Of Little Girls, Tattoos and Tunnels

A Pleasant Saturday; South King County --
Every once in awhile, Grumpy gets in trouble. Usually it is not really his fault (although all of his Grandsons insist that it is!) and this last Saturday was no exception. But Grumpy wants the reader to make the judgment call, based on the following facts:

1. The elder Mermaid strutted out to greet Grumpy, proudly showing off two (2) tattoos! One on her left cheek and one on her left arm.
2. Grumpy counseled the elder Mermaid of the unwise decision she had made in allowing her body to be tattoo'ed.

• "They won't come off!", he told her.
• "Oh yes they will!" exclaimed the eldest Mermaid, giggling.
• Grumpy rubbed the one tattoo on the eldest Mermaid's arm. "See, it doesn't come off!", he said with a concerned look.
• "It comes off in water, silly!", the eldest Mermaid said reassuringly.
• "I don't believe so", Grumpy responded, still worried that his little Great Granddaughter was marred for life.

Now, here it is a week later and the pictures prove that Grumpy was right; the tattoo's are still there!


Meanwhile, as the above "discussion" was going on, the littler Mermaid strove to show her athletic agility by constructing this "tunnel" through which she crawled and, finally, in which she here rests -- undoubtedly tired from squirming through all those tight areas within the "tunnel".

Fun in the Park -- out of the Mouth of ...

Sunday Afternoon in the Park --

Last Sunday, after a relaxing dinner (late lunch) at the Mongolian Grill, we took our Great Granddaughter Emileigh to Liberty Park to play on the action toys. Great Grumpy got an earful of new "instructions" and "do nots" during our delightful time there.

Emileigh started out on the climbing toy, including trying out the "suspension bridge". Here (left above) she appears to float along like a blithe spirit, seemingly oblivious to the wiggling that such a contraption can inflict. But then this girl has other ideas (two center pictures); soon some "victims" appear (right above) and lie down on the bridge to experience the up and down action that a jumping Emileigh can create! What fun. But when Emileigh laid down herself to enjoy the "trauma" of the jumping action, alas, no one volunteered to provide the energy.

Oh well! How about those springy ducks!? But this was sort of boring -- the ducks didn't go anywhere and didn't provide the sort of thrills that this girl was apparently looking for. No, not even with the trick "riding"!

"Want to go on the swings?" Great Grandpa asked. And away we went. Back and forth; back and forth.

"Faster! Faster!" trilled Emileigh. So Great Grandpa pushed harder and Emileigh went faster -- and higher!! The chains went limp as the weighted swing reached its high point, nearly level with the cross bar!! "Stop me! Stop me!" pleaded Emileigh. So Great Grandpa stopped the swing.

"Daddy!" shouted Emileigh. Then, as Mike came closer, "Great Grandpa doesn't push me right!" she informed her Daddy.

Being relegated to watching (and taking pictures of this gleeful, giggling bundle of joy, Great Grandpa thought to make the swinging more exciting. As the swing reached the limit he jumped at the swinging girl and said, "Boo!!"
"Stop it, Great Grandpa! Don't 'boo!' me!" said Emileigh, giggling so the words were almost unintelligible.

So, the next time Great Grandpa jumped out at her and said, "Yee-a-ahh!!""Stop it, Great Grandpa! Don't 'yee-a-ahh' me!" said Emileigh, again giggling wildly.

Then Great Grandpa jumped out once more and flipped his tongue back and forth over his upper front teeth to make the sound, "Bla-du-la-du-la-du-la-du!!""Stop it, Great Grandpa! Don't 'bla-du-la-du-la-du-la-du!!' me!" said Emileigh, still swinging and giggling.

Finally, Great Grandpa grabbed at her honey-blonde curls as they floated in the air at the extremes of the swing oscillations.
"Stop it, Great Grandpa! Don't 'Hairy Potter' me!" said Emileigh. Great Grandpa nearly collapsed from laughing at this innovation from the five year old.

Great Grandpa slept very well that night!!

