If you like to talk to Tomatoes...

Jackson and I are of course VeggieTales fans, and today we made the drive over to Palmyra to see a FREE showing of The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything! It was Jackson's first movie in an actual movie theater and he did great! I was a little disappointed that the movie wasn't very....veggietalish.....no theme song, no Bible lesson, no Bob the Tomato! But Jack still recognized lots of other characters and the movie definitely kept his attention. And hey, it was free! (but then again, when I started calculating the gas it took to get over there....) I did bring my camera but didn't get any cute pictures, so I have some non-Jackson pictures instead....


This is what I ended up making with more of my strawberry supply (I made 2 but the other one was well on it's way to being gone by the time I took the picture) I also made 12 more jars of jam - this time strawberry banana. Haven't tried it yet. Hope its good - 12 jars is a lot if it's not!



This is my favorite yard sale find of the weeked - a great vintage wire basket - currently holding my fruit but it may earn its way to other spots in the house as well. 50 cents!

Strawberries!

Yesterday I finally made it out to pick strawberries. Of course this only happened after I called the strawberry farm and was threatened with "I don't know how much longer we'll be open - maybe until this weekend." So I realized that if I wanted fresh strawberries, now was the time. Thankfully, I came to this realization after Jon was home from work and he - slightly begrudgingly - got roped into coming as well. I'm so glad he did. It was a lot easier, a lot quicker, and plus I got this cute shot of my guys together... (although I'm just noticing looks like Jon took the belt off his work jeans...)

When we came home I finished dinner, then got to work cleaning strawberries. It took FOREVER thanks to the fact that most of the strawberries were small. I was very thankful for the huller my MIL let me borrow - much quicker. I will invest in one of those for next year. I made 12 jars of strawberry freezer jam before I ran out of jars. Now I have a lot of leftover strawberries that I haven't quite decided what to do with yet. More jam? Pies? Anyone have a favorite strawberry recipe they'd like to share?

Yesterday was a productive day. Besides the jam, I made a big pot of spaghetti sauce (enough for last night's dinner plus 3 more freezer meals), 2 fiesta shrimp dinners to freeze, a quiche to freeze, and a peach coffee cake. All of this done while my house is getting replacement windows, the dog is quite concerned with the work going on, and Jackson is *supposed* to be napping but instead he's upstairs singing at the top of his lungs.

Today I just found out that the guys working on the house won't be here until 830...and I got up at 630 for what?! I guess I can spend the time doing something productive...like mapping out my yard sale route!

ARGH!

I am so annoyed at myself right now! I had an entire post written, including 3 pictures, and somehow dumb me posted it on the MOPS blog instead of my personal blog! OOPS!! It wouldn't let me cut & paste, so I'm going to have to rewrite it all. Double Argh!

Anyway...I'll hit the highlights....

Today we played with sidewalk chalk. (How's that for just the facts? I had that sentence sounding much better the last time around! Ok, time to stope being bitter). This was J's first experience with sidewalk chalk and while I would love to say that he drew all over the place, he mostly just enjoyed telling me what to draw. His favorite part was laying down on the sidewalk and me tracing around him. He did love it though, and I think next time he'll want to draw more.

My little guy has been making me laugh so much lately. Here's 2 recent examples:

**He knows his full name is Jackson Lee Mohr. Yesterday he was getting slightly exasperated with me while I was on the phone and said with the "you're in trouble" tone, "Mommy Lee Mohr!" Along with that, we've been trying to teach him how to spell his name. He starts off right but always ends up saying "J...A....Lee Mohr."

**Also yesterday, I heard a lot of lip smacking and "yumm" coming from the toy room. I knew that I hadn't given him a snack, so I went in to investigate. He had created his own snack from the leftover bits of play-doh we had somehow missed when cleaning. I said "Jack, we don't eat play-doh, that's yucky!" He immediately started sobbing and said "yes, mommy! eat play-doh!" One of his best sentences to date - glad he saved it for such a special occasion!

