Like a breath of fresh air.

It was unseasonably warm here this weekend. No one had the flu. Everyone was healthy. Cranky, maybe, but healthy enough for me to send the whiners outside to play, so that was okay.

Not that there was any complaining about the outside time. About everything else in their lives, yes. Complaining. And maybe about the fact that we didn’t have time to drive to the park. But there was no complaining about getting to ride scooters outside. They were happy enough to share the 3D chalk set that one of them got from Santa. They made soup from dead grass and obediently stayed away from the rain water that had gathered in pots…after getting yelled at for it, but who can blame them? It was gorgeous outside.

Their souls rejoiced in the warm weather clothing options, too. Being able to wear skirts and short-sleeved shirts that the girls beg for all winter long. (Woe is the child who isn’t allowed to wear skirts when it’s 40° outside. I’m a mean mama.) I was even temporarily queened Best Mom Ever! when I could finally tell my Bee-child that Yes, she could wear her sandals after weeks of requests during much chillier weather.

Being able to eat lunch outside on the patio was a treat. I think we were all as starved for outside time as we were for food; no one complained when the wind gusted and we had to hold on to our paper plates.

It was the kind of day when no one minded running errands, because it was nice outside and the music in the car always sounds better when the temps are warm. A car-full of ladies singing Michael Jackson at the top of their lungs? Pretty awesome. So are lady bug hunts and actually having to say out loud: “Jesus never lived in Texas.” Hearing your eight-year-old play in the bath at the end of a dust-covered day and act like the child she is instead of the pre-tween she wants to be? Extra awesome. Complicated plotlines involving Polly Pockets and getting eaten by boa constrictors after a horrible canoe accident optional. (But recommended.)

By the end of the day, I was just happy. Grinning with actual contentment. I didn’t mind the humidity inside the house, or the fact that the temps inside climbed as high as 74°. There’s something about that first warm air inside the house after a cloistered winter that makes everything seem more cozy. I spent a good portion of the late afternoon lounging on my bed, reading and listening to the kids catching ladybugs outside and listing every bug they found crawling around. Something about the outdoors sounds and indoor reading on my bed next to my window made me feel like I had been whisked away to my mom’s house, where I spent many, many weekend afternoons reading in my bed by the window, listening to my brother and his friends playing outside. It didn’t hurt that I was re-reading an old favorite, a novel I read several times in those days. The nostalgia was so strong that it was a little jarring later that night when I padded around the house barefoot, checking the locks and shutting down the house for the night, remembering I was the grown-up in charge of such things.

It was just one day – and not one without bumps -  but the breath of fresh spring air was just what Casa de Katie needed.

Sweet and too sweet.

I wasn’t really feeling it tonight. Then again, sometimes those are my best nights: running out the stress, the anger, the overworkedness. (Oh that is too a word. Shoosh.) There might not have been any stress or any anger tonight, but this is the storm before the rainbow, this week is. And so even though I wasn’t really feeling it, I went running to cleanse all of the projects and the phone calls from my day.

Only it didn’t really help.

Running two miles still felt like an accomplishment, but instead of feeling all-over kickass, it was a jumble of high highs and lowly lows.

I didn’t see Maximum, my hawk, and that made me sad. But neither did I see any of the rainclouds or storms that were predicted to start rolling in, and that was good.

There was smell after smell tonight – something I usually don’t notice – but it’s hard not to when one guy is cutting his lawn (freshly cut grass smells like sneezes to me, no kidding), and then I was hit with the overpowering gasoline from another neighbor’s chainsaw as he pruned a giant hedge, and then there was the random smell of the evening: nail polish. I have no idea why one driveway reeked of it, but it did.

