quick little update from camp...

...three of the four triangle members are on a grand adventure in texas and having a blast! gus is at camp and i swiped some images from their website of my biggest boy--more posts to follow (eventually).

gus and his gopher cabinmates (he's in the orange hat on the right)

run, gus!

gopher pride

the taming of the swamp, part three

a pair of most venerated rat zappers, which let us down a bit this week (only seven dead chipmunks in the trash, damnit)--bringing the grand total to 19 this spring

have you been thinking about the swamp? lord knows i have--it's damn near consumed me since it has been warm enough to work outside, and work i have certainly done. i try to get out there as soon as i get sophie settled at school and work nonstop until i have to pick her up, then go back out again until i have to make dinner. admittedly, we've had some pretty crummy meals recently...however my generous neighbor marge estimates i've done 10 years of work outside in 10 months! i know it's an exaggeration, but i'll totally take the compliment.

so, to recap: we bought a house, with a swamp, which i managed to convince the city to drain. yay me! even though we did have to install a whole-house dehumidifier to live here comfortably, things are markedly improved from last year. now to recap, pictorially:
this is what we started with...

...this is after the drain addition...

...and this is a reverse view of the above, where we are today!

i've made serious progress on the swamp. i think i actually have to stop calling it that now.

in the back: a reconstruction of the unfinished deck, complete with a long-lusted for japanese maple "bloodgood"

off the driveway: a hand-built (by me!) limestone raised bed for annuals, made with stone dug up in the back of the house. it is beautifully patinated.

front driveway corner: flowering almond, purple leaf western sand cherry, ratibida (mexican hat), nepeta (catmint), penstemon "husker red" and blue alliums

further down: gaillardia (blanket flower), blue salvia, tons of narcissus bulbs, eupatorium (chocolate joe pye weed), baptisia (false indigo), hard-necked garlic (which i definitely put in the wrong place), and a few orange border carpet lillies poking out in the back

same sidewalk, view from other direction: lots of baby stachys (woolly lamb's ear), black-eyed susans, penstemon "chocolate drop," blue-eyed grass, white echinacea (coneflower), purple echinacea (also coneflower), coreopsis and snowmound spirea

it is starting to come together, aided by the new coat of paint on everything (dig that red garage!)

other side of driveway: flagstone path around an old hackberry for sophie (leading to a tree stump) with spiderwort and toad lily

more toad lily and very long-lasting narcissus leaves, with vinca minor and heuchera in the background

to summarize: drain. work. good. the weed barrier will have to stay up until next year, as i just can't figure out what to do on that slope (it is REALLY steep)

see that property line marker and the frightening amount of overgrowth behind it (which looks remarkably familiar)? guess what i've got my eye on...

updates to come.

gus ROCKS his last day of school...

...by sporting an absolutely kick-ass new 'do!

before

after

could this kid get any cooler? bring on summer!

dead things in the trash this week: 10

seriously, 10--all chipmunks! i frickin' LOVE our rat zappers. we are so infested with chipmunks that it's either them or us at this point--those little fuckers are making our house slide down the hill and into the ravine (i guess i have to stop calling it a swamp) out front. you know, they're all cute and chip 'n dale-like at first, but now all i see are thousands of dollars of structural damage scampering throughout my garden. and i'm off for more D-cell batteries right now...

happy memorial day!

we had a lovely memorial day today--rich was off, the kids were home, and i think we actually took full advantage of the holiday. we gardened, we bike rode, we picnicked, we swum, we didn't barbeque but we had breakfast for dinner and we were so full from it that we had to take a rain check on the traditional dairy queen run.

today we even added a new configuration to our bike riding matrix: we've already got two tandems that can hold rich/missy, rich/gus and missy/gus, plus a trailer bike for sophie that can be attached to either a tandem or a regular bike (hence rich/missy/sophie, rich/gus/sophie and missy/gus/sophie possibilities plus rich or missy or gus slash sophie options)...but now there's yet another component...

happy girl...but what is rich attaching to sophie's trailer bike?

could it be...?

it's a trailer for paco!

