Nathan at Almost 10

Well I never thought I would see the day, but this year -- ten years in -- is the year I finally had to ask myself a few times, trying to remember which was Nathan's due date. (The 22nd. It was the 22nd!)

It's also the year everything went completely bananas and I stopped even pretending to blog, but I have to leave this space here anyway, my own little corner of the internet, because I need a home for memories and milestones and that kind of thing, even if the day-to-day captures have moved to other online homes.

As this is posting, our family is floating northward on America's highways, en route to Wisconsin Dells, because a day of giant waterparks is what Nathan requested for his 10th birthday, and we do love a reason for a road trip. (And a waterpark.) (And a celebration.) It's funny how tween and preteen birthday requests have moved away from toys and Thomas and Friend Cars, and are now all about devices and bikes and projects and trips. COME BACK TO ME, FRIEND CARS. (Cars 3 is out this summer and I won't lie, I'm dying to see it just so I can cry some nostalgia tears remembering the baby and toddler years.)

So yeah, Nathan is about to turn ten. We've known him for a decade. We've been parents for a decade. I am so freaking full of Feelings my head has been spinning for weeks.

Nathan has had a really good year -- dare I say it was even better than when he was five? (#fiveforever!) He is kind and responsible and funny, and while he remains a true introvert, he is ever more out of his shell. He likes public speaking, and he is proud anytime he can be in a leader role.

He is doing pretty well in school, working hard enough to make decent grades, but not so hard he sacrifices precious Pokemon chatter time. He loves science and math, and loves reading history and biography books. It's taken me years to convince him that novels (or any fiction) are also a delight, but finally FINALLY he is very super crazy into Harry Potter, is partway through the 7th book, and talks about almost nothing else these days. In classic Nathan fashion, he spends hours in internet rabbit holes about fan theories and movie castings and behind the scenes info, and lost in Pottermore fandom, and he thinks it's very important that I tell you here that he's a proud Hufflepuff who thinks fairness, justice, loyalty, and inclusion are the most important things (this is actually delightfully accurate about him).

These days he says he'd like to be an architect when he grows up; he spends lots of his time building and designing all manner of things with his legos and sketching and any boxes or tubes or bottles or other crap he pulls from the recycling bin. (He might or might not have a tiny hoarding problem in his room.)

He also loves watching Master Chef, Jr, and has been harboring some serious cooking desires recently. He wants to try new foods and learn to make them, and we don't even know what happened to our little baby who only ever wanted to eat bagels, and now requests lunch dates so he can have some grilled salmon which we never really fix at home. He delights me in surprising quirky ways, and I love seeing him become more and more himself.

He has become surprisingly (to us! we didn't see it coming!) athletic in the last year, thriving at soccer, making a good effort at basketball, and swimming and running faster than many kids his age, despite his small size (he's still the tiniest kid in his grade). He had two bad scooter spills this year resulting in a few (minor) fractures and injuries in his wrist, elbow, knee and hip -- and spent most of his spring in a leg cast, wrist brace and sling. He was discouraged at the time, but has recovered with no problems and is back to normal now.

He's still playing his cello, and has buckled down and really worked hard at this year; we are officially impressed by what he can do. And! He can now match a pitch, singing! We also never thought we'd see that day. :) He loves choir at church, partly because he's suddenly a great singing leader, and partly because as one of the older kids, he has lots of chances for speaking parts and reading at the front of the church, which he loves.

He and Anneliese are still chummy with each other above all others, but are learning to branch out and be social with their own peer groups and also with Charlotte. They've had a few moments of pain together this year that were hard to watch, but also good to see them grow and learn.

Nathan is still the tiny adult in our family, classic oldest child: doing a funny dance between needing to be a baby with snuggles and back scratching and coddling -- and acting as grown up as possible, bossing his sisters and generally trying to manage everyone and everything around him (I seriously have NO IDEA WHERE HE GETS THIS *ahem*). He's helpful, sometimes to a fault, but we love about him that  he always takes initiative and looks to see what others might need or want. His toddlerhood excellence at empathy is manifesting in new and caring ways, and we are so proud.

Happy almost-ten to our wonderful, serious, funny, loving, bright baby boy. Watching you grow for a decade has been the greatest joy of our lives.

