Already?!?

There are so many times when i cannot grasp the time of day or the day of the week.  Every so often i mistaken the year while writing a check.  Time and i are not sympatico.  But as i checked off another box on the calendar today, i seriously almost fainted!  July is OVER!  August is TOMORROW!?!  How on Earth can this be?  Where did the first half of summer go?  Where did the first half of July go?  I swear i blinked and we are entering my most dreaded month of the year!  
Yes, there it is- i HATE August!  it's too hot and too long and too end-of-summer-esque.  It's just too, too, too august-y.  and it's just so final.  end of summer and soon to be fall (which i do adore), but then it hits.  september is just a gateway to the end of the year; not, the beginning of the next year.  here is how it goes for me: as soon as september ends, we hit October= birthday/halloween central; november= thanksgiving; december= christmas (my birthday); january= new year; february= v-day; march... a breath... 
i mean, really- my life skips from october to march in a heartbeat!  yikes!


okay, i need to decompress before i explode just thinking about this all.


one day at a time, right?  that's what they say?  yeah... right.  next blink and it will be april 2012!

And she's back...

Could it be teething?  Could it be a cold?  Or could it just be my darling sweet youngest's inner most personality?  Whatever it is, Baby Wah Wah is back... and with a vengeance.  I was out for exactly three hours today.  Baby Wah Wah cried for exactly two hours and fifty minutes (she began five minutes after i left and fell asleep five minutes before i came home.)  Oh this girl of ours!  Not to mention, she is back to waking up in the night, coupled with about twenty TOTAL minutes of naps during the days!  ahhh, the short lived two nights of seven plus hour stretches and those wonderful days of two two-hour naps... 


All i can say is that Baby W. W. does not ever hide her feelings.  We never have to guess where we stand with her.  And she has about a stronger will than Iron Man.  All of these attributes are positive.  And i will focus on that.

What a day, What a day!

My three-year-old left the house at 9:00 a.m. today for camp.  From camp, i picked her up to transport her to her best friend's house for the afternoon.  I then came home with the intent to finish all of the things around the house that i still have not gotten done.  She was gone till almost 6:30!  I missed her so much that it was sickening.  I did not get many chores done around the house, but i got to spend some majorly wonderful one-on-one time with my baby, something that i'm missing a lot, too.  we played; we danced; we shook instruments; we sang; we read; we (unbelievably) did not nap.  She said her first real word - the first one that has had meaning.  My husband walked out the front door and she crawled over to it and said, "DaDa."  I get misty just reliving this right now.  I called the family and shrieked our big news!


When my oldest FINALLY came home, at a point where i didn't think i could bear to not have her here anymore, she crashed so hard from her big day that we spent nearly an hour dealing with tears and hysteria.  it happens, i know.  but, i was ready to send her back at that point!


after the hysteria ended, we were playing on the floor when the baby came over and bit my arm, which is not exactly a rare occurrence.  only this time, it hurt!  i screamed (not in pain, but in delight!) at the realization that we hit another huge milestone today!  her first tooth!!!  that teeny tiny triangle jutting up from her bottom gum!  Something so small just seemed to jump her up another huge segment of the growth chart!!!  As i put her to bed, i rocked this huge baby in my arms.  i replayed the last nine and a half months.  i had one of those moments of "where did the time go?" but when i saw her tiny eyelids shut and her perfect lips pursed, i just thanked God for each and every one of these moments that we have.  as fast as these nine and a half months have gone, we still have eons of time before she's a big girl.  i'll take each and every second as it comes!

fancy nancy,

tonight, i asked M what i should write about after she went to bed. this turned into a conversation that i hadn't exactly thought about.  she had no idea 1) what a writer was, and 2) that Mommy was one.  i tried to explain that the stories that we read every night are written by writers.  this explanation, which seemed to sink in but must not have, turned into a huge mistaken identity as M thought that Mommy wrote the Fancy Nancy books.  I swear, trying to explain ANYTHING to a three-year-old is enough to send you quite over the edge!


so, after much explanation over the fact that Mommy did NOT write Fancy Nancy, and that Mommy does actually write stories (although, again, NOT fancy nancy), she went to bed.  i, however was left with the quandary that i did not write fancy nancy...  so, i am left to write my blog- about fancy nancy.  and hopefully start to write actual stories again.  some day.  soon.

Snuggles from the anti-snuggler.

