SPT: Stars and Stripes Forever

Here is my last SPT for June...to complete the set.

I took this as we were driving through Indiana...not a great picture, but David didn't want to stop or slow down for a better one. 

My appreciation for this land of "stars and stripes forever" always grows when we do our big cross-country drives.  This land is big and beautiful and diverse, and I always say to David, "Look at all these places we could live.  Look at that little place over there.  Look at that farmhouse.  Look at these trees.  There is so much country out here."  He just shakes his head, and says, "Uh-huh" all distracted, like "Duh.  Obviously." 

But to me it is just amazing how much life, how many stories, how many main streets, how many corner grocers, how many kitchen tables there are.  And I forget.  Living in my little house and pulling into my one driveway, I forget how it could be different, how our story really would be different if we changed the scenery, and how many, many different ways and places there are to make a life.  

This is my country.  Land that I love. 

Getting Our Balance

We are quickly adjusting to life in the Midwest, though our "clocks" are still off.  [Last night we started a movie with the kids (Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark) at 11:00!]  There seems to be no end to the things you can do in Michigan, particularly in the summertime.  Here are just a few...

1.  This morning (actually it was, by then, early afternoon...we are on a very relaxed schedule here) David and I went running in the woods by Stratford Lake.  Incredible tree canopies covered the whole trail and it was gorgeous.  And who ever heard of running at one in the afternoon?  Just absolutely stunning weather. 

2.  Caleb helped his grandpa plant some flowers and fix the sprinklers.

3.  The girls rearranged all of grandma's outdoor figurines...formed a club with them and made up a whole world for them to "live" and "go to school"  in.

4.  And then there was this...

I feel my heart expanding in a million directions, so full of joy to be here, where my children can really play and explore and lay on the grass and watch the snails travel the rocks in the garden.   

And may I just add to David, that, my love, it has been such a joy to be your wife these last 13 years.  4,745 days.  Happy Anniversary.  You are my heaven in this wilderness.

Word of the Week: Dilatorily

dilatorily  /adv. /   tending to delay or procrastinate.  slow.  tardy.  intended to cause delay, gain time, or defer decision.  sluggishly.  unhurridly.  lazily.  leisurely.  poky.

dilatorily  /adv./  1.  Before I start, I am dilatorily adding a note about last week's word, "pettifog."  Soon after I posted the note about my children getting along so well, I heard them arguing in the pool over the "Marco Polo" rules.  I said, "Hey stop that pettifogging!"  They stared at me for a minute and burst into laughter.  That was the end of the argument, but perhaps Amy was right about not really being able to use it in "normal" conversation.

dilatorily  /adv./  2.  Our plan was to leave for Michigan very early Saturday  morning, and so I was supposed to spend most of the week getting ready to leave--returning the library books, cleaning house, prepping my applique for the trip, sorting out and delegating my young women's responsibilities, washing the laundry and packing it up, finding temporary housing for the bunny, etc.   But I dilatorily stalled until about Thursday, mostly doing nothing or just this and that, swimming, yoga, sitting on the couch to cool off for an hour after I ran errands.  I don't know where the days went, but by Thursday it was seriously time to hustle.  We made it though...left our house at 3:27 Saturday morning, all packed up and ready to go.

dilatorily  /adv./  3.  We made great time on the trip, as David is not one for dilatorily moseying his way along.  I kept trying to take pictures, but it was hard to capture anything at 75 miles an hour.  We only stopped twice each day for food and bathroom breaks and the closer we got to "home" to faster he wanted to go.  In fact, by the time we reached Benton Harbor last night, he was hardly willing to stop and let the kids go potty.  He haphazardly parked the car, taking up three parking spaces, (there was no time to park properly!) and made us all literally run into Steak and Shake.   What in the world? 

