Seven With One Blow!

I have not been here on the old blog for over a week in any way, shape, or form.  I wrote Sally's birthday post ahead of time and scheduled it to post on her birthday, so I've actually been gone for more like a week and a half.

Even if I am not posting anything I am usually here tinkering with drafts or starting new posts that become the drafts with which I tinker.   But I just had to sign in to Blogger with my password because I've been away for so long.   

Summer . . . no rest for the weary, I'm afraid.  That's why Jen invented Quick Takes, and don't tell me any different.

ONE

This week was our parish's vacation bible school and the kids had a blast as usual.

Our VBS is run by the parish's choir director and a small army of volunteers.  Our choir director is also a music teacher and her helpers are heavily involved with the performing arts and local theater, so the show for the parents at the end of the week is pretty amazing.

This year, we had some fantastic instrumentalists, a ukulele strumming trio of high schoolers, choreographed dances, a video of the kids reenacting the story of Moses, and a really funny skit.  I just love that my kids were belting out John 3:16 in song on a rainy Thursday night.

I think the best part, though, was when Baby stood up and yelled out each of her siblings names as she saw them singing and dancing and then clapped for them individually.  So sweet.

TWO

Cable television for children is one big awful hot mess during the summer.  It's not really your friend during the school year, either, but the summer programming is truly wretched.  Some of the cartoons and tweeny shows are the worst, worst, worst.

During these long hot afternoons, when babies and toddlers are sleeping, the big kids like to lounge a little and enjoy some frigid A/C.  I've been letting them watch old cartoons on Netflix and they are a big hit.  "The Brave Little Tailor" (hence the title of this post) and "The Three Little Pigs" are the current favorites.  It is hilarious to hear Mopsy skipping around singing "Who's afraid of the big bad wolf, big bad wolf, big bad wolf?"

At first I thought maybe it was too scary, what with the pigs squealing and the wolf growling and chasing them relentlessly, but I watched the kids watching the cartoons and I realized something.  Kids already know there is danger in the world.  They already know there are people with nefarious intentions.  Even the little girls can see through the wolf's disguises without being told.

These cartoons are ordered towards a family unit, living with each other and protecting one another from outside threats.  Neighbors look after one another and band together.  These old cartoons are refreshingly free of sarcasm, snark, and that popular ironic disdain for family life so present in today's television.

They're not perfect, but I like them a heck of a lot better than all the other junk.

THREE

I've been Netflixing quite a bit in the evenings myself.  I should be reading or cleaning or something, but, but, but . . . it's summer.  I got nothing, I'm lazy.

Rob and I have been enjoying "Sherlock" and I'm getting caught up on "Call the Midwife."  Barbara, I'm ready for a discussion post when you are!

What are you all watching these days?




FOUR

This kid . . . gah.   While shopping for Sally's birthday gift (scooter. pink, natch.) I turned around when I heard him call out, "Mom, I love this bike!  This is what I want for my next birthday!"

A dirt bike?  Methinks not.

Saints preserve us.  And him.

FIVE

Mopsy and Baby are less than 14 months apart.  13 months and 23 days to be exact, so it isn't surprising when people ask me if they are twins.    They have never seemed like twins to me, mostly because I spend all of my time with them and I can see all those subtle differences that a year of growth make.

Then Rob texted me this picture from our backyard:

Okay, people, I can see how they look like twins.  Same hair color, same little chin, same blue eyes, and same size!

SIX

Do you read Dwija over at House Unseen?  Chances are you do since her blog is pretty great and she already has tons of followers.

But in case you don't, and you are looking for a little way to perform a work of mercy these days, then maybe you'd consider donating to a fundraiser to overhaul her wretched, wretched laundry room.  The only way her laundry situation could get worse would be if she had to beat her clothes on rocks down at the river.  And then at least she wouldn't have the threat of electrocution hanging over her.

Dwija did not organize any of this - Cari over at Clan Donaldson did.  See, Dwija is in the midst of a crisis pregnancy.  The kind where most doctors counsel "termination" and she is facing lengthy hospitalization and she is praying her way through.  You can read about Little Nicholas here.

