Fruits and Vegetables

We just got back from our weekly grocery shopping trip. Life is good, now that Trader Joe's is back in my life!

Today I bought my kids champagne grapes. Have you see these? They are teeny tiny miniature grapes and they are delicious. When we got back home and Levi asked for a snack, specifically requested these. Washing them and serving them to my children made me think about my mother.

I grew up in Alaska. Things are quite a bit more expensive up there, simply because something like 99% of goods are shipped from the lower 48 or other parts of the world. It just costs more to buy fruit and milk and cars in Alaska. Growing up, I did not realize this fact. I simply opened the refrigerator and there was cold milk. (Well, most of the time. There was this one winter where our fridge broke and my parents could not afford a new one, so our perishables were kept outside until we could repair the old one.)

Anyway, we always had food. And not just any food, but my mother really tried hard to expose us to a wide variety of foods. I grew up eating pomegranates, avocados, kiwis and champagne grape. We converted to whole grains and brown bread long before it was popular.

Now that I am in charge of grocery shopping and I see how expensive these "exotic" items are, it really makes me think about my mothers good intentions as she purposely paid a lot more money for these fruits... in Alaska... in the late 80's. Thanks Mom!

I am becoming like my parents in other areas too.

Also today we made a visit to the library. We returned a bunch of books that were due today and got a bunch more new ones. However, one book was missing. It was one of Levi's and we knew it was in his room. Once we got back home, I told him he was in charge of finding it. Of course, this prompted a serious panic attack on Levi's part. He swore that he could not find it. Anywhere. Naturally I did not believe him. He has two strikes against him: being a child and incapable of picking up items to look for others, and the classic male-blindness that seems to strike both males in my family.

In desperation I told Levi that he was not allowed to leave his room until his book was found. Hello Mom! But, he found it, like two minutes later.

We are also working on conserving electricity and I am trying to teach my kids to turn off lights when they leave the room, turn off the water when they brush their teeth, and not to wash their hands for 10 minutes.

Levi cannot seem to get the whole "turn off your bedroom light" concept. He ALWAYS leaves it on! I am tempted to try my parents old trick: Each time your bedroom light was left on, you had to pay a parent 25 cents. Since Levi does not have any money, it would just be me paying myself. So for now, I will continue yelling.

Baby Ivan

Well, about six weeks ago Joshua and I became an uncle and aunt for the eighth time. Ivan Christian was born to Joshua's brother and sister-in-law on June 15th. We didn't get to see the little guy till he was almost two weeks old, and I have to say, I was quite peeved at the color of the kids hair. RED.

That is right. Me, with red hair, have two blondies, while my brother and sister-in-law have a red-haired baby. Of all the injustices out there.

Oh well, he is a super cute boy and will most likely be really mellow, seeing as how he has two older sisters, both of whom are pretty crazy!

Here are a couple of pictures of our recent visit: