Party Girl Turns One

Maria and I shared our first birthday together yesterday. Well, the first one was last year, of course, but that was no party.  So, yesteday, she turned one and I turned hmphmrddff.  She wore a party dress for the first bit, but because it was a thousand degrees here yesterday and the party dress is a little bit vintage and appeared to be a ruffled blend of polyester and styrofoam (with possibly some MSG thrown in), we changed her out of it real quick-like. Here is the official oooooh photo:

She unwrapped her presents and did the obligatory wrapper munching and paper ripping that all one-year-olds seem to love. 

She roughed up her cupcake like godzilla on Tokyo.  I will try to include some video later, so you can get the full effect of the carnage. 

Then, she had a skin reaction to whatever garbage they're putting in cupcakes these days, so she totally lost her sugar buzz when mommy swashed her all around in the bathtub to get the frosting off.  But thankfully, she was fine. She finished off her first year only a little blotchy and buzzin and went to bed with a tummy happily filled with cupcake, milk, and gift wrap. 

I'm a podrishioner

I have long appreciated the thoughts of Greg Boyd, the sometimes controversial pastor from St. Paul. We enjoyed his sermons at Woodland Hills so much that I've continued to download them as a "podrishioner" for the years since we moved from Minnesota.  Their online community, called The Bridge, has also been enjoyable.  Here is his recent interview on biologos.org.

Pomp and Smartypants

Anna has graduated from pre-K. Holla.

She was grinning the entire ceremony, waving one-armed jazz hands at us so often that she almost missed her part in the alphabet and had to dash to the microphone to go, "X is for Xylophone," and dash back to her seat to continue her waving and grinning. Of course, we were in the audience doing the same thing right back at her.

And in an unrelated news story: Infants Look Hilarious in Naked Bath Pictures

She may talk a lot about prince charming, but daddy's still the king

For a little over a year now, Steve and Anna have been hitting the Build and Grow workshops together on Saturdays at Lowe's. It makes for good father-daughter time, plus Anna gets to pound something other than mommy's last nerve, and daddy gets to hang out at at Lowe's, where the mother ship has called him home.

Like any true princess, she has an outfit for the event. She doesn't always wear her face like this. This one was special for mommy:

She gets a patch for every project she completes, and mommy gets to sew them on the work apron for her (which kind of hurts mommy's fingers, but mommy keeps her big mouth shut):

Anna's a confident girl, and her outings with daddy at Lowe's are a big part of that. She says things like, "I'm good at building," which is true, but it sorta doesn't matter that it is. It only matters that she thinks it is. If any of those losers at pre-K say something stupid like "You're not that great" (or something that pre-Kers would actually say...), she has a pumpkin, a time capsule, a jewelry organizer, a gingerbread house, a fire truck, a helicopter, and a race car that all say otherwise. Not to mention an attentive daddy who loves her a heckuvalot more than his remotes or tools.

Here's the most recently finished project. They did race cars in honor of whatever big racing event thingy happened this weekend (that's telling, eh?), but Anna doesn't care why they made race cars. She likes her race car because she made it, and she got her daddy all to herself the whole time. What more could a princess want?

Au Naturel

We've been playing in the sunshine. Anna sang you a song, and Maria took full advantage of the naked Wednesdays policy.

"Adder" by Papergirl

A good friend of mine listens to this every morning. She has been sober 632 days. May we never forget our dear ones who are fighting this same fight for their very lives. May we constantly remind them they are not alone.

Mismatched Mayhem

I took my child to school today in her jammies,

and I'm not sorry one bit.

Our darling first born woke up in a foul mood and -- as is her custom when cranky -- began doling out ultimatums about being served breakfast and not being made to go to school before the night's drool was even washed from her face. I sent her back to her room to start her day over, which she feebly attempted, but she still wouldn't get dressed. She turned downright belligerent (if I didn't know better I would have sworn she was hung over), and it was clear she thought that I wouldn't take her to school in her jammies. She discovered how wrong a five-year-old in mismatched jammies can be.

We've been down this road a lot lately with our little Anna Banana.

I'm often telling her 3 -15 times to get dressed, brush her teeth, tell the pee pees to get their water wings on and jump in the pool, etc. Recently, after an under-productive morning of trying to get her Woody doll to do his ballet steps en pointe, she ran out of time to brush her teeth before we had to leave for school. The natural consequence of that was that she was not allowed to eat any sugar that day -- not so much as an organic granola bar with carob chips: "Kids who do not brush their teeth certainly can't put sugar in their mouths," I chirped in my best Mary Poppins voice. I noticed that today, though she couldn't be bothered to do anything else, she inexplicably managed to get her teeth brushed.

Just like her mommy, she has to learn the hard way.

Somehow, she seemed genuinely shocked that, when it was time to leave for school, I quietly handed over her shoes and socks and walked her to the car in her bare feet. As she gradually came to terms with her mounting social anxiety about facing her classmates armed with nothing but a princess kitten pajama top and plaid pajama bottoms, she got so mad she told me she was fastening the velcro on her shoes as tight as she possibly could to punish me. I can tell you that withholding that much laughter for that long was punishment enough for a mommy.

My beloved Papa

1922 - 2010

Because of you, just like you, I cry when I laugh,
With a toothy mirth that waters my vision,
And then goes silent, leaving me helpless in a foolish grin,
Until I can wheeze in a breath and wipe my eyes.

Because of you, just like you, I laugh often.

Because of you, just like you, I thrive on stories.

I know to listen for the joy,

To people them with character,

To lose myself in the telling.

Because of you, just like you, I have ears to hear.

Because of you, just like you, I love a tiny Brit,
And love all things British,
And am loved by people who say 'cheers' and 'strawbrees.'

Because of you, just like you, I know a 'mate' when I see one.

Because of you, just like you, I know God welcomes desperate prayers,

Flung up from flimsy rafts in storms,

That He infuses them with His faith,

Even when mine has gone overboard into the waves.

Because of you, just like you, I have a testimony.

Because of you, just like you, I have seen the beauty

Of a faithfully tended garden.

Your memory lives on

In the growing things all around me.

Because of you, just like you, I long for a Garden I have never seen.

Lost Things

Stop motion filmmaking at its best. Anna's favorite part is when she falls down the rabbit hole like Alice.

Life Sentence

I don't know why I hadn't heard of the book Not Quite What I Was Planning: Six Word Memoirs by Writers Famous and Obscure, but I like the concept immensely.






Naturally, my inner writing teacher (not a fan?) needs to assign a project: your life sentence in six words. Would you be so kind as to add your six word memoir as a comment to this post? I would be ever-so-grateful.

Oh, wait. Fair's fair. I suppose I should offer mine first.

Why do I prefer the questions?