Oh that's right:

In Seattle, getting our shoes wet and freezing our glutes off waiting for the boys to finish. 

Which they all did. Brothers 2, 1, and 3 (respectively).

 

 And good ole dad with ole time friend/brother #3 namesake/teeth-straightener of all the Ramsay children Robert. 

Not pictured: the 90+ pounds lost collectively by the men in the above 4 photos.

Travel Tableau pt. 1

I emerge from the blogging desert with a record of our travels over the last few weeks. At 11pm Sunday night we found ourselves in LAX exhausted from foreign festivities. Over the past three weeks we've been on a glorious jaunt about the country involving relatives and friends and races and breweries and babes and Icelandic chickens and weddings and rainstorms. Below are a few anecdotes from our adventures and much more than a few photos.

Our first leg took the Cub and me to the Ramsay homestead where we reunited with our goat Beatrice and played with puppies and hatched baby guineas and met my Icelandic grandmother's Icelandic chickens. Collectively we were only bit by about 12 mosquitoes and had but one run in with a scorpion.

Soon we found ourselves in the grand Dallas Metroplex where we me up with the Pops, so he and I could become Godparents to the adorable Emma Grace

 

Jake made his Aunt Lily follow him all around the foyer for the entirety of the baptism, but he enjoyed the after party thoroughly.

as did I

And Jacob got to chill with most of his sibs + offspring.

 

After Dallas we parted ways with Jacob and made our way with my family to Seattle for some sightseeing before our Rock'n'Roll run.

The race was great.

Four years ago we ran a marathon in Rome together and decided we liked this whole family reunion/race thing, and Seattle became destination dos. I've been fighting off a running injury, so I scratched as a marathon hopeful and joined up with my sister and the lovely Jordan to do the half. Here is the whole troop at the beginning.

Some of us at mile 6:

 

I wasn't sure I would even finish, but thanks to a little persistence and a lot of 12 minute miles the race was conquered and the old hip seems no worse for the wear. We were only beat by one pregnant woman and were thus riding pretty high.

Alas, photos were not taken of the half marathon finishers, but here's a picture of me nursing five minutes after the race. My kid is patient like that.

Then we went to watch the 26.2ers finish up with Jacob's Aunt Mary and Uncle Steve - some Seattlans who came out to cheer.

Nana and Lily win the trooper awards. Nana for weathering the weather and Lily for finishing her first half marathon with a blood blister the size of Louisiana.

We were stalwart even as the winds blew and the rain came and the temperature dropped way below summer-appropriate levels.

I will unceremoniously leave you on the edges of your seats - and Jordan shivering in the cold - since my blogger is being glitchy. Tune in for some photo finishes soon.

Beekeeping IV

A lot has been happening with our bees as of late. Indeed, I've resisted updating you about them precisely because every few days the story changes a little. 

I suppose it all began when Jacob relocated the hive from its perch down in the yard. The beehive was seriously cramping my clothesline, so I insisted that he find a different spot for them. 

And he did. About 30 feet from our front door. 

He sat down to dinner with me that night and stated blissfully, "Now they really feel like pets." 

Things continued merrily in this manner for a few weeks. The bees would get Jacob's last goodbye as he left for work and his first hello as he returned. (Bitterness? I don't know where you're getting that...)

  

A few weeks ago our hive split. This happens (apparently) when there are so many bees in the hive that when they hatch a new queen, instead of the pleasant fight to the death with the old queen, the regents make a truce and the new queen flies away with half the bees.

Read that last sentence again and muse for a moment on just how cool bees are.

Not cool? You say.

Try this: bees have sex while flying.

I know. Cool. I told you.

Anyhow, back to the saga. Our hive split one afternoon while Jake and I were playing on the porch...which we do...sometimes... 

The air filled with the familiar cloudy buzz of swarming bees, and Jake and I retreated to the house and then proceeded to take this picture for the blog:

 

And where did this new group of buzzers decide to relocate? 

