If you want to know what we're doing in DC...

I am taking a Benadryl and sitting on the bed, so check out Ann's blog for a DC update.

Dad will be in charge!

Tomorrow morning I am leaving my family...don't worry...only for five days. My 'best friend Ann Kimmel' (as she prefers to be called) and I are going to Washington DC tomorrow for FIVE DAYS WITHOUT RESPONSIBILITIES! I would say that 'what happens in DC, stays in DC' but 1.) we are too boring for that to be funny (except that neither of us is going to confess to the amazing eating that we will be doing) and 2.) from previous politicians' experience, we know that this isn't true.

Anyway, Dad will be in charge. If you see the girls wrestling him to the ground and stealing his stuff, please step in and save him! Actually, I am thankful to have one of those husbands that my grandmother considers some sort of super hero.

Every year Mark and I take a trip together, sans kiddos, and it restores the wonderful in our marriage. I am hoping that this trip will restore the wonderful in me!

Anyway, no pictures of kids for a few days. If you need an update, just call Laura and she will tell you that Ava thinks 'No, Laura, you're amazing!!!'

So here's how the morning started...

Lately, if Ava wakes up too early, I let her snuggle in bed with me for a little while. Charlotte usually settles right back down to sleep, and all is peaceful in the Solomon world. Well, this morning, Ava calls to me that she needs to go to the bathroom. I get up, sneak her out of her room, take her to the bathroom and then we climb into my bed. But, this morning, Charlotte will not settle down. I give her about 15 minutes, and then we go in for her. When I get into the room, she doesn't have her pacifier. It is usually hooked on to her jammies at night. No wonder she won't go back to sleep! So, I pull her crib out a little and ask her what she's done with her paci. Out of the corner of my eye, I notice Ava opening the closet door. She picks Charlotte's paci off the closet floor and hands it to me. Then, she states, in a very parental way, that Charlotte was playing with her paci, so Ava had to take it away!

I am sure that you can imagine the rest of the day!

Girl Update

I know...I stink at blogging. I'm too busy mothering!!! So, just to keep you satisfied, here are a couple of pictures of the darlings.

You can't tell from these pictures, but Ava feels horrible and is a total grump today. I made her wear a hat because our house is cold and her hair is wet. She groused a little, but doesn't like the way I use the hairdryer - the hat is the only option. She lets her dad use the dryer, though!






Charlotte Grace loves her dad! I mean she really loves him. She'll leave her mom, scoot across the floor and grab him when she sees him. And, she is great at hugs! She gives the best hugs these days - and she doesn't let go first!

Indian Summer

So, we're outside enjoying the 70+ degree weather a couple of days ago, when it occurs to me that we were experiencing 'Indian Summer'. Then, a few minutes later, I laughed out loud. Mark is apparently 1/16 Native American (if you're a cowboy, then that's Indian to you...), does that mean that one of my 1/32 Native American daughters (fair skinned and blond) could be the first Native American president? HAHAHA! Just a moment of Solomon political humor...probably not very funny, which is the reason that I don't usually do political humor. But, it is our blog, and you love us!

Back to the real story!

Charlotte has been tough to keep off the back steps. They are scary and dangerous to mothers of 14 month old children! Sometimes she just sits on the bottom steps and looks like she thinks she's big (right! children her age who are 'big' walk! they don't crawl!). But, on this day, she discovered the recycle bin! She thinks it is a new toy box, full of new amazing things!

In this picture she is, once again, tasting the mysterious 'poison berries' that have been all over our lawn since the Norwood Hurricane of 2008. To my knowledge, and don't laugh at the amazing lack of knowledge, she has never swallowed one. I am convinced that this girl will be the one who can nap with gum in her mouth and never get it into her hair! Mind you, we are NEVER going to test that theory. Anyway, she'd given up tasting the berries for a few weeks. She just enjoyed carrying them around, held so tightly in the smallest fist you've seen. But, I guess she wanted to see if anything changed as they ripened! Don't worry. As the president of the Norwood branch of National Safety Directors International, I quickly saved my daughter from certain death and threw the berry into the back yard. If you've never been on the phone with me when something like this happens to Charlotte, I'll tell you that the dogs in the neighborhood have damaged ear drums after she let's out a blood-curdling scream!

This is Ava, being...well...Ava. She is concentrating on something very important with her hair in her face and a little bit of lunch around her mouth. Since she has begun to wash her own hands after meals, I have completely lost control of the food around her mouth. Also, I love the fact that hair around her face doesn't bother her. To me, a 'tucker' (for those of you who have short hair or are boys, a 'tucker' is a person who has long hair around her face, but cannot just let it sit there, looking pretty. A 'tucker' has to tuck her hair behind her ears, ruining the Gwyneth Paltrow sleek look that she saw in the morning, after using her wonderful hand-me-down CHI straightening iron...but I digress). To me, this lack of care for this beautiful mess of hair, means that there is at least one ridiculous, frustrating habit that may not be passed on to this amazing little girl!

Here's a video of Charlotte...listen to Ava. She's my doll!

Here is my Ava-love. Since I don't have a way to shorten her name, I just add to it.

This post is so 'wordy' because videos take so long to load!!! Sorry...or you're welcome!

Silly Charlotte!

It is almost 8pm, and I can hear Charlotte Grace in the baby monitor. She is barking at the neighbor dog!

About once a day, I wonder if Charlotte can hear. Ignoring me is a common practice of hers. Then, I'll faintly hear a dog barking from blocks away. I know that Charlotte's ears are just fine when I hear her chime in excitedly and say her little word for 'dog'!

Our First Family Garden

This summer we decided to try out Square Foot Gardening. I highly recommend it! I planned the planting and researched all of the details. Mark and I did the work (remember, I'm the girl in this relationship, so I shopped and did 'pink' level grunt work). Then, Ava and I spent the summer tending to the garden. We did almost no weeding at all, which we loved. Ava and I munched on fresh things most mornings throughout the summer. We had our final harvest last week, and I decided that it was time to document this garden...and share a cute video of Ava eating a tomato...she only likes yellow ones.

This is an early shot of the garden. The sugar snap peas, the spinach and the lettuce were doing great. The green beans were consistently eaten by something (I think I'm buying a BB gun...or Patrick, may I have one of yours?). The onions weren't very impressive, but next year I'm going to do them the way my Uncle Jack does. He just sort of sets them on top of the dirt. He is a blind, master gardener. He has the most amazing garden each year...with about 15 different sorts of tomatoes. AND, even blind, he can tell where the best blackberries are in the woods on his property!

This picture is to demonstrate the success of our tomato plants and the herbs. If stretched up - and I am not quite tall enough to do it - the tomato plants are at least seven feet tall! Sean said that I watered them too much. They didn't always ripen as quickly as we thought they should. Who knows!?! They're sure to be a little neglected next year!

This was our final harvest (except the herbs, which I'll handle this week). Everything ended up in a plastic buggy with Baby Brother. I don't know if I've mentioned Baby Brother before, but it is very important that you know that Baby Brother is a girl. I am waiting until after our ultrasound to handle this one. We are definitely have a 'baby brother'. It is yet to be determined whether our 'baby brother' will be male or female!

Here's Ava eating a tomato from our garden. She actually claims to only like yellow tomatoes. The only other yellow tomatoes she has had were sweet, ripe ones from my grandmother's cherry tomato plant. This one is a 'not quite ripe' one from our garden. I can't imagine that it was any good, especially to someone her age. At this point in our garden, the tomatoes are really tart!

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