Morning Is Broken

I didn't used to hate mornings.

I mean, I'm not a leap out of bed and greet the dawn with a blithe morning song sort of person, but I don't *mind* mornings. Morning is a good time to slog around, eat something, read something, ponder the possibilities of the day. It's not really a good time to interact with other human beings.

Somebody recently was conversing with DOB and made the comment, "You know how kids get up in the morning and they're just so *happy* with everything?"

To which he replied, "No."

Our kids do not wake up happy. On any given day, two or three of them will wake up like me, ready to slowly meander through life but not really wanting to interact with anyone--a difficult task when you have six people in a five-room house. The remaining ones will wake up as hungry, and grouchy, as bears in the spring, ready to scream at the slightest provocation, up to, and including, being served their favorite breakfast. I guess this is the flip side of that metabolism that makes them eager eaters of everything on their plates.

And, let's face it, the grownups are not much better until they have had their morning dose of protein.

I fantasize about having a smooth morning routine where everyone appears at their places with bright shining faces and fully dressed before breakfast. I haven't figured out how to be in the bedroom helping a child who has forgotten how to get dressed and serving as traffic cop in the bathroom and cooking the large and protein-laden breakfast we all find necessary for survival at the same time, though.

And usually, just when I'm trying to do all three, I forget the toast and set all the smoke detectors off as a finishing touch. Except I think I've put the batteries back in wrong now.

At some point after DOB has been delivered to his car with his breakfast and lunch for the day and the children have eaten enough to be able to distinguish between mortal insults and offers of help and I have eaten enough to identify the children individually, I finally can stop to contemplate the day. By that point, it usually doesn't look so good.

I have figured out the solution, though. All we need is to move to a large English country estate with numerous extremely patient servants where we can all wake up in separate wings and have breakfast in bed before we have to get up and face each other.

Berry Picking

Their Majesties kindly invited us over to descend upon their berry patches. Somehow a home was found for all the berries (three flats of strawberries and four or five yogurt containers of raspberries). Of course, you can see where most of them went.

Two Recipes I Want to Save

I'm not going vegan, but I am interested in a cake recipe that doesn't waste eggs and butter on what is basically just a vehicle for berries: Vanilla Eggless and Dairy Free Cake. I used cow milk.

And, still not going vegetarian, why have I never discovered pasta e fagioli before? (Or let's go by the Dean Martin name, Pasta Fazool). It's cheap, it's nutritious, it's really, really easy. The kids called it "spaghetti soup" and devoured it with enthusiasm. (Unfortunately, not with parmesan, because we were out. It's better with, as we discovered on the leftovers.)

QOC and Dot Bake a Cake

QOC: Oh, I forgot to grease the pan. Details, details. I don't like details.

Dot: I don't like details, either.

QOC: Actually, I think you like details. I think when you are big, you will take care of the details for me.

Dot: Yes, I love details. And I always put them in the cake.

Neighborhood

Our house lies in a part of town that isn't quite ready to commit to being town yet. Yes, it's within two minutes of two Large Evil Chain Stores, one in the process of becoming Even More Supremely Evil. But it wasn't that long ago that it was out in the country. We have city water, but our own septic tank. (Or at least a septic-handling device of uncertain vintage.)

The town grows, though, and our little pocket is getting smaller. Over the back fence is a brand-new development with moderately-sized houses on tiny lots, with immaculate yards and tidy driveways. It's actually a low-income development built under a sweat equity program, but it's clear that the people who live there have every intention of being just as nice of a suburban development as anywhere else. Sometimes we sneak through a hole in our back fence and go play on their playground, but we almost never see or hear children, though the few we have met assure us there are many more. Even the dirt seems particularly clean.

On our side of the fence, the houses are smaller, sometimes trailers, and the lots are much bigger and often overgrown, except for the occasional yard whose overflowing abundance of flowers proclaims its owner to be retired. Chickens wander in people's yards and wake us up in the morning. Children ride their bikes next to the road, even though the observed speed limit is closer to fifty than thirty. They say hello to strangers and invite them back to admire the poultry. Probably no one thought twice about seeing the Duchess and Deux standing by the side of the road, holding up signs to invite all and sundry for a visit. It would have been unthinkable on the other side of the fence.

We want to put a gate in the back fence, to make it easier to get between the two.

Renaming

So from the time the Ducklings first began making their appearances, we have operated on a simple numbering system: D1, D2, D3, D4. (This confuses people sometimes--no, no of their real life names start with D.)

This worked for a collection of very small people with as-yet unexpressed personalities, saying assorted random cute things. However, those days are fading, personalities are very much expressed, and it seems like it's time to have real Names. Besides, sooner or later they'll be beyond being called "Ducklings."

But to make it simpler, we'll stick with the letter D. So, presenting the Ducklings:

D1 will now be known as the Duchess, for her commanding presence and royal bearing. And because "Princess" doesn't start with a D.

D2 will be known as Deux, because he is the second born and DOB Jr. (in name and personality)

D3 will be known as Dot, for her reflective and observational qualities.

D4 will be known as Dash, for his speed and energy.

I am, as always the Queen of Carrots, and DOB remains the Duke of Burgundy.

Left to right: Dash, Deux, Dot, Duchess.

Got it?

Unexpected Blessings

A friend sent me this link about Five Things that are Worse than Being in Debt.

I read it. And I don't exactly disagree. It's just that I think so much more could be said.

See, I cut my eyeteeth on the joys of frugality and the virtue of staying out of debt. I squirreled money away like the Long Winter was coming. I knew how to do it, and I was going to do it, too.

We started out married life debt-free, frugal in habits, and determined to work hard.

Then we got hit by a whole bunch of Life. Medical bills upon medical bills. Business failure upon business failure. Unexpected moves. Kids and then more kids. The Long Winter turned out to be a lot longer than anything we could have prepared for.

We missed that whole part where you get into debt having fun and spending frivolously. We got in debt while we were living in small houses, cutting our own hair, hanging cloth diapers up to dry, and eating beans and rice.

And I felt burdened and condemned, because I thought debt was always a punishment or a consequence of foolishness. Every time somebody talked about the virtues of good stewardship or how God had blessed their commitment to staying out of debt, I felt a knife to my heart. I must not have been careful enough, I must not have been good enough, or God must not really care about us.

But I'm starting to realize that I had it all wrong. Debt is no more automatically a sign of God's disfavor or even our mistakes any more than wealth is automatically a sign of God's favor. Debt is like sickness, sometimes the consequence of bad choices, but sometimes just the way things are. And like sickness, it can be a gift from God.

Because, ultimately, God doesn't give a rat's left whisker whether our net worth is $5,000,000 or -$5,000,000. God is after our hearts. And my heart loves money. It loves its own wisdom and self-discipline. It is sick, and it needs to be healed.

So here's a few more things that are worse than being in debt:

It's worse to love money than to be in debt
If you're just substituting getting your satisfaction and security from the size of your bank account instead of from the size of your house, then your commitment to better stewardship hasn't gotten you anywhere spiritually at all. Love of money has many subtle forms, and it's one of the biggest things that gets between us and God. Yes, the Bible talks about debt as servitude. It also says we can serve God even as servants to someone else. God is not limited by our circumstances.

We cannot measure our spiritual status by our net worth. And if voices are telling you that you can, then it's time to turn those voices off. Because they're lying to you.

It's worse to fight over money than to be in debt
I have a contract with a divorce attorney whose clientele consists mostly of well-off professionals. I go through their finances with a fine-toothed comb to make sure everything is listed for the division of property. Some of them have managed their money well, some of them haven't. They're in his office just the same.

Yes, debt can be a stress and stress can lead to fighting. But it doesn't have to. And if different perspectives on money are causing stress, if you think less of your spouse because they're not as committed to living within your means as you are, then it's time to drop it. Because nobody gets richer from divorce except lawyers.

