Celebrating Our Veterans with Snow

Apparently, this year Veterans Day is the beginning of winter. When I got up at 5:47 this morning, it was 10 degrees with a strong wind, and when I went outside to let Mia out, this is what it looked like:

Mia was not amused.

Okay, so technically it didn't look exactly like that, because it isn't even light at 5:47 a.m. I waited until later to take the photo. Obviously.

The boys were very excited about the snow and were out the door like a shot as soon as they had some breakfast.

Well, a shot that was loaded by me first with winter boots, snow pants, hats, mittens, and coats.

Is it a bad sign that I'm already silently but vehemently cursing the winter apparel and it's only the first snowfall of the season? Yeah.

Anyway.

They stayed out for almost an hour, despite the wind and temperature. 

Meanwhile, Poppy was all, "Have fun, guys. I'll just stay here on the couch in my fleecy sleep sack."

Smart girl.

Incidentally, as you can see from the above photo, Poppy is in the baby acne stage of development. That's okay, though, because it gives me the opportunity to sing my own version of "Sixteen Going on Seventeen," from The Sound of Music. It goes like this, "You are three weeks going on thirteen, with pimples across your cheeks . . ." 

Catchy, no?

So that's where we are: playing in the snow and singing ridiculous songs to the baby. Cabin fever, here we come.

The Squash Haul

A. had to go the nearest city today to pick up some work papers, and Jack, Poppy, and I accompanied him.

The entire reason I subjected myself to an hour-and-a-half roundtrip drive with a constantly talking 2-year-old and a newborn was to visit the farm stand in this city. Such is my desire to stock up on apples and squash.

I was going to send a list with A., but there are so many variables that I couldn't account for on a list. What kind of apples would they have? How much was the squash? What if they had beets, but they didn't look very fresh?

Obviously, my need for control over my produce is a little excessive.

In any case, the whole crew descended upon the farm stand (which is actually pretty big and more like a store affiliated with a nearby large farm) where I found good broccoli, questionable beets, not as many varieties of apples as I would have liked, and a lot of squash.

A. would have been very confused.

Jack and I picked out about ten butternut squash, along with the broccoli, a discounted bag of Fortune apples (a little soft, but I bought them for cooking with, so it didn't matter), a bag of Honeycrisp apples, a giant cabbage, and some pork rinds.

Gross on the pork rinds. Those were A.'s contribution to our healthy haul.

When we got to the cash register, the lady weighed my squash and then told me that if I wanted, she could give me a banana box to fill with squash and the bulk discount would mean I would only pay three dollars more.

OKAY.

So Jack and I went back to the squash bins with a big-ass box and filled it up with more butternut squash, plus some Delicata and acorn squash just for the hell of it. In the end, we got about double the quantity of squash for a few dollars more.

Totally worth going myself. Even if I did have to listen to Poppy scream for the last fifteen minutes of the car ride home because she woke up and (I later discovered) had a soiled diaper and NO ONE WAS HELPING HER.

Sorry, Poppy. But our squash supply should last until you're eating solid foods in six months. You'll thank me then.

Sunday Best

This morning as I was changing Poppy, I noticed she had some poop on her onesie. Well! Full outfit change for you then, my girl!

And since today was her debut at church--which, based on the interest in my pregnancy among the congregation, really was going to be like a debut--I thought maybe I should find something other than pajamas for her*.

Because the right clothing really makes a person more comfortable in a new social situation.

So I dug through the drawer of baby clothing, most of which I have not yet used, but the only non-pajama clothing I could find was in size 3 months.

Which fit.

And which are very pink and floral. Pink John Deere socks included.

Every item of clothing she's wearing came from the baby drizzle. Good thing everyone bought things larger than newborn size.

Can someone tell me what is up with decorating the rear end of baby clothing?

Personally, I'd steer clear of that particular area, bunny. It can get a little messy 'round those parts.

She slept through the entire service in her car seat, anyway. The car seat has a cover over it, so no one even saw the outfit. But I'm sure it boosted her confidence. And the plethora of pink (the car seat cover is pink, too) made it safe for everyone to exclaim, "You had a little girl!"

Yes, I sure did. And I shall bedeck her in florals and pink. At least until she's old enough to wear some more of her brothers' hand-me-downs.

* Not the "Mommy's Little Dude" pajamas, though. She's outgrown those already.