D to Disneyland

On spring break D got to go to Disneyland with his grandparents!  He had a blast.  They rode a roller coaster, met characters, stayed up to watch the fireworks from their hotel room window and walked and swam a lot.  He’s a lucky kid.

Jack and I had a nice dinner at Cafe Flora and some uninterupted conversations while he was gone :)

Who gives a crap?

Sometimes life is improved by mundane day-to-day changes that are of absolutely no interest to those not affected by them.  Let me tell you about one such change!

Our male kitten, Toru, has had a rough few months.  Sometime around Christmas he stopped jumping like a normal cat and we assumed he had seriously hurt one of his legs.  He struggled to get up on the couch, dragging himself up with just his front paws in a really pathetic way and he was eager to play but wanted to lie down while doing it.  It looked like a problem with one of his back legs.  We took him to the vet, tried some pain meds and enforced rest.  It didn’t seem to help so we even had an x-ray of his back legs and hips, but everything was normal.  We decided to just accept the mystery.

Around this time we bought a second self cleaning litter box on craigslist and hooked it up in the basement.  Three cats have a lot of outputs.  We had to set up a third litter box in the room Toru was confined to and all the cats much prefer to use the labor intensive and smelly traditional box. 

We gave up on confinement but then had a trouble with Emo pooping in the basement.  Finally we found a good schedule for the two automatic boxes to clean themselves at different times and Emo got back on board, but Toru rebelled.  We actually would see him go in to the litter box in the basement and then step back out to go to the bathroom on the floor.  We we not happy but figured that part of it was that he was in pain.

Now a few months later, he has gotten a bit better and does jump and play standing up.   The bad bathroom habit continued for a long time, but now I’m so excited that we’ve gone over a week with no one pooping outside of the litter box. 

This site was very helpful http://www.catexpert.co.uk/cats/how-to-clean-up-cat-pee-or-poo/.  It has lots of possible causes and potential solutions.  We started small by cleaning up with Dumb Cat cleaner, because if they smell anything they’ll just stick with their old habit.  Then I think the magic trick was putting some food in the problem corner of the basement.  It has worked like a charm!

Not having a basement [corner] full of poop is such a treat.

D’s first chapter book!

We’ve almost finished reading James and the Giant Peach to D.  I bought a Roald Dahl set on a whim a while ago, thinking chapter books were a long ways off.  Then we started reading one as an experiment and it’s been really fun, after getting past the beginning where James becomes an orphan and has to live with his terrible, physically and emotionally abusive aunts.  He understands way more than we expected, recalls details from the previous day’s reading and asks questions that show that he’s following the plot!

March rounds

Two families we are good friends with have moved away from Seattle in the last couple of years, so this month we made the rounds to visit them.  As much as we enjoyed it when they lived close by, overnight visits lead to a lot more quality time than meeting up for dinner locally does.  Plus, the kids sleep part of the time :)

First we went south to Portland.  Jack and Read went snowboarding at Mt Hood and D and I walked in Macleay park (from the Lower Macleay Park entrance) while our friends’ son slept off a slight fever.  Portland has amazing in-city hiking options.  We had some nice meals and caught up and saw their new house.  It was the first time I went out to brunch with just D for company.  On the whole the two of us had a good time, but it sure is nice to have adventure with my co-parent, for the times when my patience frays.

The following weekend we went north to Anacortes to meet our friends’ second son, at five weeks old. Saturday afternoon we took a quick ferry ride to Guemes Island and did a 2.3 mile hike that took us up http://www.wta.org/go-hiking/hikes/guemes-mountain.  It was wonderful weather and the most rewarding hiking view I’ve seen in a while.  D and their older son, who is almost three, hiked pretty much the whole way.  It was fun to watch them play together so well.  We also checked out their backyard ADU, which Jack helped design.

2017 in review

This year was our first complete year at home.  There was less stress and more fun. 

Friends and Family and Pets

• babies born:   Hazel to J&S, Libby to E&R, Graham to R&A, Finley to T&J, Evan A&J, Skylar to M&M, Jakobi to F&B  (5 of 7 are second kids)
• After labor day weekend we adopted Luna and Toru,  who were born at the end of the school year.