Summer Basket List

Summer is over. Well, not really, there is still a month of summer weather left, but summer break is over, and school starts this week, and so we have crossed off as many of the remaining bucket list items as we can. I needed this summer to be something redemptive after last year, which was a sh!t show of emotions and baby soothing and feeling like I was failing everyone around me, and then feeling resentful about the failing, and yeah. This year was better.

I had a page in my notebook where I jotted down ideas the kids named as things they wanted to do this summer (a few times, someone got ahold of a pen and added ideas himself), and we got to almost all of them.

We also renamed it The Basket List because at the beginning of the summer Anneliese could never remember what it was called, so she kept saying that, and it stuck for the rest of us even though she rolls her eyes and refuses to partake of the cutesy rename herself. HER LOSS. CUTESY IS FUN, YO.

And truthfully we didn't even look much at the list because we were busy just hanging out and having fun. Montreat was a freaking delight. Our family road trip was more fun than I ever could have dreamed. And lots of little fun things in between the travels too:

1.) Ride on a ferry. This list was born in April when Nathan, indignant that I would go to Seattle and ride on a ferry without him, made a page in my notebook and put FERRY as the first thing on it. We... didn't actually get to this. But we have Outer Banks camping plans next month, and we will ferry to Okracoke and then Hatteras. The ferry will happen! I promise, buddy!

2.) Visit Northfield. Check and check. 'Twas delightful. Here are all the kids at St. Olaf:

Oh Charlotte. I don't even know, y'all. She just doesn't stop.

Road trip blogs still to come. (They are all half written and still need pics and there's a lot to sort through so eh.)

3.) Crayon A. This is a craft I have been intending to do for years with Anneliese and we finally did it, and it turned out great, and she loves it, and I love it.

NAILED IT. Suck it, Pinterest, I own you.

4.) Go camping. Not yet - this will be with the ferry ride next month.

5.) Eat purple carrots. Okay so Anneliese asked for this for weeks, and I wrote it down for her, even though you can't get any carrots at the farmer's market, much less purple ones, until fall. So this is still to come also. We did, however, make several stews with parsnips, and Anneliese has a new favorite vegetable. (She is an odd child.)

6.) Strawberries. There were no carrots, but there were strawberries, and Anneliese used them to bake her very first dessert for all of us. Bisquick shortcakes, and warm strawberries, and cream she whipped herself, and oh she was so proud.

7.) Cinderella movie. Anneliese saw this with Grandma. That counts, right? (I still haven't seen it.) (I am totally interested, but secretly more for the Frozen short than for the movie itself. Don't judge me.)

8.) Rise Biscuits and Donuts. This is a place in Durham with apparently really great breakfast treats. We never made it there, but I am counting our Duck Donut outing as a check mark on the list for new treat places.

9.) Learn ponytails. Anneliese did it! This is a life skill, I mean really.


(If you can't see the embedded video, click here to watch it on YouTube.)

10.) Learn shoe tying. Yeah, no. This did not happen.

11.) Watch Jurassic Park (not with the girls). Yes finally, Nathan, of years-long dinosaur obsession, has seen the original Jurassic Park movie. It totally scared him. But I think he thinks it was worth it. (It still is delightfully scary to me too.) We have listened to the soundtrack a thousand times this summer since then. Currently the girls' favorite song to dance to. We are That Family, apparently.

12.) Tropical Pick'n Chicken. It's a new (to us) local chain restaurant near our house, with Caribbean food and such. Nathan is enamored with it. It's just okay for me. But! We went! Summer dreams coming true over here y'all!

13.) Build legos. Um, duh. Done and done.

14.) Sleepovers. Yes, Nathan and Anneliese, every Friday, all summer (all year actually, but the summer was no exception). These two are best buddies, and never moreso than on Friday nights. We don't understand how they spend all day every day together and still have things to talk about into the wee hours. They say more to each other than they ever do to any of the rest of us.

15.) Baking contest. This got added to the list in summer's eleventh hour, and we still did it!

16.) Read lots of books. CHECK. We have been very library busy. And library days are the best days, aren't they? Let's not forget the afternoon I found the kids all outside reading their library books sprawled on the sidewalk WITH THEIR BEDDING, why children, why?

