This morning, in between bites of her first-day-of-school waffle, Mary looked up and said, “If I were you I’d be really sad this morning.” No one knows me like Mary. This school year marks so many milestones for our family, and the lump in my throat has been ready to rise to the surface for
Just as school is winding down, swim season is ramping up. The swim team is exhausting and all-consuming, but I honestly love it. Three years ago I submitted to the rigorous swim team schedule, and after one season we were a bonafide swim family. I love the social aspect for the kids AND for me,
A few weeks ago a few of Mary’s friends from her class came over for a pool party to celebrate her ninth birthday. Every time I think about whipping up a quick blog post about the party, the headline I write in my head is for her sixth birthday party. Six fits more neatly in my motherhood
The last day of school! CELEBRATION EMOJIS ALL AROUND!!!! Summer, we are ready for you even more than we’ve ever been before. Mary – third grade; Thomas – Kindergarten; David – fourth grade; Anna – bus stop side kick. On the last day of school, I arrived in the pickup line earlier than I have
MOD Pizza, Starbucks, Richmond Lager, Surge Adventure Park. Know what they all have in common? They all have Anna’s letter — the letter A. I know this because Anna shouts enthusiastically whenever she sees her letter. “MOM! GUESS WHAT I SEE!” she shouts from the back seat, straining against her straps to make her point.
Last night Mary and I had a mommy-daughter dinner date. I often hear about the value of one-on-one time with kids, especially for kids in large families, but our family almost never does that sort of thing. Honestly? Between me and you? WHO HAS TIME? (Especially in large families!) But, as expected, dinner was really
Around this time of year, it seems from my end of things, kindergarten really picks up. The phonetic spelling kicks into high gear, and these little learn to read books show up in their book bags. The books are simple, repetitive, and short. It’s straightforward enough — sight words are repetition. They’ve got all the
Thomas and his bed head started kindergarten camp this week. During this photo he spotted a lightning bug, caught it, and then handed it to me, “You can take care of it while I’m at school, Mom.” Its like he’s TRYING to make me cry! Mary went to this camp a few years ago, and
I can’t tell if it’s happening more, or if I’m just noticing it more, but recently Thomas has been crawling into my lap a lot. He turns six tomorrow. More than I do with my other kids, I spend the week before Thomas’s birthday remembering the final days of my pregnancy. I remember each day
David reads all the time, but he almost never wants to talk about what he’s read. Not even when he and Tom read Jurassic Park together just so they could discuss it. He doesn’t like when we ask him about characters or the plot, or why he likes or dislikes a book. He usually responds by
As I type this there’s a cup of Italian ice and a giant glass of water on the table beside me. I don’t want anything to do with either of them. I’ll put off the Italian ice a few more minutes, say I’m waiting for it to soften. That’ll buy me some time; maybe my
In the past few months, several of my friends have sent me this article: This family’s repeated strep throat infections frustrated their doctors To save you the click, it’s about a family who kept getting strep throat over and over and over, and they couldn’t figure out why. Eventually they discover that their CAT was the
This past week we decided to take a long weekend-ish and spend time with my family before “school” starts back up. Once again, the bizarre time-warp of 2020 snuck up on me, and what is, on one hand, “The Longest Summer Ever,” is also “Hold Up, It’s September?” We timed our trip to fall over
Well, here we are. Summer is nearly over; we’re in the countdown to back-to-school for the strangest academic year ever. That’s a true statement, right? I’m pretty sure I can say that without fact-checking. School has never been so strange, uncertain, controversial, and wildly different from one district to the next. My kids’ school will
I’ve entered a new, strange phase of parenting where I hear a lot of talk about kids moving on from toys. I was dropping David off for a playdate once and, looking around their pristine home, I asked, “Where are all the toys?” She explained that her son, who is younger than David, doesn’t play
This week I’m registering my five-year-old for kindergarten. Like everything these days, the registration will be completely different. It’s truncated and sterile. I’ll wear a mask, there will be no colorful room with blocks and crayons, and I won’t even take my kid with me. (In fact, unlike the other two times when I showed