Baltimore Weekend

We have tried to do something special for our anniversary each year....a little get-away! Baltimore is definitely one of our favorite destinations. This year we postponed our trip until this past weekend....for a special event: Pirates vs. Orioles! Our 2 favorite teams have not played each other in Baltimore since the 1979 World Series - which I am happy to report, the Pirates won.

Jon took the day off work Friday and we headed down to Hunt Valley and then took the Light Rail to Baltimore. Note: if you are planning a Baltimore trip, you can save so much money by taking the Light Rail if at all possible!! Parking for us for 2 days would have been $50...instead we spent around $6 for Light Rail tickets. (Another note: if you get motion sickness, sit forward, not sideways on the LR...trust me on this!) Anyway, we checked into our hotel...a great and wonderful deal thanks to Joelle!... and then walked to the Inner Harbor where we ate lunch at the Cheesecake Factory, walked, and shopped. The stores are a little expensive for my taste (yeah, I know, what isn't?) but it was still fun to look around.

We headed to Camden Yards early for the game and watched Pirates batting practice for awhile, then headed to Boog's BBQ for one of the best sandwiches EVER - I love that place! A game is worth it just to be able to get the sandwich!! The game was a great one, although the Pirates lost (no big surprise). There was a fireworks display afterwards which was also amazing! It was funny to see & hear the reactions from people at the ballpark when they saw Jon with his O's gear and me with my Buccos shirt. We got asked, "How does that work?" more than once.

Saturday we ate a breakfast buffet at the hotel (at 50% off...yay for Joelle again!), walked around some more, and then decided to leave. We shopped some more at Hunt Valley and then came home. We sure were glad to see Jackson so spent the 2 days getting lots and lots of attention from Nana and Peeps!!

I also wanted to say HAPPY FATHER'S DAY to my Dad, who taught me to love our Pittsburgh teams in the first place...you would have loved being at this game! Also to Jerry, who even though he and his offspring are Orioles fans, I can overlook that and say otherwise he did a great job raising his kids! And of course to Jon, who is such a great father to Jackson, who already wants to be just like Daddy!

Summertime!

Even though it's not officially summer, everyone who lives around here will agree that it definitely feels like it! We've had record breaking heat for several days now, today it finally cooled down, with a high of "only 85!" We are becoming very thankful for our house and all the shade we have, because it honestly feels about 10 degrees cooler in our yard than it does when we go into town.

We have been spending a lot of our time trying to beat the heat by enjoying Jackson's pool and sprinkler! Grandy & Pap sent us a really cool Elmo sprinkler that Jackson thinks is great! We also set up J's slide to go into the pool so he's been enjoying that too. His most favorite thing, however, is when we splash him with buckets of water.

Anyway, here's a picture of our outdoor fun!

June already!!

I just can't get over how fast this year is flying by....it's June already!

Thursday was Jon's birthday. Gramps came over to help us celebrate and I made Jon's favorite meal - Chicken Parmigiana and favorite dessert - carrot cake with cream cheese icing. It was nice to do something special for him when he does so much for me! Jackson was so excited all day helping to wrap presents and make the food. We made Jon a birthday card and I really wanted it to be from Jackson so I was asking him what he likes to do with Daddy. He said, "Play. Make bubbles. Eat." Funny how eating made the list. He did come up with a few more things eventually.

On Friday, my brother came up to spend the weekend with us. We were really glad he could come and Jackson and he had a lot of "bonding time" - Jack sobbed and didn't want to go to bed each night because he wanted to play with "Uncle Marf." (Side note: I just love the way he pronounces words wrong! It will be a bittersweet day when the Marfs become Mark and Marc.) Besides playing with Jackson, Mark also helped Jon clean out our gutters which was awesome! I also loved watching the Penguins game with Mark just like old times ~ although it would have been much better had they won. Anyway, that sums up the weekend ~ thanks for the visit, Mark!