I just managed to catch the arch in the background as we drove through St. Louis, early Sunday afternoon.

dilatorily  /adv./  4.  When my Grandma Spencer (now 94) came for quilt retreat in April, she gave me a disc with her recently completed life history on it.  She asked me to edit it for her and send it back.  She called me on Thursday night and asked how it was going.  Um....yeah, I'll get right on that.  I had dilatorily pushed it aside thinking that after youth conference, and after school was out, and after Girls' Camp, I would surely get to it.  I assured her that it would be my next top priority, and so I spent most of the 30-hours drive across the country editing her history.  It is long (over 250 pages) and amazing.  I had to stop in the mid-80's, but only have about 70 pages left to read and edit.   If any of her posterity are reading this blog, I most want you to know what a great love she has for her family, how dedicated she was to Grandpa and her children, what a tremendous housekeeper and hostess she is, and how very brave I think she is.  Of course you know all that already, but it's really, really true.  Really.

dilatorily  /adv./  5.  Over the next month or so, my blogging (and commenting) may be dilatorily done, as I will be busy playing and mothering and sunning and exploring and reading and resting and biking and camping and recharging and beaching and seeing and doing and living and being.    All things I really need to do.

Childhood is Calling

We're off to spend a month in the midwest.  Do you want to know why?

Evidence of our Hibernation

Yesterday it was 114*.  Today it is supposed to reach 115*.  Plenty warm.

I've often said that our summer is like the rest of the country's winter...you hunker down and stay inside unless you absolutely HAVE to go out.

As evidence of our hibernation:

Last night I came home from young women's to find my family sitting on the couch in their swimsuits, snuggling under blankets (?), and watching this:

When I came in and laughed, Olivia grinned and said, "I don't know why we're watching this."

I do.  It's a well-established fact that A Christmas Story is an essential part of any "winter" hibernation.

We leave for Michigan in two days.  Not a moment too soon.

SPT: My Home Sweet Home

"Home sweet home" for me is around our kitchen table.  Everybody back from their own lives, reuniting at the end of the day around this beat-up rectangle, the heart of my home.

A nurturing, sharing, uncomplicated ritual.  We eat.  We talk.  We laugh.  We are filled.  We remember who we are.  We bow our heads.  We give thanks to be together again.  We break bread.   A kind of sacrament to remember the  covenant we have with each other.

[We didn't leave Olivia out of the frame on purpose...our late dinner just didn't fit into her social schedule.]

Summer Conga Line

Okay, this is just for me. 

So that when they're fifteen and want nothing to do with their brothers and sisters or singing and dancing in public, I can remember when they did.

I love summer.  And childhood.

Eleven Years in the Blink of an Eye

My water broke a month early, as I was standing at the kitchen sink doing dishes.  David was at his first day of his summer internship at a hospital across town, and I didn't even know his phone number yet.  When I finally tracked him down and told him what happened he said, "Are you sure?"  Um, yeah.  Pretty sure. 

Caleb was born three hours later.

I can hardly believe that morning was eleven years ago.  I already feel robbed.  I have less years with Caleb here in our home than I've already had, and that hardly seems like enough.

For his birthday, here are eleven things about my boy.

1.  My friends at work warned me several times that babies are ugly when they're first born, so not to be too disappointed.  When they handed him to me I had never seen anything more beautiful.

2.  He was a breech baby and so I had to have a c-section.  I think this may be the only time in his life he wasn't obedient.

3.  He's a voracious reader.

4.  He doesn't really like sandwiches.  Unless it's roast beef.  Or BLT's.

5.  He swims in an outdoor pool, four days a week, year round, no matter the water temperature, and is a brilliant breaststroker. 

6.  He is a very early riser. 

7.  He likes to eat ice cream first thing in the morning when no one can see him sneaking into the freezer.

8.  He loves to play games.  Of any kind.  At any time.  He drools over the word "strategy."

9.  He is very brave.  And started a new school this year just because he wanted to be challenged, despite all the changes and ribbing (from his neighborhood "friends") that would bring.

