Happy Pupday Ripple!

Ten years ago we drove down to a little house out in the woods and met a tiny little poochon and his brother sleeping in a little plastic tub.  Over the next eight weeks we visited him every week watching him learn to run and play and learn his way about the big world.  After eight weeks, we got to take him home and he got to be our puppy.

This little dog ate drywall.  This little dog ran miles with us.  This little dog climbed mountains in Seattle.  This little dog travelled with us across the country on airplanes hanging out under the seat.  This little dog has eaten copious amounts of sand on the beach.  This little dog protects his boys whenever someone comes to close.  This little dog learned to eat lettuce under our bookshelves with Beulah the guinea pig.  This little dog loved to play with my students after school.  This little dog loves getting muddy at a river.  This little dog has been through several girlfriends (Ella, Henrietta) and loves hanging out with his family and trying to keep them in line (Abby, Harriet, Pepper, Merry Dog, Max, Albert, Riley, etc.)  This little dog will definitely fetch balls and sticks for hours, and hours, and hours...

Every day when we come home he's waiting near the door or on the couch near the door just shaking with excitement.  He still loves a good game of fetch even through sometimes his neck and paws give out on him before his brain tells him he should stop.  He will definitely act like a puppy forever.

So, how on earth can this little puppy be 10 years old?  He definitely follows the motto that you're only as old as you feel!  He had his big birthday in March and we celebrated with a few new toys (balls, of course) and a homemade peanut butter pupcake which he devoured in no time!

I'm most certainly hoping for another ten years with this fabulous furry member of our family!

Mud Dog and Mud Boys

As soon as winter started to release us from its grip, our family was ready to get back out into the great outdoors.  So, on a beautiful weekend day we headed up to one of our favorite outdoor haunts, the Eno River!  It has got to be Rip's favorite place in the world, so of course he had to come along.  The particular section of the Eno that we went to that day had all sorts of fun things to explore.  We crossed over the wobbly suspension bridge which made the kiddos a little nervous and the dog a lot nervous.  Then, we gave everyone a little chance to play in the shallows.  It was still far to cold to let them in the water, but that didn't stop Rip from trying to hop in and fetch sticks.

They boys and the dog could have stayed at the shore for the whole adventure, but we dragged them away to do more exploring.  We ran through the historic cabin, hiding in the rooms, and walked a little while down the trail.  I have to say that hikes really aren't as long as they used to be.  The boys have to stop every three seconds to explore something.  They especially liked a little creek we found meandering across the path.  They enjoyed creating and destroying little dams across the stream.

We didn't make it too far before Ian's stomach started hurting from his recent surgery and the boys' whining started to pick up volume, so we turned back to do a little more creek exploring and river wading.  By the time we got back to the car both boys and the dog were so coated with mud that we wondered how we were going to get them in the car.  The dog was wrapped in many, many towels, and the boys were striped practically naked, so we managed to get everyone home without too much mud in my car.

It was a great first taste of the outdoors, and we can't wait until the weather warms up and we get to head back out to explore and get a little dirty!

(crossing the wobbly suspension bridge)

(poodle heaven)

(Yay, river!)

(one filthy poodle)

(two filthy, happy little boys)

The Chef and the Farmer

Ian and I rarely get dates so when we do it's a real treat.  For Christmas, Ian got me a fancy dinner at a restaurant that we've both been wanting to check out for a long time.  Oddly enough, I almost got the same gift for Ian.  The gift even came with a night of childcare from his mom, yay!

So, the night finally rolled around and we headed out to the restaurant.  Now, this wasn't just any local restaurant.  This one was located two hours away in a little town called Kinston.  Apparently, this famous New York chef named Vivian Howard and her husband decided to move back to her childhood home and open a fancy restaurant.  Then, they somehow got PBS to film a reality show about the whole process.  (Of course, I watched a few episodes of the show to get a little insight before we went.)

It was actually very nice to have the two hour drive with my husband because we so rarely get chances to just talk.  Once we arrived, we found a nice spot at the bar and waited a few minutes for our table.  We got a glass of wine and tried to spot the celebrities of the restaurant.  We didn't see the chef that night, but we think we saw her husband manning the front of the house.

Once we sat down it was time for the eating to commence.  It was definitely one of the most wonderful meals we had ever eaten.  After some recommendations from the waiter we started with the "dirty grits" with bacon and chicken liver and the vegetable samosas with cilantro buttermilk.  Both were absolutely fabulous.  I had never eaten chicken livers before but it was the best thing that we had all night!

(dirty grits, yum!)

(vegetable samosas)

Next course was the main course and I decided to splurge both in budget and sheer amount of food.  I had a ribeye with collard chimichurri paired with parmesan spoon bread.  It was so much food, but it was so good that I couldn't stop eating.  Ian had a pork chop which he also thought was yummy.

