Summer rolls on . . .

It's been pretty cool here all summer,except for the 1½ week period in June when it was super-hot. But you wouldn't know how cool it is by the way I've been complaining about the heat...mid-70°s and I'm sweating. What's wrong with me?

Been trying to keep myself and the kiddos busy. Swimming lessons have ended, but Stella's wonderful swim teacher agreed to take her on in private lessons . . . and even agreed when I asked sheepishly if I could throw A.J. in the pool too. So they're really enjoying their lessons together.



Stella's ability to coordinate her arms and legs in swimming has really improved over the last 3 years she's been in lessons. It's really amazing.


Miss Kathryn, who's like the "swim whisperer" (she's so calm and great with kids) has even managed to get A.J. to pay more attention, kick better, etc., but seems nothin' can be done about his orneriness! Here he is, dangling from the bar. She had to scold him several times for this today.


We had a nice visit last week from my sister-in-law Jill, my niece Clara and Kathy, my mother-in-law. They stayed the night, because Jill had to pick up her oldest daughter, my niece Lauren, at a camp at Albion College (go Albion!). They let John and I go out to dinner, which we figured worked nicely because our 6th anniversary was two days later. Here is a picture of Grandma holding both Clara and A.J., when it was almost bedtime and they had their binkies, jammies, and were all snuggly. Clara and A.J. are quite a pair, they could be twins.


Since summers can be such intense motherhood for me, I've been keeping myself busy with 1)baking...especially baking with things I get at the farmer's market and 2)heirloom tomato obsession.

First, the baking. This is my first lattice crust pie. Underneath is a combination of local blueberries and raspberries. This turned out well. (I can't say the same for the plum cobbler I attempted this week!)

The trick is that I love to bake these things, but I don't want to be eating them myself. It seems like I gain enough, though, just tasting them.

The other obsession is heirloom tomatoes. Early in the spring, I put an article in the church newsletter about my love of the farmers markets and local agriculture. The outcome of that was that a lady in my church, who has a Ph.D. in some kind of agriculture from Michigan State, gave me 8 heirloom tomato plants. I planted six of them in containers (two didn't survive A.J.'s handling), and added one beefsteak plant. So I've got all these tomatoes growing on the side of our house, the sunny side:


I am anxiously awaiting to see what they'll be. Heirlooms can look like almost anything. Two of the plants have "potato leaves" so they look more like a potato plant than a tomato. But there are tomatoes because you can see that now!


I am considering trying canning if I end up having a lot of tomatoes! I've always wanted to learn to can.

John continues to paint. Now, all 2½ bathrooms have been painted! He's done a great job, too.

Well, that's the way it is!

[3 VIDEOS] of the Addis Grandparents Visit

This may be for hardcore Puzzuoli family fans only, but thought I'd share...

The kids enjoy a Michigan blueberry pie. My dad made the crust and I added the berries.



Grandpa Addis bought A.J. a baseball bat that provided comic relief.


Just a miscellaneous one of the visit.

Grandpa & Grandma Addis

My dad and stepmother Crystal arrived here late Wednesday July 8th after a long day on the Amtrak. It was their first visit to Michigan, and we all had a good time. They were only in Battle Creek for three full days, so we packed each day full of activities, including dinners, trips to Kalamazoo, pie-making, farmers market trips and sight-seeing. Oh, and Crystal helped me with a lot of kid stuff and house stuff...which was wonderful and appreciated.

My dad made fast friends with Stella by pushing her on the swing whenever she wanted...and whenever she wanted was all the time. This is a rare moment they had away from the swings.


Saturday, John took Dad, Crystal and Stella to tour Marshall -- Calhoun County's quaintest little town. Here are Stella and Crystal at the Marshall fountain.


I think this is a cool picture John took of Stella and Dad in Marshall.


Friday night, Crystal and Dad treated John and me to a great dinner at the BiCi Bistro. It was hot, humid and we were overstuffed, but here we are in downtown BC.


We managed to get one with Dad and Crystal with both grandchildren, but they now see why pictures of all four of us are rare....those kids won't sit still!


A.J. was quite fond of all the attention Grandpa Addis gave him....lots of rough-housing. Here they are on the hood of their rented Mercury.


A.J. came to say good-bye at the Battle Creek train station.


Good-bye Grandpa and Grandma!!


It's such a long trip...all day on the Amtrak (not to mention they have to drive to the train station in Kansas City from Oswego), but I hope they'll make it again. It was a lot of fun and the kids had a blast, and so did John and I. Thanks you guys!