It's worse to be proud than to be in debt
I've always been pretty impressed over my own ability to save money. I looked down on those who spent money unnecessarily and lived outside their means. I was surely thankful that I was not such as one of them.

I'm not even going to carry this further, lest I find a new grounds for being proud of myself.

It's worse to say no to the adventure than to be in debt
There were a few choices we could have made differently. We could have waited to have kids until our income was greater and more stable. We could have stayed put two years ago instead of moving and changing careers. We would be in a much better financial position from either of those. But I'm not sorry we did those. I don't think those were foolish choices. Money can be earned later, but time never comes back.

I'm not advocating reckless spending or irresponsibility. I hope to work hard and keep living frugally and maybe this time at last we'll be able to pay things off. But I'm beginning to learn that that's just a personal goal, not a spiritual goal. God is with us and blessing us just as much in debt and loss as in financial stability.

The Birthday Boy

He's a big boy now, and don't you forget it. He can carry the compost bucket all by himself, and fights for the privilege. He likes things with wheels, and things with dirt (but not in his eyes).
He likes to listen to Uncle Wiggly and Winnie-the-Pooh. His character from The Incredibles is Dash. He likes to help with almost anything. He likes to eat almost anything. He likes to stand on his head.
In fact, about the only thing he doesn't like is sitting still. Unless he's driving a car.

The Birthday Girl

She's got a lot of opinions. She likes girls, of course. And Papa. And D2 and D4. But not monsters. Except for girl monsters. (She's currently very fond of Edwina, The Dinosaur Who Didn't Know She Was Extinct. Because she's a girl dinosaur.)

She loves listening to Little House on the Prairie and quotes it at length randomly throughout the day. ("It's a long, long way to Indian territory.") She likes to play Baby Carrie while D2 plays Jack, or perhaps Jack-Jack (of The Incredibles--an interesting combination). She liked The Incredibles, too.

Her favorite things are playing dress-up and reading books and helping D1 or Mama (preferably D1). She wanted a princess birthday cake but was perfectly satisfied with a crown. She knows how much three is and she's happy to be there. But she might turn six or seven next.

Every Day

It is the appropriate thing to whine about the everydayishness of housekeeping tasks, of how you wash the dishes only to have them dirty again a few moments later, of how there's no point making a bed that is only going to be slept in again.

The process of moving has reminded me that there is a great comfort in things that have to be done over and over. There are an infinite number of opportunities to get it right. If dinner was a flop yesterday, I have a chance to do it better today. If the laundry overflowed its boundaries today, I can keep trying to catch up tomorrow.

Rarer tasks lack that opportunity. I will be staring at the drippy paint over the shower for the next ten years. And by the time I get around to painting again, I will have forgotten everything I figured out about it this time and will probably drip away.

After change and turmoil and transition, there's a great comfort in a day of just doing ordinary things. Of seeing the pile of dishes rise and fall like the tide. Of raising the shades (which still won't roll correctly) and letting the morning sunshine in, and lowering them at night.

The Duchess Turns Seven

See that Hansel-and-Gretel cottage cake? Guess who made it allllmost all by herself?

D1 is growing by leaps and bounds. She has moved on to reading long books with small print, preferably books of fairy tales. She likes to draw, preferably princesses. And she likes to cook, preferably birthday cakes. She can get everybody ready to go, in the car and buckled while I am still trying to remember where I left my purse.

It's great to have a big girl.

This is no fair

My weird aunt died suddenly last Tuesday. She was the person who taught me music and Shakespeare and baking fabulous cookies, who introduced me to Gilbert and Sullivan and science fiction and Magic: The Gathering and Sandra Boynton and personality analysis. We used to debate and analyze for hours, and more recently we instead stayed up far too late playing strange card games.

I'm glad she's out of pain, but I'm going to miss her terribly.

Style and 5 year old boys

I hate FDA-approved (or whoever it is that approves it) pajama fabric, all synthetic and treated and ooky feeling. I just don't see that my children are in greater danger of spontaneous combustion while sleeping than while playing. So instead Her Majesty makes them lovely untreated flannel pajamas for winter and for the summer I just pick up a few extra t-shirts and some knit shorts at the thrift store.

This week I got some pieces for D2 and was rather pleased that I managed to coordinate them. I found a pair of orange shorts and a grayish-green shirt with a bright orange tiger printed on it. Then I found some navy shorts and a periwinkle Gap t-shirt with "GAP" in navy.

Tonight D2 wanted to wear his new pajamas. He found the orange shorts, so I dug around and found the tiger shirt.

"That doesn't match!" he complained.

"Yes, it does," I said. "See, there's orange here to match the orange on the shorts."

"But not very *much* orange."

So I tried digging out the other pair. "See, they're both blue."

"But it's not the *same* blue. "

"Well what are you going to wear then?" I asked.

He took the orange shorts and the blue shirt and went and put them on. I don't get it.

Exploring

Some pictures (courtesy D1, which is why she's in none of them) of the kids in our new yard. I've only had to rescue two boys out of the laurel bushes so far.

Conjugation

We are moved.
We have been moved. (Thanks to many helpful people.)
We shall be moved. (When we figure out where everything goes.)

Right now it's time to feel like the old sailor. And note that this is a *really* bad time to come down with the stomach flu. But not quite as bad of a time as last week would have been.

Grammar Commando Rides Again

The Grammar Commando has been lured out of a long hiatus by QOC absent-mindedly posting as her Facebook status, "After spending the whole morning scrubbing, our new house suddenly seems plenty big enough."

"Ha!" says GC. "The house was scrubbing, was it? How lucky of you to get a self-scrubbing house!"

(A more logical construction: "After spending the whole morning scrubbing, I think our new house is plenty big enough." It's QOC that was spending the whole morning scrubbing, and nobody else. Well, except the ducklings for about three minutes. His Majesty is busy taping and wielding tools.)

But, now that GC is out of hiding, she will add an error QOC would never commit.

"Chalk full"

Really? Full of chalk? What on earth is full of chalk except an unopened package of sidewalk chalk?

No, what you're thinking of is "chock full," i.e., full to the point that they had to chock (carefully wedge) in the last bits. Which could apply, metaphorically, to a book being chock full of ideas. But it probably doesn't have chalky ideas in it.

Status Report

Potty Training: Almost there. They've got the idea. D4 persisted in a triumph of willpower over lack of readiness, but he finally started figuring it out after several days of trauma for all concerned. They still have accidents. D4 still won't use full-sized potty. I spend a lot of time debating under what circumstances they earn chocolate. Still, I packed up all my diaper covers and training pants and sent them to Goodwill yesterday. (I saved the diapers for a lifetime supply of cleaning cloths.) Disposables will actually not be that greatly reduced, since I don't think we're anywhere close to staying dry at night yet.

Packing: Agonizingly slow. I'm trying to retrieve all the little pieces of everything and get them in the same boxes as all the other small pieces of the same category. And make sure we only take our stuff. And clean, and purge, and organize. And not murder anyone who discovers a cool lost toy in a box and drags it back out again.

Moving: We closed on the house on Thursday. Now we need to clean it very thoroughly, then paint and do some minor fixes. We're hoping to move Memorial Day weekend, which we realize is terrible timing because everyone able-bodied in the country will be out camping, but it's when we think we'll be ready. People have started to give me plants, and I'm very excited about that.

Colds: The kids have had them. Now I do. Bleah.

7 Quick Takes: The Potty Training Edition

1. I had a GREAT plan for potty training the twins. We were going to wait until July. They'd both be three. The weather would be warm and sunny for minimal clothing. Grandma R., a seasoned potty trainer, would be visiting. We'd be all moved and settled in. The floor plan of the house has a large kitchen/dining area with vinyl flooring and a toilet and washing machine right off them. It was going to be great.

