a funny thing happened on the way to summer.

once upon a time my little family of three was chugging merrily along through april looking forward to celebrating bubs' fourth birthday and eight glorious weeks of summer break. and then i got an email that flipped our world upside down. 

okay, a few background facts about our life:

a) we share a one bedroom apartment with a feral four year old

b) we like trees 

c) we need a change

back to that email. it was an invitation to interview for an art teacher position with an elementary school.

in colorado.

the end of an era.

for years, the mister and i have been dreaming of moving west but our focus has always been california. since that locale is completely out of our reach, we never pondered an actual move. enter keri, who should earn a commission for her relentless marketing of the glories of colorado. she planted the seed, even assisted in the job hunt, and suddenly moving across the country seemed like an option.

and then i landed that art teaching gig and the decision was made.

sayonara miami.

with that decision, our entire world was drop kicked into total chaos, since the timeline has been nothing short of nutty. the job offer arrived on may 29th and the bubs and i left for an already planned visit to california on june 9th. in between i finished the school year in miami, threw a 4th birthday party for the bubs, and packed up our entire house.

while i was in cali, the mister drove to colorado and found a house for us to rent, while i hired movers and rearranged travel plans. and then i left bubs in california with my parents. his first time being away from both of us. ouch. i headed to colorado for a week to join the mister working on the details of moving in and then off i went to miami for ten days to do all the moving out. alone. just me and the movers. 

the movers used 13 rolls of tape to wrap our furniture with blankies.

fingers crossed that the contents find their way to denver.

my mom's 1970s luggage wheels still going strong.

and now the mister and i are in colorado stuck in that special hell known only to those in the midst of long-distance moves -- all of your possessions are on a truck somewhere between your old city and your new one and you are living in a state of suspense in a mostly unfurnished house trying to subsist on frozen lasagna from costco. don't get me wrong, that lasagna is good stuff, but well, you know.

our new home.

meet pearl. my new ride.

needless to say, the last eight weeks have been overwhelming, but we are excited for this new beginning for our little family. bubs is still in california missing us like crazy, but soon he will be with us. we cannot wait to explore our new city with him and to see him frolicking in his very own backyard. this has been a big step for us, but we think it will be a good one.

missing my bubs.

sprouts galore.

cucumber sprouts.

holy sproutville. okay, this gardening thing is happening. i planted the seeds, gave them water and sunshine, and shockingly, they grew. this might not be shocking to you, but it was to me. i was gung-ho about this project, but realistically, i was well aware that i am not known for my gardening skills and there was a significant chance that this project would be a total fail. but, the sprouts are growing like crazy. 

garden bean sprouts. these guys were slow starters, but now they are taller than everyone else.

when i dropped the seeds into the dirt, i was super generous. my methodology was something along the lines of, throw in a thousand and hope that one sprouts. well, one sprouted. and so did all of the others. so the pots were thick with sprouts.

kale sprouts gone wild.

my gardening gurus advised me that i needed to do some thinning. ummm...WHAT?!! i took some microscopic little dots of nothing and brought them to life and now you want me to lop them off and throw them away? gaaaah. but, both of my gurus have seriously awesome gardens, so i trust that they know what they are talking about.

a forest of kale.

today i bit the bullet and thinned my sprouts. it was depressing. i had to chop chop chop the darling little sprouts. sad. but the goal is for the ones that remain to grow like gangbusters. one can only hope. i also planted some more seeds. this time i tried to be a confident gardener and i only put a few extra seeds. they better do me a solid and sprout!

kale, post-thinning. looking kind of bleak, but i have high hopes.

what does my garden grow?

our balcony used to be this lovely place where we could relax with a beverage to enjoy some fresh air and people watching, but then we had a kid and the balcony turned into a cluttered mess. the mister and i have been increasingly disgusted by the craziness and started discussing affordable ways to organize the chaos.

and then two weeks ago, i had a pre-mid-life crisis. this self-described non-gardener suddenly decided that i needed to have a vegetable garden. the notion is a bit ridiculous, because our balcony is only about forty square feet, but i figured our garden could grow vertical. i blame all of this on keri. she has a ridiculously prolific vegetable garden and regularly posts photos that made me green with envy. so green that i became delusional enough to think that maybe i have a green thumb. right.

