Wow. How long's it been? Let's go check.... well, not as long as I thought. I think. he.
What have I been doing? You know, for the life of me I don't even remember. I think it's that lethal combo of child-rearing and laundry and dishes and well, summer in general.
Evan did get the Square Foot Garden (which I will from this point forward refer to as the SFG as it should be) finished and I then got the garden planted THE very next day. If you are not familiar with the SFG method, you should check out "The All New Square Foot Garden" by Mel Batholomew - just get it from your library or the inter-library loan system. That's what I did, and I loved it so instantly and so thoroughly that I used my swagbucks to get a copy sent to myself immediately from Amazon. Wow. It's so SIMPLE yet so complete and revolutionary. It's easy to start, easy to follow, and I am already so excited!
The signs of spring and soon to be summer are all around! I am really enjoying the new D3000 and the lenses, and am getting some cool pictures of the kids and also some nature here and there. We enjoy time at each set of grandparents, and some of these photos were taken on the farms.
Some days we get pretty ambitions and do things like making double batches of delicious crunchy coleslaw (Ardyn loves to crunch up the ramen noodles in the ziploc) and Ardyn also recently painted a birdhouse and helped me to make Recycled Bugs (from Milk Jugs) similar to (better than?!) those featured on the recent cover of Family Fun Magazine. We put them in the SFG, and they are adorable, except after the first rain the googley eyes slid right off, because I guess Tacky glue is not water resistant :( Oh well. Next we will have to repair them with super glue or hot glue. They are too stinkin cute!
We've really had a great time getting together with friends at the park and for playdates at different houses. 
There have been lots of great moments and funny "caught on camera" moments... lots of swimming and cozy coupes and sidewalk chalk (more eaten than written with!) and it's only mid-June!
I was pretty impressed this past week, we had a rainy day and it cooled off considerably, so we opened up the house and Ardyn and I baked Tollhouse Cookies. I used a modified recipe, decreasing the sugar and increasing the bown sugar... which makes for a moister and chewier cookies. They are DELICIOUS! So awesome in fact that I have practically eaten a dozen a day. Uh-oh! What was great? Watching Ardyn chop walnuts with an antique chopper like the one we used to "help" my mom with. She was SO excited to chop, but even more excited to stir in the chips and walnuts, and scoop the cookies onto the baking sheet. We used the opportunity to discuss how many cookies we would put on the sheet, and she learned what "a dozen" is. What really floored me? When I asked her to count the cookies, she counted to 13 without even flinching. When did she learn 11, 12, and 13? Something on TV I bet... Dora usually doesn't count that high... but Ardyn learned it somewhere! A Baker's Dozen!
Poor Marek. Right before we went camping (another post altogether!) he had this screaming fit that we unexpectedly tracked to a poopy diaper. And this poopy diaper was like no other poopy diaper.... well, except that it was EXACTLY identical to Ardyn's "allergic reaction to dairy" diapers. I was floored. Complete with burning red bottom that was instantly cracked and bleeding, and a rash that still hasn't completely cleared up- and that happened 15 days ago. He had several diapers that would incite immediate murderous screams... and then he officially went from a "once a day" very solid pooper, to a SEVERAL times a day, very loose diaper, red sore bottom pooper. And it hasn't let up yet. It's gone through several phases, but it still isn't right.This spring and summer he has had a real issue with drinking standing water. Seriously, I knew that it wasn't GOOD but that kid can find water in the most unexpected places, like the plug in the base of the little tykes basketball hoop... the lid to the sandbox, that compartment in the back of the cozy coupe.... It got so bad that as I was running around the yard emptying all the water, he was running around drinking what he could get to behind my back. It was futile, so I started taking pictures. Over a couple of months, I got quite a few. Between shoving every stick, rock, leaf, and clump of dirt in his mouth, and drinking every bit of water he could find... I just figured it was a boy thing and that I was wasting my time trying to prevent it. My mom, however, made it clear that it was dangerous, that he could get salmonella or eColi, and that I should be parenting instead of taking pictures. Ah. Moms. So... when the whole diarrhea started, I worried that he had something... and the nurses at the pediatrician's office confirmed my worries by giving me an order for stool samples (x3) and specimen jars, and I quote "I am positive that he has some type of parasite. You can not drink standing water without getting something." So. Mom starts to feel like a terrible parent (but still a good photographer, thank GOODNESS!) and starts
Get that Kid a DRINK!!!! So next we will take him back to the allergist to see if we can have him tested for more things (food) that he could possibly be allergic to. I don't want him to have an allergy, but 15 days of unexplained diaper rash and diarrhea that is EXACTLY like Ardyn's has me worried!
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