2. D3 decided on Sunday that wearing diapers hurts, and just like with sucking her fingers a month ago, that was the end of that. Being a little girl who likes to wear dresses makes it much easier. She doesn't even need reminders anymore.

3. D4 believes anything she can do, he can do better. Only he can't. But he won't believe me. Nor will he accept the idea of wearing diapers again. Or of training pants. "No! I won't wear those round diapers!" I am doing a lot of laundry.

4. Just because I feel it necessary to counterpoint conventional wisdom, I will point out that girls are not necessarily easier to train than boys, since D1 was approximately 23 times harder (counting by months) or 750 times harder (counting by accidents) than D2.

5. And my kids never read the potty training books about never trying to potty train right before a big, stressful event. They have a radar for big, stressful events. Which is why D2 decided to potty train right before the twins were born. On the plus side, this meant that Grandma R. and Wondergirl did all the work, because I couldn't reach the ground.

6. That bit about cloth diapers helping children potty train sooner because they feel wet is hogwash, too, as far as my kids are concerned. They just get used to feeling wet. Maybe I should have changed them more often. Oops.

7. D4 has all the pieces, he's just having trouble putting them together. I think going bottomless for a few days would do the trick. He's not inherently opposed, just finds it too chilly. And he did not welcome the suggestion of wearing D3's dresses. However, Her Majesty has had a brainstorm: she's persuaded him that several grown-up sized old t-shirts (especially with military themes) are in fact knight costumes. Clothed in such manly attire that will keep his legs warm and still allow for airflow, I'm hopeful that it will all click. Soon. 'Cause otherwise I'm going to be doing a lot of laundry for an awfully long time.

More quick takes at Conversion Diary.

What manly men wear for potty-training. Even though it's Grandma's.

The Opposite of Magic

In the church I grew up in, the pastors made a special point, it seemed like at each instance of celebrating communion or baptism, of saying, "Now, there's nothing magic about this bread (or water). This is just something we do in obedience."

Something in me always rebelled against that. If there was nothing special about it, why go through it? Why would God order meaningless actions? But, no, I didn't really believe in magic bread or water, so I let it lie.

Over the past couple of years, as we've explored sacramental churches and stepped back and then explored again, I've come to realize that a sacrament is the opposite of magic. Magic is an intangible action--a word, a gesture, a symbol--to generate a physical result. But a sacrament is a physical action to transmit a spiritual reality.

We are physical beings. And we are spiritual beings. In the sacraments, God promises to meet us on both levels. And as we began to acknowledge it as such (and recognize that God had indeed been present to us, in that way, all through the years of being told that there was nothing special but we were going to do it anyways), we've begun to see a whole lot of things differently.

We've begun to see that salvation isn't something that rests on the fervency of our own faith, or the complexity with which we can articulate doctrine. It rests simply on the work of God in Christ. It is not a deal to be signed by those who have reached the age of consent, but a meal to be shared with all who come. And looked at that way, it no longer made any sense to keep from sharing it with our children.

Which is why we celebrated this Easter by having all four of the children baptized and receive first Communion.

Do they understand it all? Neither do we. When was I "saved," after all? Was it the first time I prayed the prayer, hiding in the grass as a toddler? Was it when I was seven and wrote it out in my Bible? Was it when I was baptized at eight because my older siblings were? Was it when I was twelve and the enormity of God dying for me hit for the first time? Was it when I wrestled with and walked through doubts as a teenager and young adult?

Or was it all God the whole time? Did it matter how clearly I understood or simply whether I received? Did Jesus, who commended us over and over to the faith of a little child, really mean to tell us that their faith didn't count?

So today we recognized the gift of faith in them and permitted them to receive God's grace through baptism. The older ducklings can answer catechism questions with the best of them, and the twins know that they belong to Jesus. Will they have doubts? Surely. Will they have a crisis of faith, of wondering if it is really theirs or just something inherited? Very likely. I will probably have a few more crises of my own. But that won't change what God does, nor do I hold back from receiving His grace now because I might not take advantage of it in the future.

In Which I Type Up A Bunch of Stuff

I'm typing with my laptop hanging off the edge of the loveseat, the battery about to die, wishing I'd brought a book instead of a computer. Except I probably would be done with the book by now, too.

I really wish I had my Nook. I've been saving up for it for months and I finally have enough, but no time to go to the store and get it. (Yes, I could order, but I want to look at it and feel it first.) I have thought of a thousand times it would be handy to have. I'll probably break it in three weeks.

The reason I can't move is because there is a small head with closed eyes resting on my other side. D4 interrupted the morning preparations for church by throwing up. I stayed home with him while DOB took the others out to church. So there is no one to send for a book. We watched Bob the Builder and then a video of old family movies. A lot changes in forty years.

DOB had his first trial last week. He got a decent verdict. (It was public defense of a civil commitment--the fellow was undoubtedly crazy, but he got to keep a few key rights rather than having a complete guardianship.) DOB had a wonderful time objecting and cross-examining and then came home and wished he could just die and get it over with. I think he should be over the adrenalin detox in a few days. He's feeling happy to get back to estate planning and other boring stuff.

We have a contract on a house and are moving forward with it. It's a great location and price and a huge lot, but the house is currently pretty small and plain (two bedrooms, one bathroom, and a mysterious toilet in the back entry. Also a basement). We have plans for a massive expansion in a couple of years. But right now we'll just be happy to get moved. And we hope it comes through, because we're putting a bit of money into it in advance of closing so that we don't have to get a construction loan.

Now I'm getting the Low Battery warning. The end is near.

Maybe good, maybe not

D3 has been a compulsive finger-sucker since she first discovered that she had them. She's not just a situational finger-sucker, either. No, anytime the fingers are not actively employed in handing food in, they are in the mouth. They always look white and shriveled and smell like stale saliva.

So I'd been thinking about when and how to break her of this, and always, when the peaceful sound of focused sucking signaled that naptime had begun, come to the conclusion that now was not the best time.

Sunday, right as the church service was starting, she started whimpering over a cut finger. I had to quickly rummage through the back of the church for the first aid kit (fortunately I knew where it was owing to the events of my first visit to the church). I found a small round bandage and we persuaded her it was enough for now.

Not until we got home did we realize the horror of what had happened: it was one of THE fingers. And not until I tried to get her to take a nap that afternoon did I truly realize the full horror. She had no idea how to go to sleep without them.

"Try sucking your thumb," I suggested "Many people enjoy thumbs. Or what about your left hand?"

"They don't work!" she wailed. Nor would she put the finger in her mouth, with or without a bandaid.

Finally I gave up, being in desperate need of a nap myself, and called in the reinforcements. DOB finally managed to rock her to sleep, at great cost to his own afternoon.

Fortunately by bedtime she was so tired that she fell asleep rather quickly. But the same pattern has repeated all week long: no nap (which usually means she wakes D4 up after 45 minutes, instead of the blissful 3 hours we had been enjoying), then conking out at bedtime. One would think that tiny cut would have healed by now, but she insists that it still hurts.

I would be happy that we have found a way that at least is not my fault to be rid of the habit, except today I realized what is replacing it: she's sucking on her lower lip. Now she's got a red rash all along the underside of her mouth.

There's no winning this one.

I'll have to explain this one later

Last night DOB and I went to a young lawyer's event. It happened to be at a restaurant in the same building where one of the attorneys I work for is. We arrived about 5:45 and DOB started to put his shoes on (he never drives with them on) only to have one of the strings break. Only it didn't break clean--the outer part bunched up and left the tough inner core. He could neither tie his shoes nor pull the lace out to replace with a new one.

Both of us rifled our stuff, but we had nothing sharper than a key, and keys weren't doing it.

