Swinging on Birches

"Ward Christopher!!" I hollered up the stairs for what felt like the thousandth time... "If you cannot stop teasing your sister, you are skipping dinner and going straight to bed tonight!  I've had it!" -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- During breakfast, a song plays in the cd player.  The singer croons, " And our babies never cry, and we can look you in the eye, and say, 'I'm not afraid to die-e-e-e .'" Elliot: "What's that mean?" Ward: "It means, he's lived a good life and so he's not afraid to die now." -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I looked at him a thousand times tonight. I thought about how little he still is, in some ways.  Relentlessly teasing his sister, still struggling to swim; he hasn't even lost a ...

Right about this time of year, I start freaking out. It's the "pre-birthday" time. Not my birthday (although my own years seem to be passing ohsofast ), but my son's birthday. Six, this year.  Six. This baby that we hoped for and prayed for and wept for. He came.  And he stayed. And he took our lives and shook them up and pushed them forward and took all the breath out of us. And so, as this time approaches each year and our discussions turn to cake and invitations and a couple of special gifts, my heart begins to beat at an incredibly rapid rate and I try and fit just a little bit more into the current age. More outings. More snuggling. More activities. More sitting and staring at him and squeezing him and begging him to please stop growing. I try and sit and listen more when he tells me about the ninja-ship-training station he's made with his Legos and I try harder to come up with creative answers to whether Lego Luke or Lego Obi Wan ...

Sometimes, when I'm out in public, someone asks me what I do for a living. It's an innocent question, really.  After all, much of who we are stems from what we do, and if nothing else, it allows for some polite chitchat. So, I answer.  "I watch children in my home and stay home with my kids." And then comes the look. Glazed eyes, head nodding gently, benign smile. I can practically see the wheels turning. And for many people in this world that continues to value jobs outside the home so strongly, the idea of staying home and caring for children is truly mind-numbing. And sometimes, it can be. After all, the majority of my days are spent in the mundane. Pack and unpack the travel bag. Change diapers. Start laundry. Wash dishes. Correct behavior. Read stories. Arrange play dates. Prepare meals. And the craziest thing of all? All of these mundane tasks must be repeated ad nauseam. Many times a day. Everyday. For years. But, friends, there is j...

My goal for each week is to make a menu and do my grocery shopping based on that menu. I sit down with some past menu successes and a couple of favorite cookbooks and my computer and go at it.  I do a check on our schedule for the week, and also do a quick run by the Meat Man in case there's anything in particular he's wanting. I have some sites that I will typically search when I'm looking for a recipe of a familiar food ( Pioneer Woman or Annie's Eats ), and other times I use general search sites ( AllRecipes ) or even a search engine.  I've gotten pretty good over the years at gauging whether or not something will be successful in our home just by looking at the ingredients, but every once in awhile I'm surprised by the result. I don't have a lot of patience for recipes that don't come together smoothly (who has time for that!?) and you can read more about how I choose recipes and plan our menu here . I am probably successful at menu planning...

Apparently, I needed a reminder today. Because I obviously  must've forgotten how big life can be in the moments of raising our littles. (Sarcasm font, anyone?) But, I guess that in the day-to-day, I do  forget at times. And some days, the moments are clicking snapshots in my mind. A huge squeeze from small, pajama-clad arms thrown around my neck. Click. Nursery rhymes sung loudly and off-key, complete with hand motions. Click. Gentle discussions on how to handle real life situations. Click. Raucous giggles from conspiratorial boys. Click. Kisses and hugs and reading and laughing and crying and yelling and whispering. Click. Click. Click. And I look back on the day and sigh a great, exhausted sigh of contentment, and I think to myself, these are humans  we're raising. These little people are learning in every look, every gesture, every reaction. And we, hopelessly flawed people that we are, are teaching them ...

Today is March 24th. This morning, it was 17 degrees and we had snow flurries. Today is March 24th. We've been preparing for spring a bit around here. I've been in a crazy purging/organizing frame of mind for about a month now and even the Meat Man is getting into the spirit by spending all of Saturday raking and disposing of the layer of leaves that blanketed our grass through the winter. So, even if the weather won't cooperate quite yet, I'm pretending spring is here. I saw this recipe on a girlfriend's facebook page the other day, and with a couple of minor tweaks, I knew it would be a keeper. Avocado Chicken Salad Ingredients: 3 boneless skinless chicken breasts 2 avocados, chunked 1/4 sweet onion, diced 4 T mayo (I love the mayo made with olive oil) zest and juice of 1/2 lime handful of cilantro, chopped fine *salt and pepper to taste Directions: Cook the chicken breasts thoroughly.  For this recipe, I just boiled mine for 15-20 mi...

I want to share a story. A story about a child. He came in to the world in no unusual way--sweet smelling and happy and infinitely loved by those around him. His parents spent a lot of time loving him and in the process, made a bazillion mistakes. Daily. But, they tried. They worked with him to talk, walk, hold a fork, use the potty. They laid with him in bed during bad dreams and allowed him to snuggle in their bed when he was sick. They were lucky enough to be surrounded by great friends and family and mentors. And overall, they did a pretty good job. But again, they messed up. A lot. Sometimes, they pushed him to do things he wasn't ready to do. Sometimes, they held him back when he was ready to move forward. Sometimes, they were too hard on him. Sometimes, they were too soft on him. Sometimes, they got angry when they should've been understanding. Sometimes, they let him get by with something they shouldn't have. And the years pass...