Chris's Birthday

We made two apple pies to celebrate Chris's birthday last weekend!

We had a few families over for lunch, and then hosted even more friends for dinner and late-night jam session. The kids fell asleep in the den and living room to the sounds of their parents playing music. It was a perfect birthday. 

Sticky apple pie

The birthday boy overlooking his garden

Baby Maya and Baby Sid

Sid, Chris, and Uncle Zach

Adam and Almetria

Swinging and zip-lining

So this requires an explanation: when you plug your ears with fingers wrapped with dental floss which is attached to a cooling rack, the sounds are incredible. You have to have someone "play" the cooling rack by hitting it with a spoon (metal or wood)

It doesn't even have to be your own fingers (so you can do while nursing!):

The festivities went on into the night. New families joined us, kids played in the treehouse in the dark, and Avery dressed as a superhero contractor with whirligig hat.

The Big Fig Dig

Each time a Hanson boy is born, we dig a hole for their placenta and plant a fig tree above it. (You can hear Vivian sigh "only in California"). Thus, there are three fig trees in our backyard, Avery's fig, Zeal's fig, etc. The figs are all descendants of Chris's great grandfather's home in Sacramento. 

Last week, during unusually warm weather, we planted Sidney's fig. 

Waterers tend to get really wet and have to strip down:

Then we planted flowers in a circle around the fig. 

Sidney slept on... like a silent garden conductor.

Then all the fruit trees started blooming. 

A plum twig:

Taking a break from digging

Meanwhile, Chris started digging out a stump of a laurel tree that was cramping Zeal's fig. 

It turned out to be a bigger project than anticipated. I wish we had a photo of the laurel tree before he chopped it down, but it was pretty big. At least 20 feet tall and pretty thick.

Here is the laurel stump. We had to just take the fig out completely so it didn't get damaged. 

It was so big, he had to use a winch!

And then the fig was replanted. In about five years, the kids could be climbing this little tree.

3 is a Magic Number

So, 2 weeks into this 3-kid project, a few numerical observations:

5 loads of laundry each week
4 males in the house
3 potential criers
2 wonderful weeks of paternity leave
1 whole year off, yet
0 personal time

And four photos to sum it up (notice Zeal's hand placement in the final one):

Sidney: No Man Is An Island

Sidney means island, south of the water. Despite the confusion that "south of the water" poses, his Aunt Ilyse reminded us that no man in an island. As the poet John Donne wrote

No man is an island entire of itself; every man 

is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; 

So here is the proof that Sidney is a piece of the continent, the Braunohler/Hanson/Barbaria/King/Bay Area to Nantucket continent: