I'll take s-words, Alex

Zachary's Uncle Josh flew in this weekend for a visit, and brought many fun gifts for both Zachary and us. Zachary's favorite is a very tactilely satisfying sword. No balsa or particleboard here, this sword is all hickory, bubinga, and the aptly named bloodwood. Zachary keeps on trying to pick it up (by the blade of course; clearly a warrior) and happily thumps it on the table.

We've been having a really nice time - today we went to the nearby homeopathic medicine university, which was having an herb and food fair. Zachary slept through most of it (though he was awake and pleased with a live marimba band performance). We wandered through some very cool herb gardens (arranged in fascinating ways - a few by the part of the body's systems that they affect; others grouped by the four elements?; and others just in aesthetically pleasing arrays). And we also learned how to make home remedies in a lecture held in a gazebo; infusions, mieles (herbs suspended in honey), herb vinegars, etc. It all sounded (and the samples tasted) yummy enough, even if the actual medicinal properties might be a bit more challenging to accept on first presentation. And I also learned that Trader Joe's stocks larger sized containers of honey than grocery stores. (Challah recipes tend to burn through the stuff pretty quickly, so this is a good tip.) Interestingly, despite a few young babies in the audience, the speaker didn't mention that young children shouldn't eat honey, homeopathic remedy or otherwise...

The evening was another big milestone -- we had our very first teenaged babysitters! Meh's choir had their major concert (she'd actually been at the venue most of the afternoon after the herb fair), and Josh and I of course planned to attend. One of Meh's coworkers had offered for her daughters to come and watch Zachary, and they did a fabulous job. It was nice to be able to be out for an evening, though I felt like a total dork trying to tell the girls what I thought they might need to know about the house, phone numbers, what to do if Zachary woke up, etc.

Tomorrow's another planned full day - we're hoping to meet one of Zachary's lady friends for brunch, then we'll be checking out a Sunday farmers market or two.