Grandma came down to visit and help out while Tom had a two week full time internship at a local elementary school. On the weekends we took little trips. Here she is in Southport, with a potted flower that Harper put together at the town’s children’s festival. The flower is currently blooming magenta and red flowers on our porch.

It is our second year tradition that we pick peaches over the 4th of July weekend. Here I am, in 100 degree heat (why is it always 100 degrees when we do this?!)", with a basket of peaches and a sweet little boy. We pick peaches in South Carolina, about 45 minutes away from Erin. Although we may need to find a less sweltering weekend to do so.

Is there anything sweeter than a fresh picked strawberry on a gentle spring day? My Harper is a pro – can you believe he’s not even three, and this is his 3rd year picking strawberries? He’s very good at it. Corbin will learn next year, although he’s already learned how tasty the outcome is!.

Harper loves to have his picture taken. I was using the camera, and he climbed over the couch and onto my back “Take my picture, Momma, take my picture.” So I did.

Harper loves the camera and will jump in front of it at any time. Corbin on the other hand, is so startled by it that all his pictures look like this:

I have recently discovered that I need more pictures of me, tom, and general life because I have mostly picture of just the boys! I’ll work on it, I promise!

My sweet little boy turned two. To celebrate, I took the morning off and brought him to the Children’s Museum of Wilmington. He fell in love with the train tables and spent most of his time there, collecting the trains and running them on the tracks. We also had fun digging in the garden, visiting the “dentist” and the Teddy Bear Hospital. But the train station was the winner, and here is Train Master Harper, overseeing his kingdom.

For New Year’s, we traveled to Charlotte to visit Erin. Erin has come to Wilmington so many times we can’t even count! We exchanged Christmas presents (you can see the adorable elephant sweater vest Harper got and the Giant Microbe – a brain cell – that Erin got from some crazy lady).

We played dominoes, watched Toy Story 3 (the most depressing of the trilogy), toasted champagne at midnight, walked around some shops and watched Harper play on the playground.

What a nice way to bring in the new year.

We spent the weekend visiting Mom and family at their new home at Otter Springs, a county park in Florida, as a sort of Thanksgiving/Christmas celebration. We stayed in the park’s cabins (which were wonderful, with a full kitchen, beds for all of us, and plenty of room).Though we had a short time together, we managed tons of fun:

• Corralling a cow off the road
• Mini donuts at the flea market
• Party at the Rec Center
• Geckos on the windowsill
• Christmas open house in Trenton
• Boys versus girls at Guesstures
• Magician at Fenning State Park Fair
• Awesome new clock (among other wonderful Christmas gifts)
• Stroganoff
• Pig tagging and worming

So you may have heard about the global Playstation 3 meltdown (or 'ApocalyPS3') earlier this week when a small error in the system's internal clock as it relates (I assume) to leap years rendered many systems unplayable for a whopping 24 hours.

I imagine I don't need to tell you, some people flipped.

 

The conspiracy theories flew, and the fury and threats boiled over, and it was quite the spectacle to behold if you cruised by some gaming forums in the heat of it. I'll admit, I was personally thankful that I'd finished Heavy Rain the night before. I'd have probably been a little irritated to find that I couldn't sit down to play it after work. But man oh man... forget corn, we need to get our scientists working on a way to harness nerd-rage as a renewable energy source.

 

Hook one of these angsty geeks up to some machines, tell him his favorite game service is down on his day off, or that Michael Bay is directing a Thundercats movie, and power New York City for a month straight. It'll work I tell you. The science is out there.

• The California Fitness health club in Hong Kong has connected car batteries to exercise machines so that they can harness human energy to reduce their electricity bills.
• There are shoes that convert walking into electricity and can generate around six watts, enough to power a mobile phone and dance floors that turn vibrations into energy.

• The Ridgefield Fitness Club (in Ridgefield, CT) cycling studio, comprised of 17 indoor cycles, is connected to the club’s electrical grid through an inverter, so that human electricity can be used to power all aspects of the facility. This maximization of electricity helps reduce carbon emissions and lowers the community’s demand for fossil fuel based-energy. Any excess electricity generated from the club has the potential to return to the power grid for others in the community to use.

• http://neighbourhoodsatellites.com/humanpowered_ws/index.html 

We just get the one life, you know. Just one. You can't live someone elses or think it's more important just because it's more dramatic. What happens matters. May be only to us, but it matters. 
 - Gwen, Ghost Town