Quote of the Day

At Caryn's request, I will try and put up a few new things to push the snake story farther away from the front of the blog.

This morning.

Eleanor: Mom, is there a lot of dirt in the car?
Me: No, honey, there are lots of Goldfish and crumbs but I don't think there is much dirt.
Eleanor: Mom, just use your imagination!

I wasn't clear at first why she would want dirt (soil) in the car. Then I remembered she had been pretending to be a worm earlier in the morning. She was making sure that she could survive as an earthworm in the car on the way to camp.

Our Memorial Day Visitor

This morning we had a visit. I was sleeping (the kids have been sick and up in the middle of the night/waking up early) and all of a sudden I heard Henry crying and "HOLY S&!$!! MOLLY GET OUT HERE." I know when Vince uses my name and that tone of voice something is seriously wrong. I imagined a loss of limb or some other horror. As I rounded the corner to the back porch, I heard "Henry got bit by a snake." Then I felt a moment of complete panic. Henry and Vince were both freaking out and there was a four foot long black snake on the porch inches from the door leading inside.



We checked Henry for bites and comforted him. I didn't see anything that looked as if it might be a bite, so I took a moment to size up the snake. I had recently heard that some of our neighbors had spotted black rat snakes around the neighborhood up to seven feet in length. This snake fit the bill, it was long and skinny with a thin head, back in color with a whitish belly. Really beautiful and shiny, though somewhat scary as well -- especially if you are barely three feet tall, I imagine.

Anyway, we got everyone calmed down, opened the back door and watched the snake explore our back porch before finally making his way back out into the yard. Eleanor decided she wanted to name it "Eleanor" and Henry thought a good name would be "Henry". Whatever the name, it is somewhere out in the wilds of our backyard.



Edited to add Vince's perspective. He sent this out to a few but I thought it should be included here as well:

A story –

So on Monday, Henry and Eleanor were sick and the kids and I were watching cartoons on the couch while Molly was taking a nap. Henry gets bored with the cartoons after awhile and heads for our screened-in porch to play. After he’s been away a few minutes, he starts crying this really sharp, I’m-hurt-come-and-help-me cry. I thought he must have been stung by a bee, and I rush for the porch. When I get there I see the following snake coiled up next to him. From the crying, I assume he’s been bit. I was totally freaking out and called for Molly, who was very calm about the whole thing. We checked Henry out and he was OK (no bite marks). But it sure scared me. I was feeling phantom snakes crawl across my feet the rest of the day. The snake is a black rat snake, apparently pretty common around here. It’s a non-poisonous constrictor that eats rodents, but has been described as “snappy” and will bite (and can break skin) if cornered.

Quote of the Day

Henry: Happy DIRTday to you, happy DIRTday to you, happy DIRTday dear Dolly, happy DIRTday too you.

Emphasis on the "dirt". He is pretty much on key though.

In the Big Bed and Potty Trained

Henry has, for the past several days, been sleeping in a twin bed. He has had a few middle of the night wake ups and a few running out of the room while trying to fall asleep giggles but generally has done really well.



And, Eleanor is completely out of diapers. Hooray!

The Garden is Growing

Well, the garden is managing to grow a little bit. Hooray! We have some potatoes planted in the garden and also some planted in an old kids bathtub -- an idea we got from the fantastic book Roots, Shoots, Buckets and Boots by Sharon Lovejoy. Also, from the same book we planted a Sunflower House, which will hopefully be a place where the kids can hide out while I putz around in the garden. We also have some peas (shelling and snow), which are sprouting nicely. We have a nice patch of mesclun lettuces (growing well) and some arugula (slow starting). Hopefully, we will also have some tomatoes, beans, peppers, and who knows what else...

Anyway, here are a few pictures.

The potatoes:



The lettuce:



Where the Sunflower House will be (hopefully!):



And, Henry calling, "Are you worms?" [Where are you worms?]