Fall is upon us

Fall is in the air. The air is crisp at night and dusk arrives at the early hour of 8pm. But the surest sign? Our gorgeous hydrangeas have taken on that papery, ashy quality.

Stay tuned for back to school posts...the next sign that a new season is upon us.

Sous Chef Mary

On today's summertime agenda: nectarine & cream cobbler. Isn't my sous chef magnificent?

Oh, and yes, those are Grandma Fisher's baking cannisters you see. We agreed that she was blessing our cobbler from above because if you think it looked good going into the oven, you should see it out of the oven: a golden and buttery delight.

Kah-nee-ta Nostalgia

Many times as young children, we were swooped up on cloudy summer days by our sun-loving mama to head to Kah-nee-ta in search of the sun gods of warm springs (and the warm pool). And so my parents asked if they could help us re-live the fun with all of their granddaughters this summer.

The girls loved swimming in the spacious water, complete with the bear sculptures I remember from my youth and the equally strict lifeguards reminding everyone to keep off of them.

After swimming, we enjoyed a wonderful dinner at the lodge restaurant. And then we decided Lucy had plenty of energy and could use a walk before bedtime. Grandma and Mary led the way, up a rocky, steep hill to the top of the bluff. It was a gorgeous climb. The only problem? We were all in flip flops (or worse, flip-flop heels!), so the trek down was quite a challenge. But, we made it thanks to sure footing and some hand-holding. And those of us in the least stable footwear had to pose for a snapshot as evidence of our survival!

That night, Grandma read stories to the girls on the hotel room's balcony and shared the tradition of finding the first star of the night. And in the morning, the crew awoke bright-eyed and ready to head back to the pool for more splashing and swimming.

How lucky we are to have such generous grandparents. Not only did they allow us to re-live the nostalgia of our childhood, but we were able to form new memories in this special place with our own children.

To the Nines

Despite being threatened earlier in the week that she would be hauled off to the sausage factory ("to eat sausage, mama?" asks Lucy innocently), Greta has managed to make it to nine years old!

Our little Greta was number nine in her litter, so it was most appropriate to celebrate her ninth birthday in serious fashion. A vanilla-bean cake-- forget those dog-friendly confections that taste like cardboard-- was wonderfully decorated by Mary and Lucy with dog-bone shaped sprinkles.

While Greta was cautious about the candles, as soon as they were extinguished by her singing sisters, she was delighted to learn that the cake was for her consumption! And, so were those singing sisters!

Happy Ninth Birthday to our favorite number nine!

Happy Campers

We embarked on the girls' inaugural camping trip this weekend. With the entire house bundled into the back of the Jeep (or so it seemed), we took off with three other wonderful families for Little Crater Lake in the Mount Hood National Forest.

If you can picture an idyllic, little-kid-fishing, marshmallow-roasting, campfire-story telling adventure, this was it to the letter. Two happy little campers, for sure.

Wit

Lucy says to me last night as we sit down to eat halibut, "Hey, Mom, you know how you're always telling me I need to stop growing and stay little for a while longer?"

"Yes," I reply.

"Well, I think I can do that by not eating dinners." Then she adds, "And especially by not eating this one."

The Evil BakingTwin

These two canisters look alike, don't they?

But, looks can be deceiving...as we know from being part of a family with several sets of identical twins. (I promise no evil twin references here apply to you, Uncle Mike.)

Well, after several disappointingly odd, undercooked cobblers, I made this discovery:

Yes, that's right. Trader Joe's baking SODA is in a round, red tin. The variety that typically holds baking POWDER. And nothing at all like the square baking soda boxes found from pretty much every other baking soda product. Pretty sneaky, Mr. Joe.

I'd have to say, in this case, that Mr. Joe is most certainly the evil twin...

The Very Hungry Crankysaurus

The past four days, we have nearly drowned ourselves in ice cream. Which sounds positively marvelous, right? Here's our own Hungry Caterpillarish version of the week's ice cream consumption:

On Thursday, we gobbled gelato with Aunt Amy and Chiara. Delicious, rich gelato that makes you want to lick the bowl (whilst hoping no one is watching).

On Friday, we enjoyed ice cream with Nana. It was blue cotton candy, so sticky and sweet it nearly hurt my teeth to look at it.
On Saturday, we inhaled m&m-dotted ice cream with pals from the neighborhood, which led directly to this hilarious dress-up session (I blame the sugar for most of these costumes).

And, on Sunday, we cycled over to our neighborhood's annual Sundae in the Park, which featured, yep, you guessed it, ice cream sundaes. Of course, we had to get some. How could we attend Sundae in the Park and forgo the sundae (or the face painting!)? Well, obviously, we couldn't.

Which is okay, because ice cream is a good thing, right? Except, not so much. Because after four days of the creamery confection, Lucy is a verifiable crankysaurus. The kind you hope will become extinct. Quickly.

Let's hope an ice cream strike (our version of the Caterpillar's nice green leaf) for a few days can restore my Lucy back to un-crankiness.

Oh, please please.

Summer Camp

Mobbing their favorite uber-popular coach with hugs on the final day of camp!

All of the pals together on the final day of camp, plus our pal Yusuf, whom we met at camp. Yusuf is spending the summer in Portland all the way from Egypt.

We only signed up for one camp this summer, which may be a deficit to my children (though I'd like to think not, as lazy summer days at the pool and park rate highly in my book).

But, if we were only going to do one camp, we definitely did the right one. My friend Erin recommended a multi-sport camp which was from 9am-12pm for one week. Our girls signed up for the camp alongside four of their pals from St. Agatha. The coaches were college students who amazed us with their relating abilities to small children. Throughout the week, the girls became big fans of soccer and reaffirmed their love of baseball. It was such a fabulous camp that the children literally mobbed the coaches on the final day for farewell hugs.

Camp success! Now, onto lazy summer days...