The Many Adventures of Us and 'Annie The Wonder Dog'

Finally having time to actually weed the garden this year, my tomato plants look fantastic. I go out there and think about all the stuff I can make from them.... roasted tomatoes and eggplant, salsa, stew, dried tomatoes, goulash and just plain fresh tomatos sliced on bread with a smidge, ok a  wopping heap, of mayo and salt. Nathan usually busies himself in the yard with bugs, dog hair balls, clover and pulling leaves off of the trees. Today I went to show him my beautiful green globes explaining to him how wonderful they will be in a few weeks. He looks at me, "Ball?" he says. "OK, ya, they look like balls". In that moment I made a dire mistake. I look over towards the watermelons and we go over to check them out. I step around the shed. "BALL!" I hear from around the corner. "BALLLL!". Oh no, no-no, NOOOO!!! I turned back to see a giggly little face all scrinched up with glee at the new green 'balls' he has found as he whizzes one past my kneecaps. In a matter of seconds he had ripped the little green lives right off their vine. Bad idea, mommy. Now what? Hmmmm.... "Lets go find some dog hair balls, Nathan. Better yet, maybe that 6 inch black dead pincher-bug friend you made last week...."

I guess it has been awhile, hasn't it? So much has blown past me I hardly remember any of it. I finally graduated college, I do remember that. I think David would make me sit in a corner for 10 minutes if I forgot that! It feels nice and all, but I miss some of the hustle and bustle of school. Mostly I miss that hour drive all by myself listening to whatever I want to listen too and singing to whatever I want to sing to and stopping anywhere I want to to get coffee. The topper is getting out of the car without unfastening the straight jacket of a harness we put the kiddo in just to get him in and out of the car. At some point in my life I could run into a convenience store, get me a mighty fine gas station jalepeno and cheese hotdog and jump back in the car and go. Well, those days are gone. My first thought now is, "Do they have a drivethru?" I know, laziness, laziness.
Nathan has seven teeth now. Four on top and three on bottom. I think a gremlin came and got the 4th one on the bottom. It doesn't look like it's coming in any time soon. He walks and tries to talk. He says Daddy, Dad, DaDa and DADADADADA. Great. Fine. Just today he started saying 'Me me me me'. It's wishful thinking, but he might be on track to say 'Mom'. I won't hold my breath though. He also says 'cheese food', 'light', 'tree', 'potty', 'woowooo' (dog), 'truck', 'duck', and all the 'uck works (kidding). Oh ya, did I mention he says Dad? Damn it! I've also been trying to teach the gremlin 'No'. So of course his other new words are 'No' and 'Don't' all the while pointing his little finger. My favorite new words are 'belly button'. It's too cute. He's fallen tons of times and I now believe babies are made of rubber. We had one emergency room visit where he cut his finger on a food processor blade. It was in the back of the cabinet between two pots and I had missed it. $1200 and 3 hours later, he had it super-glued back together. 2 hours later he had sucked the cut open again. 1 hour later we bought spray Band-aid and did it ourselves for $5. It was 5 a.m. by then. Experience of going the the ER.... priceless.