Goodbye Karl

1995/1996 - 2009

I will miss you so very much.

New Years Resolutions

I don't have any. Nor do I have a five year plan or even a one year plan. This may have something to do with playing too much Civilization at the warlord level. Or maybe it just is what it is. If I made New Year's resolutions, I should probably include one about blogging more, especially since due to Facebook, I now have more readers stopping by, at least for the moment.

I still don't know what I think about Facebook. Sometimes it makes me super-happy. Just seeing the interconnectedness of the Hendrix diaspora. And I enjoy the silliness of it as well. And the strange disconnect but also connect between ourselves as highschoolers, as college students and whatever we are now, I guess that would be adults. But I also sort of resent the minute to minuteness of it all too, that our lives are measured by the continually updated news board of what we are doing right now. And then there is this weird sense that we are somehow staying in touch through cheerful notices about our fandom or tossing philosophers about.

Anyway, in an effort to keep you all apraised of our activities, here's what we've really been up to (when we're not making virtual buttons with My Pretty Pony Newborns on them):

This week, Jason went back to teaching classes, thus ending his long winter break. We broke down and subscribed to super duper soccer dish tv, so now there is even more soccer in our lives than before. And lots of Monk. And Dr Who - not that we watch these things, we just record them. There is only 5 hours left, we've got to get cracking. And he bought a new winter coat with a velvet collar (so very unexpected).

Nora went back to pre-school after taking a day off to finally purge the stomach virus that has been plaguing her. Now she is staying there later too and is (happily for her parents) seeming to really enjoy being there. Or is at least no longer really upset when we go. She is still touch and go on this potty learning thing. Some days are all about the big girl pants and other days we could care less. Since Christmas, we've been receiving phonecalls from Mary, Joseph, and the Baby Jesus on Nora's red phone. They are all on at once, not sure if it's a conference call, three-way, or if everyone is just bunched up around the phone. This is my mother's doing, but I think I'm okay with it for right now.

I've been back at work for the past week, and while nothing new is happening, I did get to meet up with the group of women I've been working closely with for the past 4 years (some of them for longer). We all belong to different programs in the area and externally we couldn't be more different (we span at least 40 years in age, are various races and marital statuses, some of us wear suits and heels others (me) sloutch on by in cords and tees, some of us are moms, some are grandmoms and moms and some are moms to pets, etc) and we've been meeting monthly as a committee over this time and we've done some really amazing stuff around literacy and advocacy and student leadership and all sorts of things. I've realized that I've really come to appeciate our value on the process as well as the product and the complete lack of ego, turf, and grandstanding that too often happens in meetings that are supposed to be about getting something done. Over the years we've learned so much about our lives outside of work and the stresses that drain us at work and figured out how to keep ourselves and our little group going and moving and building. It's nice, and I just thought I'd share.

I started swimming again, and hopefully I'll keep with it since it's relaxing and exercise (amazing that it can be both) and those are both good things.

Karl remains the ever loyal dog he's always been, but is starting to show his age - which would be somewhere between 13 and 14 years. His eyes are starting to cloud over with cateracts and he's not hearing as well as he used to, but he still tries to give the squirrels a run for their money.

My parents are in Florida so the kitchen wars have stalled right now, but look for a return to the battle of the toaster oven when they get back. We are also strangly aware of the lottery right now.

This weekend is the farewell tour of the Starlighters at the Maryville KC Hall. I have to say I'm excited about going.

Hmmm, that sort of covers the updates.

