On My Mind: April 2014

Greetings, friends. I apologize, the upkeep of this blog has slipped a bit. While I am often thinking of things I'd like to write about, or taking a picture I'd love to share, by the time I get the head-space necessary to compose things properly I succumb to tired laziness and instead end up playing Scramble on my phone with the television on in the background. Lame. Anyway, enough excuses, let's just catch up with what we can.

I absolutely love the picture up there, because even though I know just how very large buoys really are, visually they still boggle the mind a little, and it looks like someone shrunk my children. I not really at liberty to discuss Don's comings-and-goings for a number of reasons, but let's just say we were all happy to have him back last week, even if back meant meeting the ship downtown one night. We had a nice dinner out - a rare treat. Seeing the buoy yard reminded me of our days on the CGC Ida Lewis, where Don's job was the hands-on repair and replacement of these behemoths. Still a part of his job now, though he is the one driving the ship instead of working the buoys.

Spreading a quilt-in-progress out on the floor is an instant invitation for kitty company. Here Ollie supervises while I seam two pieces of batting together - a first - which turned out rather well, and saved me the purchase of a new piece. This project has since been quilted and is awaiting binding. In recent weeks I have also finished sewing an apron for Amy, a nice sturdy tote bag for library books, and that quilt for William. I have pictures of all those but they are so far back I will just let you take my word for it.

Speaking of "Let It Go"... we finally jumped on the Frozen bandwagon, reluctantly. I have a natural aversion to whatever pop culture thing "everyone" is into at any given time (it took three seasons for us to finally catch Downton Abbey) and it wasn't until Don watched the movie on the ship, and Amy fessed up to the fact that her classmates play "Frozen" at recess and she was out of the loop that I finally caved and we all watched it. Cute movie, though admittedly, I was not blown away. And some of the lyrics made me cringe ("...I'm somewhere in that zone" ??) ... but I don't mean to pick. The big song, however, has become something of an anthem around here. Amy made me look up the lyrics and we've watched the YouTube clip enough that she now belts it out at least twice a day. And I've found it useful to have as theme music for freeing ourselves of excess possessions as we continue to prepare for our move. Also useful in the metaphoric sense, when I find myself getting a bit too stressed and antsy trying to control things that, frankly, I cannot.

Where was I? Oh yes. On to some pretty things: I took a walk ALONE with Caroline in the stroller over the weekend while Don and the kids watched Episode II of Star Wars. I have so missed the days of simple baby stroller walks, just one on one. It was So. Quiet. And at the back of our neighborhood is this beautiful little allée of live oaks - so lovely.

And these:

Gorgeous tulips my mom sent us all for Easter. This picture was from Sunday - now they look a bit wild - the blooms are holding up beautifully but the stalks have grown in the vase and they have nearly taken over that corner of the dining room.

And here's a picture of my elder munchkins on Easter - they were super good in church and had the sweetest, most excited-and-grateful time when we got home to Easter baskets and an egg hunt. Unfortunately the weather left a lot to be desired - it was cold and gray all weekend, very not-Easter-y. But our day was nice enough anyway.

And about Easter - I had this thought, as I've come across some writings arguing that traditions like the Easter Bunny (or Santa, for that matter) detract from the religious message of Easter (or Christmas). Now, Easter has always been my favorite holiday because it is generally free of commercial trappings, and I've worked hard over the years to make sure I am focusing on the miracle of it all in my own head, and to share that with my kids. But on Sunday it occurred to me that even in the midst of that, there is a very important place for the "sillier" things like Easter baskets or presents under the tree. There is no purer faith or excitement or anticipation than that which a child possesses and the GLEE at discovering that "The Easter Bunny DID come, Mommy!!!!!" is, I think, the child's equivalent of the glee we adults should feel at the annual rediscovery of the empty tomb. A child has nearly zero understanding of what the Resurrection could possibly mean, but faith in the unseen? Only reinforced by the miraculous appearance of the Easter basket on the kitchen table while we were all, clearly, at church. Maybe I'm off on this, but it seemed important to me this Easter, so I wanted to share it.

And to wrap this one up, I shall share two pictures of my favorite photo subject these days (the other two only make silly faces).