What a great adventure with the kids today. Getting out the door is the main challenge, planning for all the eventualities, and in this case getting together the gear for swim lessons and a picnic in the park afterward, but once that's conquered, the kids and I work together like a well-trained team. Actually, the kids probably are a well-trained team, and I'm the coach, shouting encouragement and reminders as I push the jogging stroller (F and baby CJ riding) and chase the big kids on their bikes down the sidewalk. Maybe one of the reasons the Olympics are so appealing is because we all know what it's like to push through and perform our own personal bests, in tasks unrecognized but necessary. So mine today was to chase those kids down the sidewalk while pushing the stroller loaded with children and gear and picnic and water bottles and towels.
After swim lessons, we headed directly to the park where we found some shade and ate happily, though not especially locally. Carrots and cucumber and zucchini slices were local, but the hummus and pita were not, and were bought. I haven't been successful making my own hummus. Our blender isn't up to the task (we haven't found a task our blender actually is up to, come to think of it). But we sat on our blanket and chatted and watched jet planes in the sky, then the big kids ran and played on the playground and F and baby CJ and I read books, and the sky was blue, the air fresh and cool, the sun brilliant. This is the life, I thought. My own personal gold medal, to be-labour the metaphor ...
Now it's heading toward suppertime and I'm wondering what Kevin will be bringing home in our CSA box this evening. Supper will be brown rice (I add a handful of wild rice to the pot, too), and likely some stir-fry of CSA box offerings. And salad with feta and a balsamic/honey dressing, and more driveway tomatoes. I haven't explained driveway tomatoes, Kevin's gardening project. We have very little unshaded yard, so a couple of years ago, Kevin started growing tomatoes in containers along the driveway. This year he tilled a patch of front lawn along the driveway and planted more tomatoes and eggplant (we've gotten two of those already), and, along the back fence where there is now more sun thanks to those pruned fruit trees, we planted some potatoes that had gone to seed in our cold cellar. The jury's out on those yet, but the driveway tomatoes are producing brilliantly. Mostly cherry. We may need to re-brand, however. Something about driveway doesn't conjure up delectable.Labels: CSA box, gardening, kids