Nine Months

So 9 months ago today, this little girl entered our lives. Now that is her official 9-month birthday, I can share a few photos I took of our great-niece Mya... with special thanks to our friends at the farm!

 She really wanted to grab and eat those pink flowers that matched her jumper!

No soap in the eye – I added bubbles via PhotoShop.

Giggles.

With Mommy!

I got blues and I can get away with anything!

Of course, at the end, she started laughing and talking! She loves to stand so that helps. She's also a good crawler – made for speed like her daddy the race car driver. I suspect the next time we see her she'll be pretty close to walking.

They grow so fast. But I can tell she's just going to get more adorable by the day! Lucky us!

Munk-eying Around

This little guy with the full cheeks photo-bombed my senior photo shoot this morning. As soon as I saw those chubby cheeks, I thought, I bet that's what I looked like yesterday trying some variety of cake at each graduation party. Today, I was too busy to indulge in that kind of stuff.

Had a portrait session as soon as the rains cleared this morning. Was super muggy out but thankfully it stayed cloudy. That makes for better pictures. Since I was down in the Nekoosa area, I headed to the Shermalot Water Ski Team car wash fundraiser after pictures were done. Then it seemed like I had some chores on my "to do" list... and I realized just now I never got around to them today!

I did get around to getting a round in, though. At the last minute, son #2 was unable to golf with Dad, so I filled in as second choice. Other fighting off gnats and gators, hubby and I had nice time out at Homestead.

It seems we got done in like an hour and 15 minutes or something crazy. Got my 10,000 steps and good sweat.

We rewarded ourselves with a good farm-to-table feast. The neighbor's farm to our table. That's the best way to make it work.

Did pork chops in the air fryer and had garden-fresh beans and baby red potatoes. To be honest, it does taste better than cupcakes or cookies. Except for the frosting at that one party. Sigh.

Capped off the day with a phone call from Mr College. Always love to hear his voice. And hear that things are good.

It was a fun day chipmunk-eying around and spoiling ourselves – or maybe just myself.

Juggling a Few Things

Been juggling a busy schedule in the last 24 hours so I skipped on the old blog last night as I was approaching turning into a pumpkin at midnight. And no, the young man on the unicycle wasn't juggling anything, but I do identify with the skill of balancing!

Last evening was the postponed graduation ceremony for the Royals class of 2020. Like everything else this year, it was an unusual event. A socially distanced crowd of graduates and only their parents attended the combined mass and ceremony at one of the churches. Only a handful of faculty and the photographer...

Hey look, that's me! Was just glad they at least held a celebration of some sort for this senior class who got short-changed out of quite a bit this spring!

Today, hubby and I had a full docket. I had a senior photo shoot this morning. You can't top a photo shoot with a unicycle for fun! Pretty cool, actually. Well, the temps were crazy warm and humid (90+), but his made skills on one wheel were crazy cool.

This morning, Jim and I also did a virtual Capital City 5K walk in support of organ donation. We usually do this on the last Saturday of July in Madison to remember Jim's cousin Ben, who died and donated several organs. We missed seeing the cousins but we (and all participants) did it from home and posted photos. Jim and I did our walks separately since he did his before I got home from picture-taking, but we donned out team shirts and shared a picture!

After cold showers, we attended a few graduation parties. All outdoors with "sanitation stations" set up. So we spent the afternoon dropping off cards, visiting, eating excellent cake, and staying hydrated.

It's refreshing to be home in the air-conditioning!! And relax. I can juggle that task.

Pint-Sized Pick-Me-Up

The perfect prescription for a break from all the negative news lately is a little pint-sized pick-me-up. Not the alcohol variety, either. A great-niece works perfectly!

Was blessed to spend a little time after work today with Miss Mya, who will be 9 months old next week already. Uncle Jimmy and I haven't gotten to spend time with her since the stupid virus and quarantine and yada yada hit. So it was nice to actually see her instead of just pictures.

And nice to take some more, too!

Yup, she's pretty adorable and loves to laugh when her mommy makes farm animal noises from her favorite book. Really cute. And just what I needed.

Maybe what we all needed. Thank you, our little ray of sunshine!!

Circle of Life

Thanks to my subscription to Disney-Plus, I have been reminded again about the circle of life. Thank you, Mufasaa and Simba!

Today I had another reminder. Don't tell hubby, but I met the new neighbor and he's a cutie! Don't you think?

During my lunchtime lap around the 'hood, I stopped to chat with the hard-working farm lady around the corner and met this two-day-old sweetie. New life on the farm is always exciting – at least for us pseudo-city folk. The farmer doesn't "ooh" and "awww" over the new calf like we do. Not in front of us, anyway.

Today, that new life took on a new meaning at the 150-year-old farm. Not long after I left there today, there were ambulances and emergency personnel called there. The farm lady's mother – I'll call her the farm matriarch – had passed away. Her health had been declining recently. Not COVID-19 related at all. She was 93. And I bet she worked harder in her life than a lot of us combined.

She can rest now and she's at peace.

And hopefully the cute new guy flirting with the neighbors will bring some smiles.

Last At Bats

Thanks to COVID-19 the class of 2020 ballplayers never got their last high school at bats this spring. It was a bummer all around, from the kids and coaches to the parents and fans.

Tonight, the Assumption Royal softball and baseball players got their senior sendoff as part of graduation week (also delayed 2 months). It was a small gathering of the seniors, their parents and coaches, and some extra family members for the two girls signing on to play sports at the collegiate level – one softball and the other basketball. Pretty much squeezing in all their spring sports-related activity into one 20-minute event between rain showers.

Glad they could at least do that. As just a fan with a camera (usually), this made me miss time at the ballpark even more.

Guess I'll count down to the Twins baseball opener on Friday. Can't attend that either! Stupid virus.

Congrats, class of 2020 and good luck!

The Helpless Helper

As a woman, I was pleased that when Mr. College watched the Bob the Builder show nearly two decades ago, there was a strong female character on the show. Wendy knew her stuff. Even sometimes when Bob didn't. They were a great team!

Not that I'm a wanna-be Wendy, but I did make the second hardware store trip in three days this evening. Like Wendy in this preschool book, I was just trying to help out!

Hubby has some banners he needs to hang for an event tomorrow. I knew he needed zip ties, so I looked for them at Wal-Mart yesterday. No luck. I offered to go to Ace Hardware after supper tonight since I wanted to grab some Watkins hand soap there that we use. Side note: They have a lot of cool, non-hardware stuff at our Ace!

So I went, donned my mask and started to look around. They have pretty complete lists of items on their signs at the end of each aisle. So I headed down on the right side. I almost asked a guy in a red shirt where they might be, but it turned out it was just a Badgers shirt – not an Ace red apron – so I kept moving.

Just like at Home Depot, when you wear a mask, it masks your confusion, so there were no red apron rescues. I got to the end, and simply came back on the other side, reading every item on every aisle sign. Finally, when I got back to the guy in red and his younger companion, I said, "I don't want to be the helpless female, but where would I find zip ties?"

I kid you not. The younger guy reaches 4 inches from me (on a center aisle display) and says: "You mean like these?"

And old guy quickly adds: "They're actually cable ties."

OK. Wendy would've known this. I was more upset that I was THAT close to not having a blond moment. So close.

I guess we'll need to add zip ties vs cable ties to the other Midwest arguments like soda vs pop, bubbler vs drinking fountain, crick vs creek, and barbecues vs sloppy joes!

As a bonus, I did find something at Ace that I was looking for at Home Depot Saturday. So when I need more, I can channel my inner Wendy and march straight to aisle 23 and get it!

Can we do it? Yes, we can!