Baby Girl Loves Berries

We visited Kat and Sam in North Carolina over Memorial Day. Saturday we went out for some Strawberry Picking. I can't say Lydia was a big help, but she LOVED the berries. 

 

This week a friend of mine went berry picking while I watched her kids. She brought us berries as payment, and again, Lydia was in heaven!

Off to St. Louis

Two weekends later, Andrew organized a TEDxYouth-Baltimore event. So Lydia went to visit our dear friend Sara Alsup in St. Louis. We stayed with Sara at her Aunt Nancy's, and were totally spoiled throughout our entire visit!! I definitely see a pattern in the way I make friends, you must like to cook really good food. And preferably, you should really like to cook that really good for ME. Sara and Nancy were no disappointment. They really like to spoil people. And boy, were we spoiled. 

On our way!

 Lydia was a trooper on our flights. She's getting to be quite the little flyer. :)

 Sara took us to a great little part of St. Louis, where we walked, and window shopped and ate at a great little cafe. We also stopped at a Letter Press workshop that did some pretty cool work. Lydia and I both tried out their mustaches. 

 Lydia has gotten big enough that she can ride in her stroller like a big girl! I think she still prefers the car seat, because she can see me, but sometimes it's nice to have a change of scenery. 

 Cute cafe we stopped for chocolate peanut butter bars and hot cocoa. 

 Forest Park. Always lovely. 

 There was a Christmas Miracle that took place on Saturday! We had been out running errands, and I put my phone on the bumper while I put the stroller in the trunk. I forgot about it, and I couldn't find it when I got into the car, but figured it was somewhere in the diaper bag. Little did I know!! When we got back to Aunt Nancy's (where we were staying) look what I found!! Amazing that it stayed on the bumper for more than 5 miles of driving. Phew!

 Sunday we visited the Botanical Gardens: so beautiful! We loved the Japanese gardens (which are NOT pictured) and were so glad that we took the time to go visit. Perfect Sunday afternoon.

Meanwhile, Andrew worked hard at home. :)

Sweet Afternoon

Quilt top beginnings

Off to bind my quilt.

I just got home from such a lovely afternoon. I got together with a group of moms of a list serve I'm part of. I've never met any of them, we just are all moms in the Baltimore area with similar attachment parenting ideas. Today we all got together for a sewing circle (well, most of them were knitting or crocheting, I was the only one sewing) where we ate really delicious food, and told our birth stories. It was therapy for my soul.

Addendum: Emma asked a good question. More information on attachment parenting can be found here. I can't say that I follow or agree with all the attachment parenting styles, but I think for me it's just a way of parenting that makes sense. I nurse Lydia. I wear her a few hours a day. Some people co-sleep. For most people in Baltimore, it's not the norm. For a lot of my blog readers, it's probably is more the norm.

First swim

Swimming at the Bushells. :) pretty fun times.

Roof-Top Decks

One of the things I love about Baltimore is the abundance of roof-top decks. I know other cities have these, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say that Baltimore has more than most.

While Andrew and I don't have one, we have friends. :) And the weather has been PERFECT for hanging out on the roof top.

Click here to see our view from Sunday night. If you click and drag you'll get the 360 view.

We do like Baltimore. :) A lot.

Birthday Cake

Over the last few months I've become quite taken with making multi layer cakes. Yesterday we had two friends celebrating birthdays. One was turning 30, the other 72. Since I'm feeling better and food doesn't make me so sick, I've been making up for lost time and made this little beauty for our celebration yesterday. It's been so fun to want to cook again!

Gaming

We've been playing a lot of games around these parts, lately. On Friday night the Bishop and his wife came over to play one of the many Settlers of Catan expansions/versions/spinoffs: Settlers of America Trails to Rails. I would be lying if I said it isn't a complex game, but it was also SUPER fun! It took over three hours, but I think now that we have the hang of it, it's would probably take closer to 2 hours to play a full game.

Andrew won, but we did make the call that if no one had won by midnight, we would call it a game. It should be noted that Andrew won at 12:03, and that at midnight, I WAS winning. (Aren't we good hosts? We invite people over and then beat them at their own game...)

We then got together with more folks on Sunday night for more games! This time, Diminion. Another great game made by the same company.

Although the group is an ever shifting group of people, we generally play games with some group of people once a week or so. It's generally younger couples, who don't have kids of their own, and don't have family near by. While we really wish we had family closer to us, it's also nice that there are so many people in the same position. And we're able to create a really nice family of friends with each other.

