Gardening

Several years ago Ian and I planted a garden in our back yard. Yes, we live in a neighborhood, but we lucked out and got one of the largest lots (with no premium cost) and have plenty of room to grow some of our own vegetables. I remember so well spending several hours in early April of 2005 thinking (yes, somewhat naively) that we'd be planting that garden with our daughter the next spring. Obviously we planted it ourselves in 2006, but we had high hopes that we'd plant one together with our daughter in 2007. (We would have, but somehow we never found time for a garden last year...)

So this year we (and by we I mean mostly Ian) were determined not to pay someone else for our green beans, snap peas, carrots, tomatoes, summer squash, zucchini, cucumbers, basil, cilantro, oregano, and sage. Last Friday night we headed to Lowe's and bought seeds, fledgling plants, soaker hoses and some additional top soil. And Saturday it rained all day... Ian was a trooper and headed outside to turn the garden soil over, but Kylie and I stayed in and had a play date with our neighbor, Madison. The girls and I played with rice, Little People, listened and danced to music, and put together puzzles while Ian got soaked.

We simply didn't have time during the week this past week to get the garden planted, so we decided that would be how we'd spend our Saturday this week. And of course it rained again. But the plants were starting to look unhappy and we realized we were soon going to miss our window of opportunity. Ian announced at breakfast that he'd be heading outside with the assumption that Kylie and I would watch from the window. But it was warm, and I used to love playing outside in the rain, so we all put on old clothes and headed out back.

At first I think Kylie thought Ian and I had lost our minds! She kept saying, "It rain Mama!" and pointing up to the house. But when I laughed about getting wet she laughed too. Everything was fine and dandy until we got to the wet dirt in the garden. She didn't want to touch it and kept complaining that it was, "duh-ty!" But she was curious about the rake and wanted to use it, from the edge of the garden...

It was time to bite the bullet and introduce our girl to mud, so we picked her up and put her right in the middle of it. I guess it was wrong to be laughing at her trying to keep her feet out of the mud ~ she kept lifting up her feet super high one at a time ~ but it really was funny. Then Ian showed her how to start making rows...

And she loved it! She caught on rather quickly and helped us dig rows, drop seeds in (yeah, I'm going to have to thin out the beans and peas because they didn't get spaced quite far enough), pull dirt back over and stomp it down. Then it was time to create hills for the cucumbers, squash and zucchini and drop one seed in each hole. She was so meticulous about those seeds. If she accidentally dropped in more than one she'd dig it back out! And all along she'd hold her hands up to us and say, "duh-ty ands!" and then she'd crack up and plunge her hands back into the dirt.

I'm sure the neighbors thought we were crazy, and the day wasn't exactly like the warm, sunny one that I had imagined back in 2005, but at least we didn't have to water the garden when we were done planting! And we were all filthy when we were done, but aren't some of the best memories the ones that aren't "perfect?"

A few other funnies about Kylie this week...

She is now talking up a storm and repeating EVERYTHING she hears. For example, we went to the Charlotte Checkers hockey game the other night and the fans have the habit of calling out the opposing goalie's name and then yelling, "You suck!" And so my sweet little angel looks over her shoulder at me and says, "You sudt!" Classy...

She can roll her tongue ~ and so can her daddy ~ but I've never been able to. Apparently it is a genetic thing ~ Ian likes to claim that she got the dark hair and skin from her mommy and the ability to roll her tongue from him. Anyway, in the car yesterday she was rolling her tongue and I'd play along and try to do it to make her laugh. She was getting pretty serious about it and would say, "Nonono, Mama dis!" and then roll her tongue to show me what to do. I'd try (and of course fail) and she'd again say, "Nonono, Mama DIS!" And it went over and over and over until she rolled her eyes at me to indicate that I was a lost cause in the tongue rolling department.

I know that we spend a lot of time down at church, and that Traci and Adam are usually with us when we are there either for worship services or praise team practice, but I didn't realize how much Kylie pays attention to that. Ian and I went to church Wednesday night for our fellowship dinner and when Kylie saw our sanctuary she yelled, "CiCi's house!"