Seven and a Half

Nathan is seven and a half. SEVEN AND A HALF. (I keep waiting for the age that won't give me all-caps wide eyes, but we haven't hit it yet.)

My sister pointed out this week that being seven and a half means he's halfway to driver's ed. (I told her to shut her damn* mouth, because obviously.) (*I used a different word.) (Not a better one.) (Not the one you're thinking though.) (I digress.) (Parentheses!)

Anyway, he is growing up and I'm trying not to do any mom math in my head or I will realize it's all going to fast, and I will panic.  So instead I will just think about the here and now. So, some things about Now:

Nathan is growing, yet ever-smaller for his age, still wearing mostly size 6 clothes (the same as Anneliese!) but he is suddenly eating everything in sight, and asking for more, and he ordered a Korean steak taco at the smoothie place the other day, and I don't even know who he is anymore, is what I'm saying.

No, no. What I am saying is I think we are expecting a growth spurt any minute now, and maybe he won't be the smallest in his class forever. (Or maybe he will. He is also one of the very youngest. Mark was also the youngest and the smallest, so... it could happen.)

He is very into planes and ships and designing and building lego vehicles of any kind - flying and sailing and driving alike. He will read fiction with some coaxing, but mostly he reads biography after biography, even of people he has never heard of. (What?) He watches video footage about aviation and what causes plane crashes, and seems undisturbed, yet won't watch the Little Mermaid because Ursula terrifies him (see also: the first five minutes of Tangled).

He loves whales and space and geography - asking questions about countries and languages and poring over the giant world map on his ceiling (yes really) and the world atlas book my dad gave him for Christmas. (If you know my dad, that's the least shocking sentence in the history of ever.)

He and Anneliese remain best buddies, and he is jealous for her attention when she and Charlotte are feeling particularly chummy on a given day. He does his running club at school on Friday mornings, and is fast, but besides that he isn't super into sports. He sings in children's choir at church (a solid fifth-ish below everyone else, not that it matters) and still plays his cello, better and better all the time. He is a baby hoarder, squirreling away bits of paper, and pieces of toys and random... stuff that he thinks he might want to build something with.

(The other day he told me he was bored -- well, he started to, and then I reminded him if he says he is bored I will find some extra chores for him to do -- and so he went in the recycling bin and got this starbucks cup and built... a boat? I think? THIS IS SO NATHAN, Y'ALL.)

He is a kid who wavers between extreme chattiness, and not knowing how to say what he wants to say. He writes and draws a lot.

Here is some information about the Queen Mary 2. (Why, what does your seven-year-old obsess over?) You can choose whether you like or don't like the information. Complete with a hand-drawn thumbs-up, because he is a Child Of The Era. (I always circle "like." Duh.)

His obsession with this ship oddly makes me miss my Grandpa Schnack. They would have had so much fun being boring together. Truly. Grandpa would have delighted in him.

Here is a Japanese battleship, complete with WWII-era Japanese naval flag (?) (we are fully living in the age of when our kid knows more than we do about the stuff he's interested in).

And yes that's me on top, sitting on a lounge chair, reading a book. I mean... at least I get to go to war? (What does this say about what he thinks of me?)

He is known to bring random notes downstairs to us, that sometimes do or don't make any sense.

He also has an old phone of Mark's, which he can use when he asks permission. He has had a gmail account for several years, and he uses the chat app to "text" people which is usually pretty cute.

Well, usually pretty cute. Not always.

And sometimes just super exciting, as Mark is learning.

And sometimes really legitimately adorable.

And yes, like every other kid his age, he is into Minecraft (thanks Uncle John) (no really, it's fine -- cute, even) and he not only plays the game, but watches other people playing the game on YouTube. AND watches all manner of toy review and project/craft videos, and then got the harebrained idea that he should... do one himself?

Behold, a craft blogger in the making:


(Click here to watch the video on YouTube.)

So many questions. Is where/how to get that template not an important part of the instructions? Why not color the eyes before folding it? And WHY SO MUCH TAPE FOR THE LOVE. (He could use some time-lapse here also.)

(Please know, he is so proud of this. Really super duper pleased.)

(This all happened with Mark's help one night while I was at choir. I came home and it tickled me so much I cried.)