The National Christmas Tree

We went down to DC on Friday night to see the National Christmas Tree. The lights go off at 11 pm, and I think we made it there at 10:57. (Dinner was eaten at a relaxed pace, and then we went to the Temple Lights and THEN we made it to the National Tree.)

 Andrew and I got our photo taken.....

 And then the lights went out, so Brent got his picture in the dark. Outside the fence that keeps people away at night. Aren't we good friends?

Candy Trains

We invited some new friends from church over to make Candy Trains with us. I spent most of my train-making time helping 3-year old Bennett.  He was totally adorable, and everything was "so tasty!" He kept pointing at candy and saying, "We haven't tasted that one yet."

 The masterpiece of Ann and Bennett. (Although, Kellie, Bennett's mom started helping him, his baby brother who is 2 months old wanted some attention, too. So I joined Team Bennett.)

 Andrew focused on simplicity this year. 

 Brandon and his Engine. 

All I got done....

But I'm going to call it a success. Tonight when we saw Bennett at the church, he ran to his mom saying, "It's our friends! It's our friends! Look mom, it's our friends!"

Camping by the Ocean

We made our Fall pilgrimage to the ocean.  It was a lovely weekend. One of my favorite places with some of my favorite people. 

 Andrew sneaking some much needed shut-eye. 

 SUCH a beautiful weekend! We couldn't have asked for better October weather. We didn't even have our hot-cocoa in the morning. It wasn't that cold. 

 Andrew, true to form, working while camping. 

 Brent, aka: Atlas. 

Half the crew. There ended up being nine of us, which was really, really fun.

Seven Course Meal

Andrew has an old roommate. His name is Micah. He's part of our BlueZone. (A group of friends who lives close to one another. It's been found that to have a close-knit group of friends extends your life.) He has been a teacher in Baltimore for the past few years, but is trying to decide what to do next. He is thinking of going to culinary school. 

That's got my vote. 

He hosted a seven-course dinner on Saturday night in his backyard. It was incredible. It started at 6 with socializing, first course served at 7, and dessert concluded dinner at 11. It was so much fun. 

Sadly, the only picture we took was at our house before we left for dinner. 

The courses all had much fancier names (seriously, this wasn't your run of the mill food) but I can't remember them.

1. Spinach Tofu Soup

2. Fried Green tomatoes and Vinegar Brussel Sprouts (it's a tough call, but I think this might have been my favorite course). 

3. Drink: Berry Smoothie of some-sort for the Mormons. Everyone else had something else (which is even more incredible...considering he was cooking for 20!)

4. Indian dish of some variety that had potatoes and spinach in it.

5. Drink...rum something or other

6. Crusted Chicken with tomato, Cucumber soaked in vinegar and sugar (so GOOD!) and a three bean salad

7. Dessert: Chocolate Mousse. Wow. It was rich a delish.

We sat at a table with people that Andrew had met before, but didn't really know. Since there was about a half hour between courses we got to know them really well, which was really fun.

Beth and Trey get hitched.

I went to Chicago over the weekend to celebrate Beth and Trey's wedding. It was so fun! There was so much face time with the bride! She was staying at a hotel, while four of us slept at her apartment. It was so much fun spending time with girls that I lived with while I was at Kalamazoo college, and creating things for the wedding. Everyone at the apartment is SO talented, and had a specific assignment for the wedding. Erika (middle-school art teacher turned pastry chef) was in charge of cupcakes, and Jess (Flower arranger extraordinair) stole the show, for sure. 

We were able to hang out with Beth at the hotel on Saturday night, and then Sunday morning before the wedding, she came and hung out with us while there was a cottage wedding industry going on at her apartment. 

The pictures are in no particular order. Blogger had a mind of it's own on this one. 

Naked Cupcakes. 

 Dressed Cupcakes. Erika really is going to pastry school in the fall. She is incredible. 

While it was 95 degrees when I left Baltimore, it was rainy and 60 in Chicago.  

 Jess arranging the bride's bouquet. Both, so beautiful. 

 Erika and Kate, decorating away. 

 The Groom's boutonniere. 

 More Goodness. 

 The hotel lobby where Beth was staying. 

 MY assignment: the seating chart. It was a series of Yes or No questions that would tell you where you sat. 

 Elizabeth flew in from France, and was one of my housemates in college. Don't you love her style?

 The happy couple!

 Flowers, pre-arranging. 

Love her. So glad I could go celebrate with her.