THESE are “those days”

Do you ever say “ah, those were the days!” ?  I do, and I’m only 24. I had a thought this week: some day we’ll look back on NOW and say “ah, those were the days!” So these days ARE those days. Have I lost you yet? Here are some of the recent happenings that led me to think so… philosophically:

1. While I was making dinner the other night, I heard happy squeals and music coming from the family room. I peeked in and  found Jeff and Jay dancing up a storm to random music channels on cable TV! It was so cute and hilarious. [Side note:—why we now have cable: when we switched our Charter internet and phone service over to our new home, they had a deal running that was cheaper than our current service, but included basic cable. Who can argue with a lower bill? We don’t really watch much TV, but then Jeff discovered that there are a ton of music channels. Perfect for dancing!]

2. This week, we visited our new closest-to-home park twice. I love going to the park with my kids.

We have new territory to explore…

…new slides to slide…

…new ladders to climb…

…peek!…

…new swings to swing…

…and a new view for Rose. This park has shade in the right places and BENCHES in that shade. Perfect for Jay’s observing fan club. But Jay prefers it when Rose and I play with him, so we 3 all went down the slide together once or twice, and I got a friction burn on my elbow. We like our park.

3. Jeff has a job interview for a French teaching position at Sunnyside High school this coming week! When he got off the phone with the guy and told us the news, we all shouted and skipped around the apartment. Jay loved it. (he still re-enacts our celebration—supercute). Jeff also found out that he passed the French Praxis on the same day that he scheduled that interview. So we had double the dancing and shouting for joy. It was/is completely awesome to feel…excited and hopeful about the job-future again!

4. I adore Rose’s arm rolls. They are tasty. I don’t adore the stinky milkscum that gets stuck in her neck roll. No matter what, she always seems to have a smelly neck.

5. Look at her CHOW down on that toy! She has been grabbing and biting anything in reach this week. The reason for all this bite-y bite-y, drooly behavior became clear on Thursday: Rose’s first TOOTH poked through! It was her left bottom front tooth. The night that The Tooth was working its way out into the open, Rose awoke twice in tears. Teething is no picnic. For any of us. Now she’s working on Tooth #2. [Side note: That thing on the side of her gums that I thought was a tooth 2 weeks ago turned out to just be a harmless mouth-cyst that el Dr. said should disappear on its own]

6. Jay likes to read in bed. I’ll read him a story before naptime or bedtime, and the hand it over to him and he often falls asleep “reading.” He must be my son! Jay also is really in to: climbing everything, naming the color of every thing he sees and counting up to four, with a few “sebens,” nines, and tens thrown in there every now and then.

7. Since Jeff has been working at summer school in Prosser (about 15 minutes away) from 7:15am to 3:30 pm each day, my vehicle has become the Truck (aka the double stroller). Can you see it parked outside our front door? Sometimes I just chain it to that little railing there for easy access. The kids and I have adventures-a-plenty with that thing. We go to the grocery store. We go to the park. We visit Steph (Jay’s beloved Auntie-dear). We went around the high school track a few times with it one day this week. I even walked  through the bank drive-in with the stroller one morning. It was fun but kind of awkward because I was too tall for the window so I had to bend over to see in.

Another day I crammed our laundry under the stroller and went to the Whites’ house to wash it (they kindly let us do laundry there now that we have to PAY $1.25 to wash and $1.00 to dry our laundry in the basement of our apartment). This stroller rocks.

[pardon the recycled picture—a recycled picture is better than no picture to break up all these WORDS] Last week the stroller’s front wheel wobbled a TON and eventually fell off during my run one day. A nice but rather strange man stopped to help me put it back on. We later figured out that the plastic part of the wheel got warped when we put the new thorn-resistant tire tubes on. So it wobbles when you go faster than a walk. So yesterday I put our single stroller’s front wheel onto the double stroller! Problem solved.

8. On Thursday, I did my homemade “post-baby fitness test” at the high school track. No, this picture is NOT the Grandview High School’s track. The Grandview track is more like a ring of eroded black asphalt. I don’t have a picture of it. I got a Google image of a pretty track for your viewing pleasure. Anyways, I took Jay and Rose over to the track on Thursday morning, laid Rose on a blanket, and turned Jay loose on the infield. He roamed, ran, and explored while I did my little “fitness test.” I ran 1 mile in 6:35, an 800 in 3:09, and a 400 in 1:30. I was pleased. The mile was 22 seconds faster than the last time I did my fitness test 2 months ago. Jay did run right out  in front of me, and I had to put on the brakes to avoid trampling him. So my mile probably could’ve been a few seconds faster. Oh well, at least Jay survived!

I love how GOOD it feels to RUN when I’m in shape! I’m not all the way where I plan to be yet, but running has been getting better and better over the past few weeks. This morning I went on a peaceful 7.5-mile run through the scenic fruit fields (well, it was mostly peaceful—I did get chased by a snarling pack of dogs two different times). Minus the dogs, long Saturday morning runs are THERAPEUTIC. As one of my favorite authors said, “I loved the wind across my cheeks, through my hair. Running aired out my soul. It made me feel alive.” (Wendelin Van Draanen, The Running Dream—a book I highly recommend, by the way). So true!

9. My cabbage patch baby Rose. No explanation necessary. LOVE her.

10a. In a moment of weakness (or a moment of genius?), I got a 4-lb box of strawberries at Costco this week. YUM strawberries ‘n cream oatmeal!!! The best part: you don’t even need to sweeten the oatmeal if you have a little sugar mixed in with the cut up berries. Healthy food makes me feel GOOD.

10b. Who need jam? PB-fresh strawberry-wich. I just sprinkle a little bit of sugar onto the strawberries and mmmm it transforms boring ole PBJ to gourmet. Ah, the bounty of summertime.

11. Bills Berry Farm. But you’ll have to wait for more on that because this post is already too long and I need to go change a diaper and make dinner.

hasta la vista