It's probably sick of me to say, but i kind of like that the baby has a cold, because it means that she LOVES to snuggle.  tonight, before i put her to bed, she just kept laying her head on my shoulder.  i would squeeze her tight and swoon into her ears.  she'd pull back and smile, then we'd do it all over again.  you have to understand, in the entire nine-plus months of her life, i've gotten about four snuggles from her (in absolute contrast to her older sister who began snuggling in utero and still climbs into my lap probably four times a day just to snuggle before she can go on with her day.)  so, for me, this is absolute heaven.  


on a similar note, i very much like the amoxicillin that they put her on because (also for about the fourth time in her nine-plus months of life), she slept through the entire night last night!  horray!  


so, while i want her to feel better, i'll hopefully enjoy at least another couple of days of snuggles and sleep before she goes back to normal!  

Ahhh, friends!

Which is better, a night spent with two wonderful women celebrating our best friend's birthday or sharing the most divine chocolate cake with a deep red wine?  I was fortunate tonight to enjoy both!  I feel so lucky to have been blessed with friends who are smart and witty, kind and pretty (ah poetry.)   It is on nights like tonight that I am remind me just how much we need our friends.  Yes, we have our husbands.  We have our families and our beautiful children.  But life without the conversations, laughter, and of course, cake- what would we do without that?

Is this love?

There are times when i truly think my baby just doesn't like me.  i know my husband has felt this feeling at times, too.  i know she does love us, but sometimes i think she just doesn't like us.  she will just push and scream and wriggle until she is out of my arms.  the intellectual person inside of me says that this is just her independent phase, where she is figuring out what she can and can't do without me.  the emotional woman who has less than four hours of sleep in me is not so rational.  i even took it personally at 3:00 (and again at 5:00) this morning when she didn't stop crying when i rocked her.   


but then there are the snuggles and open-mouthed kisses that i'm just really starting to get.  and the smiles that are reserved just for me walking into the room.  so, i guess it is love, after-all.  love with a twist of independent strong-willed baby mixed in.  it's going to be a fun future with all of these strong-willed women under one roof!

167 posts down...

That number somewhat astonishes me. I've never been one to keep a diary or journal (although god knows I've bought every single one I've ever laid eyes on.) I never even kept up with daily writing assignments in school (always making up twenty plus entries in one night- minutes before it was due). But here I am, 167 posts in and I feel like I've barely had to blink since I started this. Sure, there are nights that I just don't feel like writing, or I just don't have anything to say, but for the most part, this has come relatively easy.
Hopefully, it continues. I have about 6 months more to go before my year-long project is over.

and we pay money for this stuff.

i realized this week that children/babies do not need to be bought toys or things.  it's like that age-old expression of the kid always liking the box better than the toy that came in it.
this week, my nine-month-old's favorite toys have been: two tupperware containers, a metal lid, and a door stopper that she could pull and release (unfortunately not installed in my own house, making it that much more enjoyable for her to play with.)  she has used a box of diapers as her way to stand up and try to cruise (not unlike what a walking push toy should do.)
today, my three-year-old's favorite toy has been the impossibly hard to chew baby biscotti that we made.  she carried the piece she crafted (the size of a baseball, and the shape of- pretty much a slightly flattened baseball) around.  she did, however, tell me that she wants an ipad.  i told her to get a job.  she can play with her cooked ball of rock-hard-dough for a bit longer.  the baby can keep her tupperware and diaper box.  maybe i'll start finding random things around the house to occupy me and we can cancel cable and internet.  okay, maybe that's pushing it a bit too far.

Baba O'Reilly

Ladies and Gentlemen, the baby's first word is...   
Babababababababababababa.  


Okay, it's not exactly a real first word yet, but she has done nothing but say Bababababababababa over and over and over for the past two days.  She says Ba ba ba for good, and Ba ba ba for bad.  She says Ba ba ba for happiness and Ba ba ba for sad.  She says it and screams and laughs and yells and waves and claps and slams her fist on the ground.  She said it today for about thirty straight minutes in the pool as she laughed and splashed.  Then, she cried and said it for another thirty minutes.


