Lillian will be attending Village pre-school this fall--actually she starts next Friday. Yesterday, Paco brought in the mail and Lillian had a postcard from her teachers. She was so thrilled she was jumping up and down. I am so happy she is excited. I feel like the whole world is going to open up for her.

Summer is ending. I love fall, but I don't think I have ever enjoyed a summer more. I have felt energized and healthy. I am a bit apprehensive about winter after this last one. I was just so sick! I think a lot of that was undiagnosed fibromyalgia, but only time will tell.

This will have to be short. Lillian and I have to get our day going.

A Lesson Learned

The picture is from the second session of zoo camp.

Now, it's a breeze. She just needed to be sure she knew where the bathroom was and she was fine. Not only did she love camp, but it has helped tremendously in prepping her for preschool. She is sitting with Shiloh the tortoise.

I learned some lessons this week from and about my daughter.

First, Paco and I went togther to pick her up from camp on Tuesday. We sat quietly and watched as the kids met the last animal--a rat. Each child is supposed to signal the zoo staffer with a thumb's up if they want to touch the animal and 2 thumb's up if they want to hold the animal. More or less, the kids did this and the staffer proceeded around the circle. When Lillian's turn came, she started chatting away explining that she would like to hold it but the rat might poke a hole in her shirt with his nails. She wouldn't like that, so she better just pet him. If she was wearing an older shirt it would be ok, but she didn't want a hole in this shirt. The zoo staffer politely listened with a slightly amused and exhausted look. DING DING DING I realized that not all kids ramble on and qualify everything they say. My daughter, bless her, can drive me crazy with this stuff. Now you (reader) no why she models me and tells her dolls--"yes or no, just tell me yes or no."

My second lesson was yesterday. Lillian had an echocardiogram and I promised her a lunch date out with ice cream after. So here we were att he IHOP. I was hungry and a little on edge form just seeing my daughter's heart on TV and NO ONE was waiting on us. The woman who I thought might be our waitress seemed lost in space and even if we got her attention, things did not look good in the service department. I was wondering if we should just leave, but knew that would mean loading Lillian up again and starting all over somewhere else. So, I asked Lillian what she thought we should do. She thought about it, smiled, and said:

We could just wait our turn.

Ah, the wisdom. So, we did. We flagged down a waitress and told her of our plight. Lost in space hustled over to our table and we did fine.

About the echo. Lillian was born with a murmur--we were told an innocent one. Our doc has heard it on and off over the years and he said if we had paid our deductible we might as well check it. She is obviously very healthy so nothing too horrible can be wrong (at least we try to tell ourselves).

More of a good thing

Well, we followed up our daredevil success at the fair with some real thrills at Indiana Beach. Not only did Lillian have fun, her daring was only hampered by her father's own queasiness!!

As for me, no way! We didn't even get a ride bracelet for me. Plain old playground merry-go-rounds make me pukey! I was so bewitched to watch my daughter have such gleeful, carefree fun without a moments hesitation.

The picture is from the county fair. I made sure we saw all the dairy goats and here is Paco moving in for a kiss. I have made a contact at the Farmer's Market who has a herd of about 20 dairy goats. We are going to set up a time to see their operation and get a better sense of what we would need to do.

My own locavore project is going extremely well. Of course as the song goes....it's summertime and the living is easy. I can get all my meat and produce locally at the Farmer's Market, go to the natural foods store for dairy (Zionsville) and organic grains. I am buying very little at the big box stores. I am trying to store what i can of summer's bounty now, but we still have a long way to go before we can be true locavores. Paco is fine with me turning into a small-time farmer so I guess I am only hampered by my own commitments and my health.

The Amish family I am buying pork form at the Farmer's Market has half a hog for me this week for the freezer and I have already laid claim to 10 organic free range chickens this fall.

I picked up some long purple shelling pods called "crowder peas" at the market this morning. I had no idea what they tasted like so I thought we'd try a few and see. Lillian and I shelled them this afternoon and she had a wonderful time. She was gobbling them up as fast as she could get them out of the pod. That makes this whole thing worthwhile!!!