• Both Jack’s mom and step dad had surgeries over the summer, and both recovered well.
• Jack’s step mom retired from Boeing.
• After a long year of writing for her last post-doc position, my sister Becky got another post-doc job at UW, which she will start in January.
• The only wedding we attended was Jessica and Adam’s in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
• Jessica visited Seattle in March and she, Rachelle and I went wedding dress shopping.
• Rachel visited from Alaska in August.
• My Texas relatives (mom’s two brothers and some of their families) visited in August during the eclipse.  D met his cousin who is only a couple of months older.

• Our poor older cat had a UTI for a lot of the summer, so she was leaking pee in her sleep, while we were on our first foray into night time potty training with D.  Oh the laundry!  We’ve been lucky to not go to the vet much, but this year made up for lost time between Emo’s infection and the new kittens.
• Jenn and Andreas visited from Boston in July.  We went sailing with my parents and kayaking on Lake Union.

• We became good friends with another family from D’s school and had lots of good times and adventures with them.

House

• We planted got lots of new trees: our Japanese snowbells, an indoor Meyer lemon tree from Jack for my birthday, a lilac tree and our second living Christmas tree, which we hope to keep alive in its pot.  Its collaboratively chosen name is Lefty Righty North Tip.

• The biggest projects we did were planting outdoor plants, fixing the master bathroom lights and building the laundry chute, which are described here and here, along with some other smaller projects.
• We finally got the king sized mattress I’ve been wanting (from Avocado Green Mattress).  We also bought a twin mattress for D on craigslist, so now I can sleep easily because along with our futons, all of our mattresses are natural fibers that are free of flame redardant chemicals. 

Travel

• January: White Pass, near Mount Rainier
• February: We spent another holiday weekend in a yurt at Pacific Beach State Park, while Jack’s parents and nephew stayed there in their trailer.  It rained but had some good beach time nonetheless.  We got to take a long rainy beach walk while D veged in the warm trailer.

• March: We had a sleepover with our friends who moved up to Anacortes, including a nice little hike to Rosario beach, near Deception Pass.

• April: Jack and I made a quick overnight trip to Portland to meet our friends’ new baby, leaving D with grandparents.
• May-June: We headed to Michigan for eight days for Jessica and Adam's wedding 
• July: Our Deception Pass camping trip continued, with three other families.
• July – August: My extended family on my dad’s side put together three sprint triathlon teams for the Whidbey Island triathlon.  LINK
• August: We did *not* go camping in Eastern Washington as planned because of the massive forest fires and smoke.  We set up the teepee in the living room though.
• August: With my mom’s side of the family visiting from Texas, we spent a few days at Fort Worden.
• August: Friday Harbor
• September: The three of us camped at Liberty in the last weekend of the month.  There was frost in the morning and Jack learned that our sleeping bags really are not three season bags.  I enjoyed my new warmer, woman-specific sleeping bag.  Don’t get me started on that subject!     Despite the cold we squeezed in another October day trip with friends before winter.  The 90 minute drive was well worth it, without the hassle of packing all the camping gear.

• October: Scotland, for 2/3rds of the family
• November: We convinced our friends to join us at Seaquest State Park over Veterans’ day weekend, where we went last year as well.  It was chilly, but we had some awesome fires (with some wood we brought from Liberty) and a cold and wet, but rewarding, hike.  We saw two garter snakes!

Recreation and Food

• Fit4Mom – In September I started a high intensity interval training classes with some of my PEPS friends.  It’s great exercise (in my last workout I burned over 700 calories and had an average heart rate of 159 for 50 minutes) in a fabulously supportive environment.  It’s fun to see other women a few times a week and I even have a carpool friend.
• Jack had a good baseball season, where his team finished in a close second place, for the second time in two years.

• D did several sessions of swim lessons and moved in to the three year old class in December where it’s three three-year-olds with one instructor and no parents in the pool.  He also took pre-ballet with a great teacher at the nearby community center.  Kids’ activities that we can walk to are such a treat.