Sometimes, on this great big inter web, it is hard to be the hands and feet of the Church to each other.  We can encourage each other with prayers and words, and we do and we should, but sometimes don't you just wish you could do something - anything - that would lighten another's burden?

Well, this is a chance.  If you can, help Dwija get a laundry room makeover before she has to go into the hospital and leave her husband to single parent her other five children.   Go here and check it all out before Sunday night.    You can donate via PayPal or directly by check/gift card.    Here is the running tally of what has been raised to date.

And even if you can't donate, keep Dwija and Nicholas and the Borobias in your prayers.  That's the best thing you can always donate.

SEVEN

Bun is infatuated with maps and atlases.  He has recently asked me to procure a globe for the house so that he can see what a map looks like stretched around the world.   He is reading three different atlases concurrently and he spends most of his leisure time practicing to be the next Amerigo Vespucci.

He also had me look up the hours for the map room of the Library of Congress, just in case we get the chance to go there this summer.

Then Rob texted me this picture while I was at the grocery store:

Bun drew this free-hand and without any map for reference or spelling.   I especially enjoy "Indonisa" and "Papa New Gini."  He also told me that he really had to squeeze Luxembourg in there so I probably wouldn't be able to see it too well.

Seriously, what do I do with him?  He's either doing something like this or he's wanting to ride a dirt bike or jumping off the top of the swing set trying or to ride a scooter with the atlas under his arm.

I'm thinking his Kindergarten teacher is going to be exhausted.  


Happy weekend, my friends!  Enjoy it!

Seven Up

"Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning."

Sally turns seven today.

I was looking through some books from my closet the other day, and I came across the baby name book we used while I was pregnant with Sally.  I found our short list of girls' names written on the fly leaf and I was amused to see that her younger sisters' names were there, although in different combinations.  Sally's name, however, was the last one written and with no previous permutation above it.

Her name, her real name, means "filled with God's grace."  Rob and I like to joke that, if we had known the kind of child she would be, we would have named her "Sunny" or "Joy."  But even those wouldn't have been really right.

Because while we think of all of our children as gifts, it's not untrue that, in my own human selfishness, I've occasionally had to vigorously remind myself of that gift during some unexpected and long pregnancies. Of course, that mindset brings its own kind of blessing when you realize that the child you weren't expecting to have is a delightful and beloved child. One that you never knew you desperately needed until they were, literally, dropped into your lap and your selfishness melts away.  

But this is Sally's story and Sally's story is that we were given the grace to recognize her immediately as a gift of nothing but Grace.

The year before Sally was born was a long and hard one.  Rob was in the Navy reserves and was unexpectedly called up to support Operation Enduring Freedom.  The base informed him of his orders on the day before Thanksgiving 2004 and he was gone by December 15th.

We were blessed that he didn't go overseas, but we did end up spending almost a year apart.  I stayed at home in Pennsylvania with a small Francie and Fiver, doing the daily grind and keeping the home fires burning. He lived in Florida, filling in for deployed active duty physicians and working long, lonely hours.

Rob's employer held his job but cut off his paycheck, so we lost between 1/3 and 1/2 of our monthly income.  And there were a few hairy weeks where we got nothing, thanks to miles of governmental red tape in payroll.  We had no money for plane tickets for regular visits.  Any plans we had were put on hold indefinitely.

It was a trying time.

Rob came home for good in mid-September, and by late September I was pregnant.  In fact, Sally was born nine months and one week after Rob came home from deployment.

Everyone joked and snickered about our "reunion baby," but what they didn't know was that we had wanted another baby long before then.  We had been trying to have a baby before Rob left, but it didn't happen.

I know God had a better plan for us, because we got Sally just when we needed her.  Rob and I say that she has happiness encoded in her DNA because our family was so happy to be whole again.

When I think about Sally's birth, I think of Psalm 30.  Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning.   That deployment was a long night in our family, and there was a lot of weeping.  But God gave us joy with the morning.

She was born after 3 pushes at 7:07 in the evening, and joy came rushing back in while Sally was rushing out.   It was morning for all of us, and it was a gift.

Happy birthday, Sally-full-of-grace.  God keep you always.

Flyin' High

We are experiencing that strange elasticity of time that only summer can provide.  We have endless hours stretching out before us and then suddenly we are snapping back to ourselves at the end of the day and wondering where all that time went.

I want to post things here and I want to close down for the summer.  I want to eat ice cream and read novels all day.  I want to spend the long afternoons writing. I want to go swimming alone and do a handstand in the pool.  I want to go to the movies at night.  In the summer it all seems like it might be possible, but of course not much of it is possible.  At least for the mama anyway.

For the mama, there is laundry and cooking and turning on the hose and turning off the hose and fixing the sprinkler and kicking teenagers out of bed and painting bedrooms and all sorts of shenanigans.  A different kind of summer to be sure, but still busy.

So I'll be back later.  Maybe. Probably. Yes. Most likely.

Enjoy, my friends, it's summer!

Guest Post: His Story

At the request of our lovely friend, Laura, here is Rob's version of how we met.  I am telling you right now, he makes me look really good.  Much better than I am, in fact.  He also made me cry (in only the best way, of course).  And now you can all see why I love him so much . . . and what a truly terrific writer he is.  


Do you remember the year that Queen Elizabeth II referred to as the annus horribilis?  It was 1992, I think, and there were dissolving royal marriages, scandals in the British press, and a fire that gutted Windsor Castle.

For my family, the annus horribilis was the following year, when my father died after a forty-two day stay in the intensive care unit following an elective coronary artery bypass graft, an experience that bookended the Easter season and mercilessly ground my family down into splinters and shards.  I remember sitting in my father's car after the June funeral, waiting to drive my mother to the cemetery, and hearing the bagpipes play "Amazing Grace" to a weeping crowd under a gentle Spring sun, and not being able to contemplate moving beyond the tragedy and pain of that moment.

"For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways," saith the Lord.

In April of 1994, I was a second year medical student in Albany, New York and my sister was attending a small Catholic college in the Lehigh Valley of Pennsylvania.  I had a few days of vacation, and I went down to visit her so that we could spend some time together.  She had always been the closest of my siblings to my father, and now she lived the farthest away.  The wound was still so raw and we were moving through the healing process at such an agonizingly slow pace that I sometimes thought being in Pennsylvania might be a profound blessing for her.  So down I drove on the 8th of April, a lovely Friday under a brilliant early Spring sky, to spend time with her, take her out to eat, and go on a trip to Gettysburg on Saturday.

Eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard, what God has ready for those who love Him.

It was hard not to notice Aimee when I entered my sister's dorm room: tall, pretty, not afraid to speak her mind (ask her about Princess Leia someday), and so sweet to me, a total stranger.  I invited her to dinner as a matter of courtesy, having eaten my share of Grade D but edible college cafeteria dinners; I invited her to Gettysburg with us, praying that she would say yes.

We spent hours the next day walking over the field (I had recently re-read The Killer Angels, and the folds and contours of the hills were fresh in my mind) and then fell upon dinner at the Gettysburg Friendly's with gusto.  When my sister succumbed to a sugar-induced coma fueled by the ill-advised consumption of an entire Jim Dandy sundae, Aimee and I had two hours to ourselves on the Pennsylvania Turnpike, and we did not waste it.

I could not, even on the drive home later to New York, have told you a single thing about which we talked, but I could tell you that our conversation was that of a pair of friends who have not seen each other in years yet, upon becoming reacquainted, speak as if no time had elapsed.  I resolved, through subterfuge or daring, that I would see her again.

For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined unto his wife, and they two shall be one flesh.

The opportunity arose shortly thereafter, when Alan Jackson came to the Knickerbocker Arena (really. I can't make that up) and I asked my sister if she--and any of her friends--would like to go, on my dime.  My as-subtle-as-a-bull-in-a-china-shop ploy, though obviously transparent, worked and my sister, her friend, and my future wife came to see the concert and spend a short day in Albany.  The time was swift, but the message in my mind and heart and soul was clear: Although you have never dated anyone before, and although you have spent but a few brief days with this woman, and although she lives five hours away and you don't know her family and you don't know if she is interested in you and you don't know where the U.S. Navy is planning on stationing you in 2 years and a thousand other and's, listen carefully to the joining of your will with God's:

You have looked into the eyes of your children's mother.

It sounds odd to write it that way, but later, after we had written hundreds of letters to each other, and I studied Shakespeare with her on the telephone while I was doing my clinical rotations, and we had returned to Gettysburg (alone and without a Jim Dandy), and I had met her family (they were wonderful), and I had realized that 5 hours is not that long to drive, Aimee and I talked about when we knew that this was it.  We both said that there was no "aha" moment, no fireworks, no crisis of confidence; we knew we would get married and have a life together for as long as we can both remember.

So, after my annus horribilis in 1993, the Good Lord returned with an annus mirabilis in 1994.  I sometimes think about the song "Something Good" from The Sound of Music--coincidentally, one of my parents' favorite songs--when I think about Aimee and me, but the truth of the matter is that I don't deserve her, not at all.  That, I think, is what makes it a miraculum. 

P.S.: I said "I love you" first, but she kissed me first, so I call that even.

Sweet Sixteen

Have I ever told you about how I met Rob?   No?

Actually, I think I started it somewhere back in the archives of this blog as part of a link-up or blog carnival or something, but for some reason never finished it.  Just like the birth stories.  (Seriously, what is my deal with that?!)

Settle in, friends, I'll tell you now.  And I'll try something new and finish it.  Always pushing the envelope over here.

It was the second semester of my freshman year (April 8th to be exact), and that winter had been long and awful.  I am not joking when I say that it snowed at least 8 inches every Wednesday during that January.  We all felt like we were attending college in the Arctic, and my friend from Florida almost had a stroke when she asked us (in December) when the snow would stop and we told her March or April.

Rockin' the '90s hair, baby.

I wasn't dating anyone, because I was never dating anyone.  No one ever wanted to date me; I was always, always the nice friend or the tag along roommate.  I had had a serious, unreciprocated crush on a person who didn't attend my school, which was perpetuated for a while through letters and phone calls, but eventually I woke up and realized that he was never going to be as into me as I was into him.

So I listened to Bonnie Raitt's "I Can't Make You Love Me" about twenty times a day for a week, and then I let it all go.  I went back to being the pal, the buddy, the sidekick.


Add to all of that the general stress of acclimating to college and homesickness.  There have been few times in my life that I've been happier to see the spring.

April 8th was a Friday, and I had finished classes for the day and was feeling restless and edgy.  We called my college a "suitcase school" because many of the resident students had cars and were from the surrounding towns.  On Friday afternoons, they packed up their laundry and headed for home, emptying the parking lot and leaving a little ghost town.

I was looking for something to do that afternoon.  I just really wanted to have some plans, something fun on the horizon to excite me.  Instead, it looked like my evening would be filled with an early trip to the cafeteria.  Not the excitement I was hoping to find.

In an effort to find some company, I headed to my friend Marguerite's room.  She was a dance major and if she wasn't busy at the theater, we could usually figure out something to do with our time.  I was hoping to at least find some company for dinner.

Marguerite and me at college graduation

When I got to her room, Marguerite was flitting from one side of the room to the other, straightening up and putting somethings in a bag.  The thing about Marguerite is that she is always, always moving. She's usually doing about 5 things at the same time, but in control of all of them.  I do well when I concentrate on one thing at a time, so I would just sit back and watch her go.

She was waiting for her older brother to drive down from New York.  They had plans to go out to dinner, then he was going with her to a baby-sitting job that night.  On Saturday they were going out to visit the battlefields at Gettysburg because her brother was a huge history buff.

As I chatted with her for a few more minutes, I remember feeling a little sorry for myself.  Everyone else seemed to have something fun going on and I was heading to the depressing cafeteria.  (Oh, it was depressing to go there alone.)  I planned to leave before her brother got there, but as I was getting ready to go, we heard a knock on the door.  Her brother had arrived.

Have you ever had a moment in time when you can actually feel something shift in your life and you think, "what just happened here?"   Not every important moment happens like that, but sometimes they do and God gives you the grace to realize it.

Rob walked in the dorm room, and he filled it up.  With his height, with his deep voice, with his presence.  I watched him greet his sister and give her a bag of all kinds of goodies from home, and I just wanted to stare at him.    To this day, I remember everything about that moment.  His wavy brown hair, his enormous glasses, his blue hooded sweat jacket, the late spring sunshine slanting in the windows.

Marguerite introduced us and although we didn't say more than 10 words directly to each other, I was drawn to him.  I wanted to hear everything he had to say, and I was desperate to sound funny and cool and relaxed, but all I could manage was to sound like I was barely above the village idiot.

Since I was still standing there like the third wheel I was, Marguerite invited me to go to dinner with them.  I protested (weakly) out of good manners, but I wanted to go so badly and I was happy to have my arm lightly twisted.

We went to a favorite pizza restaurant off campus, where I ate nothing and laughed at everything.  I was content to sit and listen to his jokes and watch him interact with his sister.  My next closest sibling is almost 7 years younger than me, so I had no experience with an adult sibling relationship.  I loved being included.

I could tell that Rob was smart.  I mean really sharp and witty and wry.  He was confident but not overbearing, and he wore his intelligence lightly, letting it show itself gently instead of making people uncomfortable.

On the ride back to campus, they invited me to go with them to Gettysburg.  I don't think I even did any fake good-manners protesting.  I wanted to go on that trip and I had a sudden sense that this was the time for me to take what was being offered to me with no reservations.

The next day was so much fun that Rob, Marguerite, and I still laugh about it.  On the ride home from the battlefields, Marguerite fell asleep and Rob and I had two hours to talk.  It felt like we had two minutes.  We covered everything: movies we liked, songs we loved, books we'd read, places we'd visited, plans for the future, our families, what we believed in . . . . it all just poured out of us into the dark interior of the car.

One of my college formals

When he left us at the dorm that night and went home to New York, I was crestfallen.  I wanted him to stay, I wanted to go with him, I didn't know how to let him know that I thought he was the best person I'd met in forever.  I let him go without saying anything and I figured I might never see him again.

A few weeks later, Marguerite came down to my room to ask my roommate and me if we wanted to go to a concert in Albany with her brother.  She said Rob could get us the tickets and he'd drive us to Albany.  It was the perfect chance.  I could see Rob again, under the convenient guise of a group outing to a concert.   I couldn't accept any faster than I did.

Since the concert ended so late, we slept over at Rob's apartment.  Marguerite, my roommate, and I all slept in the tiny living room and at one point, I remember waking up early to see Rob stepping over us and slipping out the front door.  I thought he was leaving for work and I was sad that we didn't get to say goodbye.

He was not going to work.  He went to the crummy neighborhood donut place to get coffee and donuts for us in the pouring rain.  Once he brought everything back, I could see that Marguerite and his housemates claimed all the coffees except one.  I knew he didn't drink coffee, so I looked at him and he said quietly, "I got that for you, Aimee.  You like it with cream and two sugars, right? Did I get it right?"

He remembered one casual coffee order he'd overheard a month previously and brought me a coffee. That was it for me. That was the moment when I knew I was going to do whatever I had to do to be with this man.   That might sound silly and rash, but it's true.

There have been very few moments in my life where God has granted me an almost perfect clarity, and this was one of them.  It was completely clear to me that if I wanted to make something work with Rob, I was going to have to take this moment, this chance and grab it with both hands.

I was 18 and I decided to take the chance. Three years after he bought me coffee, I married him.

Our wedding was 16 years ago, today.

In those years, there has never been one regret, one second thought, one doubt, or one fear that I had made the wrong choice.  Rob has always, always been the one for me.

Marrying him is the best choice I've ever made.

Happy Sweet 16th, Robert.  The years with you have been sweet indeed.  Sweeter days I've never known.  I always say I couldn't love you more, and I'm always wrong.

Thank God.

Pick a Link-Up, Any Link-Up

The school schedule ends and my people lose their (admittedly tenuous) grasp on the basic routine that keeps this ship of state from running aground.  There is nothing like summer with 7 children to make me feel like a bad housekeeper.   There are dirty cups and papers everywhere, and doors keep banging open but no one bothers to bang them closed, letting in every manner of insect on God's green earth.

Plus, the rain!  The interminable rain that makes everything clammy and sweaty and muddy.  And there is some kind of weird sticky spot on the hallway floor.

