Stinky's New Vocabumtary.

Some new words being spoken by the Stinklet:

Bye bye (complete with a wave)
Mommy!
Daddy!
Bapu! (we think this means cup, but we aren't sure...)
Paddy (a friend at school)
Car
Doggie
Diaper

and, of course,

Right There.

Grampa.

Yesterday marked the one-year anniversary of my father's untimely death. We are indebted to East Pierce Fire & Rescue, who organized a very touching day in remembrance. They built a lovely pond in his honor, and named a memorial brick walk after him. They also designed coins with his picture and the phrase "A Quiet Leader Who Got it Done" inscribed.

It was really great for me to spend the day among people who love, mourn and miss Dad as much as I do. I was so glad to see his memory alive and openly cherished by so many. It was well-timed, as I sometimes feel that he's being forgotten. But I don't feel that way anymore, and for that I am deeply relieved.

We also marked the day in our own ways. Katrina toasted him at his grave with a bottle of lovely wine. Wilson wore a Hawaiian shirt, khaki shorts and sandals. I tried (and failed) to get Happy Donuts, so resigned myself to Albertson's donuts instead. In hindsight, I should have had two large bowls of ice cream.

Here's a moving tribute written by someone at EPFR: http://ow.ly/ikw9

Fallen But Never Forgotten

No, not there...

Kids say the darnedest things, indeed. We aren't exactly sure where she picked it up, but Violet is saying a new phrase:

"right there".

The cuteness is painful. Especially when she walks right up to you and points to your face when she says it. It's like her own, unique way of saying "I like you".

Lavender Festival.

I took the childrens to Sequim's Lavender Festival all by myself yesterday!

So, to begin: we all slept in. Until, like, 7:45. That may not sound late to some of you, but to me, it was absolute heaven! I am proud to say that once we woke up, I was able to quickly get my act together and get out the door by 8:05 (helped a lot by packing the car the night before).

I didn't stop for Starbucks on the way to the ferry, much to my temporary discomfort, but it was all made worth it when we made it for the 9:20 boat. We only had to wait in the line for 15 minutes, which we spent reading classics like "Where's the Green Sheep" and "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you see?"

Wilson LOVED the ferry! We went up on the deck and he stood in the wind and giggled and squealed and hopped around like an extremely happy little man. I tucked Wylet into my sweater so she could enjoy the wind too, but in some comfort. That 30 minute boat ride went extremely quickly.

Then the real adventures began. First of all, did you know that the bridge out of Kingston is a drawbridge? Yah, me neither. So when traffic backed up into Port Gamble, I panicked. But being firmly committed to seeing some damned lavender, I opted to spend an hour in Port Gamble ambling about. Which turned out to be great -- we walked down to the water, where Wilson found an enormous purple starfish on the pilings. We stood on the rocks and enjoyed the salty breeze. Both of my children were mesmerized by the water all day long in all of its incarnations. And after making a stop at PG's sunday market, we successfully made it across the bridge and back on track to our purple-plant-hunting adventure.

Once we reached Sequim, Tiny Man awoke from his nap. He then decided it would be funny to wake up Wylet from hers. (It wasn't.) After a brief stop for some rejuvenating bok-bok and fries (with diet coke for me), we parked in front of a sweet lady's yellow house, crammed into the umbrella stroller and baby backpack, and hit the Fair!

We only made it about 10 feet inside the gate. We entered next to the live music, and a band named "Bowi" was performing. They're an Irish Music band, and boy, Wilson lit right up. After three songs I managed to lure him away by purchasing their album and promising he could listen to them the entire drive home (which he did. I know many, many Irish songs now). We spent an hour cruising through market stalls, eventually taking home some lavender stalks, an iron quail for the front yard and a memento purple starfish to commemorate Wilson's waterfront friend in Port Gamble.

My primary goal in attending the festival was to purchase some plants for my yard. So I packed my two now-sunburned, cranky kids back into the car to make one more stop -- a farm! We hit Sunshine farm east of town, and found 5 nice plants to bring home. We also got some lavender lemonade, some marionberry-lavender ice cream and a yummy candle for my office. The best part was when I turned around inside of the store to leave and the bottom of the backpack swung into something expensive and porcelain. While the owner wouldn't let me pay for the piece, it was certainly a moment I would like to forget.

We left shortly thereafter. We were all tired, and some of us in the car (hint: not me) were poopy. To make things even more interesting, the wait time for the ferry was 2 hours and traffic was backed up into Sequim (!!). It took me nearly an hour to make it 5 miles. After some discussions with the cruise director at home (Josh) I decided it was better to drive home through Tacoma than to risk trying the wait for the boat. So, on we drove.

End-of-the-weekend traffic and one smucky trip to Jack in the Box later, we arrived home around 7:00pm. My kids were filthy. I was cranky. The car smelled of lavender, bok-bok and poop. But you know what? I totally had a blast. And I think the kids did too. Wilson told Josh when we got home that we saw "mommy's purple plants" and "I ran around!" It'll be great fun tomorrow after work when we all get home, settle ourselves, have some supper and then spend a few minutes planting the lavender in the yard. There are enough plants to go around -- one for every one of us!

Blame Facebook.

If I wasn't on Facebook so much, providing little snippets of Tiny Man's conversations etc., we'd be better about blogging. Please forgive us. You can blame Facebook's increasing ubiquitousness and general awesomeness. (Not that I am biased or anything...)

So. Some stories?