hair cuts

my hair. here it is, (as seen in eve and ruth's mirror which explains the serious smudges i'm too lazy and forgetful to clean). fairly anti-climactic. . . i still haven't seen the back of my head but judging from the size of a few chunks that came off with the pinking shears, it's a little rough.

just to clarify, pinking shears and eve's paper cutting scissors were not my first choice. i was maniacally impatient and so used whatever i could find in thirty seconds.

a few nights after my cut, i cut chip's hair. (have i made it clear that i have no idea what i'm doing with hair and that we never do this- not even with our kids hair? i don't know what's going on.) after i finished with chip's hair i walked into our bedroom where i found ruthie, scissors in hand, giving herself bangs. not ideal. i tried to fix things as much as i could without stabbing her in the eye. she looks mostly cute in a mini hipster way but the random chunk of hair missing above her ear (the ear not pictured) will have to just sit there until it fades in. or, i can wait a month or so and do a full-on dorothy hammill for her.

++

the more i look at that picture of myself, the crazier my eyes/expression looks. do i have a lazy eye? i blame the dirty mirror, which of course means i blame my children. what good are they if i can't use them as scapegoats for at least some of my failings?

sunday

after the usual rush of getting ready and scrambling out the door, the girls and i made it to church almost on time, made it through sacrament meeting almost quietly and each went our three separate ways for the first time almost happily.

eve has been getting excited about moving up from nursery to primary, where all the big kids and a lot of her friends are, for a couple months. but she never realized ruthie wasn't moving up with her. she broke down sobbing as we dropped ruth off. sobs down the elevator, down the hall and into the chair next to her new teacher. eventually the sobbing turned to tearful wilting and with a kiss and my special lip gloss for her to hold on to- she loves that lip gloss- i made my way out and up to teach the gospel doctrine class wishing i could sob myself. i love that little team of two.

two hours later all the tears were dried and excitement filled the conversation as eve and ruth reported all the things they did and learned, many of which could have only taken place inside their little brains. with chip home from his meetings we all took a walk through the park and neighborhood and reveled in being together. next sunday we may not be perfectly on time and we certainly won't be perfectly quiet, but i think we'll all be a little closer to happy with the separation from each other for those two hours, because the reunion is pretty great.

christmas 2007 retrospective: the wrap up

the glory of the wrap-up report is that it is really simple. for the week in between christmas and new year's chip's office was closed, and for that one magical week we had no obligations. no meetings to attend or lessons to prepare or appointments to keep. we just got to hang out with each other and do as little as possible. we read books and built castles and watched planet earth. we walked to the park, the library, the playgrounds and we went out to eat. we went to the central park zoo with the upper east side riches and to the bronx zoo with the beans and we (i) did a little shopping, but really, the bulk of the break was all about being home and doing nothing.

as for new year's eve, it was another great night at the beans with a lot of friends and too much good food. alysha went overboard with a ton of chocolatey treats and i went a little overboard with my part: spinach dip in bread bowl, bruschetta, stuffed mushrooms and cream cheese/marshmallow fluff/almond extract dip with various fruit. the kids played, the adults talked. and we all said goodbye before the new year arrived. just as we were putting eve in her bed the countdown outside began. we joined in quietly in our little place and fell asleep listening to fireworks boom and our windows rattle.

welcome, 2008. i've got a few goals for you. but mostly i'm just hoping to be a better friend, a better mom, a better person in general.

christmas 2007 retrospective: the big day

after almost five hours of sleep i woke up surrounded by chip, eve and ruth. all in our double bed. after some half-hearted attempts, i gave up trying to go back to sleep. so instead i stared at chip, i stared at eve and i stared at ruth. i nudged and whispered but no one was budging. so with the darkness and silence of brooklyn outside, the glow of the tree in our little place, i got up, wandered a bit and started playing with the gift chip and i got for each other. an amazing camera is a fun thing to have when you're anxiously waiting for your family to wake up christmas morning.

