Busy, Bountiful Summer

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So much for the lazy days of summer. Even when we aren't 'doing' anything, we are so busy. With the garden to tend to, laundry to wash/dry/fold/put away, meals to prepare, children to manage, and cleaning up after all that. We celebrated Summer birthdays (Grandee, Sandee, Auntie B, and Uncle D) with a champagne Brunch on the Hornblower (cruise on the San Francisco Bay) which was really nice. Gwen probably had a gallon of orange juice, and enjoyed being on a boat and getting to view the Golden Gate Bridge from below it. We also have been celebrating Gwen's friends turning three! We have had a birthday party almost every weekend this month (including two at a gymnastics studio), and next month may be similar. Spencer has enjoyed a few three day weekends (thank you paid family leave) and this last Friday we went on a road trip to Swanton Farms (north of Santa Cruz and south of Half Moon Bay) to a u-pick strawberry farm. We picked almost 10lbs of strawberries which later translated into a strawberry and blueberry pie, heirloom strawberry preserves (in a large jar in the fridge since I couldn't manage to can them), and frozen strawberries for Gwen's new favorite, strawberry swoothies. We have had countless pounds of zucchini, summer squash, and a mysterious hybrid of the two, come out of our garden. Besides trying to hide squash in everything I cook and the obligatory zucchini bread, I have also made squash 'chips' in our dehydrator (disgusting, but hope to pass them off to Gwen as edible), a few hundred cubes of frozen puree for Graham, and a pureed squash soup (not bad with fresh herbs from the garden). Between naps and other adventures, Spencer has managed to find the time to finish the stool he started for Gwen. Besides being functional, so she can help in the kitchen (and help herself to the kitchen), it is gorgeous and I told him he should redo our kitchen table to match....alas, where we will find time to make that happen, not so sure. Graham has become a little busy body himself crawling and pulling up everywhere...stay tuned for his 11 month update.