The Kate Effect

Griffin the Four Door

i always told myself I would not be the type of individual who has a new car every year. I would be the one that had a car so true to her personality that we would be tethered together for years until it could no longer run. 

then i grew up and moved and moved again, then had a wreck, and a baby, and blew a few transmissions...and realized it's not always that easy.

so a year after getting Rosalie ( and enduring a year of weekly trips to the car dr. for her first gear issue.*which they did fix and car dr. was wonderful) we moved on to Griffin.

Griffin is a four door Jeep wrangler. He is a mysterious dark blue, which happens to be KAte's favorite color right now so she approved immediately. He came with a hard & soft top - which makes me love him even more. 

I feel like my process of growing up is represented in my Jeeps.

 

Thor, my first Jeep, was older and rougher - A bright red wrangler with attitude and giant tires+lift kit - He had a soft top and zipper windows that had been cracked and cloudy from years of abuse and weather. Windows and locks were all manual and AC was hit or miss. the seats were torn and you could pull the plug in the floor and just wash out the inside ...

it was awesome!...for a young married 20 something 

 

Then there was the recent Rosalie. She was a dark a darker red...crimson really. Newer with a hard top. Real glass windows, but you still had to roll them down by hand. the locks were also still manual. She had a nice stereo and a great AC. She was the well developed and mature version of Thor. She was perfect.... except that I have a small kid now who crawls over my seat to get in the two door Jeep leaving muddy feet prints on my seat. And my client have to squeeze themselves into the back seat. And the groceries...well, you have to STACK them vertically and be real careful to not let them all fall onto the pavement when you open the back gate.

 

Which is why we traded her in for GRIFFIN. 

Griffin has power everything!! glass windows, remote locks...rockin stereo. AND FOUR DOORS. huge back end for groceries - or bikes...whatever i want can fit there. He quite the beast but he is perfect for us. It's like my 19yr old self and my 30 yr old self compromised and this is the solution.

Hopefully he will be our for a LONG TIME. I plan on driving him into the ground~

 

* i know I posted on FB awhile back - but I realized I left the blog world out on this big event.

why I love my husband:

because he takes more take home boxes than he needs and later that week makes us home-made general tso shrimp and serves it in take out boxes so we can eat on the couch and watch tv. oh yes, he is mine, all mine.

making it more fabulous.

On the days that it's just me and kate around the house I do my best to do an activity with her that encourages some sort of learning. Sometimes it's just unloading groceries and bringing everything to full stop to talk through word problems like; we bought two avocados. but what if we decided to make guacamole for snack today and used one of the avocados - what would we have left...one avocado. ok so it's may sound boring but it's not - because we actually DID make guacamole right after that.

Recently we have been doing math on our fingers. I LOVE watching her organize her fingers and count them. it's just simple math but she caught on quick. that she gets from her dad.

from me she gets her desire to read but her rebellion to being taught. oh yes, she just wants to know it. or at least for you to think she just knows it. 

So one morning we are reading her bible about how God made everything and afterwards I write a few words for her to copy. she does a great job and breezed through them until she go to the 's' in animals. for some reason she got confused and seemed to not know when to stop making the curvy line... they looked like backwards threes. i wasn't too worried since she had just done a perfect 's' right above it with out batting an eye.

But i still had her try again which turned into four tries. finally she gets it. 

then immediately starts putting these circles/dots on the letters. What are you doing? - I ask curiously.

Oh, I am making the letters more fabulous. - she says.

MORE FABULOUS! ha!

she will not tell me who taught her this but I have a feeling it our new babysitter who is in middle-school (and is AWESOME)  - I mean there is no way she just started doing this out of the blue. Fabulousness is learned, right?!?

so there you go. our letters are now MORE fabulous.

love shoes, dislike feet

i am not a foot person. but I love a good pair of shoes.

boy, girl. heel, flats. boots.

i love shoes and what they express about us.

i stumbled upon these shoes today and then followed the little path back to the creators Etsy shop to find equally adorable kids shoes.

this is my crush for the day.

 

                                                                LaLa's Shoe Shop

 

http://www.etsy.com/listing/52197386/little-pinks-ballet-style-baby-shoes-for

the new love of my life: nut butter.

ok, so that post title could go in so many directions...but we are keeping it clean here. at least for today.

seriously, I have an a crush on this Almond Butter:

 

it is AMAZING. I grabbed a little sampler pack at the store - just a very small ketchup like packet of nut butter to spread on my toast. i was feeling adventurous. i had no idea it would rock my world. 

I like almond butter because it its strong nutty taste but it can be a bit dry and peanut butter is kind of a staple this household... until I met MAPLE Almond butter. it is just plain awesomeness in a jar. It's not utterly smooth like peanut butter but it is not chunky either. It has this wonderful texture that is complemented by the subtly sweet maple mixed in.

I loved it so much I went back to the store the same day to buy a whole jar. A very expensive jar, compared to regular old Jiffy.  We finished off the jar by the end of the week. Kate and I pretty much ate it on EVERYTHING including spoons.

just can't get enough of it.

out with the old and in with the new.

today i found an email from my lovely cousin, all it said was: I got your back! 

and it had this link:

http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/chicago/collections/tips-for-filling-your-cupboards-with-character-128562

*photo from apartment therapy

oh how I love her for sending this to me. It was very confirming after giving away all the dishes and committing to find new wonderful dishes. Just as the author of the above article, I too have set out on my own journey to create a personal collection of dishes. 

So far I have not bought one item - but I am ok with that. I am taking it slow and enjoying the search.

brad is not as patient but then again his paper plate folded the other day as he walked to the table and deposited his dinner on the floor. i can understand his frustration but i cannot be swayed to buy yet.

 

*previous post- http://thekateeffect.typepad.com/the_kate_effect/2010/09/give-it-away-give-it-away-give-it-away-now.html

...and this is what happens.

 

so if you read my last post...the one where I admitted to giving all my dishes away...you completely understand why i served my daughter breakfast in a measuring cup.

she was quite put off by this. i thought it was creative, fun and resourceful. she said it was dumb and we should buy dishes.

i tried to be cheerful about things but if I was being honest I would admit to having urges to dump salt into her cereal, but I am not that honest. I was cheerful and encouraged her to loosen up. after all there is nothing wrong with expanding the usage of an object.