No Going Back

Notice anyone different? Susannah's potty-trained, recently weaned, and really happy to be finally out of the pack and play and sleeping in a new room. She sleeps in a makeshift trundle bed-- a mattress that we slide under the bed when it's not in use-- and she loves it.


John and I do, too, but it feels odd to be in a room all by ourselves, a thing that's not been since we were newlyweds.


I'm still nagged by the feeling that something's wrong at night, kind of like I was when the girls moved into another room after we moved from Buffalo, until I realize that it's the absence of children next to our bed, and then I grin. I miss having all of us tumbled together on mattresses on the floor, but there's something to be said for talking without fear of waking up a child a'slumber.

Let Your Yea Be Yea

After last year's Valentine's-card craze, I decided that we would only make a select few this year. Ha! We made fifty-some, and the table was heaped with mice, flowers, and hearts. NEXT year, we're not going to do this.

Hold me to that, will you?

Permissible This

Don't hold me to it, though, if next year we're invited, like we were this year, to an incredible Valentine's Day party on Mount Hunger, one replete with all the local tuzzins and brimful of energy and heart-shaped variants of sugar. If that happens, I'll happily help the girls churn out dozens more.

Eureka

The day we left for the Island, I took the girls to the Discovery Center. It's been too long since our last visit, and we discovered that Susannah's big enough to get into everything now.




This is one of Millie's favorite rooms. She never tires of lying down on the hospital bed and calling "Nurse, please bring me my child" so that she can tend to her newborn babe. Yes, I'm the lucky nurse, and no, I don't understand how she bore such a dark-skinned baby.




Blurry. Oh, well.

Meager

After a busy and enjoyed visit with our Island Owens, we arrived home on Monday. Here are the two pictures I took. (This blog doesn't deserve its name...)

John's family has moved into their ancestral home, a lovely house that John's grandpa built and in which Dude grew up, so John and Dude spent the weekend moving heavy things while the girls and I tried to stay out of trouble with all the packing and unpacking that bustled around us.

John also assembled furniture while Susannah, with nose buried in the rug, slept beside him.




These two climbed little trees in the giant backyard, marveling at their good fortune.

All the Livelong Day

Due to the recent slew of never-ending rain, gray, mud, and this mother's lethargy, walks are rare around these parts. A sky as blue as berries coaxed me out, though, in spite of the mud.

The girls dutifully dug in the hillside for worms, and "also to make homes for squirrels," says Annie.



A log is no excuse for laziness, though; mining should continue even while sitting.




We actually made it to the river proper this time. The girls, whom I sufficiently impressed with the fear of breaking through the river ice, were not allowed to pass this tree.




I was oddly taken by garbage in the light. A tangle of discarded plastic bags speaks volumes about our society, but in the sunlight, beauty found them. They look like a chrysalis newly emptied.



Millie seems a general here, sternly surveying her troops.




Annie pretended to rest.




Then she abruptly awoke, nearly obscuring the General-Turned-Again-Miner on the hill behind her.




And we paused to capture our shadows near the overflow pond on the way home.



*** Yes, we're still going to the Island and will leave in about an hour. I forgot to post this last night, though it was ready and waiting, so you get a bonus.

Happy Friday!

A Note

Dear readers,

My husband came home tonight and asked if I wanted to go on vacation. I'm never one to refuse a vacation, so we're heading to the Island for the weekend to see the family we miss. I must now stuff clothes into suitcases. Please allow these few posts to satiate your need for shotsnaps until our return.

Most respectfully yours,
(signed in flowing cursive)
Snapshots Management

Food. Again.

Find recipes on buildabelly.

Specifically, find sugar from last week's pre-Lenten confecting and the spiciest shrimp you'll ever see, as well as newly-added pictures of the world's least photogenic soup. (See. Pestering for pictures worked!)

Mini Mother

She's irresistible.
Yesterday, I was reading on the couch and looked down to see this.

(And by "looked down," I mean, "looked down, walked over to the shelf, picked up and turned on the camera, took a picture, laughed, kissed her, and then went back to my book, leaving her on the floor.")

Day of Rest

Sunday, late afternoon, after we arrived home from church...

Heat here filled Millie's dress like wind in a sail.



Susannah's pigtails couldn't settle down while she read a book.




Nor could they, for that matter, when she sped-read a book. (Sped-read? Speed-readed? Somebody help me here.)

A Tale of Teeth

The two older sweetlings and I went to get our teeth cleaned. We have excellent dental insurance which completely covers cleanings, but this was the girls' first time in a dental office. (I'm not implying that it was later than it should be; I first got my teeth cleaned when I was 18, and it was at a local community college, where I was a willing guinea pig for eager, aspiring dental hygienists.)

They loved it. They loved the office, the jolly lady who scrubbed their teeth with a whir and a buzz, the paste of varied hues and flavors, the magic seat that could, if one only knew how to direct it, rise through the window and into the clouds, the counting of teeth (Millie only stopped at 100 when I nudged her into silence), the unnatural gleam of a white floor (how DO they keep it so clean?), and, best of all, Dr. Tony himself, who entered the room with a boom and a chuckle and made them giggle until he stepped out the door.

"I love that man!" Annika proclaimed emphatically as we buckled ourselves into the van, all three of us dazzling pedestrians with our pearlies, "He's a jokester-doctor!" Millie spun her sparkly bit of plastic all the way home, a prize pulled from a pail before we walked from the office, and she can't wait for the next visit.

After we got home, I surprised them with the camera as they lay on the couch together, brushing their teeth with new bristles (princess-emblazoned, no less), though without water or toothpaste.



And then I prodded them to grin like horses up for auction.



And then I left them alone, until I noticed Millie stroking Annie's hair. She's such a sweet little mother.