10.  He has a tender heart, and often checks up on me to make sure I'm okay.

11.  He wants to be a cook or a scientist when he grows up.  I'm trying to pretend this is not really going to happen.

I love you, Caleb.  You are indeed a "beloved,"  "faithful," "son of enthusiasm."

Word of the Week: Pettifog

pettifog  /vt. /   to bicker or quibble over trifles or unimportant matters.  to argue over petty things.  to practice chicanery of any sort.  to raise unnecessary or trivial objections.  pick to pieces.  carp.  cavil.  niggle. nitpick.

pettifog  /vt./  1.  This week was the final week of swimming lessons (for Ethan) and diving lessons (for the other three).  I think we're all happy they're over.  Ethan is a great swimmer, but I put him in lessons anyway this year so that he could improve his strokes.  He did not enjoy his lessons (that's putting it mildly) and spent much of his time in the lessons crying and much of his time outside of his lessons begging not to go.  It was clear that he thought learning to "use his arms" and "kick his legs" was just pettifogging his own natural technique.  Plus there's no chicken fighting in swim lessons.

pettifog  /vt./  2.  One of my favorite things about my children is how much they enjoy being with each other.   Without much pettifogging, they can spend hours and hours playing together.  I snapped these two pictures, the first after a long day of swimming followed by warm baths, and the other on Sunday evening. 

I wish I could freeze my life right here.

pettifog  /vt./  3.  The girls had their dance recital this week, which meant a dress rehearsal as well, which really meant that they got to wear mascara and red lipstick twice in one week.  Their idea of heaven.  This past year has been a difficult one in my girls' dance "education," with a studio move and a change in studio ownership.  Throughout the year I had pettifogged my grievances to David, but all of that faded away as I watched my girls on stage last Friday night.  Beaming.  Dancing beautifully.  And so happy.  Savannah blew kisses as she lept offstage.  I blew them right back.

I snapped this picture after we did their hair...just waiting for the curlers to dry.  They are decorating David's Father's Day gifts...all I had was Christmas wrap, so we turned it wrong-side up and they made their own personalized wrapping paper.  Darling girls. 

pettifog  /vt./  4.  David took Caleb and four of his friends to the Diamondback's game on Saturday night to celebrate Caleb's 11th birthday.  We used to have a rule about parties only every four years [Marie, try not to die], but the kids (and especially David) have worn me down.  They all had a great time (Caleb's review:  "It was wonderful!") and the only thing they had to pettifog about was that the Diamondbacks got beaten badly.  Caleb acknowledged that they did get to see a lot of home runs though.  Too bad the Royals were the ones hitting them.

The ballpark was giving out free hats...the perfect party favor, I think. 

pettifog  /vt./  5.  I started yoga classes this week, and I'm completely hooked.  There is a moment in every class where I just about burst into tears though.  The teacher is so gentle and the invitation to relax and release all the tension I'm carrying around is so sweet, that I just about start bawling.  My favorite part is that there is no pettifogging.  My teacher doesn't even let us pettifog ourselves.  She encourages us to just observe, not judge.  So I accept and observe my tight hamstrings and the poses I can't do and (at least in this one area of my life) I don't judge.  It is unbelievably tender to be so kind to myself, and it feels so good that I am even considering practicing this outside of yoga class.  My husband would be thrilled.

SPT{W, really}: Twilight's Last Gleaming

Okay, this picture is so bad, I have no business publishing it to the world.

But, it also captures a moment in time, [a slice of my life] and I couldn't bear not to document it.

The end of a busy summer day.

I was going to make BLT's for dinner...but because of the salmonella/tomato scare across the country right now, I had no T's for my BLT's. 

But my parents provided these beauties from their little garden...and they were certainly *gleaming* to me.  Ripe, red, juicy, and right off their vines.

We eat late in the summer...it's already past 7:30 in this picture, just picking my girls up from dance and heading home to make dinner and watch The Mole together.  A perfect summer night. 

And the BLT's were incredible.  Homemade bread and homegrown tomatoes.  Watermelon.  Ah, summer.