I am so in love with the nine month old stage!  She is such a doll and she makes us all smile!  Thank heaven for little girls!

my other passion...

my first passion in life is my family.  this, i think, goes without needing to be said.  my second passion, again- probably unnecessary to point out- is writing.  but my OTHER passion, that some of you may not know about, is cooking!  i love to cook, to bake, to create- anything!  and, of course, i love to eat.  and eat, and eat, and eat.  i went to the gym today.  i burnt a whole lot of calories per the machines i ran on. this warranted me coming home to create a garlic infused olive oil that i then made homemade potato chips in.  two words: HOLY DIVINITY!  i feel sick now, because i think i ate more than i actually put out on the dinner table for the rest of the family.  they were that good!


the other night, i made homemade spaetzle, a german doughy-noodle type side dish, that i fried in bacon pieces and their fat.  i can pretty much feel the weight as it sticks to my ribs.  but i am having so much fun!  my little sous chef helps me all the time (tomorrow we are making baby biscotti for, well- you can guess!)  M helps measure and mix and roll.  she wasn't thrilled to come home tonight to find the chips already made (but between the sharp[ blade of the mandolin and the burning oil, i probably wouldn't have let her help tonight anyway!)


what are your favorite dishes to make?  do you like to go from scratch or do the "semi-homemade" trick?  post a comment and let's talk tasty treats!

a little organization...

today's goal was organization!  while M was at camp and B slept (a two hour nap- horray!), i locked myself in the worst room of my house- the catch all: playroom, office, storage, guest room, art room, etc.  you name it, that room is it.  and it's about half the size of a normal bedroom, yet it houses EVERYTHING in the world that doesn't fit into the rest of my house (which is a lot.) 


So, today, i cleaned.  i threw out, i sorted.  i threw out a 2010 ikea catalog.  i threw out a sheet of paper with three pen marks on it.  i threw out about seventeen magazines that had half the pages ripped out.  these are the things that i have saved.  why? why? why?


i've been this way for as long as i can remember.  i keep things "just in case."  


the other day, i found a 'stash' in M's room.  First was a set of christmas snowmen picture holders living under a hat.  Then, there was a piece of string that had come on a gift i had received two weeks ago (i don't even know where she got that from!)  She had saved a subscription post card to the food network magazine in her dresser.  When i asked her why she had these things, she answered "just in case."  (her words.)  she also has about five red plastic spoons that come in the haagen dazs single-serve ice cream cartons (a surprise her dad used to bring home for her when he would have his own 'single-serving' pints.)  she keeps those "just in case" (again, her words.)


genetics are an interesting science.  maybe in my next life i'll study them.  but for now, i have a whole lot of "just in case" stuff laying around my house from the two of us.  my goal is to finish in three weeks (before my sister and her family come to visit!)  if i can't succeed in this amount of time, there is no hope for us.  but, i've got a good feeling about all of this!  i think, maybe, hopefully that this will be the time that we succeed!  fingers crossed!

sleep- anyone?

i could have posted this post three months ago; no six months ago; no... let's go with nine months ago.  actually, nine months ago, the baby slept.
i am exhausted, and somewhat delusional.  my baby doesn't sleep.  this equals me not sleeping.  last night, i attempted the "cry it out" propaganda that i am so defiantly against.  what happened?  she cried, and cried, and cried, and then woke my three-year-old up.  what could have been a twenty minute in and out nightly wake-up call turned into three plus hours of going back and forth between bedrooms and finally ending up watching tv at 5:00 this morning with a baby crawling all over my face.  


i am off to what i hope will be somewhat of a good slumber.  i, of course, will never be sure that will happen until my kids are married.  and even then, who knows!?!

Make new friends, but keep the old...

My three-year-old went to a summer camp at her preschool today.  She was so excited last night that she could barely go to sleep.  It's been a long time since she'd seen her school friends, and she was listing them and asking if this one or that one would be there today.  Before she finally dozed off, my husband asked her if she was going to make new friends.  This began a near hysteria in her exhausted state (the second hysteria of the evening: the first being crying her eyes out at the US Women's Soccer team losing the world cup to Japan.  No joke, she cried for about 20 minutes.)  Through her second set of sobs, she explained that she didn't want to make new friends, because she didn't want to lose her old friends.  It took a while, but P finally was able to convince her that she could keep her old friends AND make new ones.  Once she was satisfied with this, she fell asleep.


Today, when i picked her up from camp, she was beaming (well, not really- she actually cried wen we got in the car because she wanted to stay at school "forever."  The tears seem to flow like the nile around here lately!)  But, she was beaming about her big accomplishment.  "Momma, I made a new friend today!" She told me from the back seat.  "Really?"  I asked into the rearview mirror.  "Yes, I don't know his name, but he had a light green shirt on and was really nice!"  She was proud.  It was cute.


