• Fun With Exercise

    A super-busy start to the week. I’m attempting to wrap up the four basketball previews I’m writing. I was minutes away from submitting one earlier this morning when I realized I worked off two different files yesterday rather than putting all my updates into my final draft. So I spent two stressful hours today combing through to find what belonged…

  • End Of Summer Catch Up

      A very busy couple of weeks. I thought I was alone in trying to cram 857 activities into the finals days of summer break, but it sounds like that’s par for the course for the modern parent. Glad I was not alone. We hit approximately 83 different parks over the final two weeks of summer. Parks we had been…

  • First Day

    This morning, the alarm went off at 6:20. I roused the girls about 10 minutes later, they shuffled down for breakfast, then back up to get dressed. We cut tags off of new pairs of shorts, found skirts that fit correctly, and laced up new shoes so they were nice and tight. Snacks and lunches were packed, book bags loaded…

  • Eleven

    Eleven years ago Saturday, we welcomed our first daughter into our family. Which is totally an amazeballs thing to say. Eleven freaking years. Seriously? How in the hell did that happen? M. celebrated in a very M. way: stretching it out and keeping as much attention on herself as possible. Now that’s not exactly fair. She didn’t ask to have…

  • Summer Notes

    Some catch up on general summer notes. Monday was our annual trip to the 4H fair where the girls’ cousin shows pigs every year. As usual, they had fun walking through the buildings and viewing the pigs, cows, goats, sheep, and rabbits. No poultry this year because of the avian flu thing and the horses were not shown on Monday,…

  • Curveball -or- A Break In Tradition

    Normally this time of year, I’m sharing my thoughts on the MLB All Star game. In fact, it’s kind of a tradition. You can look it up in the archives, even! This year I was really looking forward to the All Star game, what with Royals fans highjacking the voting and sending four starters and Mike Moustakas to Cincinnati. Throw…

  • Old Films

    Like many parents, we bought a camcorder around the time our first child was born.[1] Like many parents, we recorded dozens of moments during our early years of parenting, sometimes letting the tape run long past the point when it should have been shut off because we were so utterly delighted with everything our child did. Like many parents the…

  • Summer Begins

    Day one of summer! It’s right at 8:00 as I start this. Two of the girls beat me out of bed, despite letting them stay up late and being told to sleep in, but one is still zonked out. Of course, we could still hear noise from that one’s room after 10:00 last night. I, happily, slept in until the…

  • You’re On Your Own

    It’s a tent-pole requirement of parenting to always be comparing the lives of your kids to your own childhood. We point out the ways our children are more fortunate than us: “I didn’t get to go to Florida until I was 31. You’ve been there three times before you turned 9. Stop complaining!” We observe the changes in how parents…

  • Kid Notes

    Some assorted Kid Notes that have been jotted down in recent weeks. This is totally unofficial, and I base it without knowing anything about the rest of the school, but I’m declaring my girls the Reading Champions of St. P’s. Second graders are given reading wheels during second semester they are required to complete. They contain 12 categories, with the…