happy rich, sophie and paco

a bunny turns 4...twice!

birthday bunny!

sophie is FOUR!!! we have celebrated her birthday for a week and a half here in the triangle, and i think it is fair to say that she is fully partied out now. first, we had her party at school--her teacher is fantastic about making the birthday kid feel tremendously special, so much so that sophie opted to stay for nap time. she got to be line leader, do show-n-tell (she brought her stuffed coyote and us--including gus), did snack (green cupcakes with chocolate icing and rainbow sprinkles), then all her friends colored birthday cards for her. she also got to lead the class in a sing-a-long song about the earth moving around the sun four times, representing her four years on earth:

she even carried a little papier-mache globe around a felt sun

and blew out candles on a little cake in the end

birthday girl with her birthday loot from school

that evening (and a couple of others), sophie opened presents and made some fabulous art with gus:

sophie loves books...

...and beads...

...and painting with gus


and then, finally, this weekend, the main thing that she'd been waiting oh-so-patiently for, the coup de grace, the PARTAY of PARTAYS: her birthday party at the iowa gym nest!!!

sophie takes a flying leap into the foam pit of destiny

gus, in a blur of flowing blonde hair, takes his own flying leap...

...and can only watch in awe of the spider-monkeyesque 4-year olds

rich managed to take full advantage of the gym nest's facilities--i need to sign him up for an adult class

(i jumped a little, too)

rich actually climbed this massively high/long rope to the ceiling

then gus' friend, gabe, developed the perfect game which basically involved him throwing whatever item he could find--foam blocks, balls, water bottles, small children--at rich while he was bouncing on the trampoline. amazingly, the gym nest people didn't seem to mind.

sophie wonders if she, too, will be this exhausted by the foam pit when she's 10

like father...

...like daughter--sophie absolutely flung herself into a flip, with NO hesitation, the first time she ran down this trampoline thing (and after she saw rich do it)

singing "happy birthday" to a girl, one last time

cake for sweaty kiddos

sophie, finally satisfied with her birthday celebrations, is clearly thinking of next year's festivities already

back from a quick trip to ABQ

this is the only picture i shot in albuquerque. it's kinda the only one needed, though.

i took a very quick trip to albuquerque last weekend to say goodbye to my dear friend, cindy, who is leaving for phoenix in just a handful of days. she is part of the reason my time in new mexico was so wonderful; i will miss knowing she is there (even though i can't be), and she's moving on for the same reason i did--her husband left medicine in new mexico for a much better practice in arizona. it's a shame that neither of our families could make it work there, as there was no lack of love for new mexico on any of our parts. but so it goes--we for IA, they for AZ. it'll be a new place to visit them.

the other reason for my trip was to check on our house, which is fully in the hands of our very capable and generous tenants now. it's not my house anymore--it's their house (for now)--and it no longer feels like my home. that was a sad realization. but the most surprising part of the trip was the return to iowa city...and i realized i wasn't sad to be here. and while not being sad isn't the same as being happy, i know it's at the very least a step in the right direction. however, that step certainly took its bloody time in coming...

dr. k and the kiddos

aaaahhhh! rabid gus!

gus and sophie have a fabulous pediatric dentist, dr. mike kanellis, who bravely tackled both of my children in one. grueling. appointment. slot.

i think it took like three techs to get us out the door.

sophie let the hygienist do her thing...

...but she decided dr. k needed to be more thoroughly watched

...please don't bite him...please don't bite him...please don't bite him....

gus is nothing if not a good sport at the dentist--sadly, he's had a lotta practice at it (he definitely got my teeth)

one week to sophie's 4th birthday

...and now you've been properly warned. she wants nothing but chocolate--chocolate cupcakes with chocolate icing (and blue sprinkles), hot chocolate with pink marshmallows, and chocolate milk with extra chocolate syrup. if i could figure out how to make a chocolate salad with cocoa-encrusted chicken, she'd probably want that, too. maybe i should google it.

i see a very ADHD day in her/my future.

pretty, pretty ladies

lindsay and nancy at amy's wedding.

this shot makes me tremendously happy!