Just as I was about to write off the evening due to my meh attitude and the annoying smells tripping me at every corner, the adrenaline kicked in and I started noticing all the awesome. And by the awesome, I mean all of the butterflies. I thought from when I first turned onto the sidewalk and started running that there were more butterflies out than usual. One pretty brown and yellow fella flirted with me from my mailbox down past the first street and then all the way to the corner. I saw monarchs and yellow butterflies and white butterflies. Some played tag and others flitted from grass to flowers to shadow and back again. And then there was The Butterfly Bush. Every time I passed this one bush, dozens of butterflies swarmed up and rushed my face and landed on my arms and my hair before dancing back to their perch again. It was amazing! I thought that it must be evidence of how sweet I smelled (/sarcasm), but then I realized what it must be.

And here’s where the “too sweet” comes in to spoil the sweetness of the butterflies. Amongst all of the overpowering smells, the queen of them all was the cloying-to-the-point-of-vomiting smell of the flowering bushes. Don’t get me wrong – spring is great and I love all the green and all the flowers. But good gosh almighty – these bushes have to go. At least the smell wasn’t as bright yellow-white as it was on Sunday; today it had greened up a bit. Still, I’m sure that with all my sweating and the breeze and all, once I walked past the bush the sickeningly sweet smell stuck to my sweaty skin and that is what caused the butterflies to say OH! A running FLOWER! Let’s suck her dry! Or. Um. Something.

And that was my sweaty, sweet, too sweet run tonight. There not all going to come up roses – some nights they’re just going to be the thing you get through. And since it’s still two miles down whether I kicked ass or not, I’m okay with that!

What I love about spring…

Bradford Pear trees in bloom.
Sending the girls outside to swing.
Running in a t-shirt and shorts.
Music always sounds better with the windows open.
Spring and summer birds returning to the yard.
An extra hour of daylight = an extra hour of energy.
Barbequed chicken.
Everything is so green!
Hope seems to lurk around every corner.
Patio weather for drinks with my girlfriends and my buddies.
Laughter seems to come easier when it’s 70 degrees outside.
My spring wardrobe choices include more than layers and layers of sweaters.
Have you seen how cute little kids look in t-shirts and jeans?
And, of course, love seems to lurk everywhere, too.

Happy Love Thursday, everyone! I hope you have a chance to slow down and appreciate what’s hiding in plain sight today.

Guest blog: Summer tastes like…

(Written by the very lovely and witty Kim.)

Okay, I know – it isn’t summertime yet.  In fact, it’s barely spring.  But!  Apparently, the Weather Gods love me more than Katie (big surprise, what with all my devotion these long years…).  Plus, I think they knew they OWE me after the Christmas cancellations and then the birthday/Valentine’s Day travel debacle this year.

You see, while Katie was ushering in the first official day of spring with a snowshower (in TEXAS!), I was spending the weekend out on my roof deck in gorgeous 70-something degree weather.  I even put on some SPF 40, just in case.  I swept the slate tile, brought out some new fun garden toys that I’ve been hoarding saving all winter long – but mostly I just lounged about on my chaise lounger writing stuff for my burgeoning academic career (Ha!  Take THAT, springtime productivity!).  Even when I was inside, the doors and windows were wide open and the heat I have to pay for was off.  It was glorious.

Come Sunday, I decided that what I really needed to get the most out of this gift of a weekend was some summery-flavored food.  I ordered a hibachi online (oh the guest blogginess that will generate!), but I needed something more immediate.  Something for eating on the roof deck now.  Something…lemony.

You see, lemon is a Summer Flavor.  It’s so light and refreshing and bright – exactly like my weekend!  THAT’s why I decided to do a test-run of the new recipe my BFF Erin sent out last week.  You all might know Erin from some of my sister’s posts (and comments) – she of Mint Choco-Ganache Cuppa-cake Fame.  Erin trolls multiple amazing foodie blogs and passes along the tastiest looking and most inspired of her gleanings to the rest of us.  This particular recipe is for homemade cinnamon buns that use lemon instead of, well, the cinnamon part.  [Katie's note: Can we call them Erin's Lemony Buns?] The original creator describes them in mouth-watering detail in her blog post – with pictures! – so I won’t go into too much detail here except to say: They are ambrosia.  Sure, they’re not something you can whip up after work for a quick get-together and yes, it’s true, there may be a few ingredients not readily to hand for spur-of-the-moment baking.  But boy oh boy are they worth every moment of planning and every nanosecond of doing other things while waiting for them to rise/rise again/cool off enough so you can eat them already.  (Don’t tell Katie, but I think I like these even better than the Mint Choco-Ganache Cuppa-cakes…)

So if you’re not scared to knead your own bread dough and grate some lemon zest, check out the recipe here.  Whomever you’re serving will be so glad you did – they’re guaranteed to springify even the snowiest of March days!

