August 2010

This week we celebrated our fourth wedding anniversary. Hooray for us. I have to say, life is good...still :) We're really lucky, and we work hard at it...both. In any case, Liam stayed with my mom overnight while we escaped to an afternoon on Michigan avenue, a massage, a fancy dinner and hotel. As for Liam, I missed him... a little :).
I am not sure who wore who out though, Liam or my mom. Liam got cranky early this evening and sweetly requested to go "up, up!" (his bed is upstairs and he decided he'd like to go to bed an hour and a half early this evening!) My mom mean while is out celebrating her high school reunion. Maybe Jon and I need to take some tips on how to wear out our toddler.

Otherwise, our house has settled into a rhythm that is quite lovely. We've recently renewed our commitment to home cooking. Jon has been all too happy to support that commitment with some really wonderful grilling. When we moved he got a new grill and he's really enjoyed this "grilling season" (aka summer) mastering his grill. As a special indulgence we also became proud owners of an ice cream machine and we are churning out summer favorites like strawberry and peach ice cream as well as a few sorbets. YUM! I'm also a proud gardener this summer and have grown some lovely tomatoes and lots of basil. Past attempts at basil resulted in.... embarrassment - despite the fact that it is pretty much the easiest thing to grow. Hooray for second chances and plenty of rain this summer :). Liam has really enjoyed watering the plants. Though the other morning my mom reported that he was feeding the tomato plants cheerios.

We are again enjoying Saturday morning trips to the farmers markets. One farmers market is very close to the Lincoln Park zoo and we popped over to show Liam the gorillas, which I especially love. I got him up to the glass and happily several of the gorillas were very close. I was so excited to see Liam's reaction. He however, promptly turned 180 degrees and stood staring carefully at all the people as they looked in at the gorilla. Hhrumf. Should I have been surprised that he had his own plan...really?



(Further evidence in the attached photographs of Liam going his own way.... eating paint. (Don't worry is completely safe, but lesson learned by me about stepping away to take a photo. )