Oh, and Sally discovered little picnic ants around the dining room window this morning.  Fantastic.

After spending the morning reenacting "Apocalypse Now" on the ants, I am now rewarding myself by skipping lunch, eating a piece of dark chocolate, and reading blogs.

Of course, it's Thursday, which means that two of my favorite link-ups are published.  {p,h,f,r} at Like Mother, Like Daughter and Theme Thursday over at Clan Donaldson.

Is it bad form to do two link-ups in the same post?  Oh well, I have awesomely bad form in everything else, so I might as well continue to practice excellence and join in.

First, let's get {pretty, happy, funny, real}.   This is the {real} state of my house.  I like to keep things generally neat, and I have a few friends who firmly believe that there is never a mess at my house.  That's because I always have time to prepare before they come over.  If they came over at 10:45 on a Tuesday morning, they might find something more like this:

That's just a small fraction of the after-breakfast dish mess.  

That stack of papers is from one backpack. One.

This pile is Bun's daily self-imposed seat work.
He holds his pencil like a caveman, but his work is excellent.

And now for the {pretty}!   Our first CSA farm box came this week and it was delightful and delicious.  I am so glad that we were able to support this local farm this year, and I am having fun trying to use all the good things that came in the box.

Farm fresh organic eggs.  Just the ticket since we can't keep our
own chickens right now.

These lasted just about 10 minutes after they were delivered.
Better than candy.

And this was just {funny}.  Poor Septimus woke up all sweaty and screaming from his nap and his hair was standing on end.  This is a bad phone shot and he just looks dazed and confused here, but when he was red-cheeked and crying he looked a lot like the Heat Miser.

And PS?  What were they thinking with those Rankin and Bass '70s Christmas specials?!  Trippy.

Want more pictures?  Of course you do!  "Theme Thursday: Dads" it is.

Poor dads get the bad rap in this culture.  They are told they are completely replaceable, or worse, that they aren't even really needed in the first place.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.  Kids need dads, especially their dads if they can have them.  I've been so richly blessed with a great dad of my own as well as a great man to be the father of my children.

Ask Fiver what he wants to be when he grows up and he only ever says one of two things:  a priest (yay!) or a "dad just like my Dad."

I'm telling you, dads are where it's at around here.

My dear dad, and the kids' beloved Pop-Pop.

Strawberry fields forever

I love this picture.  Such a perfect shot of Francie and Rob after
Thanksgiving dinner one year.

Monkey on his back

Just like his dad

It's a shame they don't enjoy his company. 

Theme Thursday: Where the Girls Are

Linking up with Cari over at Clan Donaldson for this week's theme: girls.

Yeah, baby.  This is my jam.  Because girls?  We got 'em.  And they just wanna have fun.  And do all kinds of other stuff, too.

Sometimes people roll their eyes heavenward and say "Four girls? Woooow. Lots of drama. You better add a bathroom."  As if all girls do is hang out in the bathroom,  filing their nails and teasing their hair.  If you gave my 13 year old a nail file, she would have no idea as to its intended use, but I bet she'd be able to build it into a science project.

Look, I don't know why lots of girls in a family get a bad rap.  If they like to take showers and put on makeup . . . well, there are worse things in the world.  And if they don't like to put on makeup?  Who cares, that's more time in the bathroom for the makeup lover.

These girls are funny, bright, caring, helpful, creative, and much more.  They're keepers.

FRANCIE
 These are her academic awards from 8th grade.
Her scholarships are not pictured.
Sing it with me: "I like big books and I cannot lie . . ."

SALLY
This is Sally's face, all the time.  Smiling, shining.
Rob and I often say that we should have named her Sunny.  Or Joy. 

MOPSY
See that gleam in her eye?  That's where all her funniest, craziest,
most exasperating and most hilarious ideas come from.

BABY
My serious baby with the giant eyes and the wild curls.
It's so hard to get Baby to smile on command.
She's very introspective, but those luminous eyes don't miss a thing.

Five Favorites

It's the last week of school and we are still going full tilt.  Francie just graduated from 8th grade tonight and Fiver and Sally have two more days.  Then my house will shrink about 1000 square feet because it's all kids, all the time.