I wish I was kidding.

Yesterday morning, The Weather Channel woke me up at 4:21 a.m. with a text message about a Winter Weather Advisory. Oooookay, I thought. The last time that happened, it was because it started hailing during a thunderstorm. My text messages went “Severe Thunderstorm Watch, Severe Thunderstorm Warning, Winter Weather Warning, Thunderstorm Warning,” all in a row. Some crazy intern mixing up hail warnings. I knew we were supposed to get thunderstorms overnight, so I was all, Whatevs. I’m sure it’s really hail. I could even hear some plinging against the windows amongst the raindrops, but I just rolled over and went back to sleep.

Then I wondered why it was so cold when I woke up. Well, Katie, that was because it was 37 degrees. Ho-hum, no matter. It had been colder in the mornings, but warming up during the day. Except…a high of 42? What the hell? WHAT THE HELL, SPRINGTIME?! No matter. Other than giving blood, I wasn’t planning on going outside and temps were scheduled to be back to normal by Monday. It would be like it never even happened.

Except then I remembered that the batteries in both of my watches had died. So I dashed out of the house to run that quick errand and I was walking back to my car, I felt a teeeny, tiny raindrop on my hand. It was still cloudy and miserable outside, so I thought it was maybe thinking about raining. I noticed, too, that a small whitish thing floated past my peripheral vision and quickly dismissed it. It was NOT a snowflake. It was much more likely a crystalized exhaust flake from the SUV that was idling right next to me. Because it was March 20th. The END of March. A day when it does not snow back home, never mind in freaking Texas. Then I got in the car and had to turn on the wipers because something kept hitting the windshield. With a suspicious tiny little plink. Son of a bitch! It was SNOWING!

Look:

Those aren't fuzzies on my sweater. They're snowflakes. Mean, evil snowflakes.

I took more pictures, because the flakes were really coming down. Some were huge – bigger than pencil erasers. And I could still see blue sky! Oh, I was annoyed. It is time for spring. Not snow. I’m sure the weather gods thought they were rewarding me for giving blood and having such awesome veins and all, but really? SCREW YOU, spring! I want my patio weather back. Not this:

An inch of snow. An INCH.

Me? Manual labor?

Apparently not.

While the zoo trip didn’t work out yesterday, I did make good on my promise to work outside and try to banish some of the weeds. The girls loved that idea, because that meant they could run around outside and play with their little neighbor. They ran from our yard to her yard to our yard to her yard and were all zoo? What zoo? while I cried into my garden gloves.

All the weeds in the front yard? I pulled them by hand. I have giant blisters on my knuckles – on both hands – to prove it. Halfway through, I even stopped to find a pair of those small, stretchy winter gloves to wear under my gardening gloves for a little cushion. That helped for a while, but then it just meant that there was more material to rub against the burgeoning blisters. My hands are not meant for manual labor; these are hands meant for research! and writing! Two hours later, my front yard was weed free! My other neighbor across the street – the one whose mercy I throw myself on when it comes to yard stuff – promised to weed and feed the yard for me. Which meant…I had to mow the back yard so he could weed and feed that, too. Some people like to just get everything over with all at once. I don’t understand.

So I went into the house, unearthed a beer from the back of the fridge, and dug out the lawn mower from the clutter in the garage. I could barely bend and unbend my hands and my back yard is about six times the size of my front yard. There was no way on God’s (very) green earth I was pulling weeds in the back. I was gonna mow those suckers down and the napalm them. Well, actually, my neighbor was going to napalm them, but I was still going to enjoy it immensely.