i instantly started researching container vegetable gardens and found gads and gads of information. plus keri, and the doc, and mrs. nipper knapp jumped right in to provide guidance and encouragement. since i was completely unable to wait even seven minutes to get my hands dirty, i immediately hunted down a baker's rack on craigslist. found some pots on clearance. bought dirt and seeds. and got to planting three pots. miraculously,  a few days later, i woke up to find that some of the little guys had sprouted. it was an exciting moment. i can't stop hovering over my little sprouts...they make me super happy!

unfortunately, i also realized that the dirt in those first three pots was packed waaaaaaay too tight. tonight i scooped up the sprouts, dumped out the dirt, and repotted the sprouts. hopefully they will not be in shock. but, if they are, i will just start over with new seeds. i also finished planting the rest of the seeds and the tomato and pepper plants we bought. the garden is perfect. i cannot wait to teach big-E how to be my helper.

we are growing basil, chives, parsley, mint, cucumbers, green beans, tomatoes, red bell peppers, kale, swiss chard, lettuce, radishes, and beets. i am still looking for some more seeds to fill my remaining three pots, and then the garden will be full. next step, reorganizing the other side of the balcony. ugh.

p.s. any and all gardening advice is welcome. especially from those folks who have attempted to grow veggies in containers.

my girl tess.

for the last 5 years, our oven has gone on vacation for about three weeks every august. seriously. sometime in the beginning of august it would post an error message and refuse to operate for about three weeks. and then just as suddenly, it would start working again. annoying, but we just chuckled and waited it out. about two years ago, the broiler went on permanent vacation. last year the broiler was joined by the large burner. and then came the new year. apparently the arrival of 2012 was the last straw for the oven. for six months we were at its mercy. sometimes it would work, sometimes it would not. we never knew. in june it gave up. threw in the towel. so yes, we have been living for three solid months with no oven. no baking. none. sad. and to add insult to injury, the oven could not just sit idle. nope, it had to beep. hysterically, constantly, unpredictably, and psychotically, all day and all night. 

this past weekend we realized we could not put this off any longer. the old girl had to leave. we went on a "quick" let's-just-check-out-the-options browsing expedition. you know where this is going right? exactly. we found the perfect oven. way more oven than we could afford at a super duper clearance price that fit our budget. we visited a couple other stores, but ended up back where we started. so, despite having no intention of purchasing an oven, we did. six hours after we began our perusing adventure, we bought an oven. i was giddy.

never ever in my imagination would i have expected to feel such a wonderful thrill after buying something as rudimentary as a kitchen appliance. but there you have it. i think i am officially domesticated.

here she is, our new girl. her name is tess. ain't she purty? 

she is a lady, so she has her heating coil tucked away somewhere, out of sight and out of range of drippings. dreamy.

she was eager to start baking, so we made some bread pudding. yummy.

welcome to the family, tess!!

the big ONE.

hard to believe, but little pringle is one year old. it has been a crazy wonderful year. and of course the big question was, to have a party or not? we all know he ain't going to remember any of it, nor will he understand what is happening, but we will. so we had a party.

the beginnings of a banner

we wanted to keep it small and simple, but i am me and simple is NOT in my dna. simple design, yes. simple projects, nope. my brain went into overdrive figuring out exactly how to transform our building's blah blah blah community room into the perfect spot for a first birthday party.

the community room. oy vey.

i painted some lovely banners, the mister created gads and gads of strings with colorful squares, we sewed some monster party favors, and we made paper stars and paper chains. we happily, the end result was dreamy.

the mister and his helper making wall coverings.

yummy.

the food corner.

i love this wall, sigh.

and then there was the cake. naturally i consulted the internet, but what i found was ridiculously intimidating. there are some seriously overachieving parents out there!!! i am not, nor have i ever been, known for my baking, so trying to make a dump truck sculpture with cake was definitely beyond my skill level. but i still wanted it to be special. i had it in my head that i would make the entire thing from scratch...cake AND frosting. of course, my kitchen is not equipped with any type of electrified mixer and apparently these gadgets make the process a whole lot easier. right. oh well. i decided to make a "trial" cake for our little family-of-three celebration that we had on the little guy's actual birthday. the cake was bright green. delicious, but seriously crumbly. the frosting took three tries. the final version was chocolately goodness, but hard. of course, pringle was delighted with the result. in fact, he got upset when we took it away. 