I hope to post some of the video I took, too! (That'll just take some time & effort).

June June what a month . . .

First of all, I need to mention that the kids seemed to have a really good time being up north and staying at the cottage. They played in Glen Lake, went to the Lake Michigan beaches, the Dunes and Glen Arbor. I think it was an adventure for them. Most of the people who see the blog see me on Facebook, too, so I won't bother reposting any of the pics I posted there.

When John arrived, he got some shots of our Saturday afternoon. Joe got the kayaks out of the boat house and took A.J. for a little ride. I am seen here shooting a super-soaker:



I eventually joined in the kayaking, even taking A.J. for a long kayak-ride with me. I really love being in a canoe or kayak. Traveling in a quiet, non-motorized vessel across the water is the best way to go, I think. And Glen Lake, with its expansive size and beautiful blue water make it all the more zen. I don't know why it's taken me so long to try the kayak. (Maybe because I'm not a confident swimmer should I capsize??)



Back at the ranch, the dawg days of summer hit with some temps in the 90°s, which is severely hot for these parts. I got the kids a pool to play in, which they do enjoy.



For those who follow the blog, I know you've seen several pics of Stella swinging. Well, so far Stella had not wanted to swing at all on her swingset. She was terrified, and no amount of coaxing could convince her. But Wednesday last week, she came home from school and just started swinging again, out of the blue. Now she begs to be pushed all day on the swing, and John and I had forgotten how annoying that was, I think. Still, I'm glad she's swinging again, because I think she feels free, not only flying through the air but somehow free of her sensory issues for the brief period she is swinging. I think that's why she loves it so much.

A.J. is talking about his feelings now. Particularly, scared feelings. Yesterday he said, "I scared of dog. I scared of cat. I scared of bird flying." LOL. I don't think he really is that scared of those things, but it sure is cute to hear him speak like that!

Other stuff . . .

I went to a picnic the other night, put on by St. Mary's Circle, which is a group of ladies at my church that do a great job raising money to keep our church going. Here are a group of them. I sit with Betty, second from the left, every Sunday. There was a lot of good food and conversation at this picnic. John watched the kids so I could go.



I made a banana cake with deep chocolate frosting today. The recipe comes out of a cookbook I got from the library: Kitchen Sense, it's called. It's a great cookbook. The cake was just as promised, light and fluffy, like airy banana bread. The frosting is delicious, too, made with cocoa powder AND melted chocolate, truly decadent. John and I both bought a big bunch of bananas on the same day, so I had to make it, so I wouldn't waste bananas, right?



John has been painting like crazy. He painted the popcorn ceilings in our master bedroom and bath – not easy – and today he finished painting the master bath.



He picked the color, a bluish gray, and I think it looks great. We are trying to get rid of the awful pale blue in some of the rooms in our upstairs. Next will be the master bedroom, which is going to be a cream/butter color, and I hope it looks good as I considered the color choice for a year at least. John is a meticulous painter and tapes everything up well. It's nice to have these rooms looking freshened up.



Well, hope everyone has a good 4th! RIP Michael Jackson, Farrah Fawcett, and Billy Mays, the OxyClean pitchman (I love that stuff). Congrats to my half brother Rye and his new wife K'eolani, who got married this weekend. Blessings to you!

New season

I think June is one of the nicest months. The month of June is like a Friday night...it's the space in time when anticipation and reality meet. The beginning of summer is coming, hasn't really started in fact, but all the benefits are here already. We've been enjoying them.

I took A.J. to our local zoo, Binder Park Zoo, for the first time last Friday. It's probably the best attraction Battle Creek has to offer outsiders, and the day we went, there were hundreds of schoolkids there on end-of-year field trips and it was crazy.

Plus, taking a two-year-old has challenges of its own. I got there early so we could get around the place before he crashes at 12 noon for his nap. Here he is with a peacock.



He also enjoyed the waterfall and bridge.


The zoo has an amazing Africa exhibit, but it's an event unto itself, so we are saving that for next time. I can see the value of having a season pass, but haven't sprung for it yet.

A week ago, John started working rigorously on scrubbing and cleaning our deck, scraping leaves out of the seams and mopping it over and over again with deck wash. Afterward, he put up our patio set, and now it really feels like a new season has arrived. It was such a long and hard winter (a neighbor said over 100 inches of snow, can that be right?, and soooo much bitter cold), and I don't think I've recovered from it completely. I had never really minded Michigan winters until I was cooped up with two small children...brutal. But with the patio set up, it feels like we've arrived, and the kids like having their supper out there. They had Papa Murphy's cheese pizza tonight.



Stella wanted me to take her picture and here is the beautiful girl with her awesome t-shirt.


Her last day of school is June 10th, and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't terrified. She's very hard to entertain, and with A.J. (a.k.a. Mr. Demanding), I can get completely frustrated. She does have summer school, but it's only 3 days a week, and she only goes for 3 days in the month of June (more in July and August). Say a prayer for me or send me some good zen vibes.

Big and not-so-big happenings in BC

I was taking Stella to the doctor in Kalamazoo on Thursday, and I noticed it was taking a particularly long time to get to the westbound I-94 ramp.

Turns out, I-94 was closed in Battle Creek!

The reason is because the Riverside Street bridge, which is very near to where we live – kind of in "our neighborhood" (but a couple miles south) – is under construction and during the process of the construction, it "shifted," i.e. moved and became too unstable to allow traffic through.

As a result, Battle Creek is flooded with interstate traffic, and it's weird to see bumper-to-bumper traffic.

This was a big story in our west Michigan news region, the top story for two nights on both Kalamazoo and Grand Rapids TV stations...we felt kind of important here in our little town.

But this doesn't surprise us. This bridge is in awful shape. It's over 50 years old and gets 58,000 cars/semi trucks across it everyday. I have strong opinions about the way our infrastructure has been allowed to crumble while strip malls and big box stores have come to characterize the urban Michigan landscape...but I'll spare those.

Before the construction started, John took some pictures of it. You'll see what I mean:


It gets tons of semi traffic, we actually hate driving on I-94.


One of the posts:


Another of the posts, bare steel:


They're working right now to get it reopened so traffic can go across. I'm sure many a driver are hating to be in Battle Creek!

Today was a lazy, cool Sunday, and we didn't have any plans (so nice, I like our slow-paced life a lot!). I visited both farm markets this morning, and there isn't much in season yet except for rhubarb, so I decided to make pie. The lady who is the director of AJ's daycare told me that all-rhubarb pie is possible, so I decided to try it. I combined two recipes, using The Fannie Farmer Cookbook (the best most basic cookbook in the world) and a book I got from the library called Pie to make it. The "Pie" book says to use rhubarb with bright red stalks. Well, I haven't seen much bright red rhubarb around here.



While I was working on this, John took Stella for a stroll downtown. AJ was content to stay home and help me. Here is a photo account of this experience:


Just hanging out to the side was okay....

Then he got more involved:



I had to get him away before the started destroying the dough.

Here's the result:

I always forget to add air vents to the pie so the juice seeps out.

And how does it taste? I don't know. We're letting it set up overnight. I hope it tastes okay, even if we didn't have bright red rhubarb. Somehow I have a feeling AJ will still eat it. I think "pie" was among his first 10 words!

Still here.

Well, there hasn't been much news coming from the Puzzuoli house. Plus I've been busy juggling life at home, work and my church volunteering...I somehow managed to get more committed than I planned on.

The school year is winding down for Stella, and I need to plan some activities for her this summer. She'll probably do horseback riding again, and maybe some extra speech therapy. Her summer school program has been shortened to 3 days a week. Hopefully we'll get a good groove going.

She's still working hard in school and comes home pretty tired. I found her in her room one day after school, and I thought her sleeping position was pretty funny.



Yesterday, for Mother's Day, I took Stella for a walk downtown and along the Battle Creek River. I wanted to spend some time with just her, and she really likes that. It was she who made me a mom, after all, so she's very special to me. She really enjoys being out in the world, going to the store. We're still working on some behavior issues in public places, though.

I also need to figure out what to do with A.J. His swimming class ends today, and there won't be one over the summer. I'm thinking of looking into a tumbling/gymnastics class for toddlers. He has so much energy and he's so rough. Honestly, John and I were talking yesterday, asking, "Could he be any rougher?"

He likes to sit out in the car and "drive" so sometimes, just to keep him busy, I put him in the van in the garage.



Other times, he has to be in the middle of things...like helping make brownies or pancakes. He loves to "cook." The trouble has come when he feels like he can push a chair to the counter any time, and start playing with knives (or like that one time with Stella's medicine). He's definitely challenging us the way any strong-willed 2-year-old would.



Mother's Day was a little rough. The night before, we went out to dinner with John's cousin Cathy and her husband Scott, at a nice little restaurant in Kalamazoo. Two bottles of wine...to bed after midnight. And the kids were up at 6 a.m. I think John and I both struggled through the day.

But here is my Mother's Day loot.
A pink and a blue hydrangea and four boxes of Whole Foods Woven Wheats (they're like Triscuits with no fat, love them).


Oh, and when we went out to eat, Cathy gave me and John a painting. It's actually a print of her painting called "Wet Stones," which she previously donated for our Blue Tie Event silent auction. John did much of the bidding on it, but didn't win it. We're delighted that she gave us a print of it.

The busy month of April

Life seems to calm down a little by the end of April. Right now, it feels like the week between Christmas and New Year's – when not much is happening. It's nice.

Spring is happening fast in southwest Michigan right now. Just a couple of days ago, signs of spring were barely visible. Now you will see the occasional green shadow on the trees, getting brighter and more leafy every day. Even our oak tree, which takes forever to get leafy & green, has swollen buds. The magnolia and pear trees are showing their flowers. It's pretty.

Some of you have asked how the kids reacted when John and I returned from Toronto. To be brief, life picked up exactly where we left off. They were both glad to see us.

Here is Stella on the ride home from Joe & Kathy's. She loves riding in the car. Long trips don't bother her at all. In fact, having her in the house is worse, because in the house, she's always begging for the "van!" And "go bye!"


A.J. quickly returned to his whining and begging which has come to characterize him, along with his ornery-ness.

He loves to sit in the driver's seat of the car and pretend to "drive." I think in this picture, he was upset because he wanted to go to the car and I wouldn't let him. I fear he's the kind of kid who, at 6, will take the keys and drive down the block.

He also runs in the street. Whenever we're outside, he sneakily makes his way to the curb and then bolts. I have to run at full speed to catch him. Several of the neighbors have stopped to say "He's got some speed!" He also still wears hats all the time, and even wakes up from a nap begging for a hat.

The Blue Tie Event went well. We raised about $10,000 which isn't bad for one night, for an organization that has only one employee – me. Here I am with Jen Delaney. She's a former disc jockey that agreed to be our emcee. As it happens, she is also a doula who's training to be a midwife. And she was my doula for the birth of A.J. (meaning she supported me and helped me deal with the pain so I could have a natural birth). I of course never forgot her after the wonderful experience of A.J.'s birth, and called her when we were in need of someone for this event. She turned out to be a great emcee, too.


There were so many people there that the short speech I gave wasn't heard by anybody, which is okay. It was a lot of fun. I'm glad it's over, but everyone was pleased with the outcome.

Last week, it was just the kids and I. John had to go to Cadillac, Michigan for "Arson School." He actually had a great time burning up houses and cars.





He was gone from Saturday to Friday, and I made a couple of his favorites for his return:

Spaghetti sauce with lots of meat, bubbling on the stove, a familiar sight for all Puzzuolis:


And apple pie with butter crust:


So that's the update! Enjoy this beautiful spring weather...

Eat, drink and walk (a lot of each)

This is one FUN place. Toronto has all the hubub and excitement of a big city, the beauty of being on Lake Ontario, and has tons to do.

We walked miles and miles today, exploring the areas of Kensington Market, Chinatown, the University of Toronto and Little Italy. At about 7 p.m., John and I were in a bookstore in Little Italy and the fatigue hit me like a ton of bricks. John and I can't muster another moment of conversation, we are so exhausted.

We started out this morning walking through Kensignton Market, which is an eclectic area with tons of little Asian restaurants, resale clothing shops, fruit markets, etc.

This is a classic John-style photograph taken in Kensington Market, with the abandoned appliance and the beautiful mural backdrop:


I decided I wanted to look more like a local, so I bought an Angora hat because all the ladies here wear hats and scarves. I also found some quail eggs at a local market, and was impressed because I've only seen these used by the TV chefs and have never seen where you could buy them.


Then we went over to Chinatown and ate lunch at a place recommended by a couple of shopkeepers: Rol San's. It was so busy there were people standing in the doorway waiting for 10-15 minutes (we got there early enough we didn't have to wait). I guess the Dim Sum was authentic enough, because the place was full of Chinese people.


We walked to Toronto City Hall, one of "the most distictive landmarks in the city," according to Wikipedia, and we could see why:


We then walked back to the hotel, took a short break, and got in the car and drove to Lake Ontario and walked the boardwalk at Woodbine Beach. Some people there had made these mini-rock Stonehenges that I thought were cool:


For dinner, we drove to Little Italy and ate at Cafe Diplomatico. I picked it because it had a lot of people there, but the food wasn't as fantastic as we had hoped.


It's nice to be getting this break, but two people keep popping into our heads:


(See the street sign)