Sometimes I wish I could teleport every now and then, to be lifted out of a particularly draining moment of monotony and placed into a different phase of life. Maybe if I spent a day or two as the elderly lady in the grocery store, telling young moms to “enjoy it because it goes so
If you’d like a quick lesson on the lunacy of Confederate monuments, you should explain them to kids. Pare it down as much as possible, don’t let your bias cloud the water. There was a war — the north versus the south. The south lost. These statues are to commemorate the soldiers that fought for the
I am always hesitant to write about current events. I go for it every now and then, but I do so tentatively, knowing that I (usually) don’t have any expertise to offer. Also because it’s easier for me to just sit inside the four walls of my quarantine and write about my vegetable garden and
On my very first night home with my first baby, I was more terrified than I had ever been in my life. Jump off a bridge? Sure! Scale a rock face? No problem! But leave me alone with this tiny, beautiful person? No thank you. I had a fistful of worksheets, clinging to the vague
NOTE: I wrote this a few days ago — a glib post about running during the quarantine. I wrote it before running was added to the list of things that are dangerous to do while black. I’ve been running since I was 14 years old. That’s 23 years of running on country roads, in the city, suburbs,
We celebrated two friends’ birthdays this week. They were both distant celebrations — gifts left in the driveway, and a drive-by “party.” My kids liked loved being a part of these celebrations, but they made the wheels start turning. “I’m glad my birthday is in the summer…” I heard someone say from the backseat on
After Anna’s speech therapy evaluation, the therapist told us that she would probably have a “language explosion” in the next few months. That was a little more than a month ago, and while I think we’re still waiting on the explosion, she’s definitely had a speech…spark. Her pronunciation is still her weakest area, but she’s
Anna calls David “DayDay.” She calls Mary “MayMay.” She calls Brigham “Ma,” and she knows the names of several neighborhood dogs. In an ultimate little sister power move, she doesn’t even attempt to say Thomas’s name. There are actually a lot of words Anna doesn’t attempt. She has a decent vocabulary, but she’s almost impossible
I’ve mentioned before that Thomas doesn’t know colors. Actually, let me rephrase. Thomas refuses to conform to the names society has given colors. Instead of using the names of the colors that you and I use, he came up with his own. For example, instead of red, green, blue, and yellow, Thomas would say David
A few weeks ago my family headed into worship at church. We found a row, empty except for a middle-aged couple at the end. We filed in and in short order, one-by-one, my children lost their minds. The couple was polite and friendly. We shared “kids will be kids” smiles as I corrected and redirected
This Christmas season has felt more hectic than any other I can remember. I’ve been thinking a lot about what I could do differently to remove some stress, and I’ve come to the conclusion that no matter what I do, it will be hectic. Of course, I’m the first to admit that I could use
When our cat was an adolescent — not a kitten, an adolescent. It’s an important distinction because kittens are adorable imps and adolescents are adorable jerks. So as I was saying, when our cat was an adolescent he spent all day being cute and all night demolishing our house. We were living in a house
Next fall Thomas will start kindergarten. This fall he is conducting experiments in our yard with the garden hose. One afternoon I was watering the garden and Thomas started digging in our mulch. I was using the hose attached to our irrigation, so he got the hose that’s attached to the front of our house
Yesterday Anna, my 22-month old, was throwing a tantrum. She threw herself onto the floor, curled her body over her knees with her forehead pressed to the carpet, and wailed. “Look!” Mary exclaimed. “Anna is doing a lockdown drill!” David and Mary laughed and laughed at the absurdity of a lockdown drill! At home! Ha!
A week after the big kids started back to school, Thomas started preschool. He didn’t want to hold his bag like I asked; he wanted to hold this plane instead. FOUR! What a difference a year makes. Thomas went to school wearing the same shirt David wore to the first grade, and hand-me-down Crocs with
One afternoon a few days before my birthday, David and I were riding bikes to the birthday party of one of his friends in the neighborhood. I was telling David that I enjoy riding bikes with him and he asked, “Is that why you asked to go for a bike ride with me for your
Our school district starts late — after nine — so we never have to wake them up and we don’t have to rush. The kids have plenty of time to play, eat breakfast, get dressed, and hold down a part-time job. As he does every morning, David curled up on the couch with a book.