A tree...next to the clothesline. Jacob put them in a plastic bin that evening when he got home from work and spent his lunch hour the next day driving to the other end of the world to buy a real deal bee box for them. Unfortunately when he got home that evening, they had ditched the plastic bin and were no where to be found.

So we were stuck with no new bees and an 80$ bee box tab. 

It wasn't all a tragedy because at least I got Jacob to hang dry the diapers since the new swarm of bees was so close to my clothesline. You cannot see them but they are nestled happily in that orange tree with the bougainvillea in it.

That WAS the end of my story. Until two days later...they came back. 

And this time we were ready.

So now...now we have two beehives. In the middle of Los Angeles.

And the end of the story is this:

My old Ikea curtains doing what they never knew they were always meant to do: straining Rhodes honey.

It was a good day. And a good year.

Our little Cub turned one yesterday.

We celebrated with friends.

We remembered to put him in his hand me down birthday shirt and even managed to balance the birthday hat I made for him on his head for a picture.

What a year. What a year this has been.

7 Quick Takes

- 1 -

Granddaddy Rhodes died on Wednesday. The illness came on suddenly, but it wasn't really a surprise. We thankfully had a bit of a goodbye with him over Christmas when we visited. He kept bees like Jacob; he had multiple hives going till the day he died and even had an observation hive in his house. The Mennonites don't do pictures, so I don't have one of him. But in tribute, I'll post this one of Jacob and his bros from when they lived in the community in 2002.

 Jacob and brother John were able to catch a redeye to Kentucky on Wednesday night. So papa is in good ole KY, and Jake and I are home alone.

- 2 -

Even though tragedy should make me chock full of grace and understanding, four days of single motherhood has me feeling pretty sorry for myself. Especially since we have teething pains to pepper sleepless nights and since Jake's mild anemia is calling for lots of iron rich foods on the north end and making the south end a sh** show...literally.

- 3 -

Last night while watching TV I managed to spill beer on the couch and found myself mopping it up with an obliging prefold that was lying on the coffee table. Just another reason to cloth diaper.

- 4 -

Drinking beer alone not classy? Well I opened a bottle of wine that was utterly undrinkable and instead of waking baby and packing us off to Trader Joe's for a new one I opted to have beer instead. But you're right. I probably should've had scotch.

- 5 -

Jake despite his weathered 11.97 months status is showing no interest in walking. But he is showing lots of interest in the feet of our patio chairs (which currently live upside down and serve as a baby barricade) and the laundry basket.

- 6 -

And he'll even play with real toys sometimes. Like this morning I found him looking at a book.

And in the bath he has a grand time with his rubber duckies which I have affectionately named

Mama Duck           &           Papa Duck

- 7 -

If you feel like reading something more meaningful then you should visit Lizzy for the sweetest little love story with all its adorable college awkwardness. Or go see Jen for more quick takes.

Blog Delinquency

I apologize for my silence. There’s absolutely no excuse for it. I’ve been done with all my schoolwork for two weeks, and I’m discovering one of those age old truths about myself: I get more done when I’m busy.

Now that I’m off for the summer, I have completely devolved. My blog is quieter, my house messier, my child fussier, my laundry hamper fuller, and my dishes stacked higher. I’ve gone back to drinking coffee everyday (which is always a bad idea for my headache prone self.) I have a mental block when it comes to running any errands outside of walking radius. An old running injury continues to flare up, and after six weeks of no running it still can’t handle 30 minute jogwalks 3 times a week. Our internet has been finicky which has me climbing 40 stairs to the garage where I fuss with a jack on the router multiple times a day. Jacob continues to divide his free time in favor of his nautical paramour. And on top of everything else: my yogurt has been very VERY grainy, and if that don’t beat all...

So forgive me that I haven’t been sharing all my molehill mountains.

In no particular order I give you the more interesting parts of our recent living (drizzled with parenthetical commentary.)