Weekend Update

This past weekend, Matt came to visit. He and Nora hit it off. And Karl picked up his Matt-worship right where he left off when Matt moved back to DC several years ago. This caused some jealousy on Nora AND Karl's part when Matt gave some attention to the other (as far as I can tell, Matt was not jealous of Nora's adoration of Karl, but maybe I was wrong). You can see, sitting next to Matt is a much valued position.
Often Nora would attempt to get up between Karl and Matt, but climbing on top of Matt was even better:

Matt's visit got us out of the house, much to Nora's delight. We went to the Farmers Market where I bought a cute purse from the St. Louis Craft Mafia booth.
I admit that I initially thought Nora needed this purse, but then I decided to appropriate it. It's a little too big for her, but just right for my wallet, keys, and sunglasses. I wish it had a little pocket inside though. There's an apple on the back as well. I feel very "first day of school" when carrying it. We also picked up one of Companion Bread's Mystery Boxes. These are a big box of pastry goods for $15. It was delicious, but really we needed more people than the three of us to get it eaten. Inside we had a chocolate croissant, several plain croissants, several danishes, muffins and scones. About 8-10 items all together. Very, very yummy.

After the Farmers Market we headed to O'Connell's, a favorite haunt of Matt's (and ours). We feasted on roast beef, burgers and fried yummy things and a pitcher of beer - O'Fallon Weach (possibly one of the best deals at O'Connell's).
Nora was very good throughout the long wait, and we kept the tiger nearby to remind her that next we were going to the ZOO!!!!!

Unbelievably, Matt never visited the zoo throughout his time here and as everyone knows it's one of our favorite places to go. It was a really hot day, which should not have been surprising for August, but we had been really spoiled with mild weather all month long. After hitting the the Rivers Edge (sorry we forgot photos) and seeing the Rhino and the Cheetas up close (all four of them where right up front) and glimpses of the Jade the baby elephant, we headed off to see if our luck would hold and if the baby tigers were out. Disappointingly, they were not, although Jason and Nora and I had gotten a great view of them on our earlier visit. We did check out sea lions, the bird house, the big cat country and then meandered back through the snake house, which I haven't seen in a while. The American alligator was giving us a wicked grin when we decided we really had had enough of the heat and that we needed to head home.

That night, Jason and Matt brought us carryout from Cherrokee Street, and it too was terriffic. Nora and I went to bed and the boys stayed up to late talking, which no doubt they regretted when they got up at the crack of dawn and took Nora to see Tottenham vs Chelsea at the Tigin. I stayed at home and read a book.

Before Matt took off back home we tried to visit some of his old haunts, but it's hard to find things open in STL on a Sunday morning. We had lunch at the Schafly Brewhouse and then took Matt to the airport. Since he left, Nora's been asking about him everyday, so we'd better not wait so long to see him again - it's hard to believe it's been nearly 6 years!

On Monday we hit the Japanese Festival and ate noodles. It was wonderful, but I'm really happy we went early, since by noon it was sweltering and very, very crowded. We forgot the camera, so no pictures of the festival but here's Nora's lunch from Tuesday: Mac and Peas, oranges, cookies and juice.


Unfortunately, Nora is reaching the stage where mixed up things are no longer acceptable. While she loves Mac and soy cheese and loves peas, they now need to be in separate dishes. I'm sad, they looked so nice together.

Owls of Autumn

It's October 8 and today it reached 90+ degrees. This is insane. I have been ready for fall for several weeks and it looks like I'm not to have it. Well possibly later this week. But anyway, Nora is all ready for crisp weather to begin. A trip to our fabulous children's used clothing store, Kangaroo Kids netted us some fun tights. Then I got too happy on hyena cart and bought her a very cute owl hoodie dress that would really only be comfortable in cooler weather, but I'm dying to put her in it. Here's some pics, but they don't really do justice to the dress since she won't stand still.

It's long enough that she'll be able to wear it next fall too, so it's not like I'm worried she'll grow out of it, but I'm just anxious to dress her up like the little elf she is:

And then there's the Halloween costume. Jason was pretty insistent that this year she go as little red riding hood, so Etsy helped me locate an appropriate cloak and Karl will be standing in as the big bad wolf. But again this isn't going to work in hot weather, so it better cool off by the end of the month.

And then there's me. What's the use of having fabulous boots if you can't wear them. Have I mentioned how sick I am of shaving my legs? How about how ready I am for some hearty chili or soup? This heat wave really needs to end so I can enjoy my favorite time of year, October.

