Feels like home

A friend invited us to go berry picking at the Mackintosh farm this morning. It was downright chilly - only about sixty-five, which is ridiculous for late July, and it was wonderful. Hurray for the polar vortex. (It DID come back in the summer when we would appreciate it!) Meg and I actually had more fun in the veggie patch than with the blackberries: the berries were fine, but on the other side we found zucchini and eggplant and peppers in their natural habitat. Meg especially got a kick out of picking peppers. 

The zucchini plants at the farm had both ripe fruit and blossoms on the same plant, which I thought was so strange. We have two zucchini plants out back, both of which are blooming, so
I figured I might as well check them. And we had a huge zucchini - six inches long and nearly as thick. It looked like a watermelon. Cool.

The zucchini that looks like a watermelon

I finally worked up the courage to take the girls out back to our deck. The poison ivy has been poisoned (well, once) and was lying low, and since I washed our little dumpster the wasps haven't been around, so out we went. Also, I couldn't waste that 70-degree weather. I knocked the spiderwebs down and we picnicked for dinner and kicked a ball around afterwards.

It's so nice to play outside. It makes it feel like home. Also, what makes this house feel like home: Sayers books by the bed, Wodehouse books in the bathroom, and library books on every flat surface in every room where Jonathan has been, like a trail of bread crumbs. I love it.

She was listening to that story about Henry II

Meg just emerged wearing her knight's helmet over a pink giraffe-spotted fluffy blanket on her head. She got right in my face and said, "I am the Emperor the Second. 'Cuz the Emperor the First died."

Technology

Mary Poppins: "At that time in England, they didn't have cameras. They only had telephones to take pictures with." Meg

The country has bugs

Also, I got caught behind a hay truck yesterday and people held the door for me at the dollar store. True story.

Meg: Mom, did God make flies?
Me, confidently: Yes.
Meg: RATS! Then it's a BAD UNIVERSE!

We moved to Berryville this weekend, which isn't that far from Leesburg, except for being worlds away. I am in shock. Hang on if I haven't gotten back to you; we just got internet this morning.