Jake and I flew to Chicago to watch my littlest-biggest brother graduate from college. You may remember him.

He’s lost in the neighborhood of forty pounds since he last was featured on the blog. (Apparently that’s what happens to football players when they stop working out.)

All the sibs were present.

As was my Nana June.

(Jake was a crying/scratching/hairpulling/notsleeping nightmare on the plane. And the angelic four month old girl across the aisle who slept and/or giggled the entire flight was just icing on the cake.)

Jacob and I are a proud uncle and aunt of two fine little babies born over the past month. Our nephew Ollin Sage was born to Jacob’s brother Shannon and his wife Willow.

And our niece Emma Grace was born to Jacob’s sister Kathleen and her hubs Thomas.

(My family isn’t fasttracking it to babymakingville so I’m really grateful to my in-laws for giving Jake some cousins and filling my life with pink and squishy newborns.)

I have finally begun playing the banjo Jacob and Uncle John bought me for my birthday several months ago, and I’m becoming slowly less horrible. (I would feel bad for our upstairs neighbor who’s had to listen to my bum ditty these past weeks, except we’ve had to listen to his yippy dog for a year, so I don’t.)

Jake understands a few words. The first of which was ball. And if you're really keen on seeing it in action you can go here or you can just look at the picture below and take my word for it.

Work on the sailboat is almost done. Uncle John is moving on board next weekend, so I hope to send some sailing pics out old internet way soon.

(I asked Jacob this morning if he was looking forward to being done with the project and spending more time with his lonely little family, or if he was going to miss working on it. He took me in his arms and said: “Katie, I love you more than any boat in the whole world.”

Thanks, dear.)

The Classroom and The Baby's Room

Since you've all been dying for more classroom/babyroom posts, I've finally decided to cave.

Yesterday my students turned in their final portfolios for the semester, so all that lies between me and almost four months of summer is a mountain of (my favorite!) grading. 

Ever since Jacob started working again I've been bringing Jake to my office hours. He chews on wires and binder clips, opens every drawer he can reach, takes off down the hallway whenever the door opens, and spreads the contents of his diaper bag everywhere. He only peed on the floor once (sorry Wendy...) When students visit I try to maintain some level of authority as he sucks on my face or pulls down my shirt.

Deceptive innocence

The classroom became the baby's room once when my babysitter bailed and I had to bring him into class strapped on my back. Jake fussed whenever he couldn't see the students, so I taught the entire class facing the side of the room.

Yesterday was full of goodbyes, lots of handshakes, and two hesitant hugs. 

One girl - my sweet little airhead - came in, handed me her work, and said: "Just the portfolio, right?" And I said yes and smiled, but I was thinking: "Yes, just ALL the written work you've done in the course." This is the same girl who once in a sentence accidentally wrote "internally" instead of  "eternally," and when I asked her which she meant, she replied: "Well..which one works better?"

That was one of the more memorable moments of my semester (riveting! I know!) until the following incident. 

One of my baseball players came in extra flustered at the cut off time for portfolio collection. He had been a decent and respectful student all semester, and he had thus almost redeemed college baseball players in my mind despite multiple negative experiences teaching them over the years. He handed in his portfolio and took a deep breath. Slightly concerned, I asked how finals week was going for him, and he said he was stressed out because his girlfriend was in surgery and he was hurrying so he could be there when she got out.  

I expressed an appropriate level of concern.

Then the 19 year old proceeded to plummet from all my good graces as he shrugged his shoulders and, with a bit of a smirk, said: "She's just getting her boobs done."

The awkwardness cannot be overstated really. I managed to raise my eyebrows only a little, keep my face-twitching to a minimum, and say something like "Ah-oh-uh." 

Then there was silence as we watched Jake rip paper. 

He told me how much he loved kids. 

I nodded.

Then I crossed my arms over my chest because I had started letting down...which always happens to my still-lactating-self whenever I get embarrassed.