avablog

Pictures. More later. XOXO, Us

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I call them “buzzer bugs” when I ask Ava if she can hear them. I don’t know if it’s been the warm weather or what, but I can’t recall the cicadas being this loud…ever. I was out in the yard the other night, and the racket was nearly deafening. I’ve been finding these spent shells […]

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As regular readers know (if there are any out there), I was hoping for good weather this past weekend for a bike ride I’d been planning on for months.  Well, I got what I wanted, sort of.  Saturday morning broke clear, a little breezy, and HOT.  Really hot.  Like, stay-inside-and-close-all-the-shades hot.  But I’ve never been […]

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I have outdoor plans this weekend.  It’s an event I’ve been anticipating for a couple months now, so I’m hoping the weather pans out for Saturday.  As of right now, it’s supposed to be sunny and in the mid to upper 90s — perfect for a 30-mile bike ride to one of the state’s best […]

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I had to do some maintenance on the garden recently. My snap pea vines have grown much taller than the 3 feet advertised on the seed packet. It’s only mildly problematic. I took some of the long strips of redwood left over from my trellis project and wove them vertically through the chickenwire fence where […]

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It’s a good feeling to get everything done over a weekend that you’d hoped you’d get done going in. The weekend had a couple notable highlights. The first, not surprisingly, was the astounding meal we had on Saturday evening at Simone’s Plain and Simple. And “astounding” really isn’t much of an exaggeration. Between the gorgeous […]

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Leah’s taking Ava to Decorah this afternoon for a girls weekend, so I’ll be on my own until Sunday afternoon.  What to do, what to do…. Tonight I’m going to have a little screening of International Blue Velvet, which is on loan from a friend.  I’ve never seen it before, and everyone I’ve ever heard […]

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Whew! What a whirlwind. Where to begin? This alliterative moment brought to you by the letters W and H.

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I like radishes.  Don’t love ’em.  But there’s something refreshing about them, particularly sliced super thin on top of a salad of mixed greens. The CSA we belong to is producing lots of radishes right now, and I’m at a bit of a loss as to what to do with them.  Salads, yes, but after […]

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I was at home with Ava on Tuesday while she got over a little rough patch. We think she’s been teething. In any case, she seems much happier now. It was a gorgeous day, so I’d planned to make some headway on a project I’d come up with for the yard. I bought a new […]

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I spent a fair amount of time (and sacrificed one or two skin cells in the process) finishing up our vegetable garden this past weekend.  The official roster now stands at tomatoes, jalapenos, green and red peppers, basil, snap peas, beans, “regular” peas, carrots, cukes, and onions.  I think I’ve got four or five different […]

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Last night our neighbor Q came over with some good news (his name isn’t really Q; it’s shorthand for his last name, which is Cusick. Get it?). He and his girlfriend Shannon are our backyard neighbors. There’s another neighbor whose yard is adjacent to both of ours, and she’s almost never, ever out in her […]

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…there’s always someone who has it worse. I was trying to find some time between rain showers this past weekend to put in some plantings that Leah and I bought on Saturday.  Just as I’d get ready to head out the door, another monsoon would hit, complete with strong wind gusts.  Then I’d get involved […]

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I do love biking to work. Sure, it’s a bit of a hassle to pack and unpack my work clothes, and dealing with the traffic can be a pain, but the benefits of the ride far outweigh those minor inconveniences. I love showing up at the office with my lungs full of fragrant spring air. […]

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Today Ava rode in her Burley bike trailer to daycare. She had a great time. I was a little worried about the bumps in the road irritating her as we rode, but she just sat back there and chatted away to herself, granola bar in hand. I need to make some minor adjustments to the […]

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It was a busy one. Our friend Judy was in town to receive some instruction on using her new 15″ MacBook Pro. It sure is a dandy little machine. I’m really looking forward to seeing what Apple comes up with for the iBook replacement. Judy really caught on quick. She was coming from an old […]

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Or at least to the 3/4-mile path between our house and daycare, which is where I’ll be towing Ava now that I got her a new bike helmet. I’m also trying to brainstorm other low-traffic routes that I can access from our house. It’s not so easy, especially with high school still in session a […]

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This time of year it seems like everything that can procreate is procreating. And rightly so. The water is running and tender shoots of grass are everywhere. All of my flowers and even the trees are loaded down with pollen, and fat bumblebees sometimes bounce right off our windows with dull little thumps in their […]

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Leah mentioned a couple times over the weekend that it was one year ago that Ava had her first ear infection. Between that weekend and last October, she suffered through seven ear infections and finally ended up getting tubes put in, which stopped the infections (or at least the suffering that they cause). This year […]

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The year’s first tulip burst open this morning in the back yard. I really do like this variety a lot, with its bright red petals and yellow center. A quick tour of the yard revealed a number of other tulips on the verge of blooming. Also, we have more fern peonies this year than I’ve […]

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