I got a letter yesterday from PSU.

I made the Dean’s list last term! Go me!

Things are really hectic around here.  I am going to make it a point to give updates about what is going on, but FIRST, I must get some things done today.  Talk to you tonight!

Daphne is becoming very crafty very quickly, and we are having to scramble.

On Sunday, we were trying to watch the finale of a show we like to watch, and it was not meant to be. Daphne was running around causing all kind of havoc. She was pulling things of shelves, putting objects in the VCR, peeing on my sewing patterns and just generally demanding the attention that was not forthcoming!

When papa Bob came up a few weeks ago, one of the things that he brought up was a small chair that used to be Jared’s. Daphne likes to sit in small chairs, and she was amused for weeks about being able to sit in the chair like everyone else.

Recently, however, another idea has occurred to her. She realized that the chair is light enough for her to carry and that she has the ability to stand on it to get up to something high.

I now look behind me often, and she is walking off with her chair and 2 minutes later, she is standing on it trying to food of the kitchen counter or the pin cushion off my sewing table.

She is becoming ever more crafty.

Last night as was wrapping things up to put her to bed, I looked in the kitchen, and she was standing on a cooler in there that she had drug in there so that she could get an apple.

We are scrambling to baby proof from Hurricane Daphne, and we are now closing ALL doors for ALL rooms that we are not currently in (including the bathroom because apparently the toilet makes a really good water toy!)

Daphne is learning a new word now, “sock.” Any time it is time to put on a shoe, she reminds us that perhaps a sock is necessary as well.

We also say the word, “food” when hungry (or even thirsty).

She is coming along on her talking.

Somewhere along the line, Daphne became incredibly aware of music.

Within the last week, she has started dancing to music anytime she hears it. She sways back and forth and lifts her feet up off the ground really high and smiles. It is an awful lot of fun.

She also nods her head, and sometimes, we wont even notice that we have music going on in the background until I look over and see her rocking out to it and dancing.

I’m going to have to post video because it is really cute.

I swear that one day I am going to find a graveyard of lost things. I have been missing a few things lately, but the list is quickly growing longer.

For one, my cell phone has been missing since the day that I got my new cell phone. I am convinced it is in my house, but in a search from top to bottom, it still has not appeared.

I have also been missing my flash diffuser. This is important and about 10 minutes before every wedding I go to, I search the house looking for it until I get up in sadness that I might have to spend another chunk of change to replace it.

Oh.. and there is always the snap press die that I had to reorder and am waiting anxiously for.

Daphne is also missing one pink shoe with a flower on it. I think she left it at my sister’s house, but it is nowhere to be found there.

And so, I go through life anxiously awaiting when these things will show up. I imagine when we are packing up her room for college that I will find all these long lost things and we will have a good laugh.

Daphne now knows the word “belly button.” She can show you hers any time you ask.

She also knows where her mom’s belly button is, but rather than just point it out, she tries to blow bubbles on my belly every time I ask her where it is. It is really, really cute because she is just remembering what I used to do to her!

This may sound like it’s going to be some kind of speech about the necessity of eating local foods and how it’s bad to eat things that aren’t produced locally, but it’s not. I’m more than happy to eat my bananas from who knows where. But Katie wrote an interesting piece on the Oakhill Organics blog about how it is the responsibility of both the producers and the consumers to work together to make the “local thing” work. It was actually a very interesting post for me and made me much more proud of Chris’ little “mini farm” that she has going.

I grew up in northern California (really northern, not SF) right next to Arcata, CA, which is known for it’s radical take on living responsibly (“hippieness” at it’s extreme, though it seems to have calmed down when I last visited). And I’ve been a computer programming bachelor in this modern era of microwavable meals. So while I may not have seen everything, I’ve experienced a lot of the spectrum. And since I’ve pretty much always been in an international scene (I went to and worked at an international boarding school, and the computer work that I do can be done from anywhere in the world), I’ve never really thought much about the local food scene.

But I must admit that over the last few months as Chris has really taken off on her “projects”, as we call them, it’s become a lot more real to me. And I must admit that it’s nice. The food we eat tastes much better. And knowing the people that produced it is actually pretty cool. It adds a bit of camaraderie to the picture. Your not just eating lettuce from the store, but you are eating lettuce from so and so’s farm with some dressing that Chris made out of milk from her goat and some spices.

So I guess to sum up, while I don’t shun all exterior foods and I appreciate the ability to interact with and get products to and from all parts of the world, there’s an added bonus to partaking of your local environment and community.

Yesterday was a very hectic day. We grabbed some pizza and decided to eat it in bed while watching TV (it was rather late and we were trying to get the baby to bed).

While watching “Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader” there was a lot of clapping. Every time, there was a clapping moment, Daphne would throw the pizza down and start clapping and then pick it back up again. It was so cute to see her realizing that there was clapping going on and that she needed to participate.

She was careful to put the pizza in the pizza box every time she was clapping, but toward the end, that consisted of actually flinging the pizza so she could get her clapping done.

Chris had something to do today so Daphe and I headed to the market on our own this week. Pretty good for only my second week of “farmer marketing”. I was given some not so clear directions on what to get and a playful “you’re dead if you get it wrong” and off we went.

Carrying a 25 pound baby around the market isn’t necessarily ideal (I’m not sure how Chris has done it all of these weeks), but we had a good time. We stopped in at the Oakhill Organics booth, where I used up way more of our subscription than I was supposed to. But it was fun and they are such nice people. Then Daphe and I got a few other things, including some blueberries and were on our way home.

I’m sort of piggy backing on Chris’ various connections, but I’m really impressed with the various people she has managed to meet over the past year of living around here. They are all very nice and share the purpose of living and eating responsibly. I don’t know–by the time it’s over, I might just end up a “techno-farmer” (seeing as I don’t see myself giving up on computers any time soon).

But in the mean time, I think I will make it a habit to check out the farmer’s market as often as possible. Not only for the food, but just to check in with the various people.