Mama said there'd be days like this

Today could have been a lot worse than it was. Let me tell you.
Hobbette woke up at 5:30 soaked. Cold. And mad. Madder than a wet hen (Shaun had never heard that saying before. He's convinced it's a "south" thing.).
So, I change her and escort her back to bed which she seems to have no problem with since she usually gets up at 6:30-7ish.
However, her outburst has awaken Hobbit. I feed him hoping to lull him back to sleep. No dice (Shaun has heard that one...). But his outburst has renewed Hobbette's door pounding and by now it's 6.
I start the day. Hobbit gets a little nap early on and then we go out to do a few errands. The kids love the car so everyone is well behaved between errands and the running into the post office and clothing stores have only a few hang ups.
Then it's on to our play group. This is the first time we got to attend and it was hilarious. We get there a little late so it's already started and there are kids running around with bean bags and yelling the alphabet. Hobbette stares.
She's not shy. I've been told she's bold for her age. So, as soon as I get her coat and shoes off she takes off. Someone gives her a bean bag and she's jumping with the best of them. She seems a little confused with what's going on but she's willing to go with it. I just sit on the floor and hold Hobbit on my lap while she brings me the treasures the instructor hands out. Finger puppets. Scarves. Rhythm sticks (which she was thrilled that part of the activity was to bang them together and on the ground). There's a little boy there who wants to be her best friend in the worst way. She didn't really ignore him but she didn't really interact with him either. It was kinda cute. She'd sit on the floor and he'd sit in front of her. She'd crawl off to get a rhythm stick and he'd crawl after her. She'd pick up a scarf and he'd hand her another one.
Overall, a great time.
We get home in time for lunch and after a valiant fight Hobbit finally goes down for a nap. Hobbette struggles through her bottle and I put her down... It doesn't last. Five seconds after I close the door she's banging on it. "Poop!" So, I change her but she won't go down again. Her crying wakes Shaun and Hobbit so everyone goes out to do a few more errands.
By supper everyone is exhausted. The routine is that Hobbette plays by herself while I put Hobbit down and then we pick up her toys, diaper change, bottle, brush teeth and bed time. I get Hobbit down, open the door and nearly trip over her. She curled up outside his door and fell asleep waiting for me. We skipped everything but the diaper change and the poor girl went down a whole 45 minutes early tonight.

Come back wagon!

Ok. I fell off the face of the world for a bit, so here's what has happened.

Friday: I gave myself the day off. I decided I wasn't doing anything. No cleaning, no laundry, no cooking, no going anywhere or doing anything. Hell, I wasn't even going to get dressed. So, of course, that's the day my family wants to see me. And, of course, my laziness was noted.

Saturday: I didn't get back on track. That's the thing about falling off the wagon... it's really hard to get back on. House work began to pile up. But we did go to church because the masses on Sunday were canceled because of the air show. It was... horrific. It was packed, people were hungry and Hobbits were tired. We survived.

Sunday: Got up ridiculously early because Shaun needed to be at work for the big air show and he couldn't park anywhere close. So, being the sweet wife that I am, I got up at 3 to drive him there. The Hobbits were not happy. It went down hill from there. I had planned to see the air show... but one of my tires on the stroller was flat, Hobbit wouldn't stop crying unless I was holding him which meant I only had one hand. Only having one hand makes normal things, like getting dressed and going to the bathroom, suddenly very tricky. When he finally fell asleep and I wasn't going to be the one to wake him up to go for a walk to see loud jets and loud people. I decided there was always next year. I managed to survive the rest of the day.

Monday: I closed the curtains. I was embarrassed about the state my house was in. That wagon I fell off of is now miles away.

Today: I caught up to the wagon. I got most of the laundry done and most of the kitchen cleaned. I felt comfortable enough to open the curtains again. Hobbette's new favorite word is cookie. And she knows where I hide them. I can't go to the kitchen without nearly tripping over her in her effort to get in front of me so she can point at the cupboard I hide them in and yell "Cookie!" She gets two for her afternoon snack and you should see the grin on her face when shouting "Cookie!" actually gets her a cookie. So, now she tries it all the time... In the morning, when I make lunch, even immediately after she eats her cookies. The crumbs are still on her face and she's shouting "Cookie!" again. Good thing she hasn't made the connection about ice cream yet.

