Katharine Elizabeth Photography {the blog}

Our neighbors brought over a huge bag of green beans (the picture below only shows a few of them) and an oh-so-tasty loaf of freshly baked zucchini bread tonight.

Both the beans and the zucchini came from their family’s garden:

Man oh man. Thank goodness for mid-summer harvests and thank goodness for awesome neighbors.

My son has a little, plush “Horton the Elephant” from the book (and now movie), Horton Hears a Who.

You know the story: Horton finds a whole town living on a speck of dust, places the speck on a pink clover, carries it around, and then saves the tiny town from being thrown into a boiling pot of Beezlenut Stew. Right.

So my son is very protective of his little Horton and his little pink clover and the (invisible) speck of dust.

And I just don’t have the heart to tell him that every time I see that little stuffed animal, I think that Horton is eating a strawberry ice cream cone.

***

My sister lives out of state, so my parents got her, me, and themselves, a nifty little webcam. That way, we can all talk to each other and the cousins (my sister’s kids and my kids) can see each other “face to face.”

Pretty cool.

And as a side note, may you all be blessed with parents (who have 6 grandchildren, mind you) that will come to you one day, give you a QuickCam and software, and then say the words:

“You need to set yourself up with a Skype account.”

So awesome.

Anyway. The camera works great.

The only thing I don’t like is that it is stationed next to my monitor and every once in a while, even when I’m not logged into Skype, I’ll be sitting there working and the thing will just randomly start moving around.

Its little camera eye slides up and down, turns left and right, and makes lots of whirring noises.

It’s looking for me, I guess.

Which is kind of unnerving. Like I’m being watched.

Like a tiny little “Hal” from 2001: A Space Odyssey.

***

After our daughter was born, for whatever reason, we sort of “hid” a lot of the new Girl Toys that started appearing around the house. Dolls and purses and pink frilly things.

I guess we just wanted to give her a chance to play with Hot Wheels and dump trucks and basketballs. I don’t know.

Honestly, I can’t really explain our reasoning to you. There wasn’t much logic to it. Looking back on it, it seems pretty silly.

And one day, when our daughter was about 1 1/2, she found The Bin With The Girl Toys and was immediately hooked on all of it: the “babies,” the bottles, the fake blush, and the purses. It became clear that we had simply been prolonging the inevitable and there had been no point in hiding the Girl Toys.

And since then, we don’t really resist. She has dress-up shoes and tutus and while she plays with a lot of her brother’s toys, her mainstays still seem to be the things that are Plastic and Pink.

But yesterday, I pulled out our son’s old GeoTrax remote-controlled train. And she was totally into it! She helped me set up the tracks, she was making the train start and stop, and loading up the tiny cargo boxes into the railcars.

And I have to say, I was feeling pretty proud of myself. Sneaking in a non-pink toy and getting her totally interested in it.

But then, she ran off into the bedroom and re-emerged with her own addition to our newly-set-up train town:

She set Ariel the Mermaid right in the middle.

Because that makes total sense.

Oh, I know, Ariel. You expected more out of life. But really, it’s either this or Disney on Ice.

Adorably blonde Jack turns 2 in another month or so.  

He’s pretty darn cute, right? But do you know what the first words out of my mouth were when I met him and his Dad outside the door of their home?

     “Oh my gosh, where did you get the ‘2′ shirt?!”

Sometimes my priorities are so out of whack, I swear.

But his parents said they got the shirt on Etsy!  Oh man, how I love that site.  And then we briefly commiserated about Etsy and the good/evil relationship we have with it.

And I knew right away that they were good people.

And, as a side note, if you haven’t gone to Etsy, you probably shouldn’t. Because it’s just a delicious black hole of awesome handmade things that you will SWEAR you have to have once you see them.

     “But I NEED handmade thank you notes.
     AND monogrammed baby onesies. 
     AND handcrafted chandelier earrings.
     I can’t live without them!”

Okay, I think I veered off the subject.

Where was I.

JACK! He’s cute. And fast. I think he gets the award for “fastest two year old yet.”

You know a kid is fast when you have to flip your camera from manual to shutter priority just to freeze him for a split-second.

But that split-second is worth it.

In addition to his ‘2′ shirt, Jack also has a “j” cape.

And he definitely looks capable of ridding the world of evil with it on.

I love that the next pictures show how natural and comfortable his mom and dad are with being parents.  Just the “everyday-ness” of it … giving out hugs, buttoning tiny shirts … the stuff they do all the time without even thinking about it:

They were so laid back and loving with Jack.  He is a lucky kid. 

Jack, I hope your 2nd birthday party is a blast.  And I have a pretty good feeling that life is just going to get better and better for you each year.  You’ve got it pretty good, buddy … pretty darn good.