On the last day of school four sixth grade boys showed up at my house. They had grocery bags of ice cream and a separate bag with an ice cream scoop, spoons, and bowls just in case I wasn’t home and they had to enjoy their ice cream out on the deck. But they really hoped I
This fall David joined his middle school’s cross country team. The second he joined the team, before he even brought home his school-issued singlet, I fell head-first into the murky waters of living vicariously through my kid’s sport. Until now I’ve been completely immune to this. As a person who can barely throw — and
Early one morning, Thomas started his day by pestering all of us to tell him a scary story. He tried me, Tom, and eventually landed on David as the most likely to come up with something good. They were sitting together eating waffles for breakfast and even though Thomas had been told no several times
This week the kids had a day off school in the middle of the week, and I decided to throw them all in the van and haul them to a playground like I used to when they were little. There’s a nearby private school that just revamped their equipment, and I wanted to let the
Christmas was exactly two weeks ago. Doesn’t it seem so much longer? New Years Eve comes at the exact right time because it marks the psychological distance between December 25 and January 1. It’s like six days but MAN oh MAN does it feel like a year. A lot of our decorations are still up,
After spending an entire year with absolutely zero things on our calendar, our family is jumping into the figurative AND literal deep-end. We signed our kids up for swim team. I know that a lot of people’s kids do swim team, but this is our first time. And I sort of feel like we’re the
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
We aren’t a condiment family. Did you know that? Nearly 10 years of blogging and I’ve never mentioned it. Tom doesn’t like mayonnaise — that’s generally well-known. But neither Tom nor I like ketchup, and we could take or leave most everything else. Tom doesn’t even use salad dressing. (As with everything, I’m much less
Two days until David’s ninth birthday. Not that anyone is counting. At the beginning of the quarantine, when the kids’ school was closed, I made a paper countdown to Easter. We were all excited to see the holiday creep closer. For me it was a secret countdown to when this would all be over and
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