wear sunscreen

because, seriously, this is ridiculous. this is the picture chip sent me last week while in LA on business. the story goes that he was "on a conference call laying by the pool and kind of fell asleep". (i know, nice job, right?).. when he woke up and made his way inside, he found he had turned a shade of red rarely seen in the natural world.

i lost all sympathy for him years ago, after about the 13th time he "accidentally" got burnt out of his gourd. but i'm putting his current truly sad state to good use (a stiff neck is now topping off the blisters and red, peeling skin); eve and ruth are more sure than ever about the importance of sunscreen. ruth has even taken to educating charlie about it. "it's so so easy and funny to spray it on. but not in your nose. and not just where your shorts are, 'cause then you look like daddy. like a lobster. or a really red crayon." 

..

edit: ruthie states she never said daddy looks like a lobster ('cause lobsters are black). she said he looks like a monster or "a blood guy". my mistake.

fodrz day

with father's day sunday and his birthday yesterday, it has been an eventful week for chip. the girls have made him no less than twenty cards (each) and several involving stacks of oversized cardstock stuck together with gluestick. pictured next to the (second of three) official father's day/ birthday gift are the official father's day cards. ruth drew a portrait of the whole family with charlie the size of a small parrot resting on her right shoulder. eve also drew a family portrait but went thematic; a circus family. complete with circus-y building, large spinning wheel, balloon-bearing clown and chip in plaid pants. penned along the top is an excellent example of eve's "sounding it out" skills. makes me want to cry i love these stages so much.

and what were the official father's day/birthday gifts? first: a jacket chip has been thinking about for months. chip never thinks about clothes for months, so we had to. second: a father's day classic that has been long overdue. ties.

his work uniform rarely involves more than jeans and a t-shirt but each sunday and one or two nights during the week chip puts on a suit and tie for church and related meetings. the girls helped me choose the fabric (although their first pick involved sparkly unicorns), i cut one inch off the pattern width (chip is a skinny tie kind of guy) and got to sewing and ironing. 

for the last few inches of the tie we used different fabric for a cool semi-secret surprise. i've gone back and forth about my feelings for the surprise, but now i really like it. chip does not feel the same way. he says he does, but he is a terrible liar. i can't blame him; it is a fact that, aside from the skinniness, he leans pretty conservative and subtle with his ties. however, he likes them and us enough to wear them very happily anyway. and that's part of what makes him our favorite.. that and the fact that in two weeks he will be used to the tiny bit of flash and will be telling the truth when he says he loves them. edit: one week! it took one week!

as for the third offical father's/birthday gift.. it hasn't arrived yet. but hopefully will within the next week or so. which works out well, because a birthday week is much better than just one day of celebrating, right?.. and when father's day is in the mix too, we might as well go double time and make it two solid weeks of gift giving.. (mom, you were a genius when you started the "birthday week" when we were little. it now serves as the perfect cover for my procrastination..).

get ready, chip, the third offical gift will be your favorite.. if for no other reason than you don't have to wear it.

...

edit: fabrics used for ties (all 100% cotton):

tie one: brown and cream stripe (pictures make it look black. it's brown.) by yuwa. brown dots on cream also by yuwa but i couldn't find it available in my hasty search just now.

tie two: both the brownish and pink tiny dot are part of the "30s collection" by atsuko matsuyama. they were bought at purl's soho shop and again, i can't find them online.. (if someone knows a source online, let me know!)

today is tuesday.

today i am doing the laundry. 

ruth is being "mama bear".

charlie just wants to be held. 

chip is on a business trip. 

and eve bowled a 36 on her class field trip. highest score in the group. 

not a bad day. 

. . .

thank you, all, for the easter dress love! to those who asked, if i can get myself to speed up and focus a bit, i plan to put some sort of instructional for the flower neckline together soon(ish). you'll like it, it's time consuming but fairly simple. 

from the archives: shoe money

one day, back when we were babies and had lived in new york for about two months, i came home from work to find a surprise on the kitchen table.

chip's parents had just come and gone for their first visit to see us in our new city. while here they outfitted their fledglings with new coats and, for chip, a pair of shoes. their sweetness and generosity compelled them to leave money behind for me, for my own pair of shoes since my working had gotten in the way of the shopping. chip's amazing presentation skills (and the flexibility of his graduate program in painting) compelled him to do this with that money left behind for me: 

these pictures carry a lot of memories- so many sweet, and a few hard- from that first year of marriage, that first year of brooklyn. but even more, they make me realize that we need more of this in our life. more making the mundane (if you can call money for shoes mundane) something special and celebratory. not overly complicated, but simple. chip is so so good at this. two pieces of paper, some ribbon and rubberbands and my return home from another day of work at an investment firm where i never felt comfortable was pure joy. so much better than a bill just lying on the table (although i certainly wouldn't have complained about that). this is what i'm after with raising my children. and with living life. making the normal, or even less-than-normal things something more. taking the time to celebrate our life. purely and simply, everyday.

monday favorite: chip rich, the great

so, apparently, neither chip nor i had any issues with self-confidence as children. i find chip's  borderline arrogance charming, my own disgusting. so, i hold back on sharing my own uppity entries rife with hideous self-righteousness (ages 11-13 are the worst so far) and share a bit from young chip's record. unfair? maybe. 

who does this account book-turned-diary belong to? why, "chip rich, the great" of course. not only did he, at the young age of eight, skip up to level nine but he was also invited to two birthday parties. not bad, chip, not bad. 

this spread may be one of my favorite in this journal. can you read it? please do. after being blamed for throwing a balloon filled with orange drink, chip reports that no underwear was hung from the flag pole at his sister's girl's camp and that the classic film, real genius, "was great." didn't we all think the same at age eight? and on the right side you get a little feel for the good sport he was. i am certain that after this outing he went home to watch himself flex in the mirror. because that's the kind of humble champion he was.