Finally I had an idea--I could run upstairs to the attorney's office and borrow scissors. When I got upstairs, the door was locked, but I have a key. So I let myself in. The receptionist had gone, but the legal assistant and the attorney were both in their offices, both on the phone. The legal assistant's desk faced the front desk, so she watched me as I waved, rifled through the receptionist's desk for scissors, and then left.

The shoe string cut, I let myself back in upstairs, where everyone was still on the phone. I put the scissors back and walked out.

D3 Anticipates Adulthood

QOC: So when you are three, you can go in the big potty.

D3: And wear big underwear. And drive in the car by myself with children in the back. And have brown hair.

D3 Explains Disaster Relief

D3: The people in Japan had all their stuff washed away by a big wave, so we have to give them their washcloths back. At the store.

'Tis Done

I am a lawyer.

Despite being admitted to the practice of law somewhere for over a decade now, this is the first time I've really tried to be a *lawyer*. Yes, I went to law school. Yes, I passed all those bar exams. Yes, I convinced the board of governors of my own state that their rules gave me permission to apply when they thought otherwise.

But actually practicing? Well, for many reasons, it's never happened. Until now.

And even so, I don't really feel like I'm practicing law. Mostly I sit at home and read and look up and write things; they just happen to be about law. I get interrupted by requests for snacks and toilet paper. I've only worn my suit three times.

Still, it counts. And it feels good. I like being a lawyer for real this time. I like learning from people who have been doing it for longer than I've been talking in sentences. I like that I can do this work and still have the time and presence to take care of my primary job. I'm grateful that I have the ability to do work I enjoy that makes enough to help out.

It's been a long and sometimes overwhelming path to get here. I've had to come to terms with the possibility that nowhere is it written that a good mother must do it all herself. I've had to admit to myself that this is something I actually want. And I've wanted to give it all up many times when it just seemed too big and scary.

Many thanks to DOB for helping me to be more myself. Many thanks to family for providing support and babysitting. Many thanks to the ducklings for being happy and helpful and flexible. Many thanks to two attorneys for taking a chance on training someone who'd never really done this. Many thanks to God for giving me the courage to try.

I'll try to do a good job.

Small Heresy

I am teaching the twins' Sunday School class, a choice that is probably ill-advised because:

a) I am pretty lousy with 2 and 3 year olds.
b) the twins are two-thirds of the class, and
c) they spend most of it fighting over my lap.

However, things are getting a little better, and today we actually had a pretty decent lesson about the Trinity. D4 was coloring a paper with a triangle on it, each point with a label of "Father," "Son," and "Holy Spirit." Then he turned it over and started marking on the back.

"Dis is God da Fadder," he said, pointing to his mark.

"OK," I said, pleased to hear the lesson was taking hold.

He drew another mark: "What's dis?"

"That must be God the Son," I said.

"OK," he said, and drew another mark.

"And there is God the Holy Spirit," I said.

He continued on, making a fourth mark. "What's dat?" he asked.

"I don't know," I said.

"Dat is God da Car!" he exclaimed in triumph.

Miscellaneous

We have lived through February. Well, we've still got a few hours to go, but it looks like we shall survive them. DOB got back from his trip OK, I went on my trip OK, I'm still waiting to hear that I'm an official lawyer and hoping the word comes soon.

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We had snow last week. Multiple times. This is wrong, wrong, wrong for the end of February. It's crocus and daffodil-shoot time! The ducklings still had a good time in the snow (except for D3, who had a good time coming back inside and curling up under a blanket).

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We are starting to house-hunt and working on persuading mortgage companies that we are good, steady sort of people despite the gaps in our employment history. This is definitely the wrong time of year to look at bank-owned houses in the dark and the cold.

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It has been brought to my attention that I am posting all the cute kid stuff on Facebook these days. This is not really because I don't like blogging anymore, but because I don't have to think up a title on Facebook. Or feel like I'm making it too short if I only post a two-sentence conversation. Nonetheless, here is an accumulation for those who would like to see it:

D1 & D2: "Hey, we found some full bottles of whiskey!" Me: "Those are *empty* bottles of *sparkling cider*." I think they've been reading too much Tintin.

D1's proposed science experiment: "I think we should all get olives or oranges on our fingers and see who can poke through the fastest."

Today in church I learned that my new square-heeled pumps are exactly the right height to serve as garages for Hot Wheels.

Beauty tip: The day of an important formal dinner is probably not the best time to make multicolored playdough with your kids.

D4: I'm not going to cry at AWANA. Crying is for naptime and bedtime.

D2 Quantifies His Hunger

D2: "I am hungrier than 100 wolves!"

QOC: "What about 101 wolves?"

D2: "I am as hungry as 101 wolves."

DOB: "What about 102 wolves?"

D2: "They would be hungrier than me."

(I'm thinking if the meal had been potato soup instead of spaghetti he would only have been as hungry as, say, three wolves.)

What a Day Looks Like

At least, a day like today . . .

6 a.m. DOB's alarm goes off. He hits snooze a couple of times, then gets up. I get up, get dressed and go upstairs to fix his breakfast (two egg sandwiches on rye, to go, plus an orange); pack his lunch (yesterday's leftovers); start the skillet granola for the kids' breakfast; remember that it's my day to fix supper, panic, consider the leftovers, then start a big pot of black beans to go with the eight cups of leftover rice; and start fixing cheese sandwiches for lunch. Wonder why I always wind up trying to cook three meals at once.
6:30 a.m. DOB grabs his breakfast and lunch and leaves. I sneak back to my room and hide out on the computer until
7:30 a.m. when the noise of ducklings playing in the living room becomes too loud to avoid. I get up and change and dress the twins and convince the big kids to make their beds and get dressed. D2 decides to wear a hooded t-shirt--backwards.
8 a.m. We eat breakfast downstairs (The skillet granola didn't turn out very well today--I don't think I should let the oil and honey heat in the skillet before the oats.) Various meltdowns over who gets how many seconds of which items. We have morning prayers and I tell them the story of the Transfiguration.
8:45ish I take the breakfast dishes back upstairs and clean things up. D4 follows me and races his bike all morning. The other three are busy downstairs, doing something that does not involve screaming, so I don't investigate. Hooray for me, I remember to turn the beans off so they don't burn while we're gone.
9:45ish We get socks and shoes and jackets on and get in the van. Wednesday is our running errands day, but we have a short list today, so we're getting a late start.
10:10ish We arrive at the library. I decide to park between the library and the waterfront park (they're a block apart) since we are having a picnic at the park afterwards. We fill our bag with reserves, then head back to the children's section. D1 selects some more fairy tales (as always); D2 decides he wants books about sea creatures and then spots The Lorax and is lost to the world. D3 and D4 play with the puzzles and pull board books off the shelf.
10:50ish I notice that the children's section of the library is starting to smell really bad. I notice that it is coming from D4's direction. I decide it is time to head back to the van.
11:00 We finally make it to the front desk and I check out. The librarian gets her day's amusement watching me try to get the right coat back on the right kid and rouse D2, who is now lying on the floor in the middle of the library reading The Lorax.
11:05 We walk the half-block out to the van, hauling a very full library bag and a couple of extra stacks, only to realize that I left the purse at the counter in the library. I briefly consider leaving the bag by the van (it's a sunny, dry day), consider the awful consequences if someone made off with them, and haul the full bag, two extra stacks, and four kids all back to the library. The smiling librarian hands over my purse.
11:10 We get back to the van and I realize I never brought the diaper bag at all. Fortunately I also never clean out the van, and there's a stray diaper and some paper towels that will serve.
11:20 We finally make it to the park with our lunch and a large bag of stale bread for the birds. We suddenly become the most popular people at the park as birds gather around looking for bread and children gather around looking for bread to give to the birds.
11:50 We eat our lunch. (Toasted cheese, peppers, apples)
12:00 We head back to the car via the beach. D4 is still freaked out by the beach after we nearly got caught by the rising tide last fall. We all take note of bird footprints in the sand.
12:20 We get to the grocery store to pick up the week's supply of milk, plus bananas on general principles and avocados and spinach to go with supper. D4 insists on getting a car cart.
1:00 We pick up the regular babysitter (shall we call her MP, for Mary Poppins?) who comes on Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons. I am deeply grateful to have someone of sufficient stature to help with hauling everything in.
1:30 The older ducklings are already playing The Adventures of Robin Hood on CD while they cut pictures out of magazines; MP is getting the twins ready for naps. I retire to my room. Over the next three and a half hours, I do two hours of legal work, plus a small amount of napping, reading (A Whole New Mind by Daniel Pink, not as great as its back represents but has some interesting further reading recommendations), laundry folding, and checking message boards. I consider going for a walk, but figure I have had lots of fresh air and walking today.
5:00 I head upstairs to fix supper. The twins are back up and MP has organized a game of hide and seek.
6:00 We sit down to supper (black beans with rice, hardboiled eggs, steamed spinach, guacamole, orange slices) with Their Majesties; they will take MP back home on their way to visit Her Majesty's parents.
6:45 DOB pulls in as we are clearing the supper dishes. He walks in and settles the crisis that has arisen while he is walking in the door (D2 has knocked down D4's sofa cushion fort); when he heads downstairs D2 and D4 commence to happily building forts together. I bring him his supper downstairs and go back up to do the dishes. D1 gets her pajamas on right after supper since it is her night to have a special play time with DOB. D3 starts coloring, then gets annoyed when her hands get covered with ink and soaks her dress washing it off.
7:20 I finish the dishes and persuade D4 to accompany me downstairs; D1, D2, and D3 are all piled on the loveseat reading new library books. D3 apparently has already memorized Each Peach Pear Plum from someone reading it to her. DOB finishes his supper and he and D1 go off to race cars. I get the other three ready for bed and read to them.
7:50 We have evening prayers and tuck everyone into bed.
8:00 I fix dessert and tea for me and DOB. I start writing this.
9:00 We should have already quit and headed for bed by now.

