You Scream, I Scream, We All Scream for Ice Cream

Iz and I had to run an errand on Sunday around lunchtime. Ed was getting some stuff done around the house so just us gals went out. Normally, Izzi will fight me about going on an errand, especially if Daddy is home and she could just stay home. But she didn't fight me on Sunday for some reason, she willingly came along with me and was quite pleasant to boot. Not sure why but it was a nice little hour of girl time with my favorite gal.

As a special surprise, I took her to lunch. Except lunch wasn't at a normal restaurant. I took her to Baskin Robbins. She was quite confused when I asked her what she wanted. "Don't I have to eat lunch first?". Nope, kid, today we're having ice cream sundaes for lunch.

She was really excited when she ordered her mint chocolate chip hot fudge sundae with crushed oreo cookies. Ice cream for lunch, and not just dessert. What a concept. It was a fun surprise, one of many I hope to spring on her in this new year of 2014.

A New Kind of Weed

I was explaining to Isabelle the important concept of "eating a r-a-i-n-b-o-w" every day because the colorful foods have lots of good vitamins and nutrients. We drew a rainbow and talked about all the foods we could find in each color that she liked to eat. We then packed a "rainbow lunch" together which she thought was such fun.

She doesn't really eat too many veggies yet so this game became life-altering when she got completely jazzed over packing shredded carrots for her "orange" food. And two days in a row, she came home with no leftovers and she even asked if she could snack on carrots. Really? Who are you and what have you done with my daughter?

The green is a bit more tricky. Like most toddlers, anything green scares the living bujesus out of her. But when she saw the diced cucumbers in my salad the other day, she said she wanted to try one and she loved it. She does eat cucumber slices but I always had to peel the skin off. With my diced version, the skin is still on, and she isn't afraid of them. She is also starting to branch into "salad" a little bit, but her version of salad means taking one lettuce leaf (spinach, romaine, whatever we're having) and completely submerging it in a bowl of ranch dressing, then trying not to drip salad dressing all over the table and herself and she tries to shove it in her mouth. I'm gonna have to work on the salad thing.

We were out of cucumbers yesterday when it came time to pack her Friday lunchbox. I told her I was going to the Farmer's Market today and asked her if she wanted anything special for her rainbow lunch next week. She got very excited when she gave me her whole list. And she ended with, "and Mommy, I think I'm a little tired of salad, so how about for my green food next week, we just do "key-weed" instead. Key-weed it is, honey, good choice.

A Whole New World

That whole “let’s put the house on the market and see what happens” thing? That turned into a frenetic two-month sprint of going 60mph for every waking moment. The last week might have been running at 90mph with no sleeping moments. It’s been fast and furious and we’re trying to relax enough to regain some energy but also gain some energy to keep progressing. Because we still have a LOT to do.

We settled on our house Friday, April 20th at 3pm. Everything at settlement went great, there were no surprises and everyone was really nice. Our little bungalow in the Selby-on-the-Bay neighborhood was sold to an adorable young couple with two small sons. I hope they have as much fun in the old ‘hood as we did for our 8 years there.

On Friday night, we said goodbye to our Edgewater friends. On Saturday, Izzi and Jen went to an Egan girls lunch and then all of us headed out to Mom’s house for dinner and a sleepover. We had breakfast with Dad on Sunday morning and then hit the road to the Auto Train on Sunday (more on that in a future post). The train left at 4pm and we pulled into the Sanford, Florida station around 7:30am the next morning.

We aren’t official Florida residents yet, but we will be soon. And then the fun begins in earnest. Stay tuned…