Reed's Birthday Week

We started the week off with Sunday dinner at Heather's house, in honor of Reed's birthday. We always love visiting her in Palo Alto. Look who was hoping for a piece of London broil:

Reed and I have been trying to go on walks in the evenings.  He has even been waking up and going into work earlier so that he can be home for dinner at a good hour, with plenty of time for a family walk afterwards. I really appreciate how seriously he takes his role as a husband and father. He is always willing to do whatever it takes to be there for all three of us, and it makes a huge difference to our family.

On this particular night, we wore the boys completely out!

Tuesday, I took the kids to our weekly park day. I send an email out weekly to all the young moms in our congregation, and we meet up and let the kids play while we talk with other adults. Cal has been practicing his pedal bike, and is getting really confident. The one thing he has yet to master is starting on his own; I ended up chasing him all over the park so I could launch him on his way every time he stopped. His friend E.J. (3-years-old) was really excited that Cal had a Lightning McQueen bike, and in his excitement, kept accidentally riding straight into Cal's trajectory. He'd yell, "Lightning McQueeeeeeeeen" and zoom right into Cal, who was, by then, also screaming. Nonstop comedy.

Even with the dive bombs, Cal was very good to his little friend, who followed him around the entire morning on his own red bike.

Tuesday night, Reed and I continued our semiannual "fancy feast" tradition at the Plumed Horse. We'd been once before, a few years ago, on Valentine's Day, and didn't have the best experience. We decided to give it another try, and we're so glad we did. This time, the food (and our experience) was fantastic. I tried abalone and antelope, and we both enjoyed copious offerings of amuse bouche from the chef (he was apparently in a very good mood that night). They even brought Reed his own supernova dessert with a candle for his birthday.

It was a great evening. I'm so glad this wonderful man was born.

We continue to enjoy our stay-at-home summer. Wednesday, we had an ice-cream social at our friend's house in the afternoon. The look on Cal's face can probably tell you how he felt about it:

Cal and his buddies enjoying their ice cream:

Cal picked out Reed's birthday present this year, and when it arrived, he begged to play it all day. Reed, good dad that he is, got Robot Rally all set up, and played through it with Cal.

Friday was miniature golfing with friends. This little golf course has been very good to us this year!

We partied nonstop this weekend. It was the first time we've left Elliot with a babysitter, and it went really well. We went out on a date (to see Guardians of the Galaxy--loved it!) Friday night, and then went to a Clue-themed housewarming party on Saturday night. I went as the maid, and Reed was Mr. Green. It was a hoot and a half. We laughed ourselves silly!

The baby did great with sitters both nights. Looks like a lot of date nights are in our near future!

Shots. Ouch. :(

Welp, I've done it. I looked the four-year-old vaccine schedule in the eye and conquered it. Well…maybe "conquered" isn't the right word. "Submitted to" and "lived through" might be more appropriate. I have always tried to tell Cal the truth about things like shots, because it's really important to me that he trust me, so when we went to the pediatrician's office and he asked me, "Is she going to give me a shot?" I bit my lip and answered truthfully, "Yes."

I feel strongly about being honest with him, but getting shots was a really hard ordeal for the both of us. I had to hold him so he didn't wiggle, and he cried and cried; the poor thing got 4 shots that day -- two in each arm. If there was any way I could've gotten the shots in his place, I would've. It's hard to see your kids go through that, but I really believe immunizations are crucial.

After he calmed down (which was not a brief period of time), we went to get his hearing and vision checked, which was adorable and hilarious. Here are a few shots from that little experiment. 

After even more time recovering and asking the nurses questions, we finally left the hospital, and headed to Kara's cupcakes for a good-job-getting-shots treat. (Incidentally, Cal got a LOT of treats that day. I started making a lot of promises when the needles came in on that nurse's tray!)

The little guy deserved the treats. His arms were very sore for nearly four days, and I kept accidentally taking him by the shoulder or lifting him up to the counter or into his carseat by his forearms. He'd give this desperate squeal of pain and then start crying. I felt terrible every time! :(

It was definitely a difficult week for the two of us, but we made it through, and I'm proud of us both!

