Despite only being actually hung over for about 20 minutes on Saturday (Bob Harper’s workout sweat the booze right out of me) I’ve been BlogHer hung over ALL WEEK. Having to care for other people’s needs is exhausting, y’all. So is laundry, cooking, cleaning and keeping up with my other commitments. I need a maid. Or at least a nanny.

Sunday:

Obligatory over the wing shot from my plane ride

Ground from the plane

Yeah, sorry, all I did was fly. Unless you want to see a picture of the giant cheeseburger I scarfed down.

Monday:

Real life can't stop me from rocking the "Internets! Hell yea!" tattoo

Little Evan's newest trick is lining stuff up

I missed this face like WHOA

Tuesday:

GET YOUR FILTHY FALL CANDY OFF MY GROCERY STORE SHELVES. (Also, mmmm...mallow pumpkins)

A 5 minute grocery store trip with two kids is actually a 45 minute grocery store trip

Heirloom tomatoes from the CSA. Tomorrow they're going into pasta with goat cheese and herb butter. And then into my MOUTH.

My dad's job brought him to Connecticut so Little Evan got a suprise bedtime story with Bampa

Wednesday:

I came home with a suitcase full of stuffed animals for Little Evan - and my husband makes them all obsolete with one stupid angry bird.

My children are confused

Yes, please climb on my face.

Thursday:

First time I made it to Stroller Strides all week...and instead of doing sit ups I lay on the ground taking pictures. Am Lazy.

Don't even THINK about making me share this plum.

In bed, lights out, before 10. It felt FANTASTIC.

 Friday:

New favorite game: Caroline rides the bouncy seat like a surfboard while Little Evan bounces it. They made it up/play it all on their own. These children will be the death of me.

Nursing in public. I am SCANDALOUS.

True fact: of all the free stuff I got at BlogHer, one of my favorites was the rosemary Wasa flatbreads. I'm a weirdo. So I bought more.

Things she ate for dinner and are on her face: grapes, corn tortillas, fruit leather, bbq chicken pizza, fig newton. ALL OF THOSE.

Saturday:

Party dresses: they're not JUST for parties!

And then mama bought THIS MUCH stuff at Target!

Cheating on Caroline with my friend Amanda's 7 week old baby. SO TINY.

And now I am exhausted so I’m going to try to sneak in a nap.

Did you take any camera phone photos this week? Link up with one or lots using the linky below and grab the code (so it shows on your blog too!) over at Amy’s . It’s really fun!

Sunday:

Lazy parenting 101: Babies love feet

Lazy Parenting 102: Beach balls rarely break things in the house

Lazy Parenting 201: Forget that strawberries are one of those food you're maybe not supposed to give an infant. Infant is fine.

Monday:

Don't worry, children, you won't be trapped inside today

Lake Compounce!

Now he needs a teeny tiny leather jacket

If I had remembered to bring my knitting, this traffic would have been a lot less annoying. For me. E was driving.

Tuesday:

Angry Birds on the iPad

Angry Birds in real life. They're scary.

Demanding we walk down to see the vegetables at Town Farm

  So I fed him to a pit bull. Just kidding. Big Boy is a very nice dog.

Wednesday:

Watcha doin' mama? Can I play? Can I can I can I?

Get me out! I think he's gonna poop!

Thursday:

Jazz Hands!

Hanging at the lake, stuffing pickled cabbage into his face. You know, normal toddler stuff.

Caroline is "pre-loving" the projects I'm knitting

Friday:

Hotness. Literally, it was really hot & I was at Stroller Strides.

Awesome lunch: homemade black bean & corn salsa, avocado and crab in a sundried tomato wrap. Low fat & SUPER filling.

Hung out at the yarn shop all day & managed to finish my shawl

Saturday:

YARD SALE YARD SALE! It looked promising but whoever priced all the junk seems to think "old and broken" meant the same thing as "pricess antique"

My friend Miranda blogged about these, so when I saw them on clearance I HAD to buy them.

I got my hair trimmed, and then took this picture with the AC blowing in my face for maximum Cosmo cover effect. Ask me for my 10 tips to make your crush think about you while he's on vacation!

 Whoa, three pictures of myself? What is this, The Suzanne Show? I promise next week I’ll focus more on the ginger babies because that’s what you come here for. Oh, wait, that’s a total lie because this is the week I ABANDON MY CHILDREN so I can go pretend I am a Fancy Business Woman in the Blogging Industry with Influence Over Important Things Who Also Wears High Heels and Earrings. (More accurate title: super awkward scaredy pants mom of two whose only goal is not to throw up on anyone for any reason.) But AFTER I get back from San Diego I’ll be taking so many pictures of the babies you’ll practically feel like you live with them too.