My child! Who spent years staring at adults, mute, when they asked him something. Who even now hates when people watch him or call attention to him or even laugh at his jokes... wants his own YouTube channel? Talks to the camera as if it's the most normal serious thing in the world? I don't even know, y'all.

Growing up. It's weird.

Happy half birthday, you quirky bright sweet wonderful child.

Anneliese at Almost Five

It's October 7th again, and I don't need any stinking timehop notifications to remind me it's Anneliese's due date. Baby Beanie! Who was due on this day, five years ago. FIVE.

I can't believe she's almost five.

I know from experience that five is an awesome age, and while the passing of time is always a little sad, and I will miss her babyhood, mostly I am excited to see what five brings for her. She has grown up so much in the last year. She's gone from a kid just pulling out of toddlerhood, into a... little lady. It is so cool to see. She's a bright spot in any day - happy, joyful, friendly. Delightful, basically.

Amongst our three, she seems like an extrovert, but out in the wild compared to the general population, decidedly less so. She's not shy, but she's not the most outgoing in a crowd either. She's friendly and chatty and easy to talk to.

She loves to swing, and play dress-up, and have books read to her, and dance. She hates being cold. She loves bright colors, as many as possible at the same time. She's never seen a rainbow anything that didn't thrill her.

She attaches to people and craves their love and wants to be with them. She and Nathan remain almost inseparable when they're home, and I don't see that changing anytime soon. There was a hurtful exchange of words last week that shook them both up (me too!) but even that, they've come right back from. I can't believe that five years ago right now, Nathan didn't even know her yet. His life, like all of ours, is so much better because she is in it.

I think, actually, that Nathan and Charlotte and Ali might each name Anneliese as their favorite -- she's a real middle child in that way. She adores them all and is happy to be the in-demand playmate, bouncing between trains and princesses and snuggles and dinosaurs and coloring.

When she does want to be alone (unusual, but it happens) she wants to sit on the deck and look at the sky and the pool. Or swing as high as she can, while singing a song at the top of her lungs. Or lie on our shoulders and close her eyes and suck her thumb. Or paint a picture in neon colors, covering the whole page til there's not any white.

She remains ever loyal to Hattie, who is more flat and less green every year, yet as loved as ever. I made Anneliese a friendship bracelet in June and she requested a matching one for Hattie, and now they both have rainbow bracelets they wear all the time. Yes, still. My four-year-old has been wearing one single bracelet for almost five months. And hasn't lost it. Which, considering the rate she loses everything else under the sun (on my gravestone: ANNELIESE WHERE ARE YOUR SHOES), is pretty unbelievable.

She is incredibly helpful at home (especially with Ali, much more than she ever was with Charlotte... maybe just an age thing?) - fetching things and soothing tears and zipping jackets and putting socks on toddlers. She loves helping. Her teachers at preschool tell me she's the same way there.

You'd think this would mean she's great at cleaning up, but no. NO. NOPE. She leaves a trail of mess behind her wherever she goes, somehow shedding stickers and glitter and feathers and toys that she must pull out of thin air, just to drop on the ground. Some days she literally leaves rainbows in her wake.

She'd rather roll around in a mess giggling than clean up, when it comes time. Well, until the giggles turn to sobs. Cleaning up usually ends in sobs. The effort she will put into not cleaning up seems so much harder than just... cleaning up. I don't get it.

Like every other almost-five-year-old in America, she loves Frozen. She also likes to watch Daniel Tiger and My Little Pony, and she loves the Olivia books. She likes nature magazines and she pores over the American Girl Doll catalog any time it comes in the mail (how can this be starting already?? curses, CURSES to whoever got us on that list).

Her love affair with cottage cheese seems to be over, which makes me sad, even though it's gross and I can't fault her for finally realizing that. But it was her first favorite food! These days she loves hot dogs and bananas and yogurt and mac and cheese, and -- her very favorite food in the world -- Daddy's spaghetti.

She sometimes says really profound things without knowing it: I was sad when that didn't happen, but it's okay because it felt good to hope for it.

Whoa.

She feels her feelings, big, all of them. Sometimes that means she hurts, and it's hard to watch, but mostly I'm really glad she's like that. I'm wired the same way. I get it. It's a curse but mostly a blessing.

