Carmel Arts Festival 2018

One weekend (when Neil was in Germany, I think) the kids joined me for my run and we decided to go to the Carmel Arts Festival and hit up the farmer's market for some snacks. We bought ourselves a few pounds of insanely juicy and delicious plums, then had a great time checking out all the stalls and participating in the arts activities! (The piece above now hangs in the art wing at the high school, which is fun.)

One of the many (permanent) sculptures that lines the sidewalks in the Arts & Design district. I love that this is so close to our home!

The Moon Cake festival the previous weekend had been postponed due to an awful thunderstorm  (there are usually festivals every weekend during the summer), so we got to enjoy some dragon dancers during the arts festival! 

Seriously the prettiest little downtown. I try to loop through here on my runs at least once a week because it's beautiful in every season. 

I pushed Matty in the jogging stroller--at that point (2 years ago as I'm writing this) it was the perfect pace for the kids to keep up on bikes when I was pushing the stroller. (Now Matthew weighs like a million pounds and I don't think I could keep up with the bikes!)

Scootering up to the bike valet at the farmers' market because #carmellife

Such a fun morning! If I recall correctly, we went home & I showered and then we spent the afternoon at the Museum of Miniature Houses, which is this darling little museum where we had SO much fun exploring all the tiny houses and their intricate furniture (and I probably had zero pictures because I was holding on to Matthew, hah!)

 

Matthew is two!!

Oh this guy. How we love him!! He is the sunshine around which our whole family revolves. Can't imagine life without him--the first thing Luke does every day when he gets home is to ask if he can go get Matthew up from his nap, and then I hear him go in and say, "Hi Matthew sweetie, it's your Lukey! Did you miss me?" and then Matthew comes running in with his arms full of stuffed cats and everyone generally erupts into adoration. Just like we've been doing ever since he was born.

He's not spoiled AT ALL.

(He got a toy kitchen for his birthday.)

(He is very spoiled.)

But he is the sweetest happiest little guy, just full of cheeriness and love. Sometimes this is a little tricky--like when he is super upset about anyone ever leaving because he wants all his people RIGHT THERE WITH HIM (this includes extended family as well, and we have a lot of times where he will hopefully call out "Grandma! Grandpa! Iris! Pierce!" But he's adjusted to the kids going off on the bus (as long as we go on a walk right away--he LOVES walks).

He's convinced that he's a big boy and likes to sit at a barstool at the counter with everyone else. He refuses sippy cups because obviously no other big boys are drinking out of them! (He will, however, drink out of a "botterwattle.") He still mostly talks in one or maybe two-word chunks, but he has a very big vocabulary and repeats back just about anything we say to him (my favorite is how he calls himself "Matt-me").

He loves tools and figured out how to operate Neil's drills and drivers about six months ago, including snapping in the battery pack. Right now he likes to push a stool over to the counter, climb up, lie down on the counter, and open the drawers where we keep all the goodies like screwdrivers, flashlights, batteries, etc. Then he goes around the house with his screwdrivers and batteries to see what he can do.

He's absolutely fearless and books it up into the 13-foot treehouse whenever he gets a chance. He loves, loves, loves cats and dogs (for his birthday one of my friends texted him photos of her dog and he could not possibly have been happier!). He loves to eat "pampates and eggies" for breakfast, climbs up to the pantry all day long to get himself apples, and is a huge fan of Indian food (the last time we took him to an Indian restaurant, he walked through the door and said, "Oh yummies!!"). He loves going to storytime at the "wibrerry," sings himself to sleep every night with "This Old Man,"  and loooooooves to snuggle so dang much that we almost always end up back in bed with him halfway through the morning because it just makes him so happy (on the weekends he likes to go climb into bed with the girls because they're often still asleep, and he will announce "cold cold!" and go bury himself under their sheets wrapped in their arms.

He loves reading books, especially if they are about construction equipment, and he has Nathan's eye for excavators, bulldozers, and fire trucks. He often brings us toys that he wants us to snap together and asks, "Open?"

As I've been watching him run around today, I've gotten pretty misty-eyed thinking about how blessed we are to have Matthew in our family. He is so sweet and we just love him so much. Today we checked Abigail out of school and took her to lunch, and the way the two of them lit up when they saw each other in the main office, and seeing him run to her laughing in delight and the way she picked him up and cuddled him close to her...man alive, we are so lucky. 

It's autumn!!

Today Matthew and I ran through our first crunchy leaves and I thought hip hip hurray, best time of the year!!! We had a weekend of nonstop rain (like 8 inches) and cool temps, so you better believe we fried scones and mulled cider and got ourselves some apple-cinnamon candle-burning going on (and pulled out the fall decorations!).

I went to New York a couple weeks ago to help my sister Ruth & her family through her fourth round of chemo--hopefully it was the last really terrible one. It was, quite frankly, so hard to see her in so much pain. But conversely, really good to be there and be able to talk with her when she was feeling well enough and make food and take care of kiddos when she wasn't. (And I had some pretty glorious alone time which NEVER happens in my regular life--one afternoon I went to the 9/11 museum, one afternoon I walked the Brooklyn Bridge, and another day I ran 14 miles around the city from Battery Park to Central Park.)

This weekend I'm going to Michigan with Matthew to see my parents and Elise's family (they're visiting from Utah). I'm sad to leave the rest of my kiddos behind, but they just have too much going on to leave, and Neil is so darn busy that he needs the work time at home. Hopefully Matthew doesn't miss everyone too much and enjoys the cousin time! I'm looking forward to apple cider mills and donuts and family.

Matthew and I have settled into somewhat of a schedule with the older kids gone all day--if he's slept through the older kids leaving we go back to my bed and snuggle for a few minutes after he first wakes up (then he starts saying things like "PAMPANKS MOLK DOWN!") and we go downstairs to feed him breakfast, then we do some housework, then we read stories, then we head outside for a run, then we do whatever event we have planned that day (grocery shopping, library storytime, playdate with friends, etc.). And then once he goes down for a nap I either do a house project or grading or--and this feels SOOOO wonderfully indulgent!!--I read a book and take a quick nap. It is AWESOME. And totally helps me gear up for the crazy pace when the older kids get home, especially since Neil is often out of town or working late or something like that. Today as I walked upstairs with my giant stack of books (this morning our run was to the library!) and thought, "Surely I could be doing something more productive with my time..." and then I thought, you know, it's okay to love reading so dang much and not feel guilty about it. And honestly, if I cleaned out one of the downstairs coat closets (which was what I felt like I should be doing) nobody would notice or care! Plus I've been doing Apartment Therapy's September Sweep and I know it's going to have me clean that closet out anyway. ;-) And last week during naptime I remortared the fireplace and painted the back door and refinished the laundry room sink so quite frankly I'm doing pretty well on projects, hah!

**This post brought to you by the brief lull in the storm after Juliet's cross-country meet while we wait for dinner to cook before we go to Isaac's classroom playdate at the park and hopefully get everyone in bed in a timely manner and maybe I will still be awake when Neil gets home??**

***ps no pics because I always used to steal them from facebook, but I quit facebook awhile back so if you want to see pics, just follow me on IG. It's private but I'll approve you. ;-)