Four Part Harmony

We’ve been enjoying these last few (official) weeks of summer. The weather’s been great, nice warm days and cool nights.

We went to our friends Brian and Alina’s wedding last weekend. Lots of friends there, and a good time was had by all.

Emily and Kayla were two of the flower girls. Our friend Jason performed the ceremony.

The reception was fun too. Among other fun activities, they had piñatas for the kids. The bigger kids were the most interested, Anna mostly stood on the sidelines at first. But I encouraged her to dive into the pile when the first one broke and she managed to grab up a couple handfuls of little trinkets and candy. The second time she decided to try her hand at hitting it. The stick was mostly too heavy for her, but she had fun trying. She spent much the rest of the day playing with the little toys she got and unwrapping (but not eating) the candy.

The garden is doing great, and we’re still getting tons of tomatoes (and basil and eggplants).

We’ve processed and frozen a few quarts, but mostly we’ve been roasting them up with basil and onions and garlic (or whatever we have on hand) and then blending the roasted veggies into a sauce/base. It’s amazingly versatile stuff, delicious as its own as a sauce or as  a base for any number of soups etc.

Our most exciting news this past week is that Anna started preschool!

Anna eating breakfast the morning of her first day of school.

Here’s a picture of where she’s going to school. It’s a nice little place run out of a house in Sellwood, right around the corner from where we live. They’ve got a few chickens and some rabbits in the backyard, and Anna was right at home. She didn’t evn hardly skip a beat when she realized on her first day that Mama wasn’t going to stay for the whole day. By the time my first day to drop her off came around, her third day, she hardly looked back once she was in the door. I had to track her down to get a kiss goodbye.

Here she is sitting down for morning snack, just before Nicki dropped her off. It’s nice to see her really excited about school. So far when we’ve picked her up in the afternoon she keeps up a stream of consciousness ramble of talking and singing for the rest of the day. She likes the kids in her class, and has made some friends there already, so we’re pretty sure this is going to be a great thing for her.

And of course, here’s the weekly picture of Anna and Milo, hanging out together.

So long for now.