JulieLeung.com: a life told in tidepools

Raspberries fresh from the garden are a wonderful treat to eat for dessert. Unless you are Baby Elisabeth. Instead of eating her food, sometimes she likes to explore it’s texture and touch. Last night I watched her smash the ripe berries in her hand. She watched herself too, looking at her fingers becoming stained with [...]

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Erika, a friend of Ted’s from college, sent us this link to a recent TV story describing her participation in a breastmilk study. All 20 of the mothers in the study were found to have traces of toxic flame retardants in their milk. These chemicals are known to be harmful [...]

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I don’t usually go shopping multiple times a week, but this week I was a bit unorganized. On Wednesday, I ended up walking past the Hallmark store, while trying to hunt down a good toothbrush for Michaela. Sitting outside the store, in a discount bin, I spied a few different commemorative quarter bears. The bears [...]

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Sight of the day:
Abigail looking at the world through her new lavender-colored goggles…and better yet her happy grin from the pool as she splashed about with her protective eyewear.
Smell of the day:
A big thank you to whichever neighbor ordered a big pile of compost! Or maybe it is horse manure. Yummy breeze outside! Oh, [...]

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Today, at the brunch at our neighbor’s home, Michaela fell off the deck. The deck is at least 2 to 3 feet off the ground. I think she didn’t see that the folding chair was right on the edge, so when she leaned on it, she flipped and fell to the ground, landing in a [...]

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Today we were invited to brunch at a neighbor’s home. It was a good time to hang out with other moms. I met a woman, a friend of my neighbor, who grew up in Saratoga, CA, picking apricots in the summers for $3 a flat. I told her I had heard about the orchards. But [...]

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While I was weeding on Sunday, I found a caterpillar, a cute one at that, with fuzzy teddy bear brown fur. I gave it to Abigail and immediately she put it in her Bug Hut , with a foam sheet she’d found floating around our hillside. I think she thought the bug [...]

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Last night we had a bit of a celebratory feast, to honor the fact that Ted had finished writing the last chapter of the book. We had some ribs leftover from the weekend, as well as some salads and wine (cheap kangaroo juice yellowtail merlot )
Michaela though looked [...]

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Today is September 21, the beginning of autumn. And it is the start of a new season in our home as well. Tomorrow is the day Ted’s book is due. It’s been an interesting and intense time for our family during these past few months he’s been writing. It was summer. It was a season.
For [...]

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At dinner tonight I said to the girls, “Tell Daddy how you feel about Uncle Doggie.”
“Sad!” Abigail and Michaela chorused.
“We were happy when he was here, but now he is gone,” said Michaela.
Abigail echoed. “We miss him.”
Yes, Uncle Doggie has come and gone. He was here for little more than a day over the weekend, [...]

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