Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother’s Day!!! I love Mother’s Day because it signals that spring is really here to stay and gardening can be pursued in force. The gardening enforcement was a misnomer this week. I think my hands and nails will be cracked and dirty for the next 4 months. Yipee!! Thank goodness we have lotion and bag balm in America.

Monday I had my semi-annual dentist appointment. Every six months my dentist says the same thing: “You must not be from Utah because your teeth and strong and white.” I guess Utahns are reputable for soft teeth. I am glad my military schools used mind-controlling fluoride treatments in grade school. Do any of you remember “swish” time every Friday morning? It was an honor to be picked to squirt two and a half pumps of the foul fluoride into tiny paper cups. 20 years later I am grateful for “swish” treatments. After my dental cleaning Amelia and I went a store to price bedding plants. While there she gagged on a piece of paper from a package she was chewing on. She spewed all over me, the aisle, the cart, and herself. Puke was dripping everywhere. I only had two wipes on me that helped precious little to clean up the mess. The overwhelming smell of barf made me want to throw-up as well. I ended up buying an outfit for Amelia and scrubbing off in the store’s bathroom sink. Ah, memories!! We visited Aunt Charity for a couple minutes before heading home. I was able to bike over an hour, half in the morning, and half in the evening (this time with Justin). It was a perfect day.

My crafty projects of the week included stripping the DI finds (a chair and stool) and making a “bow board” for Amelia. I really wanted to stain the chair but the stripper and my elbow grease were not taking off all the original paint. I ended up chipping off and sanding as much as possible then spray painting both items. The stool was painted a glossy black and the cushion reupholstered in a black & gray cloth. The chair was painted a matte brown color. Amelia’s bow board was made out of a DI frame, foam board, cloth, ribbons, and decorations. She helped me out by reorganizing all my scrapbooking drawers and shelves. It now looks like a Texas tornado ripped through my work station. Luckily, she was also interested in putting everything back with some help. She is a funny duck! While I work she sits on my lap or nearby singing and dancing to her own tunes.

Justin helped me empty all the dirt out of my vegetable square-foot garden. Last year my garden did not fare well. We have a brother in my ward who is a farmer. He said there was an airborne mold that infected the soil and plants last year. I decided it was best to replace all the soil. We dumped part of it into a small plot next to my garden and the rest into the dumpster. Mom let me borrow her rototiller to mix up the smaller plot of dirt. Friday, I bought compost, peat moss, and perlite to fill the garden box plus most of the plants to fill it. I bought about 100 plants for my front and back gardens. I am so excited to watch them grow and develop. In my veggie garden I have 4 tomato, 4 red bell peppers, basil, rosemary, cilantro, zucchini, squash, and cucumber. The front flower garden is filled with zinnia, portuculus, marigold, rubeckia, coreopsis, salvia, sedum, peony, daisy, sweet William, and liatris (plus my other perennials from last year). Amelia had the time of her life eating dirt, sucking on rock, chewing wood chips, digging like a dog, and licking my hand tools. Justin helped kill weeds in our yard and everyone else’s yards as well, watering, and digging when needed. It was a fun family affair! Friday evening we made a trip to Dairy Queen as a reward for all our hard work. Justin taught Amelia to say “DQ” afterwards in her bath! So, so cute.

Mom, Jeremy, and Jared came over Saturday morning to find me planting more flowers. They presented me with a perfect Mother’s day gift of big floppy hat, gloves, trowel, and seeds. I taught them our first lesson on photography. We discussed the art of photos, shutter speed, aperture, ISO, and some basic camera handling. There will be a couple more lessons to squeeze in before they leave for Jordan. It was such a perfect day Justin really wanted to go do something. We had a picnic at Liberty Park then walked around the park and played at the rotary park with Amelia. Everyone and their dog(s) were out! Amelia LOVED the swings and wanted to get down and crawl all over the place. The sunshine seemed to permeate and shed my winter skin. Ahh, glorious sunshine.

One last story. Justin never picks up the mail. Thursday he walks in clutching the mail and puts it on the counter. I was busy elsewhere but came into the kitchen and noticed all the mail. I started to rifle through it throwing and ripping my way down the pile. I came to a smallish envelope from the Hale Center Theater. They send me promos every couple months. I ripped the envelope open and read the seemingly hand-written note (that was most surely printed by a printer). It read, “Happy Mother’s Day. Take me to whatever show you like. Love you more than actors love to act.” I thought this was an odd note for a promo but rapidly forgot the thought when I noticed the magnet displaying the year’s list of shows. One was “Into the Woods”, a favorite of Miekka’s. So I called her up and made plans to go see the show in November. Justin walks in at this point. I end my conversation and show him the magnet of the shows for the year and telling him that some weirdo note came in the mail. I mean who else says some variation of “I love you more than a fat kid loves cake?” We’ve typed variations of this phrase since we starting seriously dating. He had this look on his face and said, “Happy Mother’s Day.” I all clicked. Duh!

Amelia ran a fever most of this week. Her top front teeth are finally coming in. Problem is they break through then retreat back into her gums. Poor little soul is miserable. No wonder teething on rocks was so appealing. She learned how to say cheese, more, DQ, milk, why, and book, this week. I love being able to communicate with her and her to understand and me be understood. She is constantly dancing to an internal rhythm. Mom played peek-a-boo with her the other day to gales of laughter. It was music to my ears. I love gathering her in my arms and squishing her with love. What a miracle.