My Mother's Day

Since the forecast for Mother's Day Sunday looked cold and rainy, we decided to forfeit our plans for cleaning the garage on Saturday and do a fun day instead.  It started with a trip downtown to our first farmer's market of the season.  The familiarity of one of my favorite summertime rituals felt so good and we welcomed old favorites - rasta lemonades, chocolate chip scones, and produce from Hoffman's, while also trying some new to the scene items that will surely become our familiar as the season goes by.  We sat on the curb and devoured La Calle's two newest additions to the market:  Arepas, a grilled corn flour flatbread, filled with their award-winning slow cooked chicken, and our favorite, Cachapas, two Venezuelan sweet corn pancakes filled with braised pork and topped with melted cheese curds from Hanson's Dairy.  Both were delicious, but the Cachapas knocked our socks off!  If you haven't tried La Calle on College Hill, I recommend it!

After filling our bellies full with market goodness, the day took us on a drive around campus and a prairie to explore.  I asked for some pictures with the kids for Mother's Day, and this was the perfect morning to do it.  The skies were overcast, the wind was slow and soft, and the prairie grass provided perfect spring hues of greens and browns and yellows.  I picked some flowers and grass for my table, Mila got wild with a long stick, and Cruz and Beau explored, later discovering a slew of ticks that eventually made their way in our car (and ear and top of my head for that matter).  We took some fun pictures, including some family ones that may have been framers if it wasn't for the fact that Beau insisted we look like zombies.  Doesn't he know that even if we try to take a good picture, someone almost always ends up looking like a zombie anyway? 

We were supposed to be pretending we were zombies...who knew?

Her curls!

Our drive continued northbound and we soon ended up at Phil's fun farm, another agent who works with Beau.  I've always loved any time spent with Phil and his wife, Ann, but watching the two of them so effortlessly take over with our children and show them their farm about did Beau and I in.  What started as a quick trip to borrow Phil's power washer, turned into over an hour of fetch with Phil's dog, Buddy, wandering around in each of Phil's barns, picking asparagus, and going on a 4-wheeler ride down to the Cedar River.  The kids had a blast and we both decided the Swisher's Fun Farm might just be the best location to ship the kids off for an hour or two every now and then. :)

Because we weren't planning on spending that much time at Phil's we decided on a late lunch on Main Street.  We got the kids hot dogs and shared a garbage basket at Toads before Beau let me off to do a little shopping on my own while he paraded with the kids, including a very Hollywood Mila, on the parkade.

We ended our afternoon with a long bike ride.  We circled Prairie Lakes Park, discovered a perfect hill to stop and watch the sunset, and ended our ride at one of our favorite new playgrounds.  We were the only ones there and were having a grand old time until Beau sprang into some super Dad action and cut his lip open trying to save Mila from getting smoked by Cruz on a swing.  The whole thing happened in about 2.5 seconds, but all I can replay it in is slow motion.  It was some pretty serious stuff!  We rode home from some ice packs and popcorn, chocolate shakes, and Paddington!  The perfect way to spend my Mother's Day, besides the whole cutting of the lip thing. :)