Dirty Work

Normally, I'd post pictures and/or video of some weekend activity. I was unable to do either on Saturday afternoon, but the more vivid sense wouldn't have been sight or sound anyway, but rather smell.

After room times, we decided to fill up the little kiddie pool and let the kids splash around while we dropped mulch on our front yard garden. Not having done this before, I was amazed at how mulch was required for such a small amount of space: when we were all done, we had used eight of the ten bags we had lugged home from Lowe's a few weeks back.

Meanwhile, the kids enjoyed splashing around in the kiddie pool, getting water everywhere, and not getting yelled at by us in the process. Amy and I made relatively quick work of our small plot of flowers, and soon enough were stepping back and marveling at how lively our little urban garden now looked. We then got everyone and everything clean, and celebrated by taking a short walk to the local McDonald's, followed by a slow meandering around the Penn campus before repairing home for bed.

And the smells? Well, there was the distinct smell of hard work that most people would call body odor (enhanced by the fact that Amy had gone running and I had taken the kids to the zoo earlier in the day). There was the smell of wet kids and wet pool toys and a wet front porch on which all of the wetness was taking place. And, of course, there was the smell of fresh licorice mulch, spread out over the entire patch of dirt that we're trying to coax some colorful flowers out of.

Some day soon, I'll be able to post these smells online for you to partake in; for now, verbal descriptions will have to suffice. Suffice to say, it was a good afternoon, which made for a hearty meal and a good night's sleep.