Did you take any camera phone photos this week? Link up with one or lots using the linky below and grab the code (so it shows on your blog too!) over at Amy’s . It’s really fun!

My CSA membership has been paying out big time for the last few weeks. I snarfed down all the early season carrots and snap peas and lettuce without even bothering to take pictures or find recipes, because what can you possibly do to a fresh-picked snap pea to make it BETTER? (Hint: NOTHING. Except for shoving it into your face hole.)

Toddler photobombing my picture of last week's haul to get a cherry tomato

All my hopes for teaching the toddler about fresh and local food have come absolutely true. He asks to go to the farm all the time, loves seeing the plants and checking out the changes each week and will eat things I NEVER thought would pass his lips (peas! beans! lettuce!) if he gets them fresh.

But I haven’t been wasting all my veggies on the toddler. They’ve been a total life-saver on my diet plan, since I can eat as many vegetables as I want – and they are SO MUCH EASIER to eat when you know they’re fresh and tasty and they’re sitting on my kitchen counter.

Here’s what I got on Tuesday:

1. Arugula
2. Cabbage
3. Summer Savory
4. Amethyst basil plant
5. Cinnamon basil
6. Jalapeno
7. Heirloom tomato
8. Garlic
9. Eggplant
10. Green pepper
11. Cucumber
12. Fingerling potatoes
13. Red poatoes
14. Hot peppers
15. Cherry tomatoes
16. Pole beans

Holy cow. How do I even START to eat all of that goodness?

Pinterest helps, of course. I used some of the fingerling potatoes for Salt & Vinegar Fingerlings, although I wussed out on the full 2 cups of vinegar and I shouldn’t have – they weren’t tart enough for me. And I’m going to make Spicy Green Beans with my pole beans tomorrow, although mine will be a lot less fancy than that recipe (grapeseed oil? pshaw). I think we’ll have Parmesan Roasted Potatoes this weekend with the red of my red potatoes to satisfy my french fry craving.

And here are my super easy, spur of the moment, straight out of my brain recipes:

Eggplant Bruchetta

Eggplant sliced thin and broiled for about 4 minutes on each side, then topped with chopped basil, garlic and tomatoes and drizzled with balsamic vinegar. 100% CSA. And it was ZERO points on my Weight Watchers plan.

Chicken quesadillas with homemade salsa

Chicken, green peppers and onions sauteed with garlic salt and cumin, then I used my handy-dandy quesadilla maker and some Mexican cheese blend to make it melty. The salsa is the heirloom tomato, tons of garlic, one of the hot peppers, cilantro and lime juice.

Potato rosemary pizza

Pillsbury pizza crust baked for 5 minutes, then topped with mozzarella, chopped rosemary, chopped garlic and all three kinds of potatoes I got from the CSA sliced as thin as possible. Sprinkle with salt and bake for about 20 minutes more. Next time I might roast the potato slices for a few minutes before putting them on the pizza so they’re crispier, but even my husband ate it and agreed it was good. And so pretty!

We have summer squash and zucchini and more eggplant (my new FAVORITE) and tons more tomatoes coming in the next few weeks, so let me know if you have any favorite recipes. Oh, and I need a suggestion for that head of cabbage. It’s so beautiful I hate to turn it into coleslaw but I don’t know what else to do with cabbage.

I want to start this post out by telling you that Caroline the best, cutest, smartest, most advanced baby ever in the whole world, but I know you would think I am just saying that because I am her mother and I am SUPPOSED to think she is the best and the cutest etc. And yes, that is true. But she also is a really, really awesome baby and if you were to come spend the afternoon with her you would also agree she is the best – except, of course, for your OWN baby, because obviously you feel the same way about your baby as I do about Caroline.

But I also don’t remember thinking these things about Little Evan as much. I thought he was the cutest and the best, but I was constantly worried he was behind in his development – not rolling soon enough or catching on in baby sign language class. Some of that was true – he did take longer to roll and crawl – but I suspect a lot of it was first-time mom worry-warting for no reason. In fact, I think I STILL spend a ton of time worrying that Evan might not be hitting his milestones as fast as other kids, while when I think about Caroline’s milestones I think “meh, she’ll get there.”

Wow, that was a lot of words to say what I really mean, which is Caroline is awesome. Other than refusing to take a bottle (ARG BLERG BLAH) she is the perfect baby – easy, predictable, happy, and a good sleeper. She gets up sometime between 5:30 and 7, takes a short nap almost exactly 2 hours later, is awake until around noon when she goes back down for her long afternoon nap (conveniently at the same time as Little Evan!). She wakes up again around 3 and is her happy, playful self when Daddy gets home from work and while I make dinner. We’ve started giving both kids a bath together right around 7 pm and Caroline is asleep before 8. She usually gets up to eat once at around 2 am, but occasionally needs me twice and even more occasionally she’ll sleep straight through. She still sleeps in the swing at night in our room, but it is broken and doesn’t actually swing anymore. I’m just too lazy to set up the pack’n’play. Mother of the year, right here. We run a nightlight and a white noise machine and the classical music on the swing for her to make up for it.