Dentist Visit

Cal had his first dentist visit this week! Look how excited he is to be in the fancy chair!

I know we should have taken him to the dentist before now, but for various reasons (including Cal all but welding his mouth shut when we've attempted a dental visit before) his first checkup was this month. 

He's old enough to understand when I tell him that dentist visits don't hurt. We've also been working on trust since he was little -- never lying or hiding things from him, even if I know he won't like the consequences -- so he believed me when I explained all about the dentist this time.

 Cal was so good. I was very proud of how well behaved he was for the dentist. It helped that they had a TV with cartoons playing in front of his chair!

 Here he is getting his x-rays. He was so interested to see the images when they showed up on the computer screen.

I was so please with him, I took him to the toy store and got him a new train track piece for his set. Now he keeps asking when we'll go to the dentist again. At least he's not scared, right? I'm so proud of my big boy.

Best Sick Day Ever

Cal and I are sick. 

As in, I've had a fever for 60 hours now. We're over the worst of it--feeling better, but not better. My coughing fits sound like an old engine trying to turn over, and I can safely ascribe about 99% of my "recovery" so far to Tylenol, Unisom, and diet coke.

I've felt emotionally sick the past day or so, too. Discouraged, I think. Regardless, in the midst of our sick week, I decided that even though we could not be around people for fear of spreading our own personal plague, we could have a better kind of sick day.

Thirty minutes later, we were a mile or so up Hwy 1 from Davenport.

There's a reason this is one of my favorite beaches. It was 75 degrees there today. Not a soul in sight.

"Cow deeg!" (Cal dig!)

 I love big bubble wands. After a few minutes of letting the wind blow the bubbles while I sat there, I noticed that the bubbles were floating all the way over that far hill. Wouldn't it be fun to be on the other side, seeing a bunch of jumbo bubbles float randomly over the top? :)

 Cal had his rash guard on, but we weren't planning on swimming today. He just stared at the waves for minutes at a time, totally hypnotized.

 And what's not hypnotizing about this? (Cal took this photo on our camera. He loves to take "peekchas".)

 We found a little eddy a ways down the beach and decided to explore a bit.

 The only footprints on the beach today.

Splashing around in a tiny current flowing out to the ocean.

A few things we thought were interesting:

We had a quick picnic lunch while Cal warmed up from so much splashing. On California's coast, the Pacific Ocean is cold!

 Look at Cal's little red nose.

After that, we packed up our sand toys and drove just down the road to another of my favorite places:

 Swanton Organic U-Pick Berry Farm! 

 (And yes, they really are that red. No color adjustments here! Just Mother Nature.)

 With his green outfit and bright red pail, Cal fit right in with the berries.

 Don't you just want to sink your teeth into those beauties?

Cal was very proud of his harvest. He found the pick surprisingly hard, yelling out "Mama, tuck!" (stuck) every time he tried to pluck a berry off its stem. I'm not sure he got the concept that our produce originally comes attached to a plant...

 Back at the store, we weighed Cal's cache: .35 pounds, not including the bucket. 

 That'll be $1.23, please.

We rounded out our purchase (in a store that is run on a hippie-ish honor code system) with baked goods, and headed to our warm, sandy car to start the drive home.

The coastline makes for good medicine.

Adventures at the Asian Market

One interesting thing about where we live is that there are a lot of Asian markets. We have one just down the street from us, but I had never been before today. What piqued my interest was its reputation for inexpensive, high-quality produce. I was not disappointed!

 Cal and I bought 2 shells of strawberries, oranges, fuji apples, asparagus, broccoli, sugar snap peas, bananas, bell peppers, cilantro, kiwis, kale, and spinach for $17!  Just look at all this healthy spread:

I'm excited to try adding a little kale to our green smoothies. Hopefully it turns me into a superhuman.

Oh, and one other fun thing about the Market: the tanks of live sea creatures! Cal was mesmerized!

I'm glad I took the time to check the place out -- we'll definitely be frequenting the produce section.