simple pleasures

It's bedtime for Kate.

We climb into her bed to read a couple books.
She and Abby snuggle in close while I read.

"All done Kate. Time for bed."

"Mommy here." She points to the pillow.

"Would you like Mommy to stay a couple of minutes?"

She smiles and puts her head down. I reach up, turn off her light and lie down next to her.

"belly. belly. belly." she says as she rests her hand on my stomach and closes her eyes.

"Good night Kate. Mommy loves you very much."

Smiles and hug from Kate.

First Day of School

Today was David's first day of preschool.

I paced most of the morning.

I was nervous about how he would react, how I would react, getting out the door ...

There were some tears this morning. He didn't want to wear his sneakers. I snapped at him and then promptly felt like shit. And, then he told me he didn't want to go ... So, not a great morning, but we made it out the door.

Kate needed to bring her backpack too.

Mike surprised us at school.

And, then it was time ...
We walked him to his class. He chatted with his teacher, put on his name tag, gave me a hug and was off.
just. like. that.

Class was only an hour today for the first day. Kate and I went shopping and picked him up. He told me about the new friends he made. How one little boy didn't listen. How you shouldn't run.

The first of many experiences he will have without me.

I need a montage

I've been in a bit of a funk this week.
Sad to think that the summer is coming to an end.

So, (appropriately) a montage of the good and bad from this summer:

... trips to the zoo, my defunct garden, classes at the little gym for the kids and David learning to do a forward roll on his own, the Sunday that Mom and Rick came for a BBQ, Davids constant whining, blueberry picking that was really raspberry picking (what was that noise?), a visit from Mr. Ox, Citifield and the game ending unassisted triple play, swimming in pop-pops pool, sitting outside with a book, a cold beer and watching the kids play when I should have been weeding (which I did not do once this summer), letter-boxing in the mud through Webster Park, blueberry picking (for real this time) and Kate deciding it was more fun to eat the blueberries than pick them, Museum of Natural History and sitting in Central Park, Kate wanting to constantly be naked (nunie as she says) and the time she pooped all over the house and herself (no, it's not marker), David needing to be naked every time he went in his kiddie pool, David/Mom time at the library sitting on the purple couch learning more about dinosaurs than I ever thought possible, Harry still having trouble potty training, the weekend it took us took us to put together the swing set, lazy rainy days spent inside doing puzzles, teaching David how to eat a slice of pizza, Mike and my dad eating 4lb lobsters, ...

My favorite memory is from the start of the summer, school might not have even been let out yet. It was a sunny day and we had gone to the zoo that morning and come back for a picnic lunch in our backyard. Mike was watering the garden and the kids and puppy were running through the hose. There was something sort of exciting about that day - nothing was planned and we had 10 weeks of vacation ahead of us.

the Imaginator

We came in from outside today and David rushed Kate and I into his room.
"Get in. Quick. There's something scary. It's a lizard. Quick."

Once we were safely inside, he closed the door. (sigh) "It died."

He opened the door and let us out.

We were getting lunch ready. After lunch, we would be heading to the zoo.

But, again David came scrambling into the kitchen.
"Quick. It's another lizard."

Kate and I made our way to Davids room. Kate was toddling along. I'm not sure if she understood the gravity of the situation.

He closed the door. (sigh) "It died."

No sooner are we out of his room than he sees another scary thing - an eel.

hmmm ....

Are they really scary? (and, more importantly, are we going to be running from eels and lizards all afternoon?) Maybe they are just some misunderstood animals who happened into the hallway. So, I asked David what he thought. Instead of running from the eel we decided to pet it.

It wasn't scary after all! It just looked scary. But, really the eel was quite nice. He gave David a wet eel kiss on his cheek.

We came out into the kitchen to find quite a zoo. David informed Kate and I that there were 4 lizards, 4 eels and 4 tigers playing baseball in the house. The tigers were pitching.

We decided what anyone else in this situation would do - we would take them to the zoo with us and drop them off.

David sort of forgot about them when they got into the stroller, but they have yet to show back up here, so I assume that they are happy at the zoo.

The zoo was fun today. We are enjoying Mike's last week home before the new school year starts again.