farmer's market

Hello again people. :)

Guess what? It's hot. I think it has been hotter these past few days in Boston than it was all last summer. I know, I know, no pity from the southerners in the crowd, but you gotta admit anything over 90 degrees - especially with high humidity is just hot - no matter where you are. Abs and I have been trying to figure out how to spend our days without spending too much time scorching ourselves in the sun.

is it just me - or did she just skip like 3 years?

Yesterday, I walked her to the park at 10am - because I'm insane and thought it wouldn't be too hot then. I was wrong. It was too hot to play - we stayed for maybe 10 minutes and I sweat and panted my way back home only to discover that Abby had thrown her shoe overboard at some point on our journey. Sigh. Long story short- we found the shoe later that afternoon...which was good.

Let me throw in a tangent here about shoes. Abby is in the phase now where all she wants to do is get dressed - by herself. Unfortunately, her skills are not all caught up to her desires. She spends a lot of time with shorts on her head, shirts on her legs, and her arms shoved through whatever clothing she could find. But shoes are hard. She is constantly asking us to put her shoes on - so that she can have the utter pleasure of taking them off. And then she looks up at you and says "'gain? shoes? 'gain?" All this to say - whenever we go somewhere in the car or stroller, Abby takes off her shoes. If we're going to the store, once we arrive I will open up the back seat to find her barefoot. every. single. time. And about 90% of the time she has taken out whatever hairdo she was given. This means, we spend a lot of our time getting re-dressed before going in places. Which is fine...I guess.

Back to our days. Yesterday we ended up spending some time in one of the indoor playspaces near our house but today we decided to go to the library. Abby loves it there. You can tell because she never stops grinning from ear to ear as she runs down every book aisle, climbs on benches, and occasionally looks at a book. We met some other kids her age, and she was very nice to them - shared well and all that, but she was definitely the most outgoing (energetic? expressive? crazy?) child in the room. I don't know where she gets it. I mean, Kyle and I are both by nature introverted - so, I dunno.

So, library was fun. We'll be frequenting more often now that I'm out for summer. We came home for lunch and nap time before heading out again. Today was the opening day of our little local farmer's market. I've been looking forward to this for a few months, so I was pretty excited. It's a shame it was So. Dang. HOT.

We went anyway of course.

The market is not huge, but you get a decent variety of goods - and I just love knowing that my money is going to local farmers for the same things I would've bought at the grocery store.

I thought this was a good name for a farm

We ended up picking up some zucchini, squash, tomatoes, and raspberries before we decided we needed an ice cream break. And by we, I really mean "I", because Abby isn't really a fan of ice cream (again, who's child is this??). I know its just too cold for her and she doesn't like that feeling. I got her to take a few bites today, which is better than ever before.

can you tell how much she loves it?

one scoop maple walnut, one scoop red raspberry chip

oh, and we bought a flower.

I let Abby walk around for a little bit, despite the fact we were both sweating and I wanted to leave. She mostly stayed in the shade and really enjoyed herself actually.

having a snack

Soon enough we headed out and went to Whole Foods to pick up a few other items. We ended up walking around the store for maybe 30-40 mins just to cool off. Abby was just flushed red and sweating - so we spent adequate time in the refrigerated section before heading back to the house.

Kyle makes fun of me sometimes because I don't like to wait when I have something new. If I get or buy a new shirt - I want to wear it the very next day. He can go months before he wears his new item and not give it a second thought. That's to say, when I buy yummy farmer's market veggies, I want to eat them right then. Abby ate most of the raspberries before we even got home, but we both enjoyed a mix of sauteed veggies for dinner with a side of ripe red tomatoes. After dinner, we played outside for a while and I let Abby have the chalk - I mean, she was already filthy, I figure that's the best time to get out chalk. We had fun.

then it was time to get clean :)

Oh, and I know she'll hate me for these things one day, but we bought Abby a potty chair over the weekend and she's learning about it. As you can see.

We're lightyears away from being potty trained, but we figured we might as well start somewhere. So here we are.

The last thing I wanted to note was that I'm really enjoying my time with Abby. Our days are long, and I try to keep us busy. I know I'm lucky to get to play stay-at-home-mom for a couple of months out of the year. Having said that, I'm tired. :) With Kyle gone all week and Karen mostly off doing things that young college kids do, it's just been me and the abster. all day. everyday. And I think the heat has something to do with it too - it takes energy out of you I think. Anyway, I'm not really trying to complain - because I really am happy to be spending so much time with this child 'o mine - I just wanted to document, for prosperity's sake, that while rewarding, it is a tiring thing as well.