A portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2019. We are finishing up birthday week here. We ate the last of Anna’s birthday cake for lunch, and Tom’s birthday cupcakes for snack. The week started warm, and then it snowed, and then it stayed freezing and I gathered the children for a
There are a great many traditions I started when I had my first baby. Almost none of them have lasted through the fourth (R.I.P. baby book intentions) Some things I’ve mostly given up on (R.I.P. baby book intentions) and other things I haven’t gotten around to, but I still hold out hope (like making a
Thomas, my little herpetologist: Mommy did you know that snakes are the same as people? Except we have hands. And feet. And also talking powers. Thomas is currently in a strong animal phase. He’s always loved bugs and other creepy crawly creatures (like frogs and lizards), but now he’s old enough to remember obscure facts
Every morning the kids wake up way earlier than they have to. Then, for two full hours, they chase their tails until the five minutes before they have to leave for the bus when they scramble to find shoes and jackets. We have a checklist, we have alarms, we have reminders. And yet almost every
The 52 Project: A portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2019. David / Tom built a swing set in the backyard for the kids. As soon as they got home from school this week I’ve rushed them outside to play, because after this week it’ll be too dark. #happyfall Mary
BOO! Our family had a great Halloween, but as I sit typing this my eyelids are heavy and I’m feeling judged by the spooky decorations that became unseasonable 12 hours ago. I’m already feeling the busyness of the holidays and taking it as a reminder to try to slow down and enjoy the season. Perhaps this
We have a rule in our family about Halloween. If it involves any help or purchasing from me, you must decide on your Halloween costume by October 1. (Or, in Anna’s case, her Halloween costume was decided for her six years before she was born when my mom bought David this toddler-sized dragon costume.) Komodo
On the morning of Thomas’s preschool field trip to the pumpkin patch, I was in the bathroom frantically getting ready. Because she never strays farther than six inches from my heels, Anna joined me in the bathroom. She insisted, INSISTED on using my blush (I tried to just hand her the blush brush but baby
A portrait of my children, once a week, every week, in 2019. David and Mary / Are your kids unbelievably, impenetrably silly when they come home from school? I can take some silliness but WOW. It’s a good thing they have each other because Tom and I can’t even understand then when they’re all spun up.
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