Oh, how I am enjoying the sweet simplicity of summer. With every day, every moment nausea that is controlling my life it has given me the opportunity to sit back and really enjoy the summer time with S and Thomn…or at least lay on the couch and enjoy the two of them. S has been utilizing her creative toddler mind and has been showing us how much she enjoys independent play, not to mention, our deck is currently a toddler paradise with her sandbox, water table, pool, plus plenty of space to ride her car.
Thomn is in the trenches of working on his Prelims before he starts his dissertation this winter so we have been very purposeful of trying to find time to spend together as a family. With a quick trip to the farmers market before we went to the playground this morning, my stomach took a brief break from its rocking, and I dreamily looked at the piles of veggies all around us. I made an offhand comment to Thomn that I wished I was feeling well enough to can and preserve our food for the winter as it is one of my favorite things to do. He just laughed and reminded me that I have been pregnant 7 times in the last 5 years… and that I am always pregnant during the summer, or at least it feels like it, and canning is probably the last thing I can do. All of this is true, we have been surviving off of take out for weeks along with a homemade meal from my mom once a week or so.
I did the next best thing to canning today. I cooked a homemade meal using our farm share goodies. At one point I considered wearing a clothes pin on my nose to stifle the smell, but considered the effort it would take to find a clothespin and opted to just breathe sporadically instead. I loaded up the rice cooker and instantly became more nostalgic than I had already been feeling – realizing that it has been almost 15 years to the day that I opened and used that rice cooker for the first time. A gift from my Grandpa Chou on my first day of college. If only he could know how much that rice cooker has been through. One residence hall, three apartments at Grand Valley, two apartments in Vermont and now here in our house for the last 9 years. It has cooked meals of joy, meals to share with friends and family, and meals of comfort when Thomn and I needed it most. Today it provided us with a homemade meal when that’s what we have been desperately craving.
As dinner simmered on the stove, Thomn and I played with S as she splashed the evening away in her water table. Signing MORE MORE whenever I turned off the hose. Not a care in the world as the spray of the nozzle bounced off her hand and tickled her face with droplets of water. These are the moments of sweet summer simplicity that I so dearly enjoy.
