Happy birthdays to liam, Debbie and Mum. Here we are at Jerry’s sandwiches on Division!

Last weekend myself and miles went to the annual bike fest, tour De fat with a neighborhood bike ride, entertainment and crazy bikes to try out.  We had a blast.

We had a huge storm here last night, with massive, golf ball size hailstones! I was looking out the door at the storm and one hit my toe and it really hurt! They completely covered the street. Pictures from Chicago Tribune Completing a crazy night, we were woken up to city workers shouting on megaphones to move our cars. The whole street hadn’t moved their cars for construction because the city hadn’t taken down the old out of date signs, the new signs looked exactly the same, except the date changed. Everyone was running out in their pj’s to avoid…

Myself and miles took the day off to cycle along the lakefront.  A fun and gorgeous day

Close up of an oak leaf hydrangea bloom. It was covered with bees this morning, they seem to prefer it to the bee balm nearby. Guard owl

I’ve harvested a few of the Cincinnati Market radishes that I planted about a month ago. They are an unusual radish–they’re shaped more like a carrot. I didn’t think about taking a pic until after they were chopped, but the cross sections were quite beautiful (kinda remind me of snowflakes). Very peppery and good. Also, I found a recipe for radish leaf pesto. Liam’s evaulation: The pesto isn’t bad but it’s definitely not as sweet as a basil pesto. I think it would work well as shown in the recipe on this blog (click link below), with some prosciutto, rather…

It feels like a warmer version of spring break around here. Liam and Miles are out of school this week and don’t start camp until next week. I am of course in school but can’t resist going out for some fun in the city in the morning, promising that I’ll hit the books in the afternoon. First, we went to the Whales: Giants of the Deep exhibit at the Field Museum. The exhibit was made by the The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa and is about half about the evolution and science of whales and the other half…

I read once that butterflies rest with their wings closed, whereas moths rest with their wings open. This beautiful one or the other was in the black-eyed susan plants this morning. I was surprised when it crawled right onto Miles’s finger!

This was taken on one of the last days of school this year. Whenever Charlie’s outside, Miles and Liam stop by to give her some love and affection.

I was down in Champaign-Urbana for classes this week. One day I explored Urbana, Illinois, a bucolic town of about 40,000 on the east side of the University of Illinois campus. The public library in Urbana, the Urbana Free Library, is really nice. There are a lot of very picturesque wooden houses in Urbana. This is one of the nicest examples! Treelined streets and cobblestones. On the way back from UIUC the clouds were really amazing!