Last weekend Tom’s grandmother’s neighborhood had a little carnival with a petting zoo, face painting, balloons, and vendors passing out plastic trinkets. Actually, “carnival” might be overstating the event. But since my kids haven’t really been to a true carnival, we’re sticking with it. Carnival or not, this sort of thing is a kid paradise,
When Anna had a broken wrist, every time we went anywhere, I’d notice people noticing her cast. A mom would casually walk over, say hello, and then ask, “What happened to her arm?” I tell the story and to their utter horror, it’s completely unsatisfying. Anna fell off a child-size chair onto a carpeted floor.
Often when I’m getting ready, Mary will wander into the bathroom to be with me. She asks if she can be fancy, too, so I lift her onto the vanity and hand her a makeup brush or lip gloss wand. She gazes into the mirror quietly, studying her reflection. The corners of her mouth lift
A few weeks ago, before spring break, I got an email from Mary’s teacher. Whenever Mary’s teacher writes us emails she does this thing where the subject line of the email is just the kid’s name. So every now and then I get an email, subject “Mary” and every single time I panic. My blood
My kids had a day off school for Good Friday and we planned to spend the day, among other things, dyeing Easter eggs, and using Sweet Frog coupons they got from school. Thursday night I looked at the weather and realized we were supposed to get rain, which was frustrating because I was planning to
My little Anna-bird with a broken wing. Ok, that was a little dramatic. Sorry. A more accurate description would be: my 16-month old (who has a penchant for climbing) with a buckle fracture. But that doesn’t have quite the same ring. When I posted a photo of Anna with a cast, several people said they hoped
Mary has been wanting to do the monkey bars at school. She never mentioned it to me, she kept it to herself. It was her own, personal, quiet goal. She had wanted to try, but she hadn’t tried yet. She hadn’t even climbed the ladder. There were plenty of very valid excuses — David broke his
What’s a little girl’s favorite part of a father-daughter dance? Gloating to her brothers that she’s going to a dance and they aren’t Fighting with Mommy about what makeup is appropriate for a 5-year old (Answer: no makeup. Be glad that you’re getting lip gloss. ) Having a special night with your daddy. We’ll never
Playing Santa is, without a doubt, one of the most fun gigs I’ve ever had. Shopping, wrapping, imagining the joy when they open the gift. It is all so very wonderful. Sometime in November, Tom’s mom, Peggy, called me from Costco. She was shopping, and there was one MaryEllen American Girl doll left. Should she
This summer Anna blew through baby clothes sizes so fast I could barely keep up. 6-9 months, 9-12 months, 12-18 months. “Hmmm, this can’t be right,” I thought when shimmying a pair of 2T leggings on my 11-month old baby. I kept a very weather-inappropriate fleece sleeper in Anna’s drawer all summer because I wanted
I’ve spent the last few weeks feeling a bit sad, a bit in disbelief. Soon my fourth baby will turn one, and then she won’t be a baby anymore. Perhaps it will surprise no one at all to find out that I’m feeling very, very sentimental about this milestone. This time last year I was
At time of publication, I’ve spent five and a half years of my life nursing a baby. Of course, that’s not five and a half years of non-stop nursing. But, yeah, actually. In a way, it is. Five and a half years! That’s longer than I was in college, longer than I’ve lived in any home
The calendar says it’s fall but it was 90 degrees outside today and my kids swam in the pool. It’s hot, humid, the leaves are all on the trees, but it does feel like fall in one very key way: we’ve been sick for the past five weeks. This is Thomas doing jumping jacks to
This morning one of my kids went to school wearing clothes that were mismatched, a tad too big and, frankly, tacky. But the clothes were in good condition and seasonally appropriate, so I’ll allow it. Several years ago I stopped apologizing for my kids’ clothes. “He dressed himself!” I’d explain, embarrassed by clothes that don’t
This summer will go down in history as the summer that Mary looked her fear in the eye, balled it up, and stomped on it. She became confident on her bike, is a completely independent swimmer, and went to summer camp all by herself. These are huge accomplishments for a little girl. Mary and I
One afternoon I was sitting on the dock while David played in the sandy area on the bank of the lake. Thomas was draping himself over my legs, doing that three-year old thing where he readjusts every two seconds or so, trying to get just a little closer to mama. David and Caleb were both
This past week Mary started summer camp — her first time ever doing something like this. (The first time any of my kids have done any sort of camp.) A few weeks before it started, she asked me, “Mommy, how long is camp?” I answered, “It’s just for a few weeks.” Mary looked down at her hands