Faces

Various Things

D4 is enraptured with the William Blake poem, "The Tyger." We borrowed a book from the library that included it along with a vivid illustration of a tiger, and now he begs for it, "Tiger tiger burning bright, in da forest of da night!" However, trying to explain poetic imagery to a curious but literal-minded 2 and a half year old is a challenge.

Blake: "Tyger, tyger, burning bright/In the forest of the night."
D4: You said bright! It's not bright!
QOC: Well, it's bright orange.
Blake: "What immortal hand or eye/could frame thy fearful symmetry? In what distant deeps or skies/burnt the fire of thine eyes?"
D4: You said fire! There's no fire!
QOC: Well, the tiger kind of looks like a fire.
Blake: (continues on to the end of the poem.)
D4: Read it again!

D4 also believes he, personally, owns the Eiffel Tower and has climbed it many times. He talks about it in long, convoluted stories that we can barely follow. If it turns up in a picture in a book (which it does often, because we're studying France right now), he won't let us ever turn the page again.

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Thanks to some good friends, we got some amazing portraits of the ducklings last weekend, which I will post when I get around to it. What amused me was the way the different ducklings reacted to the picture shoot. D1 was cooperative, but stiff. The photographer started asking her about her favorite story (Cinderella) and she immediately became relaxed and animated for some great shots. D2 was somewhat abstracted, and when the photographer started asking him about Robin Hood, he became so abstracted he could hardly look at the camera. D4 was cooperative but clueless. D3 sat down on the stool, tipped her head just so, and smiled her most photogenic smile.

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Sadly, DOB's grandfather died last weekend. He has flown out there for the funeral (and, conveniently, his sister's wedding and the brotherly Super Bowl bash). Well, actually he's flying to Minneapolis this morning and then hoping they start flying planes into Ohio again sometime soon. They keep canceling his flight and moving it later owing to the blizzard. B5 is flying back with him.

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I'm going to be taking a course in Seattle in two weeks that will allow me to get my active law license back. It's an intense two-day course meant to be almost as annoying as retaking the bar exam. With that and the trip to Ohio, DOB and I will be apart nearly as much this month as we have in our previous seven and a half years.

Robin Hood and His Merry Munchkins

It started innocently enough, with a picture book about Robin Hood D1 found in her ever-beloved folk and fairy tales section of the library. It was quite well done, a story and an illustration on each page. We read through it slowly.

By the end, we thought it was time they saw the old Errol Flynn movie, which they all watched and loved. D3 would quiver and giggle with excitement every time a sword fight broke out.

Then some random box movements unearthed an adult-sized costume of Lincoln green. More ideas took hold. A play! With all the cousins! (Script still unwritten, remaining actors still unrecruited, and perhaps most seriously, none of the main actors can bring themselves to utter a word while performing. But these are all trivialities.)

And then more box movements disclosed the old Howard Pyle version of Robin Hood, so now I have to read all the way through that, even though *I* don't know how to pronounce some of the words. (Trysting?) They found a classic N.C. Wyeth illustration in a book of anthologies, so now we'll be getting that one from the library and copying all the pictures.

And now D2 has found himself a mighty long bow (though no arrows yet) and is posing a threat to all and sundry, mostly of being accidentally whacked with it. D1 alternates between being Maid Marian and Will Scarlet, depending on how much action she is craving. D3 either understudies Maid Marian or plays "the horsie." D4 is the dragon. (OK, I haven't heard about the dragon either. But there he is--you can see him.) And they know how to get more members for their band: just pick a fight, lose, and then they'll be begging to join up. Hey, it works in the book!

On a Brighter Note

I've been whining a lot lately, so let's try mentioning three happy things. That save money, no less!

1. Last summer the dentist told me I had two (maybe three) cavities and it would cost at least $750 to get them filled. We thought this was a bit steep and procrastinated. Then a dentist in one of DOB's networking groups suggested I come in and he would give me a bid on them. This week I finally went in and had him look at them. And he said . . . I *don't* have cavities. My teeth aren't the rotting kind. So it's not worth it to fill tiny pits. I never knew there could be a difference of opinion about cavities, but since my teeth don't hurt, I'll take his word for it.

2. We sold the van! Not quite for bluebook, but for a good bit more than we owed on it.

3. The camera has been broken for a month or two. Everything worked except the button that actually took the pictures. I kept hoping I would find someone who could safely take it apart and unjam the button. This week I've been starting to really wish for it again to help with school for D2, who tends to work in three dimensions instead of things easy to put in a notebook. Yesterday morning when I woke up to him building towers inspired by the Eiffel tower and French cathedrals, I thought I'd pull it out one more time and see if I could get it to work. And it worked just fine.

Not With a Bang, But a Whimper

The new year has not begun with any great resolutions, new programs, or grand undertakings. However, it has begun. We are slowly improving, thanks to time, patience, and the power-of-two-gallons-of-yogurt pills prescribed by the naturopath next door to DOB's office. The kids remain in good health and high spirits.

Wondergirl has been over several times with new plastic totes in suitable sizes and new ideas for organizing things, so we have been making slow but genuine headway against The Mess That Ate The House.

We are having a lot of fun getting back into school. Too much fun. I wonder if I'm overlooking some Horrible Thing I should be doing so my kids will whine about school, but I haven't figured out what it is. (They even like handwriting, in moderation.) We are starting to study France--just starting with a few books and a few questions and seeing where it takes us. D4 has developed an obsession with the Eiffel Tower. D1 and D2 are more interested in the world wars. And knights, of course. Timelines may still be a bit fuzzy--although D1 actually has a pretty strong historical sense, as evidenced by her asking, when she saw Errol Flynn as Robin Hood with his hands chained to a collar, "When did they start using handcuffs behind people's backs?" (I can see it now: Report by D1 on "Historical Methods of Criminal Restraints and Pretty Dresses of Corresponding Periods.")

