[Wordful Wednesday] Attack of the Killer Lemons

Occasionally Mari, Lila and I test the waters in the produce aisle at the grocery store, making a point of picking up fruits and vegetables that look weird or interesting or pretty. Sometimes we'll even buy some of whatever we stumble across and giggle as we taste—cracking up at the scrunchie faces we make while discovering if the produce is sour, bitter, salty, juicy, dry or sweet or whatever. (Remind me to tell you about the time we bit into a handful of kumquats.) 

Anyway, I was strolling through Whole Foods recently when I came across these—Buddha Hand Lemons. And I just couldn't resist bringing one home for the girls to try. Of course, before I could get it out of the bag good, the two of them dubbed the fruit The Killer Lemon With the Deadly Fingers.   

Mari's nose didn't stand a chance.

Alas, Lila lost the battle with the Killer Lemon With the Deadly Fingers when it wrestled her to the ground with its sour smell and funky disposition. I got retribution by shredding its sweet little skin and using it as zest on our sauteed shrimp and garlic dinner. Recipe coming soon!   

That'll learn killer lemons to take out my babies, doggonit. 

{Wordful Wednesday} We've Been Snowbound For Three Days :: Send. Help. Now.

We're snowbound. Again. Being held hostage by all the ice and a bunch of people who can't drive on said ice and a city that has absolutely no plan for removing it beyond "waiting," as my hilarious sister-in-law/BFF Angelou put it, "for the sun to come out." In the meantime, my kids are eating us out of house and home, bouncing off the walls, k-i-l-l-i-n-g me with the "I'm bored" and the "Can I."

God bless their teachers—one and all.

I do not know how they do it.

I promise you, I've kicked them out the house more than a coupla times. Nope—I don't care how cold it is. Get out. Do something. Rollerskate on the ice. Build a snowman. Take your camera out and get some pictures of nature in a deep freeze. Breathe heavy on the windows and draw your name in the steam. I don't care. Just. Get. Out. And take the dog with you. 

This is them being cute in the snow. Just before Nick and I locked them out the house.

Maybe we'll let them back in.

Eventually. 

{Wordful Wednesday} Black Snow Bunnies: My Babies and their Granddad On Christmas Vacation

There is absolutely nothing more peaceful to me than spending time with three of my favorite people in the world: My daughters and my dad. Where he lives,  there is peace. And around this time of year, a bit of snow, too—something my girls don't get to see much down here in Georgia. So, as you can imagine, it was no time before they were out rolling around, licking and throwing the white stuff—just as I was putting my new iPhone Hipstamatic app to good use. Here, some of our favorite moments in the snow. Enjoy!

Footprints in fresh snow

And it wouldn't be good, clean fun without some snow angels!

This child has been eating the white stuff since her first snow at eight months. We taught her early: Stay away from the yellow snow. 

All that chocolate in snow ought to be illegal!

My Mari, keeping her head to the sky

Did I mention that my father NEVER played in the snow when I was little? The man will do anything for his granddaughters—even take some cold ones to the dome. Ha!

My Mari took this shot. Made me look pretty.

My Daddy, with his handsome self.

How could you not find peace on such a beautiful piece of land?

 

My people.

{Wordful Wednesday} Mari's Awesome, Supersplendiferous, Fantasticalicious Camp Pictures!

So my baby Mari survived her first sleepaway camp. More specifically, I survived Mari's first sleepaway camp. She was gone for three... excruciatingly... looooong... days, hiking, repelling down mountains, shooting arrows, zip-lining, and sleeping in the woods with her two teachers, whom I like and trust (I guess, considering I'd only met them in person, like, twice), and her class. The only reason I didn't do the total freakout is because she went with her Uncle James, bless his dear heart, who drove, and her cousin Miles, who loves and protects Mari like his very life depends on it. I was so very happy when she got home, but you know what made me even more happy? When she came back with a smile on her face, a giggle in her voice and incredible stories about how much fun she had hanging with new friends, watching the sunrise, celebrating the Earth (she's quite the environmentalist!) and summonsing up the strength and courage to overcome her fear of heights to do the repelling and zip lining. I'm super proud of baby girl. And I know that with this camp trip, she took one more step not away from me, but toward her independence. 

