Skipping Town

Back home. L&G seemed happy to be here and began playing with all their ponies and Shopkins in earnest the second they woke up. Late in the morning, we went to the library and got out a zillion books--probably our last summer library trip. I've loved this part of our summer--our regular weekly library visit. In years past, it was difficult to take them to the library. For one thing, when we first moved here, when they were very very little, I stubbornly held onto the idea that I should walk to the library, which meant pushing two kids plus a bunch of books up the hill in a double stroller to get home on a blisteringly hot summer day. (What folly: this is why we have cars in suburbia.) Second, there were diaper changes to consider. And nursing. And then potty training. How, how, did I ever leave the house at all???? You couldn't pay me to go back to all that. Anyhoo, then there was a stage where one or both would throw some kind of fit in the library, or run wild. Sigh. ...

Sat., 8/27 Since this was our last visit to NH this summer, we made our annual trip to the recycling center to deliver all the recycling we'd been saving up over the past few months. Of course we couldn't escape NH without an injury: Andrew cut his finger as he grabbed a bag of glass bottles. It looked terrible, but he didn't think it needed stitches, so we went on with our day. Next we went to Walmart so L&G could pick out their reading rewards--Lucia's been doing daily reading practice plus journal entries, and though going to Walmart is never fun, the girls were so excited. Greta chose a blind bag pony--Sapphire Shores--and blind bag Happy Places Shopkins. Lucia chose a blind bag Happy Places Shopkins and a regular blind bag Shopkins. The Happy Places Shopkins are ridiculously cute--and tinier than anything else the girls have. That's saying a lot. Each set comes with two regular-size Shopkins plus a miniscule accessory: a Shopkins bank plus a miniscule S...

Thurs., 8/25 We did something new-to-us yesterday--traveled an hour and a half to Lake Winniepesake to meet some of Andrew and Katherine's college friends for lunch and some lake fun. It was such a nice place--we had lunch at a restaurant right on the lake called Town Dock, then went to a public beach, where there was a lovely swimming area. Sandy bottom, no sludge, crystal clear water, waist-high for the kids at the deepest point. L&G had of course brought Equestria Girls, but they actually played with real kids too--two of the kids there were little girls age four and six, and the four-year-old had brought a big bag of My Little Ponies as well as an Equestria Girl of her own. It was a beautiful lake. Definitely a place to return to. We got home around 6:30pm and went immediately to our cousins' house for cocktails. I was worried about the kids being a tired mess--but they had so much fun. Our cousins brought out some toys they'd saved from their own kids' chil...

Lost some days in here but I'll try to recap the past few. Sat., 8/20 Did a preschool cleanup in the morning, then went to a rummage sale, then spent a lot of time losing my mind over the sheer intractable mess that was our house in preparation for a weeklong trip away, during which time the cleaners would come, so the house had to be both vacation-clean and cleaners-coming-tidied. Not fun. I gave the girls their first week's reading-practice prize--a blind bag pony and blind bag Shopkin. Lucia's been doing great with her daily reading practice, and as everyone knows I like to buy the girls their favorite tiny things, so the reading-practice incentive is win-win for all of us. In the evening, Katherine, Patrick, and Thomas arrived, to much excitement. L&G had been eagerly awaiting their arrival all day. A whirlwind of Shopkins and pony introductions ensued. Sun., 8/21 Katherine and I went to yoga first thing in the morning, and then we packed up the cars and...

The past few days, L&G have really just been happy to be home. All they've wanted to do is play with their stuff--all their stuff. All together, all at once, creating by the end of day a huge, house-size soup of stuff. Shopkins, ponies, animal figurines, play food, Equestria Girls, Playmobil food, Legos, kinetic sand, Beanie Boos. It's been blazing hot, but they haven't even asked to go to the pool. They just want to stay inside and play. We did go to the library twice so far, getting stacks of books. Today we read together nearly all day. We've found a new series called Never Girls, which is really cute and has totally captivated them. (Hence our two-days-in-a-row library visits. We read #1 straight through and had to go back for more in the series.) I'll miss our regular library trips once school begins. With school just a few weeks away, I've set up a reading challenge for Lucia--if she reads out loud every day (about 20 mins), she gets a sticker on a...

Beach week! We spent last week in North Myrtle Beach, all together in our cousin's beach condo: Andrew, the girls, and I, plus Molly, Luca, and Mom and Dad. None of us had been to North Myrtle before, and there was so much to do. We spent almost every morning at the beach, and then did some swimming in one of the condo's pools. We took a few excursions as well, and had some delicious restaurant meals. Here are a few highlights: --All three kids learned how to use a boogie board. Lucia, the eldest, was the most proficient, and she was beyond excited at her new skill. She said it was her favorite thing about the trip. --We visited the Alligator Adventure animal park, which was surprisingly fun--tons and tons of huge alligators, plus lots of other somewhat terrifying creatures. We watched a reptile show, and all the kids touched a skink. And learned the word "skink." The admission price included a second visit for free, so we went back to watch an alligator feeding--...

Friday's another one of those days that I remember little about, even though it was yesterday. I know the girls played a lot and made a gigantic mess of games and ponies and Shopkins. And Andrew and I got a babysitter in the evening and went out to dinner with friends. We also met with a contractor and then an architect about our basement renovation. It's moving ahead nicely. Today the girls slept in till 8:30am. They played for a while and then Lucia had a birthday pool party to go to over lunchtime. While she was gone, Andrew, Greta, and I went to the basement to start a massive cleanout. Greta was immersed in playing with pony stuff while Andrew and I tackled the scary area behind the refrigerator, plus the root cellar. We threw away a lot and sold a lot. We packed up all the stuff we're keeping and moved it to the attic. We made great progress and kept working even after I picked up Lucia. L&G were in a mood of happy cooperative playing, and they basically were on...

Today I took the girls for a walk on the Fairy Trail in the local nature reservation, a lovely adventure that was recently written up in the New York Times. It'd been on my to-do list all summer, so today the girls chose it over the zoo, and off we went. And it was pretty thrilling to start walking along the trail and spot the fairy houses--L&G were so excited each time they saw one. They stopped after a while to make their own fairy things--a campfire from a ring of stones and flame-colored leaves was the highlight. The reservation is beautiful, and we were having an extremely pleasant stroll. But then the stroll started going on and on and on, and I knew approximately how long it was supposed to be, and this was much much longer. And we were no longer passing other people. And there were no more trail markers, or fairy houses. We were lost in the woods--on a trail, yes, but not the right one. Fortunately, L&G were game for hiking and hiking, and eventually we made our...

Monday was a rainy rainy day. Right now, as I write this, it's only Wednesday, but for the life of me I can't remember even one detail about Monday. Not one. Was I even here??? Tuesday started off on an unfortunate note. In search of some packing material, I went down to the basement like I've been doing for the past four years, la la la, just going down to our basement, not even thinking about it, not scared, not even of the scary root cellar, and then, when I turned around to go out of the raw-storage area, I saw A ROACH by the refrigerator. It was the largest roach I've ever seen, and I've seen my share. My reaction was not in my control (see: phobia born of two nights amid roach-covered walls in Juarez, circa 1997). The next thing I knew I was in the kitchen, screaming and sobbing and hyperventilating, not even able to verbalize to Andrew what I'd seen. When I managed to rasp out roach to Andrew, he went downstairs...but found nothing. And had the gall to ...