Harvesting Oranges

Sweet little Emerson was still super sleepy when I went into her bedroom this morning. Wednesday nights are late, and Thursday mornings are usually a little slower and sleepier because of it.

But she was up and moving and ready to go in no time, and chatted with me all the way to school. Then she gave Aunt Meggie some good morning loves, and waved hello to the picture of Uncle Bo on her desk. And of course she needed some water before heading to class.

Then this goof ball went to class and started putting little bins on her head like hats!

Then she went around to the other side of this toy cabinet, grabbed two small blue fish, and put them in the blue bin. I was so impressed! Ms. Q then found a small yellow banana, handed it to her, and Emmie put it in the yellow bin! And she did it one more time when I handed her a fake blue crayon, and she put that in the blue bin as well. I swear this girl is like, genius smart.

I got a new Slim-Fast flavor in my Walmart grocery pick-up order last night, and it is so good. It legit tastes exactly like the glass bottles of Starbucks frapuccino, and it was delicious.

During my lunch break, I started two different books today. Both happen to be non-fiction, which is actually kind of rare for me. The first is by my favorite blogger/podcaster/author, Anne Bogel, about personalities. And my sweet work friend Heather got me this new bookmark! She said she saw it over the weekend, and knew she just had to get it for me! I love it!

And the second book is a Kindle book (I started it on my phone but I’ll switch over to my Kindle tonight), about midwifery in London in the 1950’s. This memoir was turned into a wildly popular BBC series, which currently has seven seasons, all on Netflix. I binge-watched the first 5 seasons while on maternity leave, and absolutely loved it. There have been 2 more come out since then, and I’m currently in the middle of the 7th season. So all that to say, when I saw the Kindle version of the book on sale for $1.99 a while back, I knew it was a deal I didn’t want to pass up!

I got lots of great photos of Emerson from her teachers today, which I love!

And these next two photos were taken last week by the photographer for the local Socially Loved magazine, and my sister sent them to me today. I love this first one SO MUCH! We’re not sure yet if they will make it into the magazine, but I’m just glad they were sent to me!

She was happy to see Mommy after school, and happy to go head home!

She loves being a helper, so I gave her a few things to carry in to the house. And she was very proud of herself.

We have a small citrus tree in our back/side yard that has produced tons of fruit these last three winter’s we’ve lived here. We had intended to pick some around Christmas time & give out as gifts, but we only did that for Emmie’s teachers’ gift, and then forgot them for everyone else… Oops! So tonight Emmie and I went out and picked some! (Well, I like to call it “harvesting,” because it sounds a bit spiffier.)

We still have a ton left to pick, but we got started tonight, and we’ll finish up over the weekend. But once again, she was such a good helper! I picked them all, them handed each one to her, and she put them all in the basket. She loved it, and kept asking for more.

Jeff was doing work for one of his side companies, so “we” had stuffed peppers for dinner, and they were so yummy. (He can’t eat any kind of peppers without it messing up him stomach.) Emmie loved the rice I made with it, but didn’t so much eat the pepper or the meat mixture/stuffing. Oh well, I loved it!

She likes to hold the cup on her own every now and then, like she’s a big girl or something…

We did bath time after dinner, and Daddy came home right as I was getting her out of the tub. She was so excited when she heard his voice! I got her dressed in her jammies and ready for bed, and her little towel-dried hair was so crazy and mess and just so funny!

As I was getting her dressed and everything, Jeff put one of our favorite songs on his phone. My sister, one of Jeff’s brother, and one of his good buddies sang this song at our wedding, and we still love it so much. There are actually two versions (one from one of our favorite bands, Mumford & Sons, and one on the Brave soundtrack), and we love both versions. Actually, we kind of “reworked” the song for our wedding, to mash both versions together, because we like the musical style of the Brave version, and some more of the words in the Mumford version. Anyways, once she was dressed & ready, Emmie just sat in his lap listening to it while I sang along, and it was so cute and sweet.

Also, my old college roommate Bridget and I swapped emails today with our favorite “go-to recipes,” because we were both feeling a little stale with our cooking lately. And I’m so super excited to try out some of her stuff. One time back in college, we each made our versions of chili for the other. Mine is what you would probably consider “traditional” with meat, beans, tomatoes, etc… But she’s from Cincinnati, so she made Cincinnati chili, and if you don’t know what it is, it’s basically not chili at all. Hahaha, but it IS delicious. She sent me her recipe and I can’t wait to make it myself.

And here’s a photo of Bridget and I from college that actually came up in my Facebook memories today!

Going to read some more of “Call The Midwife” now!