HomeLife
How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives. - Annie Dillard
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Steady
Sometimes keeping a house remotely neat or tidy when eight people share that house is a nearly impossible task. Nearly. Impossible. And there are days when I feel as if all I do is clean one room and then move to another room. And the second I exit the clean room some inanimate object explodes and destroys all of my productivity before anyone can even rejoice in it momentarily. Really. The other night I took Wilder out of his booster seat at the kitchen table where he had just dumped his bowl of peaches on the floor (peaches = sticky madness) plus his container of chicken and couscous. I carried…
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a little bit of this
Honestly, I am just a little bit too busy right now to complete a full post tonight. What with a little bit of this in the morning and some of this in the afternoon and maybe a game or two of this in the evening. But don’t worry. This adventure ends soon and I will be back with all the details of said adventure. So until then hold your horses.
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I-95: I Am Your Pupil
Last Friday five of my children and I spent basically an entire day inside the confines of our Suburban. (Berg was the missing Keiglet. He’s spending another Boys Only visit with Aunt Emma & Co.) It was a very long day. (Can you say that sentence slowly and with emphasis and while heaving a heavy sigh?) But the trip was not in vain. (Well, of course it was not in vain. We needed to get from Tallahassee to South Carolina and our choice was to live in Florida forever or to drive home.) This is what Florida to South Carolina on I-95 taught me. 1. Sean Kingston and Justin Bieber’s ridiculous…
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it sure is a good thing
This is what London said to me once . . . “Mom. It sure is a good thing you have so many kids. They can help you do all these chores.” What I thought but did not say in response – Yeah. That’s right, London. And the reason I have all these chores is because I have all these kids. I did not say that. I did not say that because six-year-old children do not generally interpret sarcasm well. But maybe, just maybe, that little London gal is on to something after all. Here’s two ways I think I can secretly (well, not now, of course) get away with using…
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go there.
I have so many funny friends that I can no longer keep track. Wait – that’s not really true. But I do have some mostly funny friends, some pretty funny friends, some occasionally funny friends and some consistently funny friends. (Are you wondering which you are?) My friend Tyler is consistently funny. Which means all the time. He is funny all the time. And he is humoring me today by allowing me to write a post over at his site. So you can go read my post if you would like by clicking right here. And then you should stick around and read Tyler’s stuff. Especially his I Already Know A Lot About…
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first.
First time in a sandbox. First time eating sand. First time taking a series of photographs exclusively using the manual settings on my camera. (And you are seeing these sans editing.)
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what a long, strange trip it’s been. emphasis on the “long”.
It seems we like adventure lately. Or something like that. And I guess it wasn’t enough to drive three hours into the mountains of Georgia last week with five young children. Nope. Not enough. I am a glutton for punishment I suppose. I threw in one more kid (totaling six, in case you’re counting) and tossed in about triple the drive time and we all headed to Florida. Let me break the trip down for you into easily digestible categories and lists. The Miracle On a nine-plus hour trip no one had to stop for an unscheduled bathroom break. No one. Not one of the seven passengers requested the bathroom. …
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a fairytale
Once upon a time (about four days ago) we embarked upon an epic journey. (We drove to Georgia.) Where we stayed with two princesses (Lindsey and Rachael) in their castle (an apartment with the red door that matched the other twenty-five red doors). Our chariot (a scruffed up maroon Suburban) lead us to a raging river (a pleasant, wide stream) where we discovered the fountain of youth (a refreshing place to splash and play). After we partook of the fountain and gained our eternal youth (splashed until we were soaking wet from head to toe and all felt like kids), we traversed through many perils and obstacles (sink holes, deeper water…
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we let him eat cake.
Otto had a pretty low key first birthday party, as far as those events tend to go. And I am okay with that. Besides, he has enough siblings to constitute a party wherever he goes, so it all works out. A few good friends joined us to do what you do on a baby’s first birthday. Watch them eat cake. Our kids have all handled the first birthday a little differently. We didn’t get the privilege of seeing Riley cram cake into her little kid face since we met her a few years after that event. (I could just make something up here but I guess that’s a bad idea…
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everyone thinks their own kid is funny. so do I.
One kid. Two stories. Because I can. The First. Yes. We are still bribing Finn to use the bathroom somewhere other than her own pull up. After one such attempt (and success!) Finn requested her reward. “I want sad-you-seize.” she informed me. “Sadducees? Like in the Bible?” I asked her. (Hey, she’s like a genius or something. Maybe she had been reading up on the Sanhedrin and stuff. You never know.) “No, Mommy. Sag-you-see!” “Okay, Finn. Why don’t you just show me where these sag-you-sees are.” And she took my hand and lead me to my desk and reached for my container of orange tic-tacs. Oh. Sag-you-sees. The second. Today…
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When Uncle ‘Stin Comes To Town
We heart Uncle ‘Stin. (He’s framily, you know.) He stopped by for a visit this week. Here’s what we learned while Uncle ‘Stin was around. I met ‘Stin (a.k.a. Austin) when he was younger than my little Wilder is now. Which makes me feel an odd combination of both sisterly and maternal affection for him. (Is that misterly affection then?) And of course I have been aware of ‘Stin’s age for, uh, all of his life. But this trip I realized – he’s not a kid. (And he probably has not been for a while, I know.) He is, in fact, (to borrow his own phrase) a Transformer. You know…
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Family Night
Wednesday evenings at our house have been officially retitled. It’s a catchy one. Wait for it. Family Night. Yeah, even I think I could do better than that for a name. (I’m working on it, alright? One can only be creative on so many levels similtaneously.) For us, Family Night just means a night where we let the kids choose an activity that we can all do together. Usually – they pick the meal as well. (We’ve eaten one dinner consisting of macaroni and cheese as the main dish and mashed potatoes as the side. Which I found perfectly acceptable.) Recent Family Nights have involved Wii games, movies and Outburst…
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Days Like These
Days. We all have ’em – right? Here’s the ups and downs of yesterday at this house. (I think I’ll put a Pollyanna spin on my day. Just for kicks, you know. Remember Pollyanna? That kid in an old movie who changes a whole town with her upbeat, optimistic attitude? She takes horrible aspects of her life and spins them with sticky-sweet cheerfulness.) I woke up super sleepy (I blame this on late night Survivor watching) and I decided that sleeping an extra half hour was a better use of my time than a shower. So my hair looked rowdy today. It sort of surprised me every time I…