To celebrate Mari's big girl moves, I wanted to share with you some shots she took with her camera, which she hardly ever leaves home without. The girl is NICE with the Casio AND nice with the verbs (she's the bold writer of the captions below each picture).  Check it... and if you're so moved, show sweetness some love in the comments section. 

This is the curvy mountainous road up the huge hill to Camp Greenville.

My pretty nice cabin (for a camp); girls on the right, boys on the left.

My activities group walking to our next fun activity through the shortcut.

One of the weird, exotic leaves that we came across on our wilderness trek, called Sassafrass.

The sky through the trees on a sunny day.

Our view of the orangey sunrise at Pretty Place.

The rules at the awesome archery range that we went to for our activities

The two targets that all of us shot at with our bows and arrows.

My bow that I used to shoot.

The ropes course that we had to WALK on high up in the air.

Some of my group members jumping across the stream   towards the water fall.

A close up of the running water in the stream.

My hand in the water while trying to take a picture. The water was freezing cold.

Me having a blast in front of Rainbow Falls (the huge waterfall)

Visit the new home of Wordful Wednesdays, Parenting by Dummies,

 to see more Wordful Wednesday photos. 

Wordful Wednesday: A Spring Break Family Affair on St. Simon's Island

I was looking through iPhoto on my desktop earlier today and came across these pictures—snapshots of a spring break vacation our family took with Nick's sister, Angelou, her husband and kids, and Nick's parents. Words can't describe how much fun we had together—not just because we went somewhere absolutely amazing (St. Simon's Island), but because we vacationed as a family. Here, a recap in pictures.



St. Simon's is off the coast of Georgia—a jewel of an island I learned about years ago after watching the breathtakingly beautiful art house film, Daughters of the Dust. The history here is amazing—particularly that of Africans and African Americans; that house my brother-in-law, James, is standing in front of is the last standing blacks-only, one-room schoolhouse in St. Simon's, and I couldn't resist taking a picture of the street sign leading up to the school. You know "Mama Lou" had to be somebody special! After visiting the school, we rode bikes into the center of town and saw this great big ol' tree; the kids couldn't resist climbing it. And then we found Ebo Landing, the shoreline where, legend has it, a group of people kidnapped from Nigeria and brought to America to be slaves got off the slave ship, turned around, and walked back into the water, chanting and singing songs of freedom. They drowned themselves rather than be slaves (the story is chronicled in the famous, The People Could Fly children's tale, and was recounted in Daughters of the Dust). Rumor has it that the people who live in the houses surrounding Ebo Landing occasionally hear singing, chanting and clinking chains—the souls of the Africans revealing their presence. We closed our eyes and listened intently, but heard only the sweet whisper of the wind and the rustling of the leaves. Still, we all took the time to pray over the waters—to send up the timber for the ancestors.














We stole away from St. Simon's to take a day trip to Jeckyll Island and Sapelo Island; the latter is home to the descendants of a family of slaves that worked the Chocolate Plantation in the 1800s—a family that, to this day, lives an authentic Gullah lifestyle. To see the island up close, you must travel there by ferry, and then hire a bus tour to take you to see the sights. For a few extra dollars, we convinced a driver to take us off the beaten path to see the remains of the tabby slave houses of the Chocolate Plantation; we also saw the lighthouse up close, and, some amazing wildlife, which was extra special for my sister-in-law/BFF Angelou, a passionate environmentalist (who's on her way to Washington today to participate in a White House symposium on the environment—woot woot!). If you really focused, you could see some amazing wildlife, too. Can you find the alligator?



























We rented a beautiful house just a short walk from the beach, and the kids made sure we got our beach time every morning. The Spring chill didn't stop them from digging into the sand; there were enough mud pies to feed a small nation. While Lila drew love notes to her mommy in the sand, her grandfather looked out over the ocean—reflecting on the beauty of all that God has made.