Lamen

I went to my first class in "survival Japanese". It was a lot of fun. I learned a lot. Such as you need to know all three ways of writing Japanese in order to read anything, like books or newspapers, because one method is used for Japanese original words like teriyaki, another is used for the Japanese version of foreign words like personal computer, and the last is the Chinese symbols that they originally used and still use today for things like some nouns and all names.

It was a bit confusing. Our instructor told us we weren't getting into the reading part of it she just wanted to make us aware of it. If we wanted to learn to read we'd have to go to the advanced survival course that they just started. Perhaps next month I'll be learning to read Japanese... who knows?

Today we just learned basic "Hi. My name is... How are you? Where are you from?" type of stuff. It was pretty cool. I don't know what it is about Japanese but I get way more excited about it than I ever did going to my Spanish class in high school. Maybe it's the immediate chance to use what I learned... We learned a phrase to say after a meal that our instructor said would make restaurant servers proud of us. I wanted to eat out for supper. Shaun's working. Perhaps another day...

I also learned that I've been saying ramen wrong. The Japanese language doesn't have an 'r' sound in it. They pronounce it lamen (the 'l' sound is a softer version of 'r' if you think about how your mouth makes the sounds...) We all laughed when we found that out.

I can't wait for next week's class!

Cooking

Tonight I had an adventure in cooking. 

Remember when I said we went shopping at a Japanese grocery store a little while ago? Well, I picked up some local produce. A goya looks a little like a cucumber but is actually a melon. They call it a bitter melon. And they aren't kidding.

I found a Japanese cook on YouTube and have been trying some of her dishes. The one I tried tonight is called Goya Chanpuru. It was pretty good. Except for the goya part. That thing made my tongue hide behind my tonsils. I recommend eating the bitter melon one slice at a time with a spoonful of other stuff. A big spoonful of other stuff.

I didn't even try to feed it to Hobbette. She ate everything else with zeal though. 

A few nights ago I made miso stir-fry with summer vegetables. That, too, was a big hit. But as I was making it a thought occurred to me. Eggplant is one of those vegetables. I know I've eaten it before... but I couldn't tell you what it tastes like. And as Shaun put it, "Even after supper, I still couldn't tell you what it tasted like..." I don't think it has a flavor of it's own. It just soaks up the other flavors without really adding anything to them. 

I've made a few other dishes that have all turned out well. I started with recipes whose ingredients I recognize and could find easily but have slowly been branching out to include things that I've never seen before... like the goya.

My sister wants me to try fermented beans called natto. They smell horrible. Maybe I'll pick some up the next time I make a trip to the local grocery store.

Pictures

As promised: here are a few pictures of life.

 The costume parade... Business in front... party in back. And I just now realized that their hair may be plastic...

 This cracked me up. Love the person with the swan head and tutu.

 Finger painting! What a silly grin she has.

In the fort we made.

Calm

Things have started to calm down a little and settle into a routine. In other words... boring. I really can't imagine anyone finding my laundry filled life interesting but I did promise I'd keep my family up-to-date on the happenings.
So, for Labor Day we did nothing.
Well, I guess not nothing. Since Shaun got the day off I had him take care of the kids all day while I did laundry. Lots and lots of laundry. The need to do laundry kind of sneaked up on me. I was suddenly a sock short of a pair. A shirt short of an outfit. A diaper short of a diaper change... You get the idea. I think every stitch of fabric in my house is now clean. To keep it that way, I'm making my children run around naked! Muhahaha! The heat is only an excuse! The real reason they run around the house in only diapers is because I'm lazy!
But seriously the heat is becoming bearable. The house is comfortable (with all the fans running...) and Hobbette doesn't get pink in the face when we walk to our car anymore. I even feel comfortable swaddling Hobbit at night now. Who knows how long it will last though. It could just be this wonderful breeze we've had for the past couple of days. Without the wind I'm sure it would be just as muggy and sticky as ever.
I guess this means I'll have to start dressing the children again...

Mass take 2...

Going to church is still in it's experimental phase. This time we decided to try the 12:30 Sunday afternoon mass. There were definitely fewer people there to give us dirty looks when Annabel started squirming... And the crying room was being used for it's intended purpose!
But the door was propped open because Father wasn't using his microphone... And it ran right into Hobbette's afternoon nap...
So, there's pros and cons to both mass times. I think we'll try the morning one again now that Hobbette has adjusted her nap time to only one in the afternoon...
The rest of the day was pretty mellow. Relaxation was the name of the game.