Later today, when my husband came home from his meetings, the first thing M asked him was, "Daddy, did you make any new friends at your meetings today?"  He told her that today was full of old friends, but that there would be new friends to meet tomorrow.  She was excited for him.  


This all just touched my heart.  I forget what it must be like to be a kid, braving the world of friends and new kids and shyness and playgrounds.  I probably never really went through that as much when I was a little kid, because i always had my older sister to pave the way for me.  I had it easy, just like B will already be going into preschool with a built-in set of friends- the little siblings of all of M's friends.  I was proud to see my girl playing with all of her old friends when i picked her up, and happy to hear that she made a new one, too.  And tonight, when she went to sleep, there was no hysteria or even tears!  That, in and of itself, was enough to make to smile, too!

And a great time was had by all.

This weekend was an experiment of sorts.  We split the family in half and had a mommy/daughter getaway to visit our friends 3 1/2 hours away, and a daddy/daughter "party weekend" at home.  My three year old and I had one of the best times we've had in- well 3 1/2 years!  Our road trip was full of loud music and laughter (and only about three arguments!)  We went to M's best friend's birthday party at a fun bounce-y place.  We then spent the rest of the afternoon playing and remembering exactly why we love their family SO much.  My night continued until 2:30 in the morning having the most fun with my bestie (and about twenty-five-hundred gallons of rum!)  M also stayed up until 2:30 a.m.-  this girl is soooo my daughter!  she had a great time sitting on the couch watching cartoons while D and I chatted the night away!
Morning came way too quickly, but we got to experience the Krispy Kreme doughnut making and had a bittersweet fun time until it was time to head out.  It is always hard to say good-bye, but it is especially difficult when we wish our friends lived two minutes away again.  


We came home to find that the other half of our family had a wonderful Daddy/daughter weekend, too.  The baby seemed a bit sad at times, according to P (but i'm not sure if he told me that to make me feel better.  i missed that baby immensely.  i mean there really aren't even words to describe it.)  But they had a great time.  We had a great time.  This could even be the start to some great bonding times with our kids.  I definitely realized that I need to spend a lot more one-on-one time with M.  I probably need to do it with the baby, too.  I guess these are all the things we learn as we go through this world.  And luckily we figured it out while having a great time!

Baby love.

Today we visited our good friends with their precious newborn baby boy B!  and my own little baby girl B was IN LOVE!  she couldn't get enough of him.  she crawled at him, bent down to see his cutsie little face right up next to hers; she laughed at him, and she tried (to no avail) to touch him.  it was the sweetest little love affair i have seen in a while.  of course, at his ripe old age of 6 weeks, it was pretty one-sided today.  he smiled a lot, but it could have been at her, or the cat, or the air.  
we'll have to wait and see what comes of this budding romance.  but even if we can't prearrange their future nuptials, if he is anything like his big brother, and B turns out anything like her big sis, at least the two baby Bs will grow up being best buds!  

Wash the day away.

You know a good day was had by all when these are the things that slid down the drain in the girls' bath tonight:


Sunscreen, sand and little rays of light; 
Bananas, raspberries, and yellow popsicle flavoring;
Glitter, happiness, and the end of boredom;
Summer, hugs-from-friends, and a whole lot of laughter.


We are hopefully on the downward hill to healthiness, happiness and a wonderful summer once again. 
My baby was born an entire nine months of eternity ago today.  


Today has been a truly great day!

she'll be coming 'round the mountain...

I am definitely on the mend, thank GOD!  even throughout today, i have been able to physically feel myself getting better and better, so i'm thinking that by tomorrow, i should be golden!


As for the world around me, while i was laying in my sick-bed, i missed a LOT in this house.  okay, not really a lot, but i did miss a couple inside jokes between my husband and oldest (she even told me to go back to bed today, so that she could play with daddy more.)  and a love affair between my husband and my youngest sprouted up right before my sleeping eyes.  she is in LOVE!  i should not be surprised by this, obviously she has been in love with her father, but she has always preferred me.  i guess when you disappear for a day and a half, though, you prefer the one who's there.  i am ecstatic about these developments!  maybe i can actually go out for a night with my girlfriends and not have a screaming baby to come home to.  maybe i can actually sleep through a night-time visit at 3a.m.  maybe!  i am not counting eggs before they need to be counted, but i can be hopeful, can't i!?!

On the way to get there.

