In the past year or so David has become increasingly interested in creating. He loves to draw, color, paint, cut, glue, and everything else. I love watching him, in part because a few years ago he didn’t like any of it — coloring, using stickers, or even playing with Play-Doh at all. Anytime I brought out
Thomas turned two over a month ago, but still whenever he hears the word “birthday” he immediately shouts, “IT’S MY BIRFDAY!” Nothing starts a fight in our family like someone saying it’s their birthday. Almost IMMEDIATELY Mary Virginia says, “NO IT’S MY BIRTHDAY!” and David shouts that it’s actually almost Berkley Grace’s birthday! And then
Oh, Mary Virginia, where do I begin? I’ll begin by saying this: before I hit publish on this post, I’m going to read it and re-read it and then send it to my friend Candace to check for errors, because Mary Virginia, at age four, already corrects my grammar. “Mommy. You don’t NEED to go
Last week we celebrated the kids’ last day of school and David’s preschool graduation. Look at those excited faces! Those faces say WE CAN’T WAIT FOR SUMMER! We can’t wait to explore and go to the park and swim all day! And I’m like, AHA! JK KIDS! Mom only has one working arm so we
I never planned to nurse Thomas as long as I did. Actually, I take that back. I never really planned any sort of timeline. David self-weaned abruptly at 12 months. I was eight weeks pregnant and in the throes of first trimester exhaustion when I weaned Mary Virginia at 16 months. Neither of those things happened
When our kids were babies, we always sang the song “Sanctuary” before bedtime. Now that they’re older we’ve switched gears a bit to a version of, “IF YOU ASK FOR ONE MORE THING…” Nap times have always been a little different, especially Mary Virginia’s nap. For her nap I tell a story, then sing a
This month Thomas gave me a nose bleed. This isn’t completely out of the ordinary for toddlers. When David was this age he gave me a black eye. In fact, I’m sure many caregivers reading this are nostalgically remembering their own black eyes, bloody noses, and chipped teeth. That’s what living with a toddler will do
As a blogger, I think carefully about what I publish here. There are a lot of things to consider, and at the top of the list is the fact that sometimes when I write about certain things, it feels like I’m tapping the universe on the shoulder and saying, “Hey, remember us?” As in, I
Thomas turned 16 months two weeks ago. I considered skipping this month entirely, but I’m going to do an update because Thomas has reached the age that all he does is change and learn and in two weeks or probably even by the time I finish typing this, he’ll be doing and saying a hundred new things.
This morning my kids woke up at 5:30 a.m. because they were SO EXCITED! SO EXCITED FOR THE FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL! Perhaps they knew I was worried about getting out the door on time. Just doing their part to help; I appreciate it. Mary Virginia looks like she’d been crying for the past 15