about two and a half hours later the girls started rustling, which possibly had something to do with the countless pictures i was snapping inches from their faces, and ruthie was the first to get a cheery "merry christmas!" whisper and kiss from me, with eve and chip following shortly after. eve's daily question of "it's christmas time today?" was finally answered with a yes and when asked if we should go into the family room to see if santa came ruth gave a very strong, panicked "NO! no santa a my house." so we stopped mentioning his name and after about 10 minutes ruth was ready to leave the bedroom with eve close by her side.

last year we over did christmas. even with my handy rhyme and limited gifts, i think we did it this year too. the stockings, which are so fun to pack full of great little gifts, kept the girls busy and entertained for a long time. i think we could have stopped it all there. but, after a bowl of lucky charms and apple jacks for the girls and grapefruit for chip and i, we went to work opening the rest of the gifts. all the gifts from chip and i were wrapped in white paper and tied with fabric ribbons only. maybe a little obsessive, but i loved it.

the girls unwrapping their gifts was perfect. ruthie would immediately flip the gift over, find the seam and tear like crazy. eve, after having untied or cut the ribbon, would carefully unfold the edges and then proceed to unwrap or tear as gently as possible until the gift was revealed.

hits: the blocks, hello kitty camera (after it finally charged after a billion hours) the planet earth series, the saute (thank you s&e), and the magic wands. along with every gift from grandparents.

misses: the bicycle riding duck, from santa to ruthie. she's terrified of it. thanks a lot santa.

after playing with all the gifts for awhile i hurried to the kitchen, pulled the strata from the fridge, stuck it in the oven and got to work on preparing and baking the cranberry coffee cake. then off we walked to the beans. christmas with the beans is always so great. and fattening. alysha had baked like crazy, so altogether we had eight (more?) different treats/dishes to choose from. between five adults and three kids we ate almost all of it and then sat around talking, laughing, napping, playing and taking pictures.

after hours of lounging at the beans we made our way over to the nelsons and their homey brownstone. more chatting, eating and laughing. once the girls couldn't take it anymore we made our way home. as chip and i cleaned up they watched a show. ruth fell asleep almost instantly after lying down on the rug. eve was not far behind and neither were we. i fell asleep to the oddly soothing sound of jamaican style christmas music and chip's heavy breathing. merry christmas, brooklyn.

next up: the final installment so i can be free: christmas 2007 retrospective: the wrap up.

christmas 2007 retrospective: the build-up

i'm starting to feel bogged down by my report of christmas. like it's a history paper i should have turned in last week, this is quickly falling into the chore category. but, i want this christmas documented, so i've just got to do it. and quickly, if i can make myself sit down in front of my computer long enough to sift through all the pictures and write something, anything, that makes sense. here goes.

church program. i wish i had a recording of the choir. the music selected was much more traditional than the usual fare; old basque, german and french carols. so lovely and the tiniest bit complicated, adding to the interest. i sang a solo in "the angel gabriel from heaven came" and shockingly, managed to not sound like a goat. in fact i was really happy with my performance. and that's rare. the best part of this program was the timing. held on december 9th, i got thinking about what christmas really is early in the month, and there was plenty of time for the excitement to really build. the worst part was the complete break down the girls had during the entire thing. apparently they're no fans of me being up on the stand while chip sits with them in the pew (a complete reversal of the usual church experience). chip was able to hear about 1/16th of the whole thing. but honestly, it was really nice watching the freak outs and not having to deal with them myself.

decorations. chip is the christmas decoration master around here. this is his doing and to his credit. except for the crowd around baby jesus. eve took care of that.

lights at grand army. our neighborhood is certainly rough on the edges, but the location is ridiculously great. the museum, the botanic gardens, the library, the park all within three blocks. and around christmas time it is grand army plaza that we love to visit at night. the tree that changes colors and lights up the arch fascinates for all of us, and eve does a strangely good job of guessing the color the tree will be when we first come down the street to see it.

