Anna started preschool on Friday. After watching her siblings go to school every day for a month, and THEN after a COVID exposure pushed the school’s first day back a week, it’s safe to say she was R-E-A-D-Y to start school. As in, about to burst with excitement. She was so excited that I was tempted
One of the beneficial side-effects of our new work-from-home lifestyle is that between Zoom meetings and phone calls, Tom carves out some time to put Anna down for her nap every afternoon. This is different than all of our other kids, who Tom almost never put down for naps because he has always been at
In the past month or so, Anna has unveiled an alter-ego that she calls “Real Anna.” I’m not sure how she sorts this out in her own mind, but basically she’s “Anna” and “Real Anna” is elsewhere. Sometimes Real Anna is causing problems, sometimes she’s napping, usually (according to Anna) she’s on the roof. The
Last Saturday morning after breakfast we all piled on the couch to watch the end of Christmas Vacation, which we had started the night before. Anna got bored (sorry, Chevy Chase!) and wandered into the playroom. I glanced at her as she meandered over to a little set of blocks and started stacking them. She
One morning after breakfast, I was standing at the counter washing dishes and Anna crawled under the kitchen table. She looked up at the underside of the table and asked, “What’s this, Mommy?” I answered her broadly, not sure if she was asking about the base of the table or pointing at a screw or
The other day a pile of Amazon packages were delivered to our front porch. (Prime Day, HEY!!) When I pulled the stack of cardboard boxes into our living room, the kids surrounded me, jumping in excitement to see what was inside, even though they already know that all we ever order are things like liquid soap
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
A week or so ago we moved Anna into a big girl bed. Well, technically it isn’t a certified “big girl bed.” Technically it’s just a crib with the side off. This is a huge milestone and you might have guessed that I have an entire sappy post queued up about how, after so many
Anna is two years old nine months old. That means she’s Over half-way through the terrible twos and well on her way to being a three-nager. Anna is really settling into her role as our resident up-ender of peace and quiet, and Captain of Witching Hour. Her new favorite schtick is to stand a foot
I realized the other day that I included Anna in her very first Semantics post without absolutely any pomp and circumstance or even a mention. Anna is talking a lot these days, and even though a lot of what she says only a mother (or 5-year-old brother) can understand, she’s grown a lot since we took