Daycare

Since I have been working part time whild Jacob is in school, Miya gets to go to daycare 2 days a week for a few hours each day. We love Renee, who takes very good care of our little Miya. In fact, Miya usually claps when we pull into Renee's driveway, and is always happy when I come to pick her up. There is usually only 1 or 2 other kids there with her (one is 2 months younger, and the other is 7 months older), and Miya loves playing with her friends there. I am so grateful we found someone whom we can trust with our baby girl!



This is a picture of Anna and Miya from this morning, eating pancakes together. Thanks Renee, for taking and sending this picture!

Visit from mom and dad Miller

My parents came out to visit last weekend, and we spent some time at the Farmer's Market, at Octoberfest, just hanging out, and seeing the changing leaves. Dad also helped us put in a screen door (yes, I finally painted our front door...no more magenta-colored entrance, thank goodness!).



We went on a little hike on part of the Wabash Heritage Trail up in Battle Ground, and as you can see, it was beautiful.







Miya carried around a branch on the way up (Jacob carried her), and a flower on the way down. She would put it to her nose and sniff it every few minutes, which was precious, but we couldn't catch her doing it on camera, of course.



These pictures were all taken by my dad (thanks, dad), but since we don't have a working camera, we don't have any pictures of grandma and grandpa Miller! Also, dad, I want you to notice that I have honored your request not to post the picture of the two squirrels in action. Maybe in a future post... :)

MORE tomatoes

Another post about my tomatoes. It is going to freeze tonight, so I decided that I had better get outside and pick whatever was left on the vine. Well, this is what was left!! One large cookie sheet, 2 bowls, and 3 pots full...and yes, there are some green bell peppers in there, too.



We canned 12 jars of salsa when my parents came to visit last weekend, wiping out my stash of tomatoes. Now I have another stash that will have to ripen on the counter. I've already given some away, but I'm not sure what I'm going to do with the rest of them yet...more salsa?? Tomato sauce?? We'll see. As always, Miya was quite the helper, especially after she saw me throw one of the rotten tomatoes into the trees behind our house. Before I knew it, she was taking the picked tomatoes and following my example. I'm not sure how many tomatoes were lost duing the throwing episode... She also ate her fair share, and took only one bite out of multiple tomatoes. It's a good thing I had tomatoes to spare.



The high temperature was only 46 degrees today, so it was a bit chilly outside. Notice her pink nose and red hands (I did put gloves on her, but the first pair she soaked in a puddle of water, and the second pair ended up covered in tomato seeds and a squashed caterpillar...yes, I have yet to teach her how to be gentle with anything smaller than her hand...lots of grasshoppers and caterpillars have died due to my failure to teach her properly).

Miya periodically went back into the house to warm up since it took me an hour to pick all of these (my tomato plants grew into a jungle-o-tomato-plants, remember?). It was a lot of work!

Sunday Best

Our camera has not been working for the past couple of weeks, and consequently, I haven't been able to take any pictures...and evidently I can't blog without pictures! Then I remembered that after cleaning out the car a while back, I discovered an old camera that Jacob had found on campus when we were living in Auburn, Alabama. Long story short, he turned it in to the lost and found, and when no one claimed it, they gave it back to him. Nice, huh? It's not a great camera (as you can see from the pictures) but it'll have to do for now.



Here are some pictures of Miya in her Sunday best. She is posing, as you can see. Can she get any cuter?!

Slides

Miya surprised me about a month ago when she followed a little girl up the steps to the highest slide, turned over on her tummy, and slid down feet first all by herself. She nearly fell off at the bottowm since it took me a minute to figure out what whe was doing.


I finally caught her in action this week. Such an accomplishment! Now she could spend all afternoon going down slides...


...with an occasional break for swinging. She loves the park (and so do I). I am going to be so sad when the snow comes and our daily park trips are interrupted. *sigh*

Double Jogging Stroller

We got a new stroller this week, and Miya and I (and her black horse) spent some time one evening putting it together. We won't need it right away, but I'm looking forward to being able to use it after our 2nd little one comes. I know...it's hunter orange, but we got a great deal on a top-of-the-line stroller, and we just couldn't pass it up.



On another note...last week I (sadly) hit our other jogging stroller with the front car tire while backing out of the garage. Sad...it took my neighbor's toolbox and his brute strength to bend the frame back into place, then some trial and error tinkering with the front wheel. But now it runs just great again! Thank goodness. Miya and I both need our daily jog to the park, and those few days without our trusty stoller were sad days indeed.

Applesauce

A family in our ward moved into a house with lots of apple trees, and they let people go over and pick them - free! So Miya and I went on an apple-picking excursion (through many-an-Indiana-corn field to get there) and had some good laughs as I tried to make the apple picker do what I wanted it to do. Miya laughed every time an apple fell to the ground or when I would duck or gasp becuase one was about to hit me...which was often, I'm sad to say. I don't think I ever really got the hang of that apple picker.

We got a decent size load in the end, and I decided to try my hand at apple pie and applesauce. I froze a couple of ready-to-bake dutch apple pies, and then used the rest of the apples for applesauce - which turned out to be delicious (even if I do say so myself)! I used a mix of 4 different kinds of apples, 2 sweet, 2 tart, didn't have to add any sugar, and it came out a beautiful rosy pink color.

I froze most of it (since I don't have a canner), but I'm enjoying having a little apple goodness every day...I enjoy it alone most of time, however, as Miya will have nothing to do with it. Hmmph...I'm trying not to be offended.