I could use a jump in the lake right about now. Do you know that NY is going through one of the worst heat waves in history? People, today was 100 degrees. That is actual temps. Even at 2am last night the temperature hovered near 90.

The weekend seems so far away, but it was only 2 days ago. We’re back to the daily grind of hectic mornings getting the kids to camp, work meetings and deadlines and rides on cramped subways to Manhattan. I look at these pictures and will treasure that weekend. I found an old post that Sara wrote earlier this year where she talks about the lake house among her other favorite things, and feel even more privileged to have spent time at a place steeped in such family history. Thank you Sara, Thor and Henry for inviting us in.

There was a moment during the weekend when Sara and I both admitted that we were a wee bit nervous about meeting each other for the first time. After all, someone’s online persona may not be what they are like in real life. There’s always that chance you’ll be disappointed or let down. I think this is why I feel a little bit awkward when I meet blog readers. I usually feel like a dork and don’t know what to say. I’m more anti-social and private than perhaps I might appear online (or maybe you can tell). But you also have a gut feeling for these things and in the past, I have had very good luck meeting people who have become such awesome, trustworthy friends in real life.

You take a chance and sometimes what you gain is worth its weight in gold.

ps. a video of Claudine at the lake house doing her special “bow”.

We just got back from one of the best weekends we’ve had in a long time. This is the summer of first meetings – people that I’ve gotten to know online, but are meeting for the first time and who have generously invited us to stay with them.

Sara Jensen and her family used to live in NYC, but they moved to the San Juan Islands in Washington state a year and a half ago (take a look at their wonderful shop. I’ve been using their pomegranate tote bag all summer). I didn’t know her when she lived in NY and I had only really started to get to know her earlier this year, but she invited us to her lake house over the 4th of July weekend while on their cross country road trip back East (yes, she single handedly drove her 2 year old and husband to NY in 6 days from the San Juans).

The lake house is a special place. It was built in 1906 and has been in her family ever since. There is no electricity or running water, there never has been. Life is stripped down to the basics – cooking, eating, swimming, talking and hiking. There were about 15 people staying in the 5 bedroom house and the girls had the best time. Claudine kept saying “it’s so quiet here” and Mia learned how to swim with a life vest on. We couldn’t get her out of the water so she happily paddled around by herself collecting lakeweed when all the adults got too cold from swimming. We warmed up in the sun and watched her from the dock with our coffee and beers.

The days really slow down when you have no regard or care for time. Though this wasn’t camping in the woods, this was as close to camping as I’ve gotten in probably 18 years when I did some serious camping and hiking for weeks at a time in the summers during college. It was a reminder of the importance to stop, unplug and just breathe.

More photos tomorrow…

Father’s Day was Mark’s first full day off in like a month. We let him sleep in and then went for breakfast at a big diner near my parent’s house. Sometimes you just feel like sitting in a booth in a typical American diner where all the menus are identical and you know you will get ridiculous portions of food. Plus we know that picky Claudine will eat pancakes and sausages, and lots of them. Win/win all around.

We then spent a leisurely 3 hour visit to the town pool after breakfast, the first visit of the season, where we always pretend to be residents of my parent’s town, only we’re not because we have to wear brightly colored guest wrist bands and we don’t really fit in and it’s not only because we’re from Brooklyn.

We drove back into the city early Monday morning and dropped Mia off at school. We found this Father’s Day note in her backpack. Later in the afternoon, the neighbors and I sat on stoops and on towels spread out on the sidewalk while the kids ran amok with the sprinklers. Innocent pedestrians tried to dodge hose-wielding children as they walked past our motley gang. Bottles of beer were passed around. Such a different scene from the suburbs the day before. But that’s how we hang in 90 degree weather here in Brooklyn.

Love the handmade Mother’s Day gifts from the kids. I love that Mia planted 2 little marigolds in a cup covered with foam hearts at school. I remember making gifts like this too when I was a kid. And I love that Claudine’s people drawings now have life-like proportions (a torso, a waist) and accessories (short, puffed sleeves and nail polish bling on the fingers, though the number of fingers on each hand seem to have multiplied).

Mother’s Day. Now that the Flea has been moved from Sundays to Saturdays and Mark doesn’t have to work anymore for Mother’s Day brunch, we get to have that holiday back. We have nothing planned, however, and I’ve been supremely lazy the last couple of days. I’m not going to wax deep words like I did last year on Mother’s Day. These days it’s fairly simple. I feel equal parts exasperation and equal parts Hearts in My Eyes when it comes to the girls. It’s the little things that make the day. A simple, absent-minded reach for my hand when we’re walking down the street; a pat, a lean with encircled arms and a squee as one of the girls walk by while I’m on the couch working. This is the stuff I try to focus on.

It was nice to spend Easter with family members we don’t see very often.

The girls were into the Easter egg hunt. So much so that they decided to hide the goodies themselves and look for them again.

I’ve never had peeps before until today. Meh.

While being dropped off again at the park while Mark and his sister visited their dad at the hospital, I met another woman who was in town for the same reason as we were. She came up to me to comment how cute the girls were. We watched Claudine and Mia as they skipped, twirled and played house between a gazebo and a couple of huge trees. About 30 feet away, I saw an elderly man in a wheelchair covered under a blanket. That was her father in law. He was 97. He miraculously pulled through an illness while in hospice and is still hanging on. Similar stories, except Mark’s dad is 30 years younger. This woman was at the end of this particular chapter as her father in law is the last remaining parent. We’re just at the beginning.