I have no idea how we fell into such a pleasant schedule so easily, but I suspect it had a lot to do with already HAVING a schedule with the toddler and Caroline being easy-going enough to just fit herself in. Sometimes I feel bad for that – I don’t want her to suffer from Second Child Inadequacy Issues – but she is so obviously loved by everyone she meets I think she’ll probably avoid therapy at least a few more years.

She is still kind of a peanut, wearing mostly 3-6 month clothes with an occasional 6-9 month sleeper or dress. I like to think she’s conveniently pocket-sized for those times I need to carry her while chasing a toddler across a playground. It’s nice of her to accommodate me like that.

Caroline’s favorite things include boobs, the dog, the cats, crawling, pulling up on things, eating mulch, swinging, Twinkle Twinkly Little Star, her brother, biting me with her one teeny tiny tooth and nomming on things. Dislikes include bottles, sippy cups, purees, falling on her face, the sun in her eyes and not being able to walk. It fills her with Baby Rage.

Other things that fill her with baby rage: being forced to pose for photo shoots. Although I may have gotten just a FEW shots to post. And by a few I mean a bazillion.

All my tutu pictures are out of focus, because she wanted to eat it.

There was a little girl, who had a little curl

You have a baby...in a camera bag!

7 Month Milestones (from BabyCenter, as usual. New chart this month!)

Mastered Skills (most kids can do)
Sits without support – Yes, easily. We’ve reached the “oh just set her anywhere” stage where I don’t worry about putting a pillow behind her.
Drags objects toward herself – Yes, although it’s much more likely she’ll move herself towards an object.

Emerging Skills (half of kids can do)
Lunges forward or starts crawling – Crawls like a champ. She can do both a regular baby crawl and a funny half-sitting monkey butt scoot, where she has one leg up.
Jabbers or combines syllables – I swear on a stack of Twilight books she’s started saying “Mama”. I wouldn’t bet any money she actually MEANS mama, but she can say it.
Starts to experience stranger anxiety – My kids have never met a stranger they wouldn’t go home with, although today at the park a friend tried to hold Caroline and she was NOT HAVING IT. So maybe?

Advanced Skills (a few kids can do)
Waves goodbye – No waving, but she can sign milk. Like I said, smartest baby ever.
Stands while holding onto something – Yes. Our hands, my leg, the couch, the bouncy seat. STANDING IS HER FAVORITE.
Bangs objects together – Well, she’s not going to be playing cowbell with the Blue Oyster Cult anytime soon but she could probably whack a couple sticks together if I gave them to her.
Begins to understand object permanence – If I am in a room and she is looking at me and I leave a room, she sometimes gets upset. She will crawl around a corner to look for me. But I don’t think she does that with anyone else, so it’s more likely “Oh no my food is too far away!”

On Tuesdays, after Stroller Strides, we go to the Town Farm to pick up our CSA half share with our friends.

Don't they look like FRIENDS? My heart melted a little when T helped Little Evan over a tree root.

Animal cracker face

Where are the peas? To the left to the left!

Picked and eaten right off the vine.

The magic of our CSA: my kid is eating a whole carrot he just pulled from the ground

1. Lettuce
2. Carrots
3. Sprouted Mung Beans & Lentils
4. Snap Peas
5. Summer Savory
6. Sage
7. Garlic Scapes
8. Chickpeas

Have you ever heard of garlic scapes? I had not, but we got some with last week’s share and they’re already gone because they’re delicious. The scapes are the tops of the garlic, the above ground part, and farmers cut them to encourage the bulbs to grow.  They’re milder than actual garlic and can be used like green onions and I pink puffy heart love them. I’m going to use the ones I haven’t eaten already to make pesto.

Not pictured is the dill from last week’s share, which I used to make a batch of refrigerator pickles last night. I’m supposed to wait 10 days before I can eat them and I am COUNTING THE MINUTES.

I also have plans for some garlic hummus and a mung bean & lentil salad as healthy summer lunch options. My friend Cheri suggested drying the sage (since my other friend Sarah pointed out it can decrease milk supply while breastfeeding) so it’s hanging in my pantry to be used come fall. I’m going to steam a couple of those carrots and see if Baby Caroline likes them as much as she likes animal crackers (UPDATE: Caroline nommed the steamed carrot sticks but without teeth she’s not eating much of them). The peas are going STRAIGHT INTO MY FACE, since they are incredibly delicious. I really can’t say “I LOVE MY CSA” enough times.