i suppose it is better to have too much confidence as a child than to be heartbreakingly short of that self assurance. however, i am hopeful our children think of themselves a little less than we did and reach out to others a little more. although, i admit that if they start referring to themselves as "eve the great" and "ruth, the great" i will be so entertained and insistent that they learn some magic tricks. 

monday favorites: on thursday

monday favorites, along with our little family, took a holiday in honor of martin luther king, jr. this week. we ventured to the home of some lovely friends where we made a snowman, frolicked in the snow, ice skated on the neighborhood pond (i know) and made and ate a ton of sushi. 

tuesday chip flew across the country to shoot a commercial. eve woke up and burst into tears when she saw only charlie and me in our double bed. taking some comfort from the letters- complete with cartoons of the girls- that chip had left for each of them, eve decided to write a letter of her own to her daddy. as she dictated the letter to me (later to be copied in her own writing) she could hardly keep from total break down. she made it through the morning and went off to school with the news of her daddy's departure to share with teachers and classmates. 

clearly, a paper chain was in order. we love the paper chain countdown. to anything, really, but especially for a loved daddy's return. six little circles linked together and hung in the window to encourage my sad little girl who cannot stop telling me "i just didn't want my daddy to fly on that plane to california." she was giddy as she clipped off the links for wednesday and thursday. and i was a little bit, too. things really are better with a paper chain. 

++

an hour after i typed the above i walked out of the kitchen to find an empty window, paper chain scraps on the floor and scissors in an ecstatic ruthie's hands. "mommy! now it's evie's birthday! now it can be here!! hooray!" i love barely-three-year-olds. eve will not be happy. but at least now we we have a reason for another, much longer, paper chain.

++

more diary entries to come for next week's "monday favorites." more awesomeness from young chip. also, when i get the chance i'll put together the quilt tutorial. you will laugh with glee, it's so easy. 

monday favorites: part two

the journal reading continues to be my favorite activity of the new year . . . occasionally horrifying enough to make me want to throw mine in a fire somewhere. . . but overall, still amusing. one of the things i really like about it is the randomness of the things we wrote; mixed in with the reports of our siblings misdeeds and our deepest desires for the latest toys are the inclusion of some truly insignificant details. details like gum.

my entry, age 10 (1989):

"I just got out of bed and accidently swallowed my gum. But luckily I have some more. There's about 2 weeks til school starts. I hope I get a good teacher!"

chip's entry, age 8 (1983):

"I went with my Dad and Emily went with me too. We got a piece of gum. Oh, Miriam went too. They had a lot of video recorders there. Emily and I watched Tron on a video recorder. It was a Saterday so we got to watch some of Thundar the Barbarian."

what i wouldn't give to watch an episode of "Thundar the Barbarian" right now. . . also, to know the details of the gum swallowing. "accidentally"? and what was i doing in bed with gum in my mouth, anyway? . . . questions (and/or concerns) aside, i love the more complete picture these bits give of who we were. . . the little worlds we lived in and the details that filled our lives . . . 

monday favorites: part one

i don't mind mondays. in fact, i like them. i like having a fresh start. i like sending chip and eve off into the world and holing in with the two littles. i do laundry and clean the house, ruthie plays games and draws while charlie goes about his business of scooting, crawling, intensely searching for paper - any paper - to shove into his wet mouth. nap times come and go, lunch is consumed, a treat is made before we three head out to reclaim the fourth from school. more drawing, more playing, more cleaning, cooking, welcoming daddy home, eating, playing, planning, singing, two games (or three. . . or 12 if the girls can get us to agree) and finally, putting to bed.

i like the monday routine. and i'm about to like it even more. starting now. favorite mondays. or monday favorites. random things, any things, that fall into my wide category of "favorite." let's begin.

chip and i rang in the new year reading excerpts from our childhood journals to each other. we laughed and laughed and got embarrassed a bit (or a lot) as we revisited our old selves. . . chip's obsession with he-man toys. my obsession with proving my little brother got everything he wanted. our reflections on life as 12-year-olds. . . the gems in these journals are incredible. 

 

chip's journals include a lot of drawings and occassionally, my favorite, the beginnings of very promising comic books. comic books like TIMBERLOCK: MAN OF THE WOODS. amazing. i can hardly stand the suspense. or the erased pencil lines. few things are more adorable than watching people diligently erase, flip their pencil over and try again. especially-13-year-olds who grow up to be my husband.

0000001

"you are my favorite robot maker helper, dad. i super super 'cited you making robots with me, dad. you are my really favorite."

is there anything better than a three-year-old in a paper-bag-turned-robot-costume, talking in her best robot voice and walking her very stiffest robot walk with her dad first thing on a weekday morning? 

++

just before bed tonight, eve and ruth, clad in the newest robot costumes (cardboard boxes, we upgraded) ran at, smashed into and literally bounced off of each other over and over and over. robot war. everyone made it to bed unharmed, but now this song (which has been in my brain for well over a year now) is playing on a continuous loop. . . i think maybe i need to make a robot mix so we can have a robot dance party. with a couple more deliveries from UPS we'll have enough costumes for a little civilization. . . add some music, several little bodies and it will be total robotic chaos. could be great. 

eight years ago

we became a family of two. now we are a family of five.

chip, you were right. if we would have been able to see all of this when we were first together in college we would have been so excited. because even now, right in the middle of it, whenever i take a minute to really look around and see our life i am amazed. i love you. i love all that we can call ours. . . . . except for the mouse. i do not love that elusive mouse. 

here's to love, marriage, babies and the millions of things in between that have made up the substance of our life together.