We started Labour Day by labouring. Reid and I got some chees bread started – I don’t think I have baked bread since Reid was born. She is becoming an expert ingredient-adder and her stirring technique is developing nicely. 
While our dough was rising, we picked up on Ken’s lead (he was cleaning out the coat closet) and tackled the cupboards on either side of the sink. They’re so narrow and deep they’re a bit of a nightmare and getting something from the end is a challennge. Or it was without a toddler in the house. Reid was only too happy to crawl all of the way into the cupboard where we keep big Tupperware and haul stuff out. 
To think all along the door had a safety latch on it and she couldn’t get in! I managed to identify some things to give away, some containers of Mom’s to return (oh you know you have some, too, Chris/Pam/Roger/Karin ;+)
and some stuff I’m not sure why we ever put them anywhere but the garbage.By the time we got everything put away, it was time to knead the dough. 
Reid liked the texture, the bounciness of the dough and the smell, I think. She tried to get a taste but I tried to discourage her. Who knows if I was successful :+? 
We started some Sourdough Starter while our bread baked. I’ll have to remember to check it tonight to see if it worked.
After naptime, we went apple picking at the orchard behind Reid’s daycare. As we walked down the lane to the trees, Reid was holding our hands. She was running and so Ken and I had to walk faster. 
Apparently we didn’t walk fast enough because she dropped our hands and ran ahead. I’d tried to talk Ken into getting a pole with a basket-thing to pick the high-up apples. He said, “no”. When we got to the trees, he put Reid on his shoulders and they were able to reach many apples. (It shows how your world outlook is shaped by your reality. I’m short and think like a short person while he is practically a giant :+)
Reid loved picking apples! She kept saying, “‘nother one apple, Daddy” and pointing to the place she wanted to go next. When he’d set her down, she would drag the bag of apples we picked, even though she was practically parallel to the ground with the effort of pulling. 
We picked too many apples. I need to bake up a storm so that we’ll need to go again. 
Maybe I should set up a stand in front of our house so that Reid could sell apples she picked. That way, she would get to pick more and play with money (and she loves to play with money!)
I know that some of you may have wondered if I would take a photo of anything as long as Reid was in the photo – here is Reid with her first portapotty.
Since it was a long weekend, I was jonesing for a Starbucks tea and took Reid to get Amanda and a tea and then we played at the park by Amanda’s house. It has pretty good equipment – different structure, even a hand pump and series of troughs. There were big kids at it and so we’ll have to file the memory away for next summer. Reid is so much braver than I expect her to be. She climber up the big steps and went to the big, unfamiliar slide right away. She also has a bit of “small dog who doesn’t know it’s small” syndrome. There were some kids who were at least 8 or 9 and Reid was sure she should be allowed to go play with the sand-throwing, rowdy, rule breakers. Mama disagreed. I helped her slide across on this thing they’re suppposed to hang from and swing from one end to the other. She liked doing that over and over until I felt her slipping and so shifted her weight to make her safer – and bashed her face into the metal handgrip. She had a bit of a bump and some blue bruising but nothing like I was afraid would happen.
I made a fabulous supper (though I don’t recall what right now) but Reid wasn’t interested. We went outside and picked some cherry tomatoes. Reid ate them as fast as she could pick them, even some that were not quite ripe. Maybe she has been listening to “raw food” stories on CBC when I thought she was just playing. Just before bedtime, we spoke with Uncle Roger, Auntie M (Merri-Lynn) and Danielle via Skype (a video phone call over the computer – Voice Over IP, if you want to sound hip). At the end of the call, I suggested that Reid should give them kisses, meaning blow them some kisses. Reid leaned up to the screen and kissed their faces on the screen. It’s too bad they couldn’t see her but at least they could hear the smacks.
