a big (little) family

Trying to maintain my sanity and live to blog about it.

Tales from the back of a very large van. Part 1.

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And… we’re back. Swimming in the contents spewed from the van, but home. Looking forward to a day at home to clean up said van spewage. We were somewhere in Iowa at a rest area about 1/3 of the way home when we nearly lost Brady. The kids opened the van door before I got […]

The Case of the Missing Teeth

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Ruby gave me a new bedtime stalling tactic I hadn’t heard before. In nine years of parenting and now six kids, I’ve heard a few. Pretty sure Ruby’s topped them all. “Pajamas and teeth, Ruby.”“I can’t.”“Why not?”“I can’t find my teeth.”And then… she looked at me most sheepishly, realized the error of her dreamed-up excuse, […]

Mispronunciation hesitation.

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Kindergarten is a fun grade to teach. The learning is so new, there’s so much to learn, and five year olds are brutally honest. Today’s reading had Sterling in a befuddled mess. Dr-i-ve. Dr-i-ve. Over and over he sounded out ‘drive’, saying it but still unsure what the word was. Finally I jumped in, and […]

Overachiever.

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In doing (kindergarten) math this morning with Sterling, I asked him to tell me a “some, some more” story. He looked at me with confusion. “I’ll tell you one, and then you can tell me one. Three kids were in line for the slide. One slid down. Now there are two kids waiting. Your turn.” […]

Poor boy.

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Dear Pierce, Today, you are one. With a typical one-year-old vocabulary, you can’t tell me what kind of birthday dessert you’d like. You did come out with something that sounds remarkably like “I love you” – said at the appropriate time, so I’m calling it real. Impressive, Baby Boy. But I digress. Dessert. As the […]

It’s a sad state of affairs.

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So I’m sitting here, staring at “Enter a post title” followed by a blank white page and I’ve realized something. My funny got up and left. Somewhere, in the stress that is life right now, my sense of humor snuck out the back without so much as a farewell. It’s a sad state of affairs. […]

My Job, According to Ruby.

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Ruby had a startling observance yesterday. I was hanging up wet laundry to dry and she was ‘helping’. “You’re lucky, Momma.” Lucky is her new word. Everyone is far more lucky than she in her pessimistic worldview. “How’s that.?” “You get to sit at the computer and click, click, click while all of us have […]

Ten.

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Friday Blaine and I celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary. A friend took the kids Friday and Saturday. We stayed home and wondered what on earth we’ll do when the kids are grown. It was so… quiet. No one woke me up at 4am. I got more hours of sleep straight than I have since before […]