While i am not even close to feeling good, and am not exactly even feeling much better, i have high hopes that the antibiotics and steroids will have to be able to take root overnight and do whatever it is that they do and make me feel better tomorrow.
my husband and kids have been truly amazing today.  i spent the entire day in bed, coming out for dinner only.  and then i put the baby to bed, because i missed her.  and then played blocks with M, because i missed her.  but now i am back in bed and will hopefully crash for the next ten or so hours (a girl can dream!)  


to use a word that's usually banned in my house, i HATE being sick.  i'm not a good patient- maybe because i'm used to being the caretaker.  i usually try to do things for myself when i'm sick, and i usually keep the intensity to myself.  but this time, i am playing the patient role well.  i can't even try to rally- my puffy eyes and rattling cough would give me away.  i let my husband do everything for me today.  he did everything for the kids, too.  i would say it was a nice treat, but i was in the inner-depths of hell to even realize it at the time.


i'm off to bed now.  i HOPE HOPE HOPE i will have a happy and healthy report tomorrow.  fingers crossed!  good night!

sinus infection.

I am thankful that my chest and head x-rays came back with nothing more than a sinus infection. It's been a long and cough-y day. My head hurts. And, sinus infections= heavy drugs= exhausted mind. Off for rest and hopefully healing overnight!

hacking my lungs up.

for four nights now,  i have been hacking up my lungs with an obnoxious cough that rattles from the inner depths of my soul.  i have been attributing this to allergies and even took benadryl for the first time in my entire life.  but at some point between last night and this morning, it's changed for the worse.  now i feel sick in my chest and throat.  i feel achey in my body.  i go from hot to cold and back quicker than a porsche can get to 60.  i think i am sick.  i hate being sick.  i hate being sick when i have a three-year-old who needs 110% constant attention and a just-about-nine-month-old who has no concept that she cannot wrap cords around her neck or eat the dog's tail.  and now that she's mobile, i need to be alert 120% of the time!
i need to go to bed.  i need to fight this with the little remaining strength i have left.  i need more medicine.  blah.    

Who Are You?

As a child, I had an impressive imagination.  In fact, I still do.  As most of my readers who know us well know, my eldest daughter has taken on not only her father's physical attributes, but a lot of his idiosyncrasies, as well.  One of them, I thought, was her penchant for reality.  I was, however, reminded today, of her absolutely wonderful childish trait for make-believe that we all have somewhere within!


On her first birthday, we bought M the uber chair from pottery barn.  with her name monogrammed in.   she loved it for months, even years, but recently (as in the last seven to eight months), it has really just taken up valuable space in our ever shrinking house.  But today, i was reminded of one of my favorite things about this chair- that it is never really a chair at all.  At least it wasn't for years after she first received it, and then today, it came out of hiding (as much as in the corner of her own bedroom would be a hiding spot- but under swaths of clothing, i guess anything could be lost).  She turned it up on its side this morning, and turned it into her magician's stand, "disappearing" objects that we, the audience, provided.  With the swipe of a magic wand (actually a too-long dowel for a 3-year-old), the object went flying from her platform, i.e. disappearing!  After that (hours after), she turned the chair upside down and climbed to the top of "Triangle Mountain!"  She then "ski'd" down the other side.  She also "explored the dark caves" underneath the mountain, in which she found many treasures (like my spatulas, whisks, and her own plastic cups.)  After another long amount of time, her chair magically turned into a cage to keep the wild beast (a.k.a. the baby) at bay while we ate dinner.  (on a side note- i was both happy and panicked at the same time to see how happy the baby was with the newfound chair.  this could only mean that in three months, i would be purchasing another monogrammed uber chair for another first birthday.)


As much as i love to play with my children, i have to admit that i sometimes more enjoy taking the onlooker's approach and watching what transpires.  I was ecstatic today to learn that beneath the facts and rules that M lives by, my little girl still has an amazing imagination!  I was thrilled to see the baby enjoying something i hadn't even thought about in months.  But mostly, i was just amazed at what kids can make out of nothing at all.  A chair, a dowel, a spatula and a whisk turned into about five or six straight hours of play.  It brought such a warmness to my heart, reminding me of my own flights or fancy as a child- stories of which, i am sure, you will hear another day!

Nuzzling the nape.