(my ribeye)

(Ian's pork)

Of course, we had to finish off the meal with some decadent desserts.  We went traditional and got exactly what we typically get.  Ian had an apple cobbler dish and I had the most chocolatey cake that I could find on the menu!  They were both good, but at that point there was no way I could eat much more, so I actually got most of it to go and took it back to the hotel room.

(nom, nom chocolate)

(apple cobbler)

Once back at the hotel room we both just collapsed on our backs on the bed and laid there while our stomach tried to unstuff themselves.  Ian and I always love trying new foods together, and this was a great date night!  I just hope they have something up in St. Louis that can compete with this kind of awesome Southern food.  Thanks so much for the date night, sweetie!

Hello Winter!

As February was nearing its midpoint it had been a relatively mild winter so far.  I was really beginning to think that we would make it all the way through the winter with out any measurable snow.  I was getting a bit disappointed because not only do I like snow, but I definitely wanted the boys to have a chance to play in it.  They had been given one opportunity when we went to Atlanta to the snow park, but I wanted them to be able to play in it in their own yard.

So, right after my big donut race we flew off to St. Louis for a preliminary house hunting trip (more on that later), and I looked at the Durham forecast and saw snow.  I was pretty bummed because I thought that I would miss out on Durham's one snow day of the winter!  Gram got to keep the boys at home for snow days during our whole trip instead of taking them to school.  Did I miss out on winter?

Oh, I definitely did not!  Over the course of the next two weeks we had several snow storms that shut down school for basically two weeks.  That's right, I had my boys home with me for two straight weeks with no school beyond one Monday when I was at the hospital while Ian had his surgery.  Actually, that meant that I had ALL of my boys home with me for one of those weeks because Ian was at home recovering from his surgery.

I'll admit that I like a good snow day, but by the end of those weeks, we were all a bit tired of it.  We did have a lot of fun playing in the snow though.  The boys made a few snow men, sledded down our neighbors driveway with the neighbor girls Izzy and Carolyn, made snow cream, and threw snow balls.  They warmed up on hot chocolate when they came inside and were generally happy campers.

The last snow storm of the two weeks definitely did me in and made me begin to wish for all things spring-like.  At about 1am the ice started cracking on the tree limbs and we lost power.  By day break I was beginning to get cold.  To make it even worse, I had gotten one of our delicious butter braid pastries out of the freezer to bake the next morning, and I really didn't want it to go to waste!  So, when we realized that we wouldn't be getting our power back any time soon I got Ian to give me some instructions on our grill, I took it outside and grilled that darn butter braid, and boy was it good!  Then, just when I was about to pack us up and head over to a nearby warm hotel, the power clicked back on and we were saved!  Hooray, no one else in the family seemed to mind that much, but I definitely didn't like the cold!

So, we ended up getting our fill of winter after all.  The boys seemed equally thrilled when we mentioned that St. Louis gets about double the snowfall that we get here.  So, bring on the snow next year!

(Sledding is fun!)

(Yep, skating is fun!)

(C'mon, give me a little push.)

(Jill and little Cooper watch the snow start again.)

(Do you want to build a snowman?)

(Happy snow boys)

(The kids come together to play as the snow continues to fall.)

(Butter braid feast on the grill.)

A Sweet Challenge

This spring I wanted to compete in a longer triathlon than I did at White Lake last April.  However, being busy with the move and suffering from a nagging neck injury, I decided to hold off on that goal.  That's ok because my friend Liz and I found a great race to give us another sort of challenge. Now, Liz and I have done lots of races together from team races with a pineapple to triathlons.  This one was a little different.  This time, we ran the Krispy Kreme Challenge, not as casual competitors but as a dynamic duo.  This meant that we had to run 2.5 miles, eat a half dozen donuts each, and then run 2.5 miles back.

We went out for several training runs along the way.  We even did several donut training runs.  We discovered on the training runs that it was embarrassingly easy for us to eat that many donuts.  What does that say about our typical diet?  HA!

Anyway, when race day rolled around, we had our matching tee shirts with our team logo-swim, bike, run, donuts.  I was flying out that afternoon for a great adventure in St. Louis, so I was a little nervous about the day in general.  I was worried that eating that many donuts might not sit as well with me that time around.  However, I always love the race atmosphere, and this one is more festive than most.  So, when Liz and I got out there and started seeing everyone in their silly costumes ready to gorge themselves on Krispy Kremes, I got in the spirit of things.

We started off racing and just enjoyed watching all the costumes pass by from Santa being pushed in a grocery cart by an elf to a large bearded man in a bunny costume to a girl wearing a donut floaty with elvish on it surrounded by other characters from the Lord of the Rings (get it--she was the "one ring"). We were having a lot of fun and before we knew it we were at the halfway point.  We got our box of donuts and sat down to eat.  Since we had practiced our donut eating we knew the technique and squished several Krispy Kremes together at a time.  Soon enough, our tummies were quite full and we had finished our box of donuts!!

Now, some people finished their donuts and sprinted back to the finish line.  Most of these people also left most of their donuts at the finish line or ran to the string of port of potties.  Liz and I decided to just enjoy the return trip.  There were moments when our tummies didn't feel that great, and there were moments when we had to walk, but we made it with donuts still safely in our tummies.  Hey, we even passed the bearded bunny in the last hundred feet before the finish line.  How's that for fierce competitors??

The race was a great time!  While I didn't have the desire to eat another donut for a while, I was and am still looking forward to my next race with a good friend.  What's our next race, Liz??

(all smiles before the race)

(our box-minus the one that Liz was munching on)

(mid-donut munching)

(We did it!)

...And So We Meet Again

This semester Evan revisited his love-hate relationship with swim team.  He decided to join the developmental swim team at the YMCA which meets once a week.  He never knows whether he likes it or not.  It always makes him a bit nervous.  However, he persevered the whole season and improved a lot.

At the end of the season, there was one meet where they could show off what they had learned.  Evan was not so sure about the meet.  He's never sure about anything that involves racing or competition, but he was willing to give it a try.

So, one Saturday morning we headed over to the Cary YMCA for Evan's swim meet.  Swim meets are always crowded and have a lot of wait time involved.  The wait time didn't appeal to Benny, but it went pretty well for the rest of us.  Evan waited with the rest of the swimmers for each of his events until it was his turn.  He competed in the under 6 freestyle, backstroke, and breast stroke.

His first event was freestyle and that was definitely his favorite.  He got up to the starting line and did a graceful dive (belly flop) into the water and raced across.  This was the first meet where he got across the whole way without touching the ropes!  He also made it across in under a minute for the first time which was a personal best by 20 seconds.  

The second event was backstroke.  This one is definitely not his favorites.  However, he was still willing to try it.  He got in, pushed off the wall, and valiantly swam across.  He's funny to watch do backstroke because he's inherited his dad's heavy body.  His legs sink so he's almost vertical in the water, but he continues to swim.  He finished in about the same pace as he did in his last meet.

His last event was the breast stroke.  Now, he had never swam breast stroke in a meet before and really had only swam it in one or two practices ever.  He was not excited about this one.  Then, right before they were going to blow the whistle, I noticed that Evan was missing.  I tried to get his coaches' attention, but they were talking.  Turns out he wasn't paying attention (shocker) and missed his heat.  He was devastated when he found out.  He hates to do anything wrong and gets really embarrassed.    So,  the coach found him and encouraged him to swim in the next heat which was the girls' 7/8 heat.  He jumped in and cried the whole way across.  When he got across he was just crushed, poor boy.

Then, we kept talking to him and managed to convince him that the meet was a success.  We told him that professional swimmers would be amazed that he improved by 20 seconds in the freestyle because they only improve by hundredths of a second.  Fortunately, that cheered him up and he kept telling people about it for several days.

So, I feel like the meet was a success, and was a good culmination of his session of swim team.  However, Evan said he definitely needed a break from swimming after that.  We are proud of him for his hard work, and I will be interested to see if he goes back to swimming later.

Evan swims the freestyle.)

(super backstroker)

(our graceful diver)

A Durham Day

We have lived in this city for more than 12 years.  It's been fun watching this scrappy city grow and take off, and we will definitely miss every part of it.  One morning a few months ago, we went out on the town and had a glorious Durham morning, trying to hit some of our favorite places before we head on out to get to know a new city.

We started after church by heading downtown to Durham favorite, Dames Chicken and Waffles.  Of course they had a wait.  So, after a little parkour on the downtown buildings, we headed to Letters Bookshop just down the street from Dames.  I got to browse on my own while the boys all sat down and read a little Calvin and Hobbes.  It was their first exposure and you could hear their laughs all the way on the other side of the store.

Finally, it was time for our delicious meal.  Dames is always one of our favorite meals.  The boys feasted on waffles and bacon while Ian dined on waffles, chicken legs, and hot sauce and I had friend chicken, waffles, and orange honey schmear.  It was a delicious meal, and I wonder if they can import it to St. Louis.

(my absolutely delicious meal)

After our awesome meal at Dames, we travelled just a couple miles down the road to check out newly opened Bull City Ciderworks.  So many great little stops like that are opening up all over Durham.  They welcome everyone including our kids and even pets if we had chose to bring Rip.  The boys sat on a picnic bench and giggled through their copy of Calvin and Hobbes while we sampled a flight of Durham's best cider.  For one of our samples, we tried the nonalcoholic root beer.  While Evan wouldn't try it, Ben discovered he was a big root beer fan.

(our flight of cider)

(Benny and his beer---root beer)

It was a glorious Durham day and while we know we have to leave the city, we know it's not the last fabulous Davis family adventure.