Big Spoon

Edie demanded to eat her pudding cup with a "big spoon" so Jeff offered her this serving spoon:

How not to hate your cats by Jill Culver

The truth is that shortly after our initial honeymoon period with Mimi and Mort, we sort of ... fell out of love with them. Turns out all kittens really do is ruin furniture and wood floors, make a racket wrestling and chasing each other, jump on your kitchen counters, and fill litter boxes with disgustingness that needs to be dealt with every day. I don't say any of this lightly either - which is why I didn't announce it here. I had fallen out of love with these cats and I was feeling pretty terrible about it. I considered finding new homes for them but was wracked with guilt about it. And while Jeff was experiencing the same disillusionment, he pointed out that if we gave up these cats, we didn't really deserve to try again later with new cats. 

We kept asking ourselves, "Is it kittens in general? Or THESE kittens?" In the end, responsibility won and we kept them. But it wasn't until 2 things happened that I decided maybe I maybe sort of loved them. 

#1 (and most importantly): We decided to let them use the cat door. We'd locked Maurice's old cat door when we brought them home, but one sunny week last month we decided to try unlocking it. We let them out in the back yard while we had a picnic dinner. Life has been INFINITELY better since the cats have become indoor/outdoor cats. They come and go as they please, we lock them in at night to keep them safe from the raccoons and they have chilled out considerably. Instead of wrestling on the leather chairs, they wrestle in the grass. And when they come inside? They are TIRED. And do the appropriate cat thing: sleep. We no longer have to slam the doors behind us when going outside to keep curious cats inside. Edie can play in the backyard while I make dinner and I can keep the back door open to keep an eye on her without worrying about letting loose the cats.

Also? Mort made a friend:

Edie named her Mirabelle.

Mimi watching her stunt double Mirabelle from the bathroom window:

The first night we let Mort out, he huddled in my lap terrified but curious. He's since proved bold enough to visit the neighbors regularly, taking to pooping in our friend's back yard which is funny but also horrible. Any suggestions on how we can make them stop and/or compensate our neighbors?

#2 is that one night Mimi didn't come home by 10pm. I was going to bed, wanted to lock them inside, and realized I hadn't seen her in hours. She hadn't come home for dinner. I went to bed fretting and had terrible dreams that Mort died of loneliness when Mimi never came home. I thought I'd have to tell Edie and she would be so sad. So when Mimi finally showed her face at 3am I was SO RELIEVED. Which made me realize that maybe I *did* care about these cats after all. What a relief to find I'm not a terrible, animal hating asshole. Whew.

This is Mimi's "Oh Shit" pose:

Underdog

I particularly love that we are both concentrating so hard that we stuck our tongues out.

Crankiest unicorn ever

Wine pairing: Chicken nuggets and Sauvignon Blanc

I had a draining day of work today. I spent about 5 hours of my day on various conference calls trying to decipher what all the people on the other line(s) were saying and at least 3 of those hours were spent reviewing a 20 page audio visual quote line by line, trying to cut the budget by half. So basically, a super fun day.

At 4:30, I wrapped things up early to pick up Edie from daycare by 5pm. She wept and yelled at me the entire way home because she feels she should be able to ride in a booster seat and was pissed when I told her she had to weigh 40 pounds before she could do that. I have no idea why this is such a hot topic all of a sudden because she has never once before mentioned the desire to ride in a booster seat. Probably one of the bigger kids in her class graduated to a booster and talked about it in class today. Awesome.

I got home, and despite wishing we could just get take-out, decided to be responsible and made pizza dough from scratch, caramelized onions and peppers to go on the pizza and then assembled a fancy pizza and salad for dinner. I tell Edie and she yells, "But MOOOOOM - I had pizza for LUNCH!!"  Ohmygod. We are just one small step from her standing in front of a full fridge and declaring, "Ugh, there's NOTHING to eat in this house."

She begged to watch 5 more minutes of My Little Pony before coming to dinner and I was too tired to fight. I took one bite of the gourmet pizza I didn't want to make in the first place. It was burnt. AND MOLDY. Must have been the tomato sauce from a can that I used. Out of desperation (and starvation) I made pizza crackers (melted cheese and pepperoni on Ritz crackers). Right as I take a bite of one and a giant droplet of grease falls onto the boob of my new white sweater, Edie comes in from the living room, ready to eat dinner and is immediately upset that we threw away the pizza that she DIDN'T WANT IN THE FIRST PLACE.

Cue Jeff offering me a glass of wine.

In the end, we heated up some chicken nuggets and after all that effort, I had chicken nuggets and a giant glass of white wine for dinner.

Zip line

Georgetown

We are staying in Seattle for the long weekend and when Jeff woke up yesterday morning, he suggested we take the monorail to the Space Needle and go up to the top of the needle. Edie and I got all excited and then when we got close to the Seattle Center to look for parking, I noticed a disproportionate number of hippies walking around. Uh oh. It was Folk Life Festival! We weren't really interested in fighting our way through drum circles and henna tattoo lines to get to the Needle, so we opted for heading south to have a Georgetown day. Jeff and Edie took me to the "hat and boots park", which I'd never been to, and where Edie made a best friend named Edda who was 7. They became inseparable and I couldn't get a photo of her in the park without also photographing Edda, but it was ridiculously cute and made me impatient for Edie's cousins Luna and Caroline to be 3 so that they will follow Edie around like Edie was following Edda around.

After the park, we headed to The Hangar Cafe. Hands down best crepes in the city. Last time we went, I tried to be virtuous and ordered a salad and then was super jealous of Jeff's crepe the entire time. This time, I had the special with ham, brussel sprouts, carmelized onions, cheese, spinach and a chipotle sauce with creme fraiche on top. Amazing. Edie had bacon, and a nutella crepe.

Browsed the goods at the Georgetown Trailer Park market:

And visited a few stores before heading home for a giant, late afternoon nap. 

Ballet

Edie's last day of ballet culminated in a mini "recital" wherein parents are invited to class to watch. It was ridiculously cute. I took a lot of videos for Jeff who couldn't be there, but at a certain point realized it was more important to be present than to document the moment. A few photos:

Showing me her hand stamps after class:

Edie and Penny hugging after the performance:

Then we went for ice cream at the nearby Molly Moons. My Mom and Edie and I:

Chocolate ice cream face:

Faith in Humanity

The park 2 blocks from our house has been closed and under construction for quite some time as part of a parks levy that passed a couple of years ago. The new park will encompass our old park as well as the enormous water reservoir next door that the city has spent the last 2 years covering and turning into a 16 acre park. To recap - we will soon have a 16 acre park 2 blocks from our house! Before having a kid, this news would have been only medium exciting, but now it's like we live 2 blocks from endless entertainment.

I loved the park to begin with, for it's convenience as much as it's old time-y play equipment. But after months of being closed, the play area portion of the park re-opened this weekend. Since opening on Saturday, we've been 4 times already and it's rocking Edie's world. The other thing it's doing is restoring my faith in humanity. Everyone in the neighborhood has been anticipating this park opening for so long - we've been watching the construction together for weeks and weeks, chatting about it with strangers in line for coffee at the neighborhood coffee shops, pausing with other families to look at the progress from behind the chain-link fence... And now it's open! And the neighborhood is ecstatic.

Every time we go, the playground is full with families and everyone is so happy that Spring is here, we aren't cooped up in our houses any longer, and I think we all feel giddy with the luck of having such an amazing park in what is suddenly an up-and-coming little neighborhood in the city. There is a zip line that is probably the best part of the park and waiting in line for this feature turns into an opportunity for the parents to chat and suddenly it's like I know everyone in the neighborhood and we are all out, flinging our children down the zip line, running them back up to the line, holding the seat so the next parent can lift their kid onto the ride and it all just feels so fabulously old fashioned. Something about the newness and excitement of this park has made us all open up and chat with the people who share our community. I can't wait for the reservoir portion of the park to open this Fall. I feel like we've pretty much secured Edie's birthday party location for the next several  years.

These photos don't do it justice and I couldn't photograph the zip line this trip because Jeff wasn't there and I was too busy giving her a running start push down the line and squealing as she zipped to the bottom without letting go to also hold a camera. I'll try for better photos next time. In the meantime: any of yous parents reading this - let's plan a Maple Leaf Park playdate asap.