Coronado Island

Many months ago Dan noticed that a law conference was going to be held on Coronado Island during the week of my birthday. He began the process of requesting permission to attend the conference, and finally received approval for full funding, including his airfare, meals, and 4 nights at the famous Hotel del Coronado, where the conference was being held. He also received permission for me to share the room with him, on condition that he not skip out on any of the conference. That is how I ended up spending my 35th birthday in a beautiful warm place, far away from the stresses of home and family life (not to mention the Michigan winter).

My mother and sister kindly agreed to fly out to stay with the children while we were gone. Dan was in meetings most of each day, so I got to explore on my own, which I thoroughly enjoyed. Although the California natives that I ran into were horrified by the weather we experienced while I was there (rain and temperatures in the high 50s/ low 60s), I found it delightfully warm and the scenery green and lush. One morning, as I was walking along the beach, a warmly bundled local stopped me and asked if I was from out of state. "Yes," I replied, wondering how she knew. It was my shorts.

Although I enjoyed a trolley tour of San Diego, walking in Balboa Park, exploring Old Town, a dinner in Little Italy, watching Avatar in 3D, and a long train ride and walk to the old San Diego Mission, the highlight of the trip for me was the time I spent on Coronado Island. I loved walking through the neighborhood near our hotel. The homes were so nice, beautiful landscaping, new plants that I wasn't used to seeing, lovely, diverse architectural styles...I loved eating breakfast at a little cafe on Orange Street, eggs scrambled with fresh tomato, onion, and cilantro. I loved sitting on a small balcony at the hotel right up at eye level with the top of a palm tree rustling in the wind. I loved the blue sky, and watching how quickly the clouds blew in and it started to rain, and then the clouds blew away again for another patch of blue. One night after dinner, Dan and I walked down to the ferry landing and enjoyed a beautiful view of the San Diego skyline across the water, all lit up.

Here is our hotel:


San Diego skyline from the Coronado Bridge:


A beautiful tree at Balboa Park:

The baby is 14 months

Naomi turned one in November, and almost to the day I felt the cloud of first year baby haze dissipate. It has recently occurred to me that I used to post to this blog, and there is no reason that I could not start to do that again. In the past I wanted a separate blog for every aspect of my life, and I created "Healthy Potato Girl" about my quest for fitness, "Depression Club" about my struggles with my mood, and various blogs to post old journal entries from times I spent abroad. I have pulled all of these old posts from different blogs together into this blog, and I am going to start blogging about everything in my life that I want to talk about right here. Everything except my children. I did actually create one new blog, a private blog where I record family activities, interviews with the children, et cetera. If you are just dying to read about my kids and their glorious escapades, let me know and I will send you an invitation to their new "Tater Tots" blog.

P.S. The long list of links to friend & family blogs at the right of this page has gotten a bit unwieldy for me, so I'm going to start getting rid of links as I move them to my google reader. If you are still using my blog as your gateway to other friends, please make note of those peoples' addresses before they disappear!

Dan's blog puzzle

Note From PG: Dan hacked into my blog to write this rousing endorsement for his blog puzzle. Can you believe that?!!! He even used my voice! But, he is my husband, and it is a really good puzzle, so I guess I will let it pass this time:

You should all go to Dan's blog, Unravel Every Riddle, to see if you can solve the puzzle he posted recently. You need several eclectic bits of knowledge and a flexible mind. Plus the prize is, well, unique.

Cilantro-Lime Vinaigrette

Thanks to the editor's of Cook's Illustrated for this yummy taco salad dressing, which almost caused Dan and me to die of yumminess when we tasted it this weekend:

5 T fresh lime juice
1 shallot, peeled (I omitted this)
1 jalepeno chile, stemmed and seeded (I also omitted this)
1 small garlic clove, peeled
1 t sugar
1/2 t ground cumin
salt
1/2 c fresh cilantro
3/4 c extra-virgin olive oil

Process lime juice, shallot, jalapeno, garlic, sugar, cumin, and 1/2 t salt in blender until shallot and garlic are finely chopped, about 15 seconds. With blender running, add cilantro, then oil, and continue to process until smooth and emulsified, about 15 seconds.

Little Brother

Some friends of ours moved from Michigan back to Utah this past weekend and needed a family to care for their dog until they could have it shipped to them. That is how Little Brother, the Beagle, came to be living with us. He arrived at our home on Saturday afternoon, and if the weather is warm enough, will be flying home to his family on Friday. Little Brother (or "Brody" as I've been calling him) has been teaching me a lot about what life is like with a dog.

I bought Brody a bone at Kroger today because I've noticed that he wants to chew on something, and we don't really have anything that seems like a good candidate for that honor. I handed it to him right before our afternoon walk. He reluctantly left it by the front door, and then picked it back up when we got home. At that point he started whining and asking to be let out. I've never seen him do this after a walk before, and thought maybe he had to go to the bathroom. I let him out and he took his bone and went right to the back yard with it. He found a pile of dead leaves under a saw horse and began digging. He dug and dug and dug, buried his bone, and then diligently covered it back up. What a cutie! It just melted my heart to see him do that with his brand new bone.

I have never lived with a dog before. I've been begging Dan for a dog ever since we bought our house four and a half years ago. The main reason I have wanted a dog is so that I can have a walking companion. Since Brody arrived, I have been out walking several times a day, in spite of the single digit temperatures. I can assure you that without a dog, taking a walk would not have crossed my mind this week. But in spite of learning first hand what good exercise motivators dogs can be, I also discovered that having four children, including one baby, and then adding a dog to the mix, is a bit more than I want to deal with right now. So when we say goodbye to Brody, I think I will also be ready to say goodbye to my dream of having four small children and a dog.

Seven Weeks

Naomi is seven weeks old today. That means seven weeks since I became the mother of 4. As I write to you, I am eating from a bag of Lindt dark chocolate truffle balls for lunch. I am surrounded by the post-apocalyptic mess which is my living room. I've got one baby falling asleep for her nap and one just waking up. We are running out of clean clothes and clean dishes. The bathroom...I would advise that you use your own before visiting. I read this statement in the Enisgn (church magazine) this morning:

"Have you received a recent calling and feel overwhelmed? Remember how easy it sounded when someone described how to play a piano or to swim? Then when you tried to do that, or any other challenging task, how complicated it seemed. Remember how as you persisted it became more comfortable and much easier to manage? As you diligently serve, the Lord will help you in like manner with your new calling."

This struck me as being quite applicable to my own situation. On days like today, after a night of being awakened by Naomi twice and Esther four times, I feel like I am wandering aimlessly in a fog. I have time to do what needs to be done, but I can't seem to get myself together enough to use that time. Esther had school this morning, and I squandered those three hours on a trip to the grocery store, a few KenKen puzzles, and iTunes. On other days I do much better.

The one thing that I am most happy about is the fact that I've been making good dinners each night so that we can sit together as a family and enjoy our meal at the end of the day. And of course the baby is well-fed and growing. The one thing that I think is most bothering me is that I haven't yet figured out how to make exercise a part of this new life. I was walking nearly an hour a day most days until the morning of the birth, and since that day, nothing. Last night I was trying to solve this dilemma with a list of times that I could exercise. After studying the list, the best option seemed to be 5:30 a.m. at the YMCA. So I set my alarm last night. No good. I got up for the seventh and final time at 7:30, barely in time to get the boys to school.

I think one of the reasons that I'm not posting to my blog very often is that I feel like a post should include pictures, but pictures take FOREVER to upload to my blog, so I always put it off. If I let go of the requirement to include photos, like I am doing now, it is easy and even therapeutic to post something. I think there must be a way to upload smaller versions of my photos. If the files were smaller, I imagine it would go much faster.

Well, I'm headed to bed. At times like this, being awake doesn't seem to do much good. The baby I thought was waking up is still asleep, so I'd better jump on this chance. Bye!

More Pictures of the Birth Day

Disclaimer: Dan and I have never managed to have a camera with us for the birth of our children. So, this was our first birth with a working camera, and we tried to make up for past births by taking pictures of every thing and every body. Feel free to skip this post if the content is too boring :)

Here I am shortly after arriving at the Family Birth Center reception area. This was between contractions. I wanted to document my belly at its biggest:



Here I am in the triage room. They had just measured my cervix and told me I was an 8. Dan told me to put up 8 fingers and took this shot. I don't know why I look so happy...this must have been between contractions, too:



This is my anaesthesiologist (i.e. favorite person in the whole world). We waited for this shot until the epidural kicked in:



This is the doctor that delivered my baby. I had never met her before, but I liked her a lot. Dan had promised the boys a picture of the crochet hook they use to break my water, so here it is, moments before being put to work:



Thanks to the exquisite timing of Naomi's birth, Bug was able to be with us for the big event. The whole thing happened while all three of my older children were at school:



Here is Naomi's first photo op with her papa. She has been cleaned up and properly swaddled.



This is my labor & delivery nurse, Michele. She was the best: