Our First Week Back Home: The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

3 of the 4 of us are home! The first part of the drive back was not pretty, and I was doing the math on turning around and trying the next day, but fortunately the gremlin in the back seat (otherwise known as Ripken) finally stopped screaming and fell asleep for a while. Some of our highlights (and lowlights) of our first week back:

The Good

Our first morning at home I was feeding Ripken and told Ainsleigh to get something to wear from her yet-to-be-unpacked suitcase. The result...

Shirt: Inside out and off the shoulder (going for that totally '80s look)

Skort: Backwards

Accessories: Firefighter hat (which had been left behind all summer and has not left her head since their glorious reunion), shades, and unwalkable flip flops.

The look: The envy of all 2 & 3 year olds.

I just laughed and said "good job!" We were just going over to see Uncle Garth, so I thought we were safe. So of course when we arrived Garth said we were going out to lunch...the only thing to do: wear the shades and firefighter hat to the restaurant (I hoped it announced "I dressed myself" rather than "My mom went overboard with the stripes").

More good things from this week

*Playing with her two best friends, Emma and Ella. Unfortunately, her other best friend Matthew moved to PA this summer, which she doesn't understand. She keeps asking to go play with him :( We'll visit next summer, Jen!

*Ripken is sleeping loads better at night! I think the combination of leaving siren alley for our quiet cul-de-sac along with moving him into his own room are to thank.

*Enjoying all of the toys that were left behind, including the play-doh (I didn't think the person from whom we were subletting would appreciate little pieces of play-doh everywhere).

*Making brownies in celebration of having a functional oven again! (note the extra on the forehead)

*We also spent a morning at the library around the corner. All summer Ainsleigh talked about several books she wanted from the library. Fortunately they had most of them. Here she is reading Ripken a very appropriate book, "My Visit to the Aquarium" (she just can't get enough).

The Bad

We had a very gracious friend mow our lawn all summer. However, the planting areas were neglected, so we were greeted with 10 foot tall dandelions (no joke) and vines growing up the window screens. After machete chopping the major offenders, I found a lovely layer of poison ivy that had taken up residence in the shade under all the taller weeds. We've always had to battle poison ivy in the woods in the back, but never in the front flower beds. How rude!

Also, we had a limb come down during some heavy rains earlier this summer. which is going to require a chain saw and some hauling to get out of our back yard.

The Ugly

I'm not going to tell the whole story, because I think it's poor form to vent via the blog-o-sphere, so we'll leave it at an accident-prone family member had an...incident...with our deck. I made the picture small in order to convince myself this is a small problem, but if you can't tell, the deck is burned in the middle. To add insult to injury, there are vines growing up onto the deck. This is impressive, because our backyard slopes down underneath the deck, so they had quite a bit of growing to do to make it all the way up.

There are a few bushes under there somewhere, if the vines haven't choked them to death. A few extra projects just as we are heading into our busiest semester ever. *Sigh*