I kept thinking about that this weekend and my head can’t quite grasp this, especially since our other 3 parents are active and healthy, but it’s overwhelming to think that we might be dealing with this 3 more times. It’s also made me think about what we need to do to prepare for the future 30, 40 years down the line.

I know that this is so obvious, but it’s poignant how we revert back to the needs of a child when we grow older and are unable to care for ourselves. Help with being fed, changing clothes, walking…the most basic of needs, a reversal of roles. It’s sad, but also quite…poetic.

Last year we tried to get a little fancy with our easter eggs by trying pysanky (the Ukrainian art of decorating eggs). We didn’t have the right kind of wax so it didn’t work, but the dyes were so vibrant. This year we went simple and just bought the tablet kind of dye you can buy at the grocery store.

The girls and I dyed eggs while Mark and his sister visited a few nursing homes in the area. We are all staying at Mark’s uncle’s house. I’m not quite sure why, but the girls were really subdued and quiet during egg-dyeing.

The daunting task of taking care of a sick parent and trying to work with the system is overwhelming, confusing and wrought with anxiety. I know that all this is inevitable, but you never think that it might happen this soon. Relatively speaking, our parents are not old. They age before your eyes, but somehow they never seem old – that is, until they fall ill. Or maybe you catch a glimpse of a photograph that makes you stop and look more closely. And then it surprises you because yes, you can see the evidence of age that you usually don’t notice. Because most of the time, they are just mom and dad.

Nothing brightens up a drab winter day like an unexpected riot of colorful roses delivered to your door (thanks, bro).

This morning was spent with a friend having coffee and pastries at Cafe Falai as we had our second meeting over decorating her new apartment. Did I mention that I’m being hired to design a living space? Yes, and not as easy as it seems. One design discipline doesn’t necessarily cross over to the other, but as we made our way through 2 stores, we’re honing in on a vision.

And finally! A low key day after a very weird and hectic week. We’re spending Valentine’s and President’s Day in the burbs with my parents and had a very much needed home cooked meal to celebrate the lunar new year.

And the Olympics? We’ve been watching and the girls are rather captivated with it. Mia especially is excited about the ice skating as it’s something that she has taken a recent interest to. The 1 hour TV rule has been thrown out the window for these 2 weeks and we’ve been turning it on and letting them stay up late to watch the events (but damn all those commercials). The Olympics were absolutely HUGE when I was a kid and into the 90s – Mary Lou Retton, Nadia Comaneci, the US Gymnastics team in Atlanta, ice skating, and if I think back hard enough, I can remember what a huge deal it was for the US hockey team to win at Lake Placid in 1980. They’re totally burned into my memory and the Olympic Summer Games was one of my favorites games to play on Atari. The graphics were so so crude even back then but we’d hum that anthem as we tried to pole vault our way to a medal.

So when did the Olympics lose a bit of its luster? When they decided to let pro athletes compete? When the Summer and Winter games staggered so that the Olympics were on every 2 years and not every 4? Whatever it is, it’s fun to share the excitement with the kids, who are learning that luge is dangerously fast, that mogul skiing is done on a bumpy course with tight, bent knees, that short track is popular in our family because of the Koreans and that a South Korean girl might be the first in the country to win a gold medal in figure skating. Good memories.

We’ve got some special little packages of Valentine’s Day treats for the Brooklyn Flea today. The “new-to-the-Flea” marshmallow hearts in 2 different flavors (cinnamon and rose/vanilla) are packaged with 3 hearts and our Pink Peppercorn Red Currant Linzers come packaged with 2 cookies. Perfect for picking up a little something sweet to add to that Valentine’s Day gift, yeah?

So in all this effort to get ready for Valentine’s Day for the business, we totally forgot about the kids. I think Mark is going to pick up some Kumquat cupcakes and Liddabit heart-shaped lollipops from our fellow fleasters today to surprise the kids with tomorrow. We’ll skip gifts to each other this year. I think we’ll both be glad when Valentine’s Day comes and passes.

For this year’s Valentine’s Day gift box we’ve brought back our Earl Grey Hearts, sprinkled generously with coarse pink sugar and introduced a variation of last year’s cookie: Pink Peppercorn Hearts (one of my favorites). There’s also 8 Creme de Cassis infused Chocolate Sandwich Cookies. All are cute and mini. In the shops here or here.

Coming up for the weekend, we’re back at the Flea, this time indoors in Brooklyn at the most grand and amazing Art Deco space you can imagine: the lobby of the former Williamsburg Savings Bank Tower. Check out the slideshow from last weekend’s opening. Foodies will be downstairs in the bank vault! We’ll be there this Sunday and every other weekend. Check this space for dates.

January is typically our R&D month since it’s a month where we can catch our breaths, but Valentine’s Day is just around the corner so we’re scrambling a bit. Stay tuned…

Oh, by the way, I changed some things around on the blog, but they are subtle changes that might go unnoticed which reminds me that as designers, we might fuss and fidget with details for hours and days and not have it mean anything to anyone but ourselves, lol.