Goodbye naps!

Yesterday was Jack's fourth day in a row without a nap. Wednesday night he slept from 7:30 to 7. Last night he slept from 7:45 to 7. I don't think I've ever seen him as well-rested and happy as he was yesterday. He played by himself for most of the afternoon. By himself! Happily! This is a very encouraging and joyful turn.

Jacksitting

In the past month we've (finally) entered the realm of babysitting. We've left Jack twice with 2 different sitters, and he did great each time. His last nighttime sitter, Ian, made quite an impact on Jack -- he's been talking about her ever since, and wants a picture of the two of them together.

Today another sitter came and played with him for 3 hours while I caught up on a bunch of stuff. As I sat at my computer and listened to them as they hung out in Jack's room, I realized why I'm so tired at the end of each day -- the boy is exhausting! He just doesn't stop talking and playing and jumping up and down (sometimes all at once). When Paula left Jack was very nearly vibrating with energy.

Here's what I accomplished during those 3 hours:
made bread dough
started a load of laundry
answered emails
called my sister
filled out Jack's preschool paperwork
filed about 4 months worth of bills
worked on my website (hooray!)

What an awesome luxury. I felt like I was on vacation!

Eating right out of the garden

While we were watering the vegetables this morning, Jack wanted a beet, so I pulled one up out of the dirt, washed it off, and he ate it raw standing in the garden, with beet juice running down his face. Then he ate one of our carrots! Obviously we need to plant more vegetables....

I decided to check one of the potato plants, and since I could feel a potato in the dirt, I pulled it up. Six small potatoes! I'll let the other potato plants grow much longer, but I just had to see them to believe them.

No luck at all so far with the lettuces and zucchini. Something (I'm guessing snails) eats each zucchini sprout almost immediately, and the lettuces just never got beyond tiny sprouts. I started another batch of lettuce, using fewer seeds, and I'll try the zucchini this time on the deck.

Fruits (and vegetables) of our labor

Our edible garden experiments are coming along well. We've pulled a few young carrots and beets and they have been tasty, albeit small. Next year I'll thin the young plants better. We have 4 big pots with potatoes, 3 tomato plants, and newly planted lettuces and zucchini. The big surprise has been our apple trees. We planted them just over a year ago, and each has a ton of small apples. I'm not sure when to try to eat them -- many are blushing already, but I've read that the earliest apples aren't ripe until July. And they are still quite small. I guess we'll wait a bit and see.

I'm already thinking of next year and dreaming about new plants, but in the meantime I potted some herbs and installed them in our atrium, where they get a fair amount of and are out of harm's (aka slugs and snails) way.

A pillow socky for bobcat

A few weeks ago, we made a pillow socky for the bobcat at Coyote Point. As you can see from the first photo, Jack was so excited that he fell asleep in the car! I wasn't sure if the staff was merely being polite when they said they "loved it," so it was a delight and a surprise to see our pillow socky in bobcat's area yesterday. I couldn't get a decent photo of both the pillow socky and bobcat, but that's her in the background, asleep. We may make another pillow socky for the coyote next!