For lack of a better title. This weekend is always so busy for us, and this year was no exception. Luckily, Olivia is a little older and that just makes it more fun, now that she is noticing more things.
Saturday
Saturday has historically been our annual pool party at my aunt and uncles’ house. This year, we added a second pool party, a surprise birthday celebration for one of my favorite friends. So that meant Olivia got to swim twice.
In hindsight, our friend’s pool was drastically warmer, so I should have just swam with Chris and Olivia in that, but I decided to wait until my family party (because wet swim suit in car) and their pool was much colder. I’m sure as a kid I didn’t think anything of it, but unfortunately, Olivia and I didn’t last too long in it.
Sunday
On Sunday, we made our annual trip to historic Stillwater, where we had a picnic lunch with my parents and sister.
Boats are a hot new thing. A sighting was almost always followed by frantic pointing and a “toot toot!” with her arm.
There are shops around there, and we spent the majority of the time in the antique shop. Chris, bless his heart, occupied Olivia so I could shop.
Not too sure about all these old breakables littered around the store that she in fact, was not allowed to play with.
We stopped for ice cream and sat back by the river where our picnic was, and Olivia had a blast playing with bubbles. Apparently, they are much more fun when you can blow them yourself.
By the later afternoon, I knew she was exhausted, but the baby refuses to sleep anywhere but in her crib or car seat. I tried to put her in the Ergo, in hopes I could rock her to sleep for a little nap, but nope. She was having none of it. In her defense, it was probably pretty warm in there.
Monday
Monday, Chris worked from home, thinking he was going to get done early, but he wasn’t off until 3:30. Olivia and I killed time by probably watching way too much TV. Later that night though, Chris and I cracked open a bottle of wine we bought in Stillwater and did some good old-fashioned drinking, in which I did a lot of stumbling over Olivia’s toys and laughing so hard I started wheezing. Oh, and I think I finished off the lime chips and cream cheese salsa dip we made.
The Fourth of July
Sad fact #1: We don’t have a cabin.
Sad fact #2: We were too lazy to make any real plans.
Sad fact #3: We were probably a bit hung over as well (don’t worry, the baby wasn’t hung over).
So we puttered around the house. During the baby’s nap, Chris and I got down on our hands and knees and weeded the frightening jungle that is our garden. I sweated a lot. I had dirt smeared across my forehead.
But we got it done and it looks so much better.
Then I went to work with the radishes we had harvested, and made a pint jar of pickled radishes. I haven’t tried them yet, but here is the recipe.
Olivia played out in the sprinkler with Toby while Chris finished the garden. I got her this sprinkler really because it was the only one left at Target, but she loves to squat there and hold the little wiggly tube while water shoots out of it. Toby, I think, loves the water more than her.
After we cleaned up, we all got in the car to hit up a consignment store that was having a 50% off sale. I had a great time; Chris and Olivia merely tolerated it.
We made these chicken lime tacos for dinner and I tried giving it to Olivia to hold as an actual burrito. It was ungodly messy and we had to keep stopping to rewrap it for her, but she loved it.
I wasn’t sure this year if she would wake up from the fireworks, but I turned her white noise up more and hoped for the best. Chris and I watched the movie Passengers, which was really good. At 10:00pm, we headed out to the backyard, sprayed some bug spray, and watched the city’s fireworks.
There is a tree that blocks them just a teensy bit, but we got the general gist and our commute home was about 5 seconds, so I called it a win.
We do have these neighbors directly behind us that moved in about a year and a half ago. Previously, we had a young family with two kids and they have an in ground pool. They invited us over one day two summers ago to swim while I was pregnant and I was excited we would have neighbors that were cool and had babies for Olivia to play with. But then they moved, and this older Hispanic couple moved in. And 364 days out of the year they’re quiet and we hardly know they’re there.
Except on the Fourth of July when Grandpa purchases no less than $5,000 worth of illegal fireworks for the kiddos and lights those fuckers off like bombs over our house all night.
Seriously. They go off and they’re deafening and I am caught off guard because we’re always standing out in the backyard watching, you know, the actual city fireworks run by professionals and suddenly Hiroshima is exploding over my head, colors raining down and I think I have let out a scream or two both years now it happens.
“I’m calling the police,” I threatened to Chris no less than five times Tuesday night. I didn’t though. Apparently I make empty threats.
Olivia miraculously slept through the whole thing, which was impressive with the amount of bangs and pops from the fireworks and the shrieks from her mother all night. And then to top it off, I decided to leave her white noise cranked up the rest of the night and we proceeded to have a loud booming thunderstorm at two in the morning. So yay for another Fourth with a sleeping baby.