She asks every Friday to have a sleepover with Nathan, and we always say yes. She asks every night to be tucked in one extra time. She asks every night for us to leave the hall light on til we go to bed. She tells us every night, still, for years now -- love you night night, like it's all one phrase, like a good-night is always connected to love you. We all say it that way now. She's a good influence on us.

Happy due date, Anneliese. You delight us every day with your kindness and your sweet heart and the joyful way you love people. You are a ray of sunshine to those of us who get to be around you. It's tempting to believe I love you so much that I couldn't possibly love you more, but I know I will again tomorrow. You keep chasing those rainbows, little lady.

September in the Pool

Hey know what's great about North Carolina? We get to wait til late September (the proper time) for fall to really start, and even then it's interspersed with enough warm days that we still get to swim, too.  So we have been spending a lot of time this month out in the pool.

And Mark got a new work phone, and a new LifeProof case for said work phone, so you can bet yer ass I jumped in the pool with that thing and took some pictures, straight away.

I never thought I'd see the day when Nathan, Mr. "I Don't Like the Spray" himself, willingly, happily, swimming underwater.

Also the underwater hand-holding just slays me. My sweet babies. I love my family.

The End of This Summer

Well since labor day is over and Nathan started back to school last week and the girls start back to preschool tomorrow, I guess it means summer is over... and I feel complicated about that. I don't know whether to feel relieved that this season is passed (because it kinda sucked), or cry because it isn't what I wanted to be and I don't get to go back to re-do it, time being one-directional and kind of a bummer like that.

I am trying to think less about Mark traveling so much, less about the sad screamy-baby months, less about the best friend goodbye, less about the largely-untouched bucket list of family fun -- and think more about the lovely moments (yes! they were there! swearsies!) and fun trips and and new memories. I'm trying. I am! But I'm having trouble shaking that overall, it wasn't what I wanted it to be, and now it's over.

Blah.

At least we did up our last day of summer in style. And by "in style" I mean in a frenzy. Although you would never know it from this here, right?

Besides Charlotte being halfway out of the picture (even after I tilted the camera to accommodate her), and Ali working on her poetic Thoreau-contemplating-Walden gaze, we look like a completely together and un-frazzled lot, yes? Right? SAY YES.

So anyway our frenzy involved taking an extra friend, Beatrice, for the morning (there was a fifth kid) (of course there was a fifth kid) (she is a friend of Anneliese's and her mom needed to work and she is a dream to have around, and after a few days of Anneliese being weepy, she needed some happy distraction so I have never been gladder to have a fifth kid, actually) and then getting Nathan on the bus and Ali to her first day of MMO (see, that's how the fifth kid thing balances out, you send two others to school).

Also, it should not be called MMO, not only because I'm an aunt, not a mom here (and isn't it all about me?) but because I am not the only non-mom who might want or have a kid in the program, and the language around it is gross, and I will begin my campaign to change it shortly.

Like after some more coffee.  Several weeks's worth.

So Ali went to church and I took the big (big?) (middle?) girls out for coffee treats, which was really fun and cute until Anneliese spilled hers and then even Beatrice couldn't quell the weepies. Sigh.

Starbucks with outdoor seating + September = RECOMMEND.

We regrouped and went back to church to do preschool orientations, which were all fine and easy. Charlotte's teacher is one we already know well (both Nathan and Anneliese also had her, but at different ages). Anneliese's teacher is new to us, but seems like maybe the most on it preschool teacher I have yet to encounter, so I'm pretty thrilled about that match.

Anneliese found her coat hook and she loves it.

She also took posession of a rainbow nametag.

Charlotte danced in the hallway with no one watching, as she is wont to do, and then stopped and got all smiley instead when I wanted her to do more.

Then Beatrice and Anneliese climbed on her, because we are the dream family to have lingering in preschool hallways when teachers are trying to do orientations.

Seriously you want us around. We are delightful. And definitely not loud or anything.

And then we skipped grocery shopping to swim in the pool because y'all, the schedule only had so much room.

Also it was hot as the blazes outside. Is it September? It was like mid-nineties today. I literally sat under a bush by the pool like freaking Jonah, just for a tiny spot of shade. I took a picture but it ain't pretty so you don't get to see it.