kid's work party. eve now thinks that everyday chip goes to a place where cotton candy is readily available, pigs in a blanket and chocolate milk are continuously supplied, photobooths hang out for your enjoyment, movies about santa and reindeer play on fancy t.v.s and all conference room tables are covered with countless sugar cookies. before this visit eve was convinced chip worked on the train, so at least she understands there's a building involved now.

rockefeller center. started out walking from chip's work, got really lazy really fast and so decided to hop into a pedi cab. worth every dollar. eve waved to the people walking by, the "driver" drove them by the american girl superstore which they had little interest in, and we all hopped out at the huge tree. rockefeller center is an annoying place to be during the holidays- always so crowded- but we managed to have fun seeing the tree and watching the ice skaters. except for ruth. she did not like the ice skaters dressed up as oompa-loompas. something about painted faces and white gloves. a terrifying combination for her. i should probably avoid the circus for awhile.

church party. ruth's first up-close experience with santa. not a fan. eve, however, summoned all her courage and was able to sit on his lap and tell him what she wanted without completely wilting. "i was kinda a little bit nervous, but so i did it anyway."

christmas eve. all our pictures from the event are useless, but nights like this make me think i want to live here forever. the palmers, beans, and jeppesens. such great friends with all our kids gathered together in a brooklyn apartment. of course they won't all stay, but for now it is almost magical being together on nights like this. excellent food, great laughter, a lot of singing (accompanied by guitar and violin- how great is that?) and a ton of dancing by the kids. the nativity acting was so sweet. ruth was primed to be mary but lost focus moments before we started and ended up being a lone, mostly naked, wanderer. but eve was a solid shepherd; her character of choice. the white elephant gift exchange was entertaining. we gave the sad earless and armless sock monkey to the beans and we scored a can of spam from the palmers. i'm calling it food storage.

after leaving around 10pm, eve shouted her "very christmas!" cheers to everyone and we made our way home. we dressed the floppy girls in their christmas pajamas, put out a cookie and egg nog for santa (despite ruthie's protesting that he come into our house) and watched them fall asleep within seconds of their heads hitting the pillows. chip and i set to finishing the wrapping, filling the stockings and getting everything just right for the morning. with the tree lights still glowing we got cozy in bed around 2am, and i fell asleep feeling more excited and giddy than i have in years.

happy birthday (and christmas) david!

dave, i love that i cannot hear acdc without thinking of high-school you, your old blue truck and the mullet you sported. and then i think of your truck catching on fire -woops- and your replacement cars, first the 280zx, shortly followed by the geo metro whose bumper you "sewed" back together with big metal wire/staples, instead of just getting a new one after it was ripped off. i love your intense frugality and the incredible (although sometimes unsightly) solutions you come up with in order to save. the incessant "guess what? i love you!" game you played with little boy bobby still makes me smile. i cannot believe, but dearly love and am secretly jealous, that with a little soldering you turned a bike into a unicycle and legitimately taught yourself how to ride it all over our bumpy dirt roads. you are so quick to give a full, hearty laugh at my jokes and stories and that alone makes me love you forever. yes, you once rocket-launched me across the entire front room when i refused to get out of your way, but you also didn't yell at me when i borrowed your white shorts and then ruined an entire load of all your new clothes with the tube of lipstick i left in the pocket. it is amazing and so impressive that with a full family you went back to college, worked like mad and officially revealed that you're an engineering genius. i still can't believe you and erin have SIX kids, but i love the happy chaos and love that rules your home and how you are all just perfect together. when i was about 6 years old you pulled me out of too-deep water in a friend's pool just as i was about to start panicking for air. i was so relieved and grateful to have you as an older brother at that moment, and the feeling has stuck. happy (late) birthday dave. i love you.

"o tannenbaum. . ."