numero uno.

even though it was yummy, the mister and i decided that the cake for the party needed some improvements. enter betty crocker. in the end i made a four-layer cake, with blue and green layers. and white frosting with orange decorations. the design was simple, simple, simple, and it turned out sooooooooooooo pretty. so so pretty. i kept opening the fridge to look at it, because i was so surprised that it turned out so glorious. and the taste..well, betty crocker did a fabulous job, so the cake was scrumptious. and did i mention it was pretty? it was.

i adore this cake. it makes me giddy.

staring down the cake.

monster party favors!!

all in all, it was a delightful party. and pringle had super much fun.

the birthday boy.

fauve fauve fauve.

when selecting projects to do with my students, i have been avoiding painting. why? because the reality of painting with large groups of young children and limited time is daunting. but a few weeks ago, i braved the craziness and took out the watercolors. love. the kids behaved. love. the cleanup was easy. love. the pictures turned out awesome. love.

we made fauve portraits. [fauve: characterized by the use of bright colors and simplified forms.]

seriously people, i love my job.

mr. lorenzo, if you please.

sometime in january, i was driving down the road with my boys and i saw a billboard for the yellow green farmers market. i convinced the mister that our life is not complete without a weekly visit to a farmers market, so the following saturday we checked out the place. i tried hard to see this place as the market of my dreams, but reality won...it is a flea market with a few farmers and a pretty name.

fresh herbs. would you like conventional or organic? exactly.

now i have always dreamed of living in a small town - you know, the kind with a main street actually named "main street", home to a butcher, a baker, and a candlestick maker, where everybody knows my name - so, no surprise that i was itching to include a farmer's market in my weekly grocery shop.

maybe it is the palm tree, but this picture disguises the dinginess of the building.

enter lorenzo's farmers market. a squalid peach-colored building next to the railroad tracks. not exactly the open-air stalls of beautifully laid out produce from my dreams, but i am willing to sacrifice decor for the amazingness that is lorenzo's. a time warp that takes you back thirty years to the days before computerized inventory. here the prices are hand-written on signs and the cashiers have them all memorized to type them into the register. want to change a price? walk to the front of the store and tell the cashiers the new price. wow.

baskets and baskets of deliciousness.

on one side of the parking lot is lorenzo's farmers market. a tiny market bursting with every fruit and vegetable you can imagine and some you cannot. i have found things in that place that i have never heard of and it seems that every trip, there is something new at which to look. golden beets? check. fresh bay leaves? check. fresh garbanzo beans? check. black radishes? check.

love.

and the prices. oh my god, the prices. 99¢ for a pint of grape tomatoes?!? what? 79¢ for an avocado? who are these people? $1.19 for a bag of basil? puh-lease. last saturday i walked out with my three reusable grocery bags bursting at the seams, for a mere $23. heaven.

such an unassuming little place.

across the parking lot is the big daddy market, lorenzo's italian market and restaurant. looks like a whole lot of nothing from the outside. inside it is dreamy. upon entering, the first thing to greet you are two cases of homemade pasta. yum.

fresh, hand-made pasta. oooh la la.

wander around the little store and you will find a restaurant/café alongside several aisles of groceries. wrapped around this is the bakery, deli, butcher, and seafood counter. that is right kids, i found the little market from main street, usa, plopped in the middle of bustling miami. amazeballs.

an aisle devoted to pasta. both sides. dreamy.

and like its little farmers market cousin, it is bursting at the seams with yummy goodness. lots of things i know and a whole lotta craziness of which i had heard, but had never seen and certainly would not know where to buy. 20 pound bags of couscous? check. grape leaves? which brand would you like? pasta? there is an entire aisle!!! tomatoes in every form you can imagine? got it. cardamom pods you could not find anywhere else? check. and while the prices at the italian market are not jaw-droppingly low, they are no higher than the regular grocery store.

grape leaves, if you please.

whoa, olive oil. no joke, somewhere in that collection is a $58 bottle.

it only took me five and a half years of yearning for a farmers market, to discover that all this time, the little shop of my dreams has been 0.8 miles from my house.

p.s. yes, i plan to blatantly ignore the fact that we missed the entire month of march. details.