March :: Like a Lion!

3 eggs a day from our hens

Spring just crept up on me and I'm not sure I like it.  Our winter storms hit us around the end of December and we haven't really had a storm since.  I love a good rain storm, local flooding and spending all day inside drinking tea and watching movies.

Loving the new app Over on my iPhone - let's me quickly add captions to my photos

Grady was sick and missed a few days at the end of the school week.  Of course, he kept himself busy reading his dwindling stack of library books.  He also worked on his illustrated casa project for Spanish class for hours on end in his art studio while listening to hours and hours of Harry Potter on CD.  After four days at home, he was ready to get back to school.

Temperatures reached 76 degrees last week and I prepped my garden bed at the office.  I planted radishes, carrots & beets.  It felt good to be out in the warm sunshine and digging my hands in the dirt.  I came home to find our field dotted with dozens of yellow daffodils.  And as much as I'm sad winter is coming to an end, I'm slowly coming around to spring.  Everything is blooming and I can't help but like it.

Tomales Elementary School's inaugural chess club 2013

We had our last Chess Club meeting this week and all 16 students showed up.  They signed the sweetest note to the instructor and were genuinely enthusiastic about all they had learned.  There is a chess tournament in May and I think the boy wants to give it a whirl.

Signs of Spring in Valley Ford

We're gearing up for a trip to Arizona for spring training.  Steve & Grady have tickets to see the Dodgers play, as well as the A's.  I think this will be a great opportunity for them to bond over baseball and I'll get a little time to bond by the hotel pool with a good book.  A win-win for all of us.

Speaking of winning, Grady's 4th grade CYO basketball team are now league champions!  It was a fantastic game and came down to the final seconds until we secured a 20-19 point victory.  This team was comprised of 2nd, 3rd and 4th grade boys (the only one in the league with such a young group) and they played their little boy hearts out.

Steve kept score every game this season and I was cheer leading from the bleachers.  I'm happy they won, but I'm more happy to have our Monday and Wednesday nights back as a family.  The weekends are free, as well, for now.  More neck jewelry for Grady with this awesome medal.

I've been inspired in the kitchen this winter.  I've been reading some great cookbooks, pulling inspiration from magazines and trying it out on the guys.  They are always up for whatever I'm cooking and that just motivates me all the more.  We have been eating lots of fish tacos, homemade pinto beans, braised ribs, cherry pies, coffee cake, pizza and lots of eggs.  

I went out to our mint patch to grab a handful and found one of our hens had a secret laying spot nestled into the corner of the mint bed.  Twenty-two eggs!  I let Grady smash them into the compost bin and crossed my fingers that the hens were done laying there.  

Saturday afternoon we went to the McLean Homestead in Two Rock for an art show and walked into another world.  Beautiful metal spheres dotted the landscape (some filled with roaring fires) as we made our way to the dilapidated former chicken house, wherein we found barbed wire sculptures and massive pastel portraits, both mediums by Jennifer Pulchinski (she had me sit for her in early January and I can't wait to see my portrait.  Her stuff is amazing!).  There were dozens of mechanical robots, a light tower and a pretty wild group of people.  Jason McLean is a sculptor and tinkerer and his tools, shops and materials captivated my husband.  Grady ran around looking at all of the gypsy wagons and forts that their little girl, Xenia, had access to and thought it was the coolest.  It was.  It is.

The vibe was Burning Man-esque and we weren't staying for the band and performance art, which was going to be Farmer Anna (the one who wrung my rooster's neck on xmas eve - yes, her!) playing Jolene by Dolly Parton on the upright piano.  The kicker was that someone was going to set it on fire while she played that song.  God, how I wanted to stay and see that performance!

More Grady stuff:

G is officially a tween.  He says things like Totes, OMG!, TMI and LOL.  He thinks it's hilarious that I make a big deal about this.  He's even making up his own silly acronyms like ISHICB!, which means I'm So Happy I Could Barf!  Cute, eh?

9 and 11/12 years old

I can't get this outfit off of his body.  It's his uniform as of late - ripped up converse high tops, some non-descript grey or blue shirt, turquoise hoodie, camouflage pants and his LA Dodgers hat.  Every. Single. Day.   I'm over it and by the look on his face...he's over me, too.

We spent Dr. Seuss's birthday at the Rohnert Park Library and their courtyard was exploding with plum blossoms.  The trees just outside our kitchen window are bursting with tiny white blooms.  Spring has sprung in Valley Ford.

I've been dabbling in watercolors lately.  I'm finding it really relaxing to cut up watercolor paper, get out my favorite vintage paints I scored from a flea market and just start painting.  I'm sticking to simple, familiar forms like hearts, circles, birds and messy paint splatters.  It's the one thing that has been making me really happy these days creatively.

This entire post sums up in photos and words the last week of our lives.  So much happens in a week and sometimes I'm dumbfounded at all that we fit in.

Grady thinks I take too many pictures, but I don't want to forget this time in my life, our lives, so I'll just keep snapping away.  I love coming here to this space to slap it all down, relive it with my writing and hit publish.

These days are fleeting and I know that now more than ever.