Busy

Nora has been a whirlwind these past few weeks. It seems like everything is much more interesting to her than ever before (which given her curiosity previously, doesn't seem possible). She is always carrying one, two, three or more items around and then gets frustrated when she wants to pick up more, but can't without dropping what she already has.
She is also getting the hang of moving things in and out of other things (fish in and out of the boat, little people in and out of the plane, shapes in and out of the sorter) and wants to do this for longer periods of time.

The other big steps are the imaginary play - bears and dolls are of more interest now and can be fed, put down for naps, and generally dragged around by their appendages, and this weekend there was cooking! As I made the ill fated sun butter cookies, Nora stirred up a mixture of flour, brown sugar and honey on her tray allowing me almost the entire time to make the cookies. Now she's obsessed with carrying around her dish and spoon everywhere. If only she had more hands! Or could figure out how to make use of pockets! And she has plenty of those, since another big deal for her is putting on clothes. She's been wearing two pairs of pants (over the giant diaper) in this heat the past week or so. She's insisting that once pair isn't enough so she'll try to pull on a second, usually the chinese pjs or the red and white striped pair (both sized for babies under one year of age) and then gets angry when she can't pull them up all the way. We pull them up for her and she's happy as a clam. I can't imagine where she gets this desire for more clothes from...
But there's always a still moment in the middle of the tornado. Karl, the every faithful, will make her slow down for a second just to give him a few pats or make him model a hat. And then she's chasing him round and everything is in motion again.

Arkansas

Last week we were in Arkansas visiting the Grandparents.

We took Karl, because somehow it seemed easier at the time. Nora loved talking to him on the way down, and the grandparents are fond of him too. We all got out on the boat as evidenced here. Nora was a good egg about the floatation device she had to wear, but was less thrilled about having to remain on our lap.




We eventually relented, and let her peak over the edge....












But we both remained ever vigilant, should anyone fall in the water.








And she got to drive the boat with the Captain.

We all made it back to shore safe and sound!

Zoo Two

Here's some more pictures from this weekend. Sadly, I have none(!) from Todd and Natascha's fabulous slide show party. But here are some more from the zoo and throughout the weekend.

Here's Nora and Zelda finally making use of that crib! They got on so well and Zelda was a peach for playing so nicely with and keeping an eye on Nora.


We got out and about by use of my parents van, which made me accept that if we ever have another child, a minivan would be an necessity.


Bob, Sarah and Zelda at the zoo - I am totally sad that I didn't dig up my cowgirl hat to join in the fun. I don't know if you can tell from this photo, but Z's hat also includes a tiara!



Here's Zelda and a friendly penguin. It was a busy day at the zoo and I'm amazed we were able to get this close to the tank and I was able to snap the photo without someone walking through.



And then we fizzled out on picture taking and we didn't get much else of the weekend. But in addition to the afore mentioned slide show party (check out Todd blog for the lowdown) there were also waffles, sausage, beer, Thai food, a run through the water jets at Tower Grove park, some tag playing, lots, and lots, and lots of commentary on Karl, (finally, Nora found another member for her Karl fan club in Zelda) not enough chocolate (Merbs closed too early), Ted Drews (that's a DOUBLE chocolate, mocha, heath bar, please), Buffy, and quite a bit of lazing around and napping. Oh and there was some talking too (that's a given).

It was a really nice visit and I was shocked to realize that it had been TWO years since we last got together. We won't wait so long again!

Messy Spaghetti

One of the things Nora learned on our trip was the joys of eating spaghetti. Here she is digging in (at one point she had both fists full). The downside to this gourmet extravaganza is the mess. Karl had orange streaks on his back from flung spaghetti. He would have enjoyed this more if it was meat sauce. Despite the mess, I think we'll be eating spaghetti often!

Yes, Once There Was Sun

It seems like it has been raining forever. But to remind you what the sun looks like I give you these Nora pics from sunnier days.


Note the object of Nora's affection on the other side of the door.
Finally, we're outside too! Karl got to go on this trip as well.

Outside

It's been so cold lately, we're all pining for warmer weather and maybe a day at the zoo. It's just the beginning of February, and it looks like we've got weeks yet to go.