It actually didn’t take nearly as long as I thought, although I had been pulling weeds for two hours so, really, anything was going to look easy in comparison. When I was finished, I gathered my children from next door and hopped in the shower. Then we dashed for a quick errand and came home to have a “picnic” in front of the TV. (Confession: I tricked the girls into watching Clean House with me during our picnic. I am an awesome mom.) Then it was time for the girls’ bath. The point is that I was very, very busy even after I came in from the sun…

…which is why I never noticed the very painful sunburn on my back until late last night. Yeah. While I was pulling weeds on my hands and knees, I knew my shirt kept riding up a little bit because I kept pulling it down whenever a car drove by. I wish there had been more cars. I have a raging sunburn across my lower back. It look like a smiley-face mouth, roaring with laughter at my idiocy. And the worst part about it? I won’t be able to peel it when it burns because my arms just don’t bend that way. (But wait and watch me try.)

So, to summarize, I have a (sort-of) pretty yard for the moment, and it cost me six giant blisters on my now-inoperable fingers, aching muscles in my shoulders, upper arms, and glutes, and a bad sunburn that insists on mocking me. Spring: I wish I knew how to quit you.

Bring on the sunshine.

I am ready – beyond ready – for the return of patio weather. The afternoon highs have been very accommodating this week, ranging from 65-75. Of course, Monday it stormed all day, and Wednesday it stormed (and hailed!) all morning, but the sun has been out most of the week. The problem is that when the sun goes down, the heat disappears right along with it.

Still, it was nice enough out on Wednesday night for a group of co-workers to meet up for happy hour at a local watering hole. It was a bit breezy (gusts of 30 mph), but it wasn’t that bad. The guys at the table were complaining about the cold, though (weaklings), so we soon moved the party inside. But soon. Soon we can drink our worries away on the patio. It will be like old times. FUN times. I can’t wait!

******

If the sun holds out, we’re headed to the zoo this weekend. I’m trying to decide if it’s a good idea. We have a membership (thanks, Auntie Kim!), so we go often. I’ve figured out that the best time to go to our world-renowned zoo (ahem) is right when it opens. The crowds are still there, but they’re manageable. The problem is that the low on Saturday morning is supposed to be 42 degrees. Now, the high is still supposed to be in the mid-60s, so I’m hoping it will have warmed up to the mid-50s by 10 a.m. when we get there. Walking around in the cold is probably not the most fun. Especially when the girls will still expect their red slushie. The alternative is to go after lunch and hope the crowds are busy at the rodeo or whatever kind of festival is going on downtown. (Yes, I thought of going to that instead. But – ZOO! I have been waiting and waiting for the temps to rise to a respectable zoo-trip temp.) We might even pack a picnic lunch and eat on the grass or piled into the back of the jeep. Kids are easy to please.

******

The downside to all the sunshine and warmer temps (well, and that day-and-half of rain) is that my lawn is in serious need of a mow. Just to get the weeds down to small shrubs, you understand. It’s crazy – my lawn care hiatus just started. I mowed last in December, I think. That means I’ve had two months off. Well, two-and-a-half since I’m pretty sure it was before Christmas. But not too much before. Le sigh. You Northerners just think you’re tired of all that snow. It’s tamping down the grass growth! Embrace it.

Yes, I just argued the benefits of snow in a post clamoring for patio weather. Clearly I’m in need of some warmer weather to burn away all The Crazy.

To heck with Spring. To heck, I say!

Forget Spring, I’m through with Spring. I’ve got Summer Fever, baby. The weather is nice (85 degrees today, thank you), I’ve been lunching in my happy place with the windows rolled down, the sunshine streaming in, and a good book pouring into my imagination. It’s the time of year for sitting on patios, drinking a nice cold beer, and singing along to some good tunes. Singing: that’s what it’s really all about. Because it feels good.

It just feels good, man.

It doesn’t matter where you are or what you were doing. The right song comes on, the kinda feel-good song that can jumpstart your morning and make your day go right, you just gotta sing along.

You sing in the car, and under your breath while you’re walking places. You sing during musicals, and especially during movies you’ve watched a zillion times before. You sing during commercials and then later while you’re doing housework because you can’t get the song out of your head. You sing in your room when you’re supposed to be cleaning, and sitting around doing nothing but entertaining the kids because it’s just so damn fun to remember every single Girl Scout song you ever sang. You sing to figure out what llamas say, and to pass the time away, and because he’s shakin’ your confidence daily. You sing to remember and sing to forget and sing because that’s just what you do, it’s who you are. You sing because it’s in you and you never realized before how deep it went.

You sing because it binds you, and that’s good, it’s great. You sing because it feels good, like sunshine.

It feels so damn good.

Spring has sprung.

Spring, she has sprung. Actually, spring arrived a wee little bit ago. A few weeks, at least. But it’s been chaos and bedlam over here at Casa de Katie and, shoot, it’s hard to fit in a post about the blooming of the flowers and the leafing of the trees! Thank goodness she wasn’t waiting for a break in my schedule.

No, spring opened the door and let herself in. And my, has she made herself comfortable. The trees they are abloomin’! In fact, the Bradford Pears, the ones whom I love above all others, have already dropped their delicate white flowers and have sprouted tiny little green pointy things…leaves, I think they’re called. I’m only guessing because I am horrifically allergic to Bradford Pears. Otherwise I would have about a half-dozen of them planted out in the yard. Instead, I admire from afar. The curvy backroad I live off of, there’s this one bend in the road down towards the main street. It seems you’re turning ’round the bend for a country mile, at least. There are Bradford Pears lining the road and at the very first of spring it’s like Anne of Green Gable’s White Way of Delight come to life. It’s the one time of year I purposely drive slower than I need to, just to drink it all in.

Of course, not everything is as beautiful with the coming of the spring. The weeds, they are also a-growin’. My yard is full of them. In fact, if it weren’t for weeds, I wouldn’t have a yard. The girls cry when I mow all the pretty yellow “flowers” that will grow back in a day or two. And one of these free weekends I’m going to borrow one of my neighbors’ weed-spreader-on-wheels thingies and put out some weed and feed. And then, if I get really adventurous, I might put down some grass seed and see if I can get something to grow before June (and the scorching season summer) hits.

Another sign of spring I noticed just the other day: the mockingbird is building her nest in our front tree again. Usually that front tree is the very last in the neighborhood to grow leaves. Every other year it’s waited until weeks after I was sure it was dead before it started doing anything. Either this year it got with the program…or else I was a bit busier than I thought and just never noticed. I’m glad the mockingbird is back. We might get dive-bombed a few times when we go out to get the mail, but I’m happy to have a bird nest for the girls to watch. If we’re lucky, we might even get some baby birds floundering around for them to see.

I wonder if my bluebird will be back this year. The first time I saw him was on Mother’s Day, 2006. Last year I saw him quite a bit, him and his lady friend. He will sit out back on a fence post and puff himself up for the ladies to admire. I’ve named him Jeremiah. (You know…”Jeremiah was a blue bird/Was a good friend of mine…”)

And last weekend, when I was mowing the weeds back yard while the girls watched from the patio, I scared up a small bunny. She ran hippety-hop down the fence line before she got scared and froze. The girls and I were able to get about a foot away before I made every one stop – all I would need to make my life complete right now is to be attacked by a rabbit, of all things. The girls and I stared in awe and talked to the bunny forever, it seemed, before she felt brave enough to run down the rest of the yard and scoot under the fence. Thank goodness it wasn’t into Mr. MacGregor’s garden.

Spring does seem to be all around us. It has been for awhile, or so say my allergies. Still, I wouldn’t have it any other way. (Unless we could adjust the pollen count down, just a tinge.)