I have my first project in my new second contract, and I had two meetings this week. I'm hoping balancing it all will work, but the next month or two will probably be a little busy as I learn the new stuff, finish up my prerequisites for getting my license activated, and try to recuperate from the last two months.

On the Third Day of Christmas

I am hiding out in bed, but the ducklings are still pretty occupied with new toys.

It looks like the ducklings finally did get over The Stomach Flu That Never Leaves. Then we got it. The good news was, it wasn't on the Friday that Ron had three court hearings (all of which he won) and I had an interview for a new contract (which I got). The bad news, it hit both of us at once all weekend. Their Majesties took the ducklings out to get a Christmas tree and D1 and D2 decorated it. D1 put all the glass balls in one spot, and D2 decided to add the packing peanuts. But they are happy with it.

We got a little better on Monday, enough to get out of bed and try to face the world. But not a lot better. D1 wrapped most of the presents. There's no tape left in the house, but the presents were good and covered.

Her Majesty did the Christmas baking I had promised to do while I stayed in bed all Christmas Eve, fighting a relapse. We made it up for Christmas, very very late.

DOB points out that we have a lousy Christmas every three years. Three years ago, the twins were on the way. Six years ago, we woke up Christmas morning at 3 a.m. to the infant D1 vomiting all over her pack'n'play. (And that was after driving hours through a blizzard to make it to the airport and then flying standby to get here.) By contrast, this was pretty tame. It's hard to have a really cruddy Christmas when you have kids old enough to participate and young enough to get excited over opening boxes, let alone what's inside.

I really hope it doesn't take us another four weeks to fully recover from this and get back to just being regularly exhausted. Now that I have two ongoing contracts, we are really hoping and praying we can hire someone able-bodied in here to help out soon. Umm, today maybe?

Uphill Both Ways

So about a month ago we had a little stomach bug run through the kids, not a huge deal although it did seem a bit much coming right on the heels of a big legal-education-project thingy for the grownups.

Then just as everyone was getting better from that and I was all set to get things back to normal, we had a big snowstorm that knocked everything out of commission until Thanksgiving. Then D1 had a regression of the stomach flu. Then we thought she was better.

Then she was suddenly much worse again, and got dehydrated to the point of complete listlessness, which if you know D1 is a shocking sight indeed. But she finally started to improve again, and then it took me several more days to begin to feel human again. Tending to sick children takes out of me all the things I don't have enough to spare of anyway, especially when it's administering tiny doses of fluids around the clock.

So Monday was the first day I started to feel decent, started to work and do school with the kids again. We've had a few social/professional events I've managed to sneak away and attend in all this. I was still pretty tired, but things were beginning to come back together.

Then today D4 started throwing up again. I have NO IDEA what is going on. The doctor we took D1 to thought it might be her system still unbalanced from the former illness and prescribed probiotics. I don't know where it's going to hit next or if that was the end of it. I do know I'm very, very tired of holding one cranky small person while trying to keep the other three fed and occupied.

I don't even want to THINK about how close Christmas is.

The White and Drifted Snow

I probably shouldn't have chosen "Over the River and Through the Woods" as our folksong to learn this month. Repeatedly singing about the joys of an old New England Thanksgiving seems to have brought the appropriate weather out to the Northwest, where the proper Thanksgiving weather ought to be gray drizzle.

The adventure really started on Sunday after church, when we noticed a few flakes of snow. How charming, we thought. It will soon turn to rain, we thought. Or clear up and get cold. And so Wondergirl and Bookworm and I continued with our plans to take the ducklings to the zoo on Monday, since we had yet to make a second use of the zoo passes Wondergirl got for us back in July, what with car problems and busy grownups and all.

On Monday it looked a bit less promising. There was actual snow on the ground. But surely, it wouldn't stick to the roads, would it? Not the real roads that more than three cars use? Besides, Wondergirl used to live in the Northwoods and knew how to drive in snow. So even though it defied all expectations and kept on snowing, we ventured forth, confident that the roads would improve as we got further into civilization.

The snow kept coming, and the roads did not improve, but we were well bundled up and had lots of food in the car in case of emergencies and made it all the way to the zoo, at which point it seemed silly to give up and go back. So we went in. We were half an hour past opening, and the first people to arrive. We decided to stick with the aquarium, which had the advantage of being interesting AND indoors. It was really quite lovely to be able to browse at leisure without having to constantly worry about losing children in the crowd. According to their preferences, D3 stood and watched the same window for nearly the whole time, while the others ran around three times over. There was only one other family there the entire time.

Which was not a very long time, because a zookeeper came out and informed us they were closing the zoo. But we could take our time and head back out when we were ready. Since I was trying to get home for an online class at one, this gave us about as much time as we had planned on. We emerged from the aquarium to find the snow had progressed from powdered sugar sprinkle to cream cheese icing thick.

The good news about the return trip was that there was no danger of injury, because everyone was traveling so slowly. The bad news was, I was in serious danger of missing my class at one. However, we all remained in good holiday spirits and sang all the verses of all the Thanksgiving songs we know, which is quite a few. And I parceled out lunch in slow sequence so that the children would have something to munch on or at least look forward to for the entire long trip home.

We did arrive in one piece and I raced inside to start my class only to discover it really started at three. Which was a pity, because the snow got thicker and thicker and the wind got higher and higher, and it became evident that a class started at three was probably not going to get finished. But I tried anyway.

DOB was at the office and thought, when things started closing down and they started sending everyone home, that he'd just wait for everyone to get off the road and then proceed home himself. He decided against it, though, and therefore arrived all the way home a short while before the power winked out for good. The next morning he thought he would venture forth and discovered a very large tree across the road, pulling down the power lines. He tried to go up the hill on the other side, but gave up when he went more back than forward. It was just as well, as just over the next crest was another tree down.

So we were marooned. Fortunately Their Majesties are well stocked with wood stoves and flashlights and even a generator (except they'd forgotten to get gas) and it really was only a modest inconvenience. Once the wind had died down we went out and inspected the damage to all our favorite climbing trees and climbed on them horizontally instead.

We figured it was a bad sign when Her Majesty called the power company and in the message about the outage it said, cheerfully, "Did you know that if you are without power for more than 120 hours, you qualify for a $50 rebate?"

By Tuesday afternoon the roads were reasonably clear, but there was no sign of light. We had finally persuaded D4 that the power being out was not the end of the world, and that a man would come in a big truck to fix it, a thought which gave him much consolation although he continues to be afraid of the dark.

On Wednesday Her Majesty and I had the bright idea of doing a Christmas present craft project for the kids, which it was great to have done, and I was reminded that the reason I am not the sort of mom who does elaborate, creative crafts to build warm memories with my children is that the warmth in those memories would derive from the increasing vehemence of my feelings and the creativity would be primarily manifest in the language used to describe this paper backing of lamentable heritage and dubious prospects that won't just come off the recalcitrant fabric already. I think we'll stick to memorizing a lot of holiday songs.

Anyway, the power came back on Thursday afternoon, and since all the baking parts of Thanksgiving were taken care of by people whose power was already on, everything went fine. Except that D1 came down sick and we had to leave early. But still, we had much to be thankful for.

Assorted Craziness

1. DOB is learning to be a trial lawyer, so he took a class in it for a very intense weekend last month and then this past Saturday they did a mock trial in a real courtroom with a real judge and real objections (though not enough of them). I got to practice my evidence-fabricating skills by making up pictures to go with the fact scenario: D1 and D3 posed for childhood shots of the plaintiff, and I painstakingly modified a picture of "Mugsys Sports Bar" to become "Chuggies Sports Bar." (No apostrophe--what do sports bars know of apostrophes?) I also got to be a witness. We won, slightly. We learned a lot and had a lot of fun and then met up with some good friends for dinner and got home very, very late indeed.