"wie treuse deine bletter. . ." i can't rememeber more than those four (horribly mispelled, i'm sure) words from the german version. but that doesn't change my love for the christmas tree and the season that welcomes it.

after the untimely and crunchy death of last year's tree i have been determined to get my hands on the freshest tree possible. and i did. this year the holiday dream of cutting my own tree came true. there was no snow, no boots, no hot cocoa or axe involved, but there was my family, a saw and plaid wool. not bad.

in fact, it was nearly perfect; the tree, the crisp and clear dusk, the looks of horror on the girls' faces when the tree fell, the birds flying from tree to tree. we even managed to get our 8'8" beauty home from from rhinebeck, ny strapped to the top of the car without too much trouble, thanks to the massive amount of twine strung through and tied all over our little two-door. we had to get in and out through our windows for the food and bathroom breaks on the way home, but i think we all secretly loved it (it will always make me feel like one of the dukes of hazzard). once we were home we all stayed up until 11pm turning our pine into a legitimate christmas tree.

now my home is filled with freshness, winter, rebirth, love and charity all rolled into the scent of fresh pine. which will stay fresh until the day i take it to be chipped into tiny little pieces for the local parks, if all goes according to plan.

++

and thank you to all for your excitement and kind wishes. after another scare and resulting ultrasounds this past thursday i can confirm that we are both doing well and that this IS a boy. (i have two more pictures with giant arrows to prove it).

happy birthday (week) mom

i love you mom. i love that you made all seven of us volcano-shaped mashed potatoes "erupting" with red colored gravy that destroyed the broccoli trees and cheese-cube houses on it's way down. i love that i can't count how many times i've seen you laugh until you cry. i am in awe when i think of throwing a wet, dirty dish rag at bobby, missing and hitting you in the face instead; you were so calm as you peeled it off your glasses and slowly handed it back to me. i love thinking about the hours you spent patiently helping me with my third grade robot project. i love the power you had over us with just one look. i love, though will never really understand, how you rarely have a recipe for something, you "just make it." i love all those songs you were constantly humming, singing or whistling and the fact that you are, to date, the best whistler i have ever heard. i love that you gave us each our very own box of sugar cereal each christmas. i love the motherly pride that frequently beems from your face and how you have always been so quick with your praise. i love that you seem genuinely pleased to talk with me, even if it is the third call full of questions that day. i love the absolute confidence you have always had in dad, yourself and all of your kids, no matter what. i love that you are still one of the very first people i want to talk to about news in my life, good or bad. i love you for always being able to help me see the good and hope in hopelesness, that you have always been a safe haven to come to.

i love realizing more and more each year how much of you is in me. and how much happier my life is for it.

happy birthday week mom. i love you. a bushel and a peck and a hug around the neck.

in production

thanksgiving was fun and delicious and the visit from (a part of) the joneses was even better. i've had no time to check the internet, emails or even voice mail and it has been wonderful. apologies to all who've been ignored the past week and a half. i'll be getting back to you shortly.

my projects have been fairly pathetic lately. too lazy. too tired. too unmotivated. and here we have the big reason why:

yes, child number three is in the works. coming up on 17 weeks. and the word from the dr who gave me an ultrasound a few weeks ago after some mystery pains is that this one is a boy. a boy. it took a few days to get over the fact that we wouldn't have three little girls all in a row- we love girls- but now we're really starting to embrace the idea. the idea of a mini chip running around makes me laugh and will be crazy. although if he follows chip's course, i'll be lugging him around and spoon-feeding him for the first two years until he decides to start running away and talking non-stop. but at least he'll be entertaining.

to all dear friends who are finding out about this for the first time here, please accept my apologies. know that i love you and if i weren't so lazy and tired i would have called or at least emailed you personally with the news. but by kid number three, it's kind of no big deal right??

in order to preserve some of the child's dignity i have not included the ultrasound with the giant arrow pointing to his privates. really? do they have to use that giant arrow? at least this time they didn't type out "it's a boy!" along the top like they did with ruth. except ruth was a girl, clearly, and they knew that.

seven

october 6, 2000

seven years later we're as happy as ever.