And I'm hungry because I've stayed up too late (does that happen to anyone else?).  So instead of eating cookies, I'm joining Hallie and reporting what's hot at the HomeFront Corp. right now.

ONE

Kidz Gear safe headphones are the best headphones ever.  I mean it.

My kids are complete weirdos when it comes to headphones, but I can't fault them because I am a complete weirdo when it comes to headphones.  Some things breed true.

My problem is that I have very small ears, especially on the inside.  Of all the dainty body parts, I got dainty inner ears.  Go figure.

I don't know that my kids inherited my diminutive ears, but they do like to play games on the iPad and listen to music.  But sometimes certain people, who shall remain nameless, cannot take the same song on repeat for 15 minutes.   Earworms are vicious.

Also no one can enjoy the same song or game at the same time.  It's a law of the universe, didn't you know that? So we need headphones.

The problem with many headphones is twofold:  First, the ubiquitous earbud type, which usually come new with whatever gadget we have but are excruciatingly painful for those of us with such tiny ears. Second, I am not crazy about the lack of volume control for earphones.

My kids are very sensitive to loud sound and many headphones do not stay on their heads. Annoying.

Enter the Kidz Gear headphones.  I bought several pairs of these as Christmas gifts for the kids but I really should have bought myself a pair.  I love them.

They have excellent sound quality, and they are very comfortable.  They have nice cushy earpieces that create a sort of seal when you put them on, and the band part for your head is super adjustable.  I can adjust them down to fit Mopsy but they are big enough to fit my head.  And I have a pretty big head.  Tiny ears on a big head.  Nice.

The best part is the volume adjuster right on the headphone wire.  It doesn't matter if they turn the volume all the way up on the device, the volume is locked in.  I regularly borrow these headphones from the kids when I am on the treadmill, and they come in so many cool colors that I might just get myself my own pair.

They make my dainty ears happy.

TWO

The barely controlled glutton in me is in love with these almonds.

I started out with rice cakes and almond butter when I was trying to find a healthy-ish snack that was not a piece of bread or anything of its carby ilk.    Then I found these and the search was shut down immediately.

The toasted coconut ones taste like summer, if that is even possible.

Excuse me, I just have to run to the kitchen for a sec.

THREE

This is our local dairy farm and store.  Their milk is delicious.  The times when I pour myself a glass of milk are rare, but sometimes I really like an ice cold glass.  I always thought the grocery store milk was fine, but this milk is so much better.  No hormones, no antibiotics, from a local family owned and operated farm.

It takes a little extra planning, but now I buy all our dairy products from them.  Did I mention that they make their own ice cream, too?  

Oh, twist my arm.

FOUR

This is the dress I wore to Francie's graduation.  

Look, I am having a major clothing crisis these days mostly because I've grown 5 humans in the last 7 years and I never managed to lose all the weight from about 3 babies ago.  And I am now mumblecoughmumble pounds overweight after Septimus.

I am working on it, sloooowly, but working just the same.  Still the problem remains that I have no flattering clothes.  Lots of maternity clothes (no!), lots of shapeless t-shirts, yoga pants, and one pair of jeans.  This is fine for my regular life of hermit, but even a hermit has to go to town eventually.

On a whim I stopped in to Old Navy, and I saw this little number on the sale rack.  It has tiny mirrors sewn all over the dress.  That sounds weird, but the effect isn't garish, just a nice sparkle factor.

I paired it with a coral 3/4 sleeve cardigan and cute wedge sandals.  It was cool, comfy, and it fit.  A miracle.

It won't be weird if I wear this every single day this summer, will it?   Good, that's what I thought.

FIVE

My favorite 5 month old recovering colic-aholic.

Come. on.

I mean really people, how can I be expected to not kiss this child all day long?

Rob and I still marvel over what an excellent baby he has become.  If you had told me, in those dark days of 4 hour screamfests, that he would eventually be a laid back little guy, smiling at everyone and being generally amiable . . .  well, let's just say I might have lost it a little on you.  I was a woman on the edge, my friends.

But whatever was working itself out or maturing or growing or whatever cures colic, it happened in the nick of time.

Now he's just hanging out with a popped collar and a little drool on the chin.