2. The difference between the first and the fourth baby, as observed with our friends--people who have had their first baby find it turns their life upside down and they can't do *anything* for awhile. People who are on number four realize that they can pull extra babysitting and household help credits and take advantage of that quiet, portable newborn to get out for once.

3. Sunday morning after all of that, we were almost ready for church when D3 threw up all over our new carpet scraps. We decided not to go to church.

4. Carpet scraps--it turns out almost all of DOB's extra feet/ankle/knee problems over the past several months, which we thought were *car* related, were actually *floor* related. (The floors around here being tile, a variety with much value as, for instance, when people throw up all over it.) A quick trip to the carpet outlet and his feet are feeling much better and he can drive again. If only, if only . . .
However, it's very good to have him able to function again.

5. The illness has gone around at least with the kids, but the symptoms are so intermittent and mild it's hard to know when it begins or ends.

6. I'm progressing on taking my online courses, but not so fast as I wanted to. They don't always download so well--especially, some theorize, when it's windy. Or something. Anyway, only nine hours to go. I'm also getting to draft a whole motion for summary judgment. (Which is basically a paper explaining to the judge why you shouldn't bother with a trial because the other side couldn't possibly win.)

7. We also had a windstorm, power outage, and earthquake this week. But I didn't feel the earthquake.

Just In Case You Needed It

Or perhaps I'm the last person on the Interwebs to discover it, but we just found a new way to waste time this week: Wolfram Mathematica Demonstrations. I came across it looking for a way to demonstrate the tides (after we nearly got sloshed by one that was coming in faster than we thought) and we quickly got hooked on all kinds of cool little free doohickeys where you can change This and change That and ooo! See what it does!

And it's got "Mathematics" right there on the top, so it's got to be educational, right?

Synacisms

For many years I've been subject to a particular variety of slip of the tongue which as far as I know is an as-yet unobserved and unnamed phenomenon.

The situation is this: There are two words that have essentially the same meaning, and so your mind is unable to choose between them. Instead of one or the other, out comes a mishmash that combines half of each, which just happens to be another, quite unrelated word. Awkwardly, you grasp for the correct term--and instead produce a second mishmash with the remaining elements, which turns out to be yet another unrelated word.

The first time it happened was when I was much younger, driving about with my siblings, and observed a heavy-set woman working in front of her house. "There's someone working in her lard," I said, and then on further reflection corrected, "No, no, I mean her yawn!"

When I first studied corporate law, I spent a lot of time pondering what exactly happened when a corporation issued shocks--er, that is, stares.

And recently I was telling DOB about how the children went out in the puddles and got their shoots--that is, their booze--soaping, that is, socking, wet.

So I propose a term for this phenomenon: a synacism. Have you ever met one?

The Final Results

From left to right: D2 as a dangerous green and yellow dragon, D4 as a cowboy turned workerman at the last minute when the other cowboy hat vanished, D1 as a medieval princess, and D3 as a cowgirl with a lasso. Guess which parts of the costumes I was carrying within five minutes of arriving at the carnival, along with four balloon animals, the water, and DOB's shoes.

A good time was had by all, and the following morning as they sorted out and compared their candy, D3 composed the following song:

"I see mine! It's all mine! It's all mine! I love that it's mine! I can see mine! ..."

Into the Woods

Fun: Building forts and climbing in the giant maple trees on a sunny fall day.

Not so fun: Clearing out half an acre of nettles in order to get to the trees.

As Long As It's Gray

So the big kids have been thinking a lot about costumes this week, and about the AWANA carnival coming up next week. Actually they've been thinking about it a lot for the past two months.

D1 has remained unvarying in her choice: a princess. However, she's been designing her own costume, including making a headdress loosely inspired by Griselda in The Court Jester which consists of a piece of purple gingham in an embroidery hoop, with purple butterfly charms sewn onto it. (Yes, she did them herself, with some help threading the needle.) I'm not sure what will wind up being on the rest of her, but you can be sure of one thing: She will not look like she got a Disney Princess costume off the rack.

D2 initially varied between being a robot and being a knight. No problem, I said, and made sure his fall wardrobe included a pair of gray sweatpants and a gray thermal shirt. Robot or knight, we're covered with the base, and he already had the knight accouterments, whereas a robot merely required a cardboard box spray-painted silver.

But "indecision" is D2's middle name. As the time drew near, he started thinking about other things. I got worried. DOB suggested a dog or a wolf. "It's OK," I said, "Dogs are gray. Wolves are gray. All it takes is a pair of ears. I can do that." Other ideas came up. D1 made a long list of possibilities (and an equally long list for herself, all variations on Girls Wearing Fancy Dresses), then asked me to correct the spelling and recopied it twice. Most of them could be done in some variation of gray, if not just regular clothes.

Unfortunately, what he finally seems to have settled on is Dragon, after some concern over whether it would violate the carnival's ban on scary costumes. (I pointed out that some dragons are non-scary, like the one in The Reluctant Dragon.) And what kind of boring dragon is gray?

I did dig up an old but not impossibly small bright yellow hoodie that I can sew felt spikes and a tail on. But I'm still kind of hoping he'll switch back to knight before I do it.

And I have an uneasy feeling that whatever I sew, he'll wish at the last minute he'd picked something else.

Picture from D2's Birthday

Impressed by my glamorous cake? He asked for a house. It was a house. He could help make it. We actually got it made. Someday D1 will be old enough to make fabulous complicated cakes like I used to make before I had kids to make them for.

The State of Things

After being absent all summer (and spring, and winter), the sun has finally come out. When it gets high enough to shine over the trees. Not entirely coincidentally, I recently decided to scuttle school in the mornings in favor of going outside. I needed more fresh air. The twins needed more activity in the morning, or they failed to fall asleep until 4:30 in the afternoon, and then had to be woken for supper, and it went downhill from there. The hard part has been persuading the big kids (OK, D1 mainly) that the great big world out there is in fact equally if not more interesting than that of books and drawing.

The main culprit in the aversion to outdoors has been the spiders. This has been an unusually good year for spiders, and for most of September one could hardly take a step outside without getting entangled in a web. Cars parked overnight would sport webs in the morning, sparkling over the slug trails.

As a counterbalancing measure, we read Charlotte's Web and Spiders by Seymour Simon and learned to identify and distinguish them, but academic interest could not entirely overcome the icky sensation of an unexpected face full of web. But the spiders are starting to die off with the advancing fall, and there are compensating activities: raiding the last of the raspberries and huckleberries; making stone soup; spotting rare squirrels, heron nests, and gopher snakes giving birth.

At the same time, the Washington Bar rule change finally became effective and I can qualify for active status again if I take 45 hours of continuing education; half of that has to be live. Then another fifteen hour class for good measure. Fortunately webcasts count as live classes for the first requirement, but even so getting it all in over the next two months so I can be active at the beginning of next year will be daunting. It also looks like the legal research I've been doing will be picking up, for another 15-20 hours a month. Which doesn't seem like that many hours on paper, but it does when someone wakes up early from naptime.

And school? Well, they taught themselves to read last year, so we're already ahead of the game. Why rush matters? They have their whole lives to be chained to desks; best to get them out and running while they still can. Besides, I still hold the best and simplest method of education is to leave a child idle in the presence of heaps of books. It worked for C. S. Lewis and Samuel Johnson. And, less illustriously but more practically, for me. Why not the ducklings?

Give me Five

Someone turned five today, at 8:30 this morning Pacific time, as we discussed in some detail, since it was 11:30 and Eastern time where he was born. Someone likes discussing time zones and looking at maps. And listening to stories. And reading stories. And coloring elaborate abstract designs.

Someone likes to pretend to be a small, cuddly version of a large, ferocious predator. Or dressing up as a hero of old. Someone is so busy inside his own head that it's hard to guess what's really going on in there.