I, as so many of us, adore laughing.  I have been known to start with giggles and end with hysterical laughing-crying fits.  But as nice as it is to feel the release of a laughing fit, there is nothing so wondrous as hearing the laughter of kids and babies.  Especially when you are the producer of the laughs!  
I learned today that a passed down form of affection/tickling that my mother did to me, that my sister does to her children and that i have done to M for the last 3 years has the same effect on B as everyone else in its path- hysterical laughter.  It starts out innocently enough, a little nuzzle under the chin.  Then it turns slightly, just slightly, sadistic.  With my chin, i nuzzle all the way under her chin until i can get the exact right angle of the tickle spot, to which she begins laughing and tries to push away, but cannot get out of the neck-in-neck embrace.  She laughs to a point that i had yet to hear from her.  M is old enough to scream with the laughter, but she cannot escape the grip of the chin-to-chin tickle fest!  And if i do let go, she jumps back for more, just like i did so many years ago with my own mother.  The baby can't scream or jump away yet, so i get the pure and utter satisfaction of tickling her to the utmost.


I love the sound of my daughters' laughter.  And i love that i can relive such a deeply ingrained memory with them.  Hopefully they will turn around and do it to their kids someday.  They will if they want to hear true, deep down guttural guffaws from the ones they love.

Nine Years Ago...

Nine years ago today, my husband and i drove up to lake placid for our honeymoon.  but nine years and one day ago, my "real-life" began!  Yesterday, P and I celebrated our nine year anniversary, and had i not been excruciatingly exhausted last night, i would have written about this then.


Nine years ago, as my father and i descended that long aisle, we held on tightly to each others' arms.  He then kissed my cheek, and my parents gave the hand of their youngest child to her future husband.  The rest is a proverbial blur.  I was ecstatic to be standing up there, next to the man i would be spending the rest of my days with; I'm pretty sure he felt the same.  The ceremony was beautiful, and we both teared up as we said, "I do."  We left the church to a bubble barrage and we never stopped smiling.  In fact, my face hurt from smiling so much.  That sounds like a cliche, but the photographer actually told me to, "Stop smiling so much" because the pictures would look staged.  (imagine that he didn't catch the irony in that one.)  The reception was amazing.  Everyone ate and drank, then danced the night away.  I'd guess that most people feel this way, but my wedding was my favorite wedding EVER!  it was the greatest party with the greatest people for the greatest reason!  I may tear up again just thinking about it.  


And here we are nine years (and one day) later and I can report about my life almost exactly as i reported about that big day.  My life is my favorite life EVER!  Even with the sleepless nights and life-given ups and downs of the every day, i feel truly blessed that i am enjoying the greatest party with the greatest people daily.  my husband has given me the best nine years of my life, the two most gorgeous children anyone could ever imagine, and i can only foresee things getting better.  we grow closer and stronger each day.  there are days where we want to scream at the top of our lungs and days when we laugh so hard our bellies hurt.  but at the end of each of those days- the good ones, the bad ones, the ones that just are- we go to sleep each night with a hug, a kiss, and a great big high five (courtesy of my oldest!)  I thank God daily for the life I have, the family we've created, and the time we share.  I look forward to the day when we can celebrate our daughters' nine-year-wedding-anniversaries and marvel that it felt like just yesterday that we were celebrating our very own- with the baby crawling underfoot and M wanting to know why she has to go to sleep before the steak comes out (our big date was an amazing steak with grilled asparagus at about 10:00 last night!  but at least we had a lot of time to hang out!)


And so, nine years ago today, as we drove off to Lake Placid, we enjoyed our first day of being able to say, "Remember when..." about our wedding.  And here we are, still remembering and reliving and always and forever loving.

how tired am i?

I am so tired that I fell asleep with a cup half full of tea undrunk and my blog yet to be written. I did not read any more pages of the very intense book I want to have done by Saturday for the book club (a feat that would have been much less daunting and was probably achieved by my younger, less exhausted self.)
I just finished tending to the baby and realized I had not written my post tonight, an idea that I am going to hold onto for tomorrow night, because I really want to write about it, but will not be able to do it any justice hunched over my phone in the dark, sipping cold sleepy-time tea.
Hopefully the next six or so hours will do my tired bones (and mind) some good! Until tomorrow... good night!

Summer Vacation...

Our summer vacation in 30 words or less:
Family, friends, fun, sun, sand, beach, ocean, waves, laughter, lots-of-driving, swinging-on-swingsets, NO HUMIDITY, swimming, swimming, and more swimming, fireflies- millions of them, fireworks, food, family, fun.


And now we're back to reality.  Back to bedtimes to be implemented, ballet classes to attend, laundry to do and dishes to wash.  Such is life at the end of a great trip, and the beginning again to real-life.