Nerd alert

We have a new hobby her in Casa de Bennet - geocaching. Basically you use your computer, GPS or phone to navigate to these places to find little "caches" that have been left behind by other treasure hunters. They're pretty well hidden usually and in all sorts of various containers. It's been a fun activity to use the phone GPSs to navigate as a family to various spots and find treasures. Inside the boxes are at least a little list to sign your name that you were there (bring a pencil) and often, if it's a little bigger, there are little trinkets. Bjorn wants his calling card to be little Swedish flags. So far, my trinket has been whatever little plastic toy happens to be laying around the car. It's pretty cool, as Miley Cyrus would say.

Also new in the past two weeks are our kittens! I am embarrassed that I don't have pictures posted yet, but right now we're just dating. They sort of come out briefly, sniff us and dance around the living room. They're warming up quite a bit, but I haven't been able to get any good new pictures. On my list of toys for myself has been to get a fancy new camera, all the better to take fancy pictures with, but that was before the washing machine started spewing water on the floor of the laundry room. Lovely husband is at Sears as we speak trying to find a replacement. I mostly want energy efficiency. The one that came with the house for $50 was probably manufactured in 1989 so it has lasted a good long time. I imagine the newer ones are tons better.

First day part two

Meg had her first day in her new preschool yesterday. She handled it quite well. I think having both first days on the same day helped. Maybe.

First day of first grade

Seriously, when did this happen? He was just a toddler and she was a baby. Now they are so big and opinionated. Andy starts first grade today and rode the bus to school for the first time (I didn't cry but I thought about it). Meg starts a new preschool. Yay! And I'm not ready!

Most miserable cousin

We got to see one of my cousins in Austin and her two kids. It was a nice visit, mostly because we picked a place called Waterloo with a super awesome playground attached to the restaurant (seriously Dallas. Get on that.) Andy however was unhappy to leave as evidenced below.

Adorbs

Andy and I came home from my indoor soccer game tonight to find this. I do love these guys so much.

Austin

The only picture we got of all of us. Look at my little vampire on the right.

A cool picture Mary took of all of us on the boat. She's right, it's a nice shot even if my rear end looks gianormous.

BATS! Seriously, how cool is that?

The kids and I to Austin this weekend to visit my sister. What fun. It's a good thing I didn't know about Austin sooner or I might have really made some sort of push to move there. Forever. What a fun town, friendly, quirky people. My lack of pot smoking probably makes me an anomaly there, but I think I could live with it. The kids were on great behavior, partly because we only went to restaurants with playgrounds. Dallas, are you listening to that? Restaurants with playgrounds. What a great idea! We loved being able to visit while the kids could eat, play, eat, play. Props to my college friend Julie who gave us the names of all the places in town with playscapes built in.

The highlight though was a boat cruise to see the bats come out of their colony under the town bridge. It was so cool and a little creepy to see two million bats flying out in rows at dusk to go hunting for their breakfast. Then we watched them fly off into the sunset looking more and more like a huge swarm of bees than bats. They must have flown out in organized rows for 20 minutes. It was pretty awesome. So awesome that I didn't have time to notice the woman breastfeeding her potty-trained, two year old child.

The great Texas heat wave of 2011 (or why I am melting)

Dear Texas,
I love you. I really do. I love how the landscape changes throughout the state. I love how you have beaches, hills and mountains, rivers and lakes, sand hills and green pine forests all in the same state. I love how proud Texans are, how people are generally nice to women with children and try to help them exit a plane instead of cutting them off. I love that the cost of living is a lot less here. Sure, I have issues (well, tons and tons of issues) with the conservative, Christian agenda that seems to want to keep people (especially immigrants and women) poor, unhealthy, uneducated and pregnant. But in general, this is a nice place to be.

I do, however, have some complaints about this weather you're giving us. I know summer in Texas is hot. That's to be expected. We don't have a Boston winter where it's too cold and snowy to be able to do anything, but we do have a summer so hot you also really can't go out and do anything. I accept that. I am just not so keen on this 110 degree business though. If I wanted that, I'd move to Arizona where at least it's cool at night. And I know it's dry here generally, but I need a little more change of scenery beyond sunny and hot with a chance of clouds for three months. I need at least a good hail storm or severe thunderstorm to make up for the monotony.

It's so hot that it's too hot to swim even. It's hotter than swimming in a bathtub. It's like swimming in a hot tub. It's not even refreshing unless you do it at 10 p.m. and there's a cool breeze.

I will no doubt look back on this wistfully in January when there is an inch of ice on the ground, but I would willingly trade one for the other. Now, how do we go about changing some of this? Do you need a good rain dance? A cloud dance? Vodka? Brie? The new Chelsea Handler book? You name it.

Thanks, Texas. Love ya!

-Katherine

Boat safety week

Today is boat safety week at swim class. I do love that they teach basic boat safety as part of swimming. Most likely a lot of accidents happen with kids in boats and I love that they are teaching them this, too.