First week of summer

So much to write about, so little time!

Joel is all about kicking his strong little legs. He does it when he's happy, when he's excited, when something is funny, and when he's tired. It already cracked us up, but then tonight he was sitting in his new jumper that I put together this week (go me!), and he did it standing up. When you combine those crazy legs with his intense stare of concentration and cartoonish classical music, you get full-blown hysterical. I thought I was going to lose my dinner I was laughing so hard. He had his six-month checkup last week. He's 21 pounds even and 28-1/2" long. The directions for the jumper say the baby can't be more than 30" tall, but I think he'll hit that well before he turns a year old. They don't make baby stuff for plus-size babies. Discrimination!

While at my gyn. office, I got really sad thinking about the fact that I will never be pregnant again. I know it's just plain greedy after receiving these two gifts, but I just can't help it. If we'd gotten started sooner I probably would have wanted at least one more, maybe even more. But I'm not quite crazy enough to act on this. My almost-43-year-old body probably couldn't take another one, to say nothing of the risks at our age and with our history. Sigh.

On to happier subjects! Gabriel has taken to peeing in the potty like a duck to water. He's letting us know when he has to go, stays dry all day, and he's gone at several places besides home and been totally comfortable doing it. I'm blown away by how great he's doing. We'll work on the other area. Bribes really seem to work with him, and he really wants us to get Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer for him to watch (he found my old Rudolph book in a big box the other day and hasn't stopped talking about it).

Gabriel and I had a mid-week zoo trip, and the weather was surprisingly pleasant. It was supposed to rain that morning, and the temperature was around 85 or so. We explored the new Museum of Living Art (the new herpetarium), and it is truly incredible. The funniest thing that happened was in the Bug and Spider Room. Gabriel had been oohing and aahing at all sorts of snakes and lizards up to that point with no fear whatsoever. But when he got a look at the tarantula, he said, "Put me down. Put me down. I don't wike it." He ran in to tell me while I was making lunch yesterday that there was a tarantula in Joel's room. It was a little black spider no bigger than a nickel. Anyway, we also rode the carousel (which I'm wondering if it's the original one we used to ride as kids) and found the rather cheesy petting zoo, with one guinea hog, seven chickens and two goats to pet. We also found the penguin house and the kangaroos. We only stayed an hour and 45 min. and had a fantastic time. The only complaint I have about the herpetarium is that they got rid of the aquarium and the sea lions, which were always really fun to see. I also loved that big underwater room you could go down into and see all the fish swimming around. They have several see-through walls with fish and turtles, and even huge crocodiles, though, to make up for it. The komodo dragon exhibit is really cool too.

And I am working on the project of cleaning/fixing up our back porch. I figure we are going to spend tons of time out there this summer and I want to make it more inviting. We need to clean up Gabriel toys and get a "toy box" (heavy duty plastic box) to put them in. I want to add several units of storage drawers to put things like bug spray, suntan oil, and all the things I'm constantly running back inside to grab. We're getting Jav a small charcoal grill for Father's Day, which he already knows about because I had asked for it for my birthday but he really wanted one too. We are eventually going to get a wheelbarrow cover or tarp so that we can get it off the porch and I can store my potting soil, mulch, etc.. in it. We need to get some lawn chair covers too and get them off the porch. We only have two chairs with our table right now and I'd like to add two more. I want some pillows for the porch swing, some funky lights to hang, and some citronella candles and tiki torches to combat the mosquitos. And finally (this is down the road, at least next year), it would be cool to get a small dorm room refrigerator to have cold drinks available out there (another thing I'm constantly going back inside to get).

This will take all summer to get it right and spread out the costs, but I will be patient. We got the toy box today, so I'll start by cleaning up Gabriel's toys tomorrow and getting them stored away. I love getting organized!