And then we went back to church to pick Ali up from Aunt's Morning Out™ because apparently three round-trips in one morning is how much I needed to drive to church today. Oh wait! I also did two more, for children's choir in the afternoon, after Nathan's carpool! Yay! Five round-trips! My life is full of meaning and purpose. Wait, what? Anyway.

Ali did just fine at church this morning and was smiling and happy to see me after lunch and she napped hard after her big morning.

But not before she pooped all over me and then (after I took my shirt off) spit up all over my back and down my jeans so I got to do extra laundry and get an extra shower today! I also got to change not one but TWO sets of poopy underwear, AND wait in a carpool line that was longer and slower than it would have taken the bus to get home. Sigh, again.

MEANING AND PURPOSE.

But actually it was not a bad day, just a frenzy. After a few sad no-Another-Nathan tears, Nathan had a fun first children's choir of the year, and he and Anneliese were giggly and playful all evening, excited for her school tomorrow reading books together and practicing writing. Anneliese wanted to write a letter, so Nathan showed her how to write hi and I love you, and I think the love might have just been a heart shape, but it still totally counts. Also she wanted to dot all her i's with hearts, which I would have (probably patronizingly) discouraged, but Nathan sweetly told her "okay just make them as tiny as you can," which is why he's a better person than I am.

(Queen poopy crabbypants went to bed early. If you pretended not to hear her tantruming upstairs, watching Nathan and Anneliese together was lovely.)

Whoever tells me to *cherish every moment* gets a chair to the face.

Hm  it occurs to me (brace yourself, obvious epiphany coming up) that sometimes real life tedium and lovely tender moments happen all at the same time, and maybe my disappointing summer can be disappointing but also okay too? No happy ending needed. No brilliant closure better-next-year takeaways required. Just letting it be what it was, missing what it wasn't, and now starting the next thing.  I think I will try to be okay with that.

Yesterday Today Tomorrow, Aquarium Version - With Bonus Existential Overthinking and Also (Possible) Crab Sex

Yesterday - Ali went with Nick and Barbara down to Lake Wateree, and Mark was off work, so we had a rare free Friday as a family! Nathan's last free weekday of summer! We decided to make the most of it and drive to the beach, not for the beach itself (it was hot as the blazes) but to see the aquarium. Just because. So we did, and it was fun.

It looks like they're looking at a painting but I swear
this is a normal fish tank with real fish inside.

Praying this doesn't result in more turtle nightmares.

This is a megaladon jaw. Did you know a megaladon is a shark? Not a dinosaur?
(I did not know this.) (Three guesses who *did* know this.)
(Yes he is wearing a shirt full of sea creatures to the aquarium.)

Nathan told me these horseshoe crabs are mating. I don't think he knows what
mating means, nor do I know if it's even true, but if it is, then hey! horseshoe crab
sex! on my blog! you're welcome! (Hi there spammers.)

We went to a talk about sharks. There were lots of facts.
Some of us loved the talk about shark facts more than others.

Our outing ended with a big ol' gift store tantrum (from Anneliese! not a store-tantrumer! I do not know what happened! I mean I do, but I was still surprised) and me putting my foot down and dragging her from the complex sobbing (yes I was That Mom), feeling frustrated and hurt that we can't just do something NICE together without some kid wanting MORE instead of just being THANKFUL, but true to Anneliese, she was calm and happy and non-pouty within relatively few minutes, despite having not gotten her way, and all was well for the drive home. There was even iced coffee. (For me. Not Anneliese. In case that wasn't clear.)

Today - I napped, basically all morning, because I have been sleeping terribly all week and I can't seem to turn it around. Normally I am pretty emphatically not a napper -- both because my body rarely even wants it, and when I do it makes me feel worse anyway -- but this past week I took a nap at 8:30 almost every morning when Ali went down. My nights have been anxious and exhausting, and I have just needed more sleep, come morning. Although, I guess if you're taking a nap at 8:30 in the morning, it is less a nap and more... going back to bed. Whatever. I needed it, and lots of My Little Pony was consumed in my living room, and I did it again today, and I am not ashamed.

I also finished another delightful book (lest it sound like I am only reading awesome things these days, please know I abandoned like four books in a row earlier this month because I hated them all).

I have no idea how a book about liberal arts majors playing baseball (there is a lot of baseball in this book) could have sucked me in so fast