Piper Finn Willow
Mix a little foolishness with your serious plans; it's lovely to be silly at the right moments. - Horace
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Bergen Hawkeye, HomeLife, Keiglets, London Eli Scout, Mosely Ella Claiborne, Otto Fox Wilder, Piper Finn Willow, Riley Amber
What They’ve Been Up To Lately
Scrambling eggs. Becoming increasingly obsessed with The Lord of the Rings. (Despite the fact that none of our children have ever watched even one of the films.) Saying “happy new year” after every sentence, regardless of appropriateness to the conversation. Speed reading through The Hobbit. Taking her first college level science class, complete with weekly three hour lab. Painting drumsticks red without anyone’s permission. Wearing a Snow White costume on top of her normal clothes. Reading food labels and researching soy lecithin. Attempting to stop sucking her thumb every morning and forgetting about the challenge every evening. Baking Aunt E’s Famous Pizza Dough recipe solo. Creating miniature paper cutouts of…
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Would You Rather?
We drove to a wedding in the mountains this weekend. On the drive across the curvy roads through the gorgeous trees of blazing color, we all played a little car game to pass the time. It’s called “Would you rather?” and it’s simple. One person asks the rest of the players which of two bizarre or both awful options they would prefer. The questions were hysterically funny and I wish I could remember more of them but on curvy mountain roads I am incapable of recording moments in any other fashion besides my not-to-be-trusted memory. By far, the title of Creator of the Oddest Questions belonged to little Willow. (Who…
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How To Celebrate Five With About That Many Dollars
1. Allow your daughter the rare (first in her lifetime actually) privilege of choosing three friends to invite over for an evening of fun. 2. Instruct the girls to all wear dress-up princess attire. 3. Have big sisters paint finger nails and toe nails, brush hair, apply sparkle lip gloss and show the girls their reflections in a handheld mirror. 4. Spread a cache of beads and girly-colored pipe cleaners on the table and create necklaces and bracelets galore. 5. Eat miniature snacks served in muffin tins. (Pizza bites. Baked mozzarella sticks. Broccoli and hummus. Apples with dip. Chocolate cupcakes with pink icing.) 6. Permit the princesses to run around…
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Five Year Old Finnian.
There’s no end to the posts I’ve written about my youngest daughter. But when it’s your birthday – you get another one! Piper Finnian Willow Lacey turned five. Five! Half a decade. Little year on top of little year on top of little year. She only remembers ever having lived in South Carolina. She has no recollection of sleeping in a crib at the foot of our bed for the first six months of her life. Of loading all of our possessions in a U-Haul and moving two states down to as far south as I ever hope to reside. In her memory, her life began at Look Up Lodge…
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holding her hand
I lie in bed with my four-year-old daughter. We’re holding hands on top of the blankets. Her eyes are closed, I’m half reading a novel and half gazing at her tender, sunburned cheeks. My little Finnian. Our time together is both sweet and bitter. You know the combination. We have our moments – my youngest daughter and I. She is strong-willed and she is loud and she demands attention and as the youngest daughter in a family of so many, she currently adheres to the philosophy of “by any means necessary”. She is me. And I am her. You can imagine the struggles that creates. But I love her. Oh,…
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Awkward
Overheard while standing in the laundry room . . . Piper: Otto, hey – let’s put our bellies together. Otto: [silence] [apparent acquiescence] Giggles. More giggles. Exuberant giggles. Piper: That was awww-kward.
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One for the Finn Files
Our family eats meat. We likes us some chicken. But, despite the fact that I was raised on a farm, I don’t care for discussing the bones of the creature that I am eating whilst chewing. Our dinner table last night featured a roasted chicken. (Yes, I finally remembered to put it in the crock pot. And it was roasted with rosemary that we grew in a pot on our front steps! I can’t believe I haven’t killed the rosemary.) Piper Finn and London both ended up with a chicken leg. Finn kept pulling out the bone and holding it in the air for us to marvel with her. “Look…
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speaking of . . .
Lately Piper says . . . “Speaking of…” She says it before she begins any random sentence. And most often when we have not at all been speaking of anything of which she speaks. “Speaking of corn – can I have some?” “Speaking of peanut butter – can I lick some peanut butter?” And this one. Said for real. “Speaking of pants – where are mine?”
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she’s still funny . . .
I should probably teach my four year old a little more about April Fool’s Day. (And the days of the week.) I guess she’s been mis-hearing the phrase for a couple of days. Tonight she walked up to me and said, “Hey Mommy. There’s a spider on your head.” Already cracking herself up, she added, “Happy Tuesday!”
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All She Wants For Christmas.
Despite the fact that we will only be opening stockings this Christmas weekend, the kids still love to chat about toys they like and items they would wish to acquire. On a recent car ride, the conversation in the backseat broke down a little something like this: “If you could have anything in your stocking, what would it be?” London asked. Normal responses flowed from her siblings. “A pillow pet.” “Nerds!” “Legos.” “Doll clothes.” Piper Finn didn’t offer such a speedy comeback. She sighed. She pondered. She waited until everyone was done sharing. She took a deep breath. Sounding as if she had just…
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My New Favorite Title.
Last week it was eighteen first graders in Bergen’s Class. This week it was seventeen four-year-old’s in Willow’s co-op class. The day was long but it was really oh-so-sweet. What a privilege it was to watch my child interact with her tiny peers. To see her serve as the helper and offer all of her classmates a squirt of hand sanitizer as they headed to lunch. To eat lunch with her at the same table and to feel her wee little hand pat my hand as I walked by her seat. I was the helper, of course, so my task was to help. To help paint seventeen small hands with…
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True That Finnian.
We are packing, albeit incredibly slowly. (Today I packed one box. One box. That’s the kind of progress I’m making over here ya’ll.) As we pack we find ourselves running across memories that have been sitting on a shelf for several years. The teddy bear crafted from my grandmother’s favorite blue bath robe. The tie-dyed onesie London wore home from the hospital. My dad’s childhood wind-up bear. My mom’s faded red leather bible. I’ve been sharing stories with the kids as we find each little treasure. And they, in turn, have been sharing stories with one another. As we recounted days of their toddlerhood, Mosely repeated a story about my…
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what have I done wrong?
Sometimes she makes this face – she calls it her cute face. Willow makes us chuckle. She makes us grin. Her turn of a phrase can send us rolling in the floor with laughter. And then there are moments like this . . . . Pre-dinner, Willow comes prancing into the kitchen with a smirk on her face. “Hey guys,” she says. “I just peed in the sink.”