Someone has a whole world that lives inside his stomach. Maybe that's why there's not always room for much dinner. But he still likes cooking meals and eating them. Or at least talking about eating them.

Someone doesn't fit the "typical little boy" profile at all, but is very, very happy being himself. And we're very, very happy to have had him with us for the past five years.

Journey North

So we've decided to sell our current van to eliminate the car payment. We'll be driving Their Majesty's old van instead. This, although it doesn't sound very simple, is much more complicated than it sounds--first, because DOB now uses hand controls to drive upright vehicles, and second, because a day or two after we decided to do this, I backed into my grandpa's old Dodge truck. (I don't know if the truck was damaged--it was hard to tell. But the van's bumper was done for.)

Step one, then, was taking both vans into the shop to get the hand controls switched. Not just any shop does this, of course--and the place we go to have it done is on the far side of Seattle, an hour and a half north if you're lucky about traffic. We originally chose this particular place--they are all pretty far away--because it is close to some good friends of ours. Unfortunately, their kids were getting over something involving vomiting, and our kids were getting over something involving coughing, sore throats, and mysterious rashes, and an exchange of germs seemed ill-advised. So we missed out on the hoped-for visit.

Wondergirl kindly agreed to help out with the driving, though, and we set out with the ducklings parceled out among us to allow both of us to use the carpool lane. I had hoped that stuffing breakfast in their hands (french toast and dried fruit in little baggies) as I buckled them in would make for a quiet ride up, but D3 decided to scream for the first twenty minutes, "I don't want you to drive!" This is going to be a long day, I thought. But after awhile D4 and I started chatting about the fascinating sights of the interstate and she quieted down to eavesdrop.

After the controls were removed from the first vehicle, we were free to go and found a couple of parks to explore and eat lunch at, which more than satisfied the ducklings as to the value of the expedition. On the way back to the shop, we spotted a pair of thrift stores and at Wondergirl's suggestion I seized the opportunity to take the big kids in to try on tennis shoes without having to occupy the twins at the same time.

I figured to time returning right at nap time. (Wondergirl waited for the second car and returned at her leisure, after braving the germs at our friends' house.) Understand that on our usual 10-minute drives back from town right before or after lunch, it is a heroic undertaking to keep D4 from falling soundly asleep, whereupon he wakes up when we arrive and never takes any more nap. But though I played soft music and spoke to no one, and though everyone else fell soundly asleep, D4 remained alert and chatty all two hours home.

At our usual exit there is an intersection that backs up severely in the late afternoon. I figured to avoid it, as is our usual custom, by getting off at the exit before and going around. Which I did--I got off at the exit, went around the roundabout, and got right back on the highway. It had been a long day.

We got home with everyone tired and cranky and I tried pulling out my latest secret weapon in the maternal arsenal: back rubs. I've been teaching them all how to massage each others' backs, and even the twins like to join in, tiny fists pounding. While it didn't make for perfect harmony (mostly on the question of whose turn it was be rubbed or rub), it was a lot better to have consensual pounding on backs instead of antagonistic pounding on heads.

Yesterday we did the only slightly less onerous undertaking of emptying the car of the landfill's worth of detritus that accumulates after about three minutes of buckling in kids. And we took it to a much closer shop to get the bumper replaced.

Laws of Children's Clothing

1. If you want the weather to warm back up, just complete the seasonal clothing switch.

2. If you allow a young boy to choose his own clothes, with or without the assistance of his father, the results will be as follows:
a. If the day's plans are staying at home or playing in the mud with his cousins, the clothing selected will be a nice sweater and a pair of corduroy slacks.
b. If the day's plans are church or going to town, the clothing selected will be a pair of ripped jeans and an old hoodie.

Comes Round the Year

It's one of those times when I get nostalgic and read back through the posts from a year ago, two years ago, three years ago . . . Goodness, there's a lot more history than there used to be. I really should learn how to do a more manageable archive.

Somehow--the revolution of the earth around the sun likely being responsible--the duchy has arrived at seven years of existence. A result that has often been in some doubt, not because we might set off without each other, but because we might just drop dead from exhaustion simultaneously.

Rereading old posts, I wonder how I manage to sound so chipper and sure of myself. I don't have as much momentum as I used to, and I definitely don't know as much as I used to. Sometimes I feel like trolling my old posts. Life's a lot tougher than you think it is, youngster.

And yet . . . it's worth it, too. There's four wonderful people in the world who wouldn't exist apart from us. (It's hard for me to feel like I can take credit for that. . . I mean, it's not like we were really working at it . . . but we've at least done our best with the follow-through.) We've stuck it out through difficulties that have done in many other relationships--and grown closer through them. We still have someone to talk to and laugh with.

Maybe we know less, but maybe it's that less of what isn't so. Maybe we have less starry-eyed optimism, but we have more real experience to count on.

Marriage isn't safe or easy, but it's good.

Conversation

D4: My neck hurts!

QOC: That's because you have a cold.

D4: Take the cold* off me!

QOC: No, you're sick. Your nose is running, your neck hurts. You are sick.

D4: I'm not six, I'm twelve!

QOC: No, sick is not the same word as six.

D4: Oh. I'm sick.

QOC: Right.

D4: My nose is running. My neck hurts. I am sick. I need a book!



*This is what he calls the ice cubes he gets on him when he bangs his head.

Faint Similarity

I write like
Douglas Adams

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

What really cracks me up is I first put in the Not So Simple post and got H. P. Lovecraft. (Not that I've ever read or ever in a million years would want to read H. P. Lovecraft.) Hmmm, I thought, what if I put in a real horror post? So I substituted the You Probably Don't Want to Read This Post and got Douglas Adams, which I can live with. There you go folks: If Douglas Adams had written about potty training, this is what it would read like.

An Equation

R = kO

Where

R is the time to recover from an organizing project.
O is the time actually spent organizing.
k is a constant factoring in the amount of time it takes the children to turn everything back into chaos.

This is why I can never get ahead.

Many Kinds of Peril

A month or so ago His Majesty picked up an old pup tent somewhere and set it up in the garden for the kids to play in. Needless to say, it wasn't too long before the older two were begging to be allowed to sleep out overnight in it.

Now, DOB and I have very different feelings about sleeping outside, and not according to gender stereotypes, either. He cannot conceive of why anyone would want to sleep outside, while I grew up in a family where tents were for sissies and where my aunt and uncle have slept outside every night for decades. (Although they live in southern California, so it doesn't quite apply here.)

Anyway, last Friday we finally agreed to let them have a try, and trotted out the requisite amounts of blankets, pillows, stuffed animals and flashlights. Then everyone remembered they hadn't been potty. Then everyone remembered something else they had forgotten.

Then everything got quiet.

Until ten o'clock, when we heard them at the door. D1 was crying because D2 didn't want to sleep outside anymore, and she didn't want to do it alone. So we sat down and discussed why D2 didn't want to sleep outside any more.

Actually, what we discussed, as D2 brought up one thing after another, was the better-known animals of several continents, their level of danger to humans and their likelihood of coming into the tent. Polar bears were perilous, but wouldn't like the heat. Lions couldn't cross the ocean. Bunnies were near at hand, but afraid of humans. So were deer. Slugs were not afraid of humans, but wouldn't like the tent fabric.

Spiders, though . . . there was no denying that spiders might get in. Whereupon D1 began to look relieved that sleeping out was no longer on the agenda.

We put the quilt over the table instead and let them camp out in the living room. As I passed by a few minutes later, I heard a small voice from under the table, "But . . . couldn't we bonk our heads on the table?"

Flowchart

If you have a 2-year-old daughter who is obsessed with animals,

And if you have a 2-year-old son who is obsessed with trucks,

And if you have a low tolerance for obvious morals and incessant rhyming in children's books,

Then you should definitely not let anyone bring this book home from the library: