Rainy Days, Rainy Nights

One day last week Anja and I ate our lunch out on the porch and watched the rain. It's been raining for days and days. We've been spending much time on the porch and on our cozy back patio. After the girls are in bed, Martin and I make some tea and sit out at the patio table together. It's really nice. I have a feeling our backyard is going to get a lot of use this summer. We've already done more with it than we did last year, and feel motivated (not to mention able) to keep it up. And after this weekend it'll be time to plant the garden! Have I said it enough? I'm so glad winter is over.



I have the enormous task ahead of me of organizing all of my fabric and moving it from the bedroom closet (in multiple boxes and bags) into my new old trunk. Yikes. Currently, my dining room is a wreck as I tiptoe into this project and then backstep a little bit. For example, this morning I had the idea of moving some of the fabric, so I brought three bags from the closet up to the dining room. Then I took two bags back to the closet, left one bag out (letting the girls dig through the contents) and started making a paint smock.

Today Laura and MaryGrace came over and that was fun. And yestesrday Lina and her girls came over and that was fun too.

We have some new neighbors. Our good neighbors, Hugs and Nick, moved out a few weeks ago. I miss them. They led an alternative lifestyle, but we did have some things in common, and they were so nice... now that place is full of hoodlums and the things I watch from the upstairs window (doesn't that sound creepy) while I'm nursing Greta to sleep are just weird. In fact, they're so weird that I thought about calling the police. Maybe I will be surprised. Maybe I will eat my words as they become my close friends.

But I doubt it.

Oh well, at least we have Kelsey and her roommates on the other side. And I really like them.

Oh, and I stopped baking for various reasons since about Christmas. I have not noticed any difference in my waistline, but at least I don't feel like I'm spending our entire grocery budget on baking supplies! Anyway, on Sunday night I made chocolate almond biscotti and it turned out pretty brick-ish. Now, in my book, chocolate is chocolate.... but this stuff had to be eaten with caution or we might have ended up in the dentist's chair. Yikes. I think I should be done with biscotti all together. And in fact, I think I'll take another baking break. Except for bread, of course.