap day, I was at Trafalgar Square in London with Braeden and Emma.  They loved to climb the lion sculptures.  I wasn't sure if that was OK but I could plead the ugly American so I let them.

I decided that was a pretty good way to spend an extra day.

This year I am here.

I am convinced that I should be a snowbird when I grow up.  I love deserts.  I love sunshine.  I love dry heat.  Who am I kidding?  In February, I love any kind of heat.

In July, I will be thanking my lucky northwest stars that I am in Seattle, where people are happy and summer is mild.

Mark may or may not have been really excited to be on the plane.

A lot of pictures were snapped out the window with my phone.  Here's the difference between the place we left:

And the place we landed:

A little bit more water in Seattle.

But Palm Desert is a delightful little place.  (Maybe when I am a snowbird when I grow up I can work for the chamber of commerce here...my life's purpose will be to tell people how lovely Palm Desert is.)  There are palm trees (naturally) and citrus trees, heavy with fruit.  There are flowers blooming everywhere and the horizon is my favorite kind of horizon, filled with mountains.

There's an In 'n Out Burger.

Paradise, people.  Paradise.

When Baby Made Four

Emma's birthday cake this year:  a result of an oven that self destructed (it's since been fixed) and spectacular friends.  Leif made the cupcakes for Emma and Janet added the lovely frosting.  I may pretend my oven is broken for all future birthdays.  (Forget you just read that Janet.)

 Two things happened recently that reminded me.

 1) On Emma's birthday, Braeden wanted stories about when she was a baby.  He is always wanting stories.  My historian.

2) My brother and his wife welcomed their second baby, a little girl, into the world.  (Welcome aboard, Azure!  I am looking forward to meeting you.)

I remembered the first few days of Emma's life.  The day we brought her home from the hospital, I lay Emma in the middle of our bed and went about putting things away.  Luckily, that didn't take me very far from Emma because Braeden covered her entire body with a pillow.  He said he wanted to play hide and seek with her.

When my heart started beating again,  I explained to Braeden fervently that he was never to do that.

I felt slightly alarmed about this whole mother of two proposition.

My mom came to visit and kept us fed and cared for and kept Braeden from playing hide and seek with Emma. She stayed for several days and it was lovely.  I decided that after she left, I would cope with all the feeding sessions, when Braeden could potentially get into all sorts of two year old trouble, by reading to him.  (Even back then, he loved stories.)

On the morning my mom left and when it was time for me to feed Emma, I settled onto the couch and instructed Braeden to bring me a book.  He amiably selected a book and scampered to my side.  He handed me the book and then climbed onto the couch.   As he was propelling his stout legs upward, he accidentally kicked newborn Emma with one of his chunky toddler shoes.  He kicked her in the head.

Emma started screaming.

I started crying.

And then Braeden did too.

As we sat there crying together, I wondered what on earth I was thinking.  Why did I think I could handle two babies?  I in no way had what it took.

(I still feel like that sometimes.)

But the upside is that Braeden hasn't kicked Emma in the head since...and Emma's head survived.  We all survived.  So far so good.

Sigh...I miss Braeden and Emma.  Tomorrow I'll give you a Palm Desert update.  I wish they were here too.

Adam, Traveling

Welcome home signs from Emma and Mark.  (Braeden's not really a pen and paper kind of guy.) Incidentally I am glad Emma wrote her whole name.  We have so many Emmas around here that it's hard to know which one is which...

Recently Adam was on a business trip.  He had four hours+ before his flight left Louisville, KY and he was about two hours away from Louisville.  He called me and described the countryside of Indiana.  (It's very gray and brown in February apparently.  I think he is a little spoiled by green all winter.  You know, the Evergreen State.)  He told me he was going to explore for awhile.  I would have arrived at the airport early and found a quiet corner to read.  Adam instead drove down country roads, seeing what there was to see.

He called me a few hours later.  He said, "I feel panicked."  He usually has to tell me when he feels panicked because he didn't sound panicked.  He's usually quite calm unless he stubs his toe.  (Then, yikes.)  He said, "According to Google maps, I am 2 hours and 15 minutes from Louisville.  And my flight leaves in 2 hours."  He explained that he'd gotten lost on his rural Indiana expedition.

"So what are you going to do?" I asked.  I meant what are you going to do since you are going to miss your flight.

He said, "Drive really fast."

"You won't make it," I said.

"I might not," he said, which was sort of a major concession for him because, like I said, he's not an alarmist.  "Actually," he added, "I'll probably make it and then I won't learn my lesson."

I would have been hyperventilating if I'd been with him but I just told him good luck.

According to his receipt, he checked in his rental car at 6:36 p.m.

At 6:44 p.m., he called me from his seat.  On the plane, which left Louisville at 7:00 p.m.

I'm guessing he didn't learn his lesson.

But I'm glad.  Today Mark and I are joining him on another trip and who knows what adventures are in store.   I wanted to take Braeden and Emma too but they have to stay for school.  (School!  Humph! Who needs it?)  Maybe it's a good thing we're leaving them home.  Otherwise, I may not be willing to come back.  We're going to Palm Desert, CA and word on the street is, it's sunny and warm there.

Meal Planning

Technology I love:  Plan to Eat

I saved the best for last.  This is my favorite new thing.  I am a sucker for a good organizational system and this one is pretty great.  It is nice because you can sign up for a free trial (and you don't have to remember to cancel or they'll charge you, I didn't have to enter any credit card information).

First, I entered (or uploaded from the internet) my favorite recipes onto the website.

After that, I can arrange them onto a calendar by clicking and dragging.  It keeps track for me how often I've used a particular recipe.  I can narrow the recipe selection by category--main ingredient/crockpot/you name it.  It makes me giddy.

Then, it just keeps getting better.  It will generate a shopping list, even to multiple stores AND it will remember which store I usually buy which item.

I am in love.  Here's a link if you are so inclined:Plan to Eat

App Happy

Technology I love:  apps

My favorites:

TeuxDeux

This is a list makers dream.  (And I am a list maker.)

Here is a typical day:

If I decide with going to Disneyland, I don't have time to get that massage, I can drag it to a different day.  Also, if there's anything I don't accomplish, it automatically rolls over to the next day too.

Beautiful.

My very favorite feature of it though is that I have certain tasks I do every week.  For example, every Monday, I change the sheets on our bed.  After I'm done, I click on "change sheets" and drag it to the following Monday.  You would think that since I've been changing our sheets every Monday for years and years, I wouldn't need the reminder but there is something so satisfying in having a neat and tidy little list and getting rid of items on it.

Candy Heart Maker

In a nod to Valentine's Day month, I've been sending Adam candy hearts.  I think real candy hearts are nasty.  These aren't.

From this:

You get this:

It makes me happy.

We all have our favorite apps.

Adam has a NY Times primary election app that is pretty good. Among other things, it creates maps of the states and lets you know which counties voted for which candidate.  Without that app, I never would have known that Newt Gingrich won Mineral County in Nevada.  Have you ever been to Mineral County?  Our school used to play against the teams from Gabbs which is in Mineral County.  Gabbs is no longer a town because it got too small.  I now know they like Newt there, in that county with the depleting population.  (A question the NY Times primary election doesn't answer is why.) Thank you NY Times primary election app and you're welcome, readers, for giving you this cutting edge information about Mineral County, Nevada.

Emma likes weird apps like Zombie Highway.  I don't want to analyze why.

Mark is an Angry Birds kind of guy.  If you know Mark, I think that's obvious.

Braeden is my one child that isn't frequently asking me to play on my phone.  Maybe because I don't see that kid enough for him to get bored with the scintillating conversation I provide.  Why would he want to play on my phone when he could talk to me?  Am I right?

Apparently I didn't give my non-techie sisters enough credit yesterday.  They didn't know about Pinterest either.  Sorry girls.  And seriously, Marianne, programming your cell phone is not the gateway drug to other addictions.  You're just showing off that you have so many numbers memorized.

Thoughts on Pinterest

Technology I love:  Pinterest

I have the feeling that if I let it, Pinterest could take over my very life.  It is chock full of inspiration.  If I had the time/took the time, I'm sure I could find a myriad of ideas that would delight me every single day.

I just keep Pinterest more or less at bay because I don't need the distraction.

Here's why I love Pinterest though.  I love magazines.  I get ideas for books to read/what's for dinner/decorating/holidays all from magazines.  I used to tear pages out of magazines and have a pile of torn out pages to sift through.  Now I see something tear-out-worthy and look it up online and pin it.  Wonderful!

I pin ideas that seem like a good gift for someone and I pin stuff I would like for myself.  At Christmastime, I told Adam to look at my Pinterest boards for gift inspiration.

In our recent decorating of Emma's room, I pinned ideas that she or I liked.

(Alas, usually she and I didn't like the same thing at the same time but we eventually found a meeting ground...I will post pictures when the whole project is complete.  This may take awhile.)

My boards are a little anemic but I'm glad other people have boards brimming with charm to delight my senses whenever I succumb to the siren song of Pinterest.

(Are you thinking that this is insipid because everyone already knows what Pinterest is?  Well, I guarantee one of my favorite readers does not.  He's a handsome cowboy with a broken leg who still rides but has to climb on the horse using a chair.  Hi Tabor.  I love you and please be careful.)

Instead of TV

source

Technology I love:  Hulu and Netflix

The cable we pay for is the bare minimum.  Below basic.  We like to watch TV shows on Netflix.  Mark soaks up Mythbusters and America's Funniest Home Videos.  We all love Phineas and Ferb.  We pull up Keeping Up Appearances when we need a Hyacinth Bucket fix.

We also are fans of Hulu.  Besides Masterpiece Theater on PBS, I don't think I've watched a show on TV--when it was actually on--in years.  We either connect one of our laptops to the TV or just watch on the computer.  I much prefer it to conventional TV viewing.  There are fewer commercials and we can watch it when we want.  It's our poor man's version of a DVR. 

I like to watch shows while I fold laundry.  Adam and I like to catch up with "our shows" over a span of a week because we rarely have time to watch them when they're actually on TV.  I love being able to be deliberate with my viewing.

Downside:  Because we don't watch TV, I never see movie trailers or advertisements for new TV shows.  What am I missing?  What are your favorite TV shows/ upcoming movies you are looking forward to?