The photo evidence that will one day be our ruin.
With the upcoming time change, our days are going to turn inside out. Not only are the kids going to start getting up at like 4 in the morning now, but the evenings – as we know them – are going to be gone, baby gone.
(click photo to see entire set)
(click photo to see entire set)
There was a time, back in the day, that Stella and I would walk to the park in our old neighborhood and I would spend the entire time pushing her on the swing. We are talking 45 minutes straight. I even figured out a way to incorporate an abdominal muscle workout timed to the rhythm of each push.
Enter Porter. He won’t be caught dead on a swing – and by the sound he makes each time I try to put him on one, you’d think I was trying to inflict Death by Swing. No, Porter is a slider – not to be confused with a miniature hamburger. Although sometimes I wonder….oh, nevermind.
One of the first orders of business once we moved in at 111 was to put that overgrown apple tree to use and install a couple of swings – knowing that at least there would be three of us who would use them.
So guess who went and grabbed her camera when just one short year later he not only put his padded little butt on those wood planks, but let his sister show him how to do it right proper – which naturally included the spin-till-your-brains-ooze-out-of-your-ears trick she is so proud of.
This lovely frock arrived last Friday. As you can see, she is trying to keep herself from exploding into a glittery pile of Disney princess micro-particulates. Even the graininess of the photo doesn’t mask the raging boil of joy that erupted the moment she slid into it’s iridescent embrace. Saying she loves this costume doesn’t even come close to covering it. When she talked to Dore on the phone that afternoon and proclaimed that this was her best day ever, she was clearly not. even. kidding.
If I could bottle the frantic energy of my children during this outing, I swear I could stop buying gas for my car.
(click on photo to see the entire set)
The last couple of days it has been windy. The kind of windy where you look out and find your lawn furniture resting inexplicably in the next door neighbor’s yard. I am very much enjoying the shift in the weather. It has gotten colder and clearer and the few trees that have the capacity to change color are doing their part to make up for all those slacker evergreens that dominate this county. Stella’s soccer game tomorrow is about 45 minutes east from here and I am looking forward to seeing fall from an inlander’s perspective.
Aside from Mother Nature’s lawn-furniture relocation program, she has also rolled out the fence and barrier quality assurance testing. Yesterday when I pulled into the driveway I noticed not one, but two furry faces staring out at me over our white picket fence. Looks like the neighborhood dogs got the memo that wind+fence=freedom. Turns out, that other furry face was the neighbor dog, Shatzie, who we watch regularly in his yard a couple of houses down. He is probably one of the biggest, furriest and sweetest German Shepherds I have ever met and I have always wanted to get him and Ranger together for a run around the yard. However, I have always stopped short of asking the neighbor for a doggie play-date lest I give the impression that I am one of those creepy dog people. You know the kind.
The way our gate works, it is easy to push open from the outside, but once inside, those without opposable thumbs have a difficult time getting out without the assistance of a quick physics lesson. So basically, once Shatzie got in, he was stuck. I don’t know how long they had been hanging out, but I do know that the back of Ranger’s neck was covered in slobber (Shatzie’s head completely clears Ranger’s back — the dude is HUGE) and they were both panting so hard I thought they were going to pass out. And when I took this picture, it captured the exact expression that Ranger had on his face for the entire rest of the day – the expression that basically said, this was the best day of my life.
