rainbow rider

first ride

apparently hell froze over. it wasn’t so bad, actually

on the farm

well, K and I finally made it for a weekend trip to visit the fabulous Clare and her hubs at Big Table Farm.  AND we went without kids.

no kids.

as in: sleeping all night, without interruption. sleeping in past 6:30 in the morning.  lounging about, reading.  having long conversations.  staring into the fire. basically, sitting on my ass for extended periods of time doing nothing, and other similar activities which are impossible with children in the house.

it was lovely.  cold.  actually, freezing-ass cold, but wonderfully restorative to body and soul.

one huge bonus feature was that there were FOUR puppies in residence.  7-week-old puppies.  the level of cuteness was truly breathtaking.

here are some shots:

K and the “chicken tractor”

hanging with “Hummer” and trying to stay warm

another view of the chickens and the lower field

Clare and K hauling water up to the cows

K at the window

our drinking glasses

view of the kitchen

the line-up

Clare’s studio

some holiday decorations remain

puppies!

this is Dude and Lily

Ms. Clare

keeping warm by the fire

how close CAN you get?

some of the fruits of their labor

K looking very scary getting ready to target shoot

Clare in fine form

Brian with a bb gun (you’ll shoot your eye out!)

me, novice shooter.

the Belle of the Barn

and King of the Compost

old barn

feeding time for puppies

puppy exercise time

Lilly sleeping on K’s sholder

puppy pile

an impressive party trick

warm puppies

christmas day

wow, Christmas with three kids, one Oma, one fabulous Aunt Kate, and one au pair is a whole lot different than that single-mama-one-kiddo holidays of the past.

total chaos, but i wouldn’t trade it in for anything.

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dancin’ fools, part 2

(for part 1, see here)

… after a brief costume change for Elsa (yes, the observant among you will notice that in addition to the super-cool leg warmers, she donned a few extra pairs of undies), the Solid Gold Dancers were back for another song…

it’s a little slow for the first 45 seconds, then it gets rolling.

scenes from a weekend in the snow

the whole motley crew went to Tahoe to celebrate Jack’s 6th birthday.

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dancin’ fools

Elsa and S bust a move to “California Girls”.  Very different dancing styles, these two.

i’m three!

Halloween photos to come.

In the meantime, please enjoy a fab little video clip taken by my sister (Aunt Kate!) a few weeks ago.

Tor the first 30 seconds or so, Elsa is just tooling around.  But then she declares – several times and with great enthusiasm and even some dance moves – I’M THREE!  Of course, she’s holding up 4 or 5 fingers, but whatever…

happy extravert

One of the things that is wonderful about being in a relationship with someone who has kids is that there are some built-in playmates for my single child whenever we get together.

This means Elsa gets to hang out with Master J, who is 5 (almost 6) and Miss S (3 and a half), the two kiddos of my Sig Oth.

She is head over heels with both of them.

Elsa and S are super-girly together.   They dress-up as ballerinas daily, play games they have created called “picnic” and “sugar mugar lugar wugar”, and make a disgusting mess by putting on “makeup” all freakin’ day. Yesterday we all went out to lunch, and Elsa and K decided they needed to dance whilst waiting for the food to be delivered.

Elsa and J have a typical big brother/little sister dynamic – she follows him around like a lovesick puppydog and he tolerates her sometimes.  It’s great for her to have someone in her life who is actually bossier than she is (a high bar, let me tell you!)

At lunch, J was entertaining us with the age-old classic orange-slice-in-the-mouth trick.  Elsa loved it.  And then she just decided to hang on his arm and suck her thumb.  It was pretty cute.