• We joined the Instant Pot (a popular electric pressure cooker) bandwagon.  I’d say we’re using it a couple of times a month and we still have some more to learn.  We’ve made lots of beans, cooked chicken without defrosting it, made soy yogurt, made some delicious vegan soup and even cooked a 6 lb leg of lamb in 90 minutes!
• Volleyball kept going though I stopped going when my PEPS groups started and Jack had a lot of conflicts due to baseball league meetings.
• D started eating grapefruit after his birthday because “when you’re three you like grapefruit.”  We got some serrated grapefruit spoons and have really enjoyed having them for breakfast.
• Our oven worked for most of 2017, which was a treat :)
• I raced in the spring with my dad and often with my sister too!

• We did some hiking.  Distances were pretty short, but D was either walking or being carried on our shoulders so it’s progress.

Reading, Watching and Thinking

• In January and February I took a weekly mindfulness class through Swedish.  It was interesting and powerful and I hope to get around to incorporating more of it in to my life.
• D did winter and summer music classes.  He’s one of the older kids in class now, but still has a blast.
• Best Books
• Jack: The Wind Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami
• Cari: This was my best reading year since D was born, so I’m going to pick two books and say What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty and Tell the Wolves I’m Home by Carol Rifka Brunt, recommended by my sister.
• D: The Magic School Bus books
• C+J read-aloud: we only finished two read-alouds so it’s not a close race, but I’d say it was the umpteenth book in a series we have read together for a long time, Revolt at the Beach by CD Payne.  Note that this doesn’t constitute an endorsement :)
• Best movies and TV:
• Cari: Hidden Figures and Big Little Lies
• D and Jack: Moana!   We watched that, The Lion King and Frozen and Moana was by far the best.  We expected more from Frozen after the hype of a few years ago so we were pretty disappointed.

Work and School and Community

• D reduced his days at the neighborhood daycare/preschool and started a few mornings a week (minus the summer months) at a French immersion preschool.  We’re really happy with the school in general and having fun with the limited French he’s learned.

• Jack designed an apartment building for the first time.  Sadly its financiers pulled out so it will probably never be built.
• I talked myself in to speaking up at work about raises and promotions and got a raise that I am happy with, which may or may not be related to speaking up.
• Jack served as the commissioner for his baseball division and did a good enough job to get to do it again next year.
• I volunteered as a PEPS leader for a 12 week evening newborn group with some awesome new moms and dads.

matrimony in Michigan

Jessica, one of my childhood best friends, who was with me in school from first through twelfth grade, married Adam, in Ann Arbor, in June.  It was a beautiful outdoor ceremony followed by a fun party.  My parents, who also knew Jessica well as a kid, came along and we made it in to a week-long trip in Michigan.

We spent the first night near the detroit airport and went to Belle Isle Park, which is a big island park in the Detroit River, right by downtown.  Then we drove 4+ hours up to Glen Arbor (on the pinky of the Michigan hand), where we stayed in a nice airbnb for several nights.  We did lots of short hikes at and around Sleeping Bear Dunes and the Old Mission Lighthouse.  Our awesome down-stream canoe ride was a nice break from the slow hikes.

Look at all these scofflaws climbing back up the huge dune, past the “Danger” sign!

Then I rented a separate car and dove back to Ann Arbor a day earlier than Jack, D and my parents, for the bridal shower I co-hosted in Gallup Park. Then it was the usual, rehearsal dinner, hair appointment (acutally I have rarely done this for weddings) and the ceremony in the afternoon.

All the childhood wedding planning I did was with Jessica, so this was a long anticipated event and it came through with beautiful and thoughtful vows and details.  Her other childhood best friend, Yasmeen, whom I’ve known from afar after meeting only during one visit when we were eight, and I pulled together a joint speech that I think went well.  There were tears and laughs so that has to count for something.  I also made this photo collage before the wedding.

My immune system carried me grudgingly through the toast but then gave up, relinquishing me to an excruciating sinus infection that was diagnosed when I got home, thus delaying this blog post for ….seven … months. Whoops.

July–December 2017 house projects

Since my last house project post in July, we’ve accomplished a few more house tasks.

• On a lovely fall weekend, before the rain started, we planted heavenly bamboo (nandina, not actually bamboo) and put in rocks for last construction obligation to our neighbors.  We’re lucky to be abe to borrow a truck from Jacks parents for projects!

• On the north side of our house, we planted daphne, rosemary, a yellow blooming lilac and three sarcococca plants.
• We put up a peg board in the basement and organized our tools, which have been in disarray for quite a while.
• Between Thansgiving weekend and New Year’s we built cabinets in our bedroom and and the first floor bathroom, and built a bucket laundry chute.   Thanks for the cabinet help, Mom and Dad!  Dropping the laundry from levels one and two, all the way down to the basement is awesome.

• We’ve had a frustrating and mysterious electrical problems that all seemed to trace back to the vanity lights in the master bathroom.  For over a year we just didn’t turn on the lights to avoid the problem.  Luckily there are other bathroom lights that worked.  Finally this fall, Jack un-wired the almost the whole bathroom to diagnose the problem.  It turned out to be the DC adapter in one of the vanity lights.  After ordering two replacement parts (the first of which wouldn’t fit in to the fixture), Jack re-attached the lights.  Putting up the fixtures is really tricky because of the tight space between the mirror  and the wall.  The first time we did it took us about an hour of working together.  After all the struggles, the threads were stripped so Jack couldn’t use a screw any more.  Jack is optimistic about the utility of hot glue, so he tried that twice without success.  Then he bought these super strong magnets that worked like magic to re-attach the light, perfectly straight, in about 10 seconds.

• This might be a stretch to include in a post about house tasks, but we spent a lot of time on it, so I’ll throw it in.  With three cats our self-flushing litter box was under considerable strain.  We spent a few evenings up to our elbows in *** deep cleaning it in our shower.  Then we ended up installing a second one of the same type in our basement, which takes times too because we use this hacked control board that this guy sells online so that we can avoid buying the cleaning cartridges that are the expensive re-occuring cost for the little box.  There are now NO EXCUSES for not using a litter box correctly!
• We successfully covered the house in Wifi using a 3-pack of mesh routers.  It’s not that the house is so big, it’s just that it is very strangely shaped (5 small levels). We had done the data wiring and, amazingly, we were able to find both ends of enough wires to create a wired connection at all three access points.  In the last, most difficult one (high in the wall in the pantry), Jack re-wired the end dozens of times (he was running out of slack coming out of the wall) before figuring out that his tester was malfunctioning!  Gaah!
• We also had an “anti-project.”  Unfortunately some of our windows are leaking.  Stay tuned for the soltuion…

holiday pomegranate salad

We’ve made the Moroccan Orange Salad from this excellent cookbook, for several holidays in the last five years, including this Christmas.  I like how it tastes but admit that part of the appeal is that it is just so refreshingly pretty.

• 6 navel oranges (we often use cara cara oranges)
• 1 tbs orange flower water
• 1/8 to 1/4  tsp cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon clover honey
• pinch freshly grated nutmeg
• chopped fresh mint for garnish (the more the better…)
• pomegranate seeds (more is better.  We actually used 2 pomegranates for 8 oranges, I think)

Slice the oranges, catching the juice in the salad bowl.  Combine the orange flower water, cinnamon and honey and toss with the oranges.  Sprinkle with nutmeg and chill or serve at once, garnishing with mint and pomegranate.  This will hold for several hours in the refrigerator.

Merry Christmas from the cutest parts of our family

Luna is voluntarily inside the cat house D made out of carboard bricks.  He’s insisted that he wants to be an architect for at least the last six months.

Emo and Toru, almost touching but definitely still not cuddling …

my mom’s sweet seventieth

In late November my mom threw herself a big (and fun) birthday bash a few weeks before her actual birthday.  Little did she know, in June we had booked a three bedroom airbnb in the Fremont/Ballard area to surprise her.  We actually managed to pull off the surprise part too!

My dad cancelled her plans for the weekend, as she made them, and we all agreed to meet for dinner Friday night in Fremont.  The ploy for getting her from the restaurant to the airbnb was “let’s go look at Christmas lights.”  It was enough.  Jack, D and I go there first, and my parents and Becky drove up, at which point my mom saw us on the porch and was very confused, but then happy.

Saturday we walked around Ballard, ate lunch at Bitterroot BBQ and enjoyed not driving at all.  Jack was kind enough to take D home for a rest in the middle of the day to “check on the kittens” so that the rest of us could walk at an adult pace.  In the evening, Becky and I made a leg of lamb in my Intstant Pot and Myra continued the surprise by joining us for a nice dinner.

Sunday morning more good friends came for quiche and coffee cake.

Thanks for everything, Mom.