A Dickens of a Visit!

Sunday, 16 August; South King County --

With nothing much to write about (other than upside-down tomatoes!), Grumpy hasn't posted for a couple of weeks. However, the excitement of this weekend (the announcement of an impending Great Grandchild expected!!), with a visit from the to-be parents and their lovely daughter Emileigh, things definitely took a turn for the better! Come, see for yourself.

First we had lunch at the Mongolian Grill [watching the cooks toss, flip and turn your choice of meats, pasta and vegetables is worth the price by itself; the food becomes a bonus benefit!].

Then we went to the Park for a "relaxing time". First there were the "pony-ducks" -- if there is ever a need for someone to break a duck to ride, Emileigh is your gal!

Next there was the climbing apparatus; some jumping on the "suspension" bridge -- the victims came later.








A trio of "girl monkeys"!













Then over to the swing! Such exhilaration!! Such giggling!! But Great Grandpa couldn't push quite right; So Daddy had to be recruited to do the job just right!

Great Grandpa got his reward anyway!

And so did Great Grandma.

Garden Update: An Invention and Fruitful Abundance

End of a Hot Week; Grumpy's Castle --
The warm weather this past week was very good for Grumpy's upside-down tomatoes. And also for his Raspberry Row! But the hot weather (103o on Wednesday!) brought a problem: keeping the tomatoes properly watered. Once or twice a day, Grumpy poured two or three cups of water into the upside-down "pots" from which the tomatoes hung. This still did not keep the plants from showing some wilting toward the end of the very hot days. The necessity to provide plenty of water gave rise to the mothering of an invention: A heat-powered watering system (see photo at right.)

Each one-liter-sized bottle is filled approximately 3/4 full and then capped. A 5mm hole is punched through each bottle cap. The bottles are turned cap-side down into the watering hole at the top of the upside-down planter. When the daytime temperature warms the water and the air pocket above the water, the air expands and pushes out the water. The warmer it gets, the more water is pushed out. The result is that the water is supplied to the roots of the tomatoes in proportion to the amount of heat that is experienced during the day. Grumpy has found out that just about the entire 3/4 liter of water is emptied during the hottest day. On a relatively cool day, less water is expelled and so during the cooler night, air is sucked into the bottle and is available for the next day.

While we are on the subject of tomatoes, Grumpy is proud to show off his first "Yellow Pear" that is finally showing signs of ripening! Grumpy will give it a few days before he samples this hopefully delicious fruit. In the meantime, the reader is directed to note the abundance of the cherry-sized fruit developing on the "Sun Gold" vine on the right. The Sun Gold is by far the most prolific tomato vine of the four Grumpy has.

Perhaps the second most prolific is the one he thinks is an Early Girl, shown here in the photo on the left. Grumpy and the Grand Mother have had five ripe tomatoes off of this vine already. The Glacier tomato vine has produced one ripe tomato which Grumpy sampled and concluded that it wasn't nearly as flavorful as the Early Girl. Grumpy is concerned that the size of these two varieties is much smaller than he would like. Perhaps the soil in which they are growing does not have the right pH -- he heard today that lime is needed in the soil to grow good tomatoes. Maybe next year.

Finally, the Raspberry Row! In an earlier post, Grumpy stated that no one had harvested raspberries while Grand Mother and he were gone to Florida. I was wrong! We were honored this week with a visit from Nancy Nurse and husband, Paul, from up Norske way. Paul mentioned that he had picked a half gallon or so of the raspberries while we were gone. Grumpy is glad that someone was able to benefit from ripe berries rather than let them be ravaged by Starlings or Clark's Jays -- or attract an itinerant Black Bear!! Oh no!!

Since returning, Grumpy has picked about three gallons of raspberries, resulting in one pie, three batches of freezer jam and enough frozen raspberries for a half-dozen more pies. Grumpy believes that he will be able to pick enough berries in the next week or so to enable the Grand Mother to make one or two more batches of freezer jam.

So much for Grumpy's weight loss goals!!