Baby, it’s cold outside!

Wooo-eee.

It’s a blizzard.

Our backyard:

Our front yard: (Please note the door handle, especially)

Yeah, we aren’t going anywhere.

We were actually scheduled to speak in our church meeting tomorrow (on faith), and give a special “fireside” presentation to the youth tomorrow night (on nutrition)… but it’s all canceled due to the weather. Can’t say I’m too crushed about having another week to prepare!

So what did we do to warm up today?

Well, Mackenzie sat there looking darling and cooing at us, I made whole-grain (vegan, yummy, fluffy) pancakes with no added oil or sugar, and Scott ate said pancakes. It’s a tough life for the Beans, let me tell ya.

Here’s photo proof of Mackenzie’s cuteness, and the recipe for the pancakes. No photo proof of the pancakes, because we ate ALL of them before it occurred to me to take a photo. But I’m including the “recipe” for my favorite berry syrup to make up for the lack of photos. Try it. You’ll never ever want store-bought again. Promise.

Where Baby Bean Will Sleep

I’m sorry the photos are a bit blurry. It’s a dark Columbus night, but I was antsy to take photos and cross something off my list.

Here’s what you’d see when you first walk in the door (if you are a camera and your flash catches mad glare off the photo on the wall, that is):

Notice the purple walls, the dresser and closet on the right, the handsome and proud soon-to-be-daddy, the fun bookcase with crazy stuffed animals from Ikea and the very very drafty windows.

Here’s a better photo of the closet/dresser wall, though I still caught too much glare off the photo to see it properly. Click here to see the peacock in all his (her?) glory.

This is the wall immediately to the left of the doorway as you walk in:

Turning a little more left, you see the cool train photo Scott picked out for the room. (Many thanks to my co-worker, Andy Williams, who took every photo you see on the walls!)

And finally, the beautiful crib my parents gave me, and the glider and ottoman Scott bought me when my belly got too big to balance a laptop on. (This photo is hanging just to the right of the crib, and this print will be hanging above the crib as soon as my dad brings it out from CA. It hung above my bed my whole life. )

A tradition is born

As you may recall, last year Scott and I went to a local pumpkin patch/farm and had a blast.

Well, we went again this year and let me tell you… things had changed. First of all, we went with our church friends so we got a group deal that included:
1) apple cider
2) a homemade donut
3) a pumpkin
4) a hay ride

Whoo! A few problems:

1) So, last year, they had fresh apple cider. This year? One of those 4oz plastic cups with a tinfoil lid. It was full of apple JUICE, which, we-who-have-made-apple-cider-from-real-apples-with-an-apple-press know, is not the same thing.

2) The donut last year was to die for. This year? Meh. I gave most of mine to Scott.

3) Last year, we slogged through mud and cornfields, braved spiders, and spent a very long time selecting and cutting the perfect pumpkins from their vines. This year? The pumpkins were trucked in from Michigan and piled up for you to choose from. No mud or spiders.

4) I’ll come back to the hay ride.

So why the title of my post? Scott and I plan to come back next year. We had a great time and got all excited thinking about bringing Baby Bean along in ‘08. The only explanation I can find is, it’s now a family tradition. Otherwise why would we bother driving 30 minutes each way for plasticy apple non-cider, a mediocre donut, and piled up pumpkins?

All kidding aside… let’s get to the serious business of The Rules. We learned last year that there were no hard drugs allowed on the hayride, and that throwing corn was strictly prohibited. However, this year they really buckled down on the hooligans that obviously frequent the farm:

Also on the rule list was “Each damaged bale of straw- $4.00 fine”. Oh, and of course the classic “No adults in the kiddie maze”. What kind of a no-good roustabout would duck under the “you must be this short to enter sign” and terrorize the poor kiddies?

Of course, I couldn’t say… but this knee high maze sure has Scott stumped.

If he blogged *ahem* he would pipe in here that he was not the only one who couldn’t resist breaking a few rules:

Other highlights of the evening included getting my shoes untied by chickens (apparently NOBODY on the farm had any manners):

… getting lost in a really real corn maze…

… taking in the sights of farm life…

… and of course the obligatory dance with the scarecrow…

Here’s a blurry photo of Scott and I showing off our pumpkin selections:

And here’s a blurry photo of me trying to show off the pumpkin while simultaneoulsy hiding the belly.

The evening ended with a romantic jostling hayride in which I almost died of happiness gave birth going over one of the bumps… while sitting on a bale of straw and doing my best not to damage it. After all, I hear they fine you $4 for that!

Welcome to the Jungle

The view from our sliding glass door:

The morning glory who ate our fence:

Our “large tomato” plants:

Our “small tomato” plant, who is fraternizing with the squash in the middle of the patio…

… and has taken over the trellis and ironically enough, found the tomato cages stacked in the corner. It seems to like them after all! Oh, and there’s our in-the-ground basil plant sharing the space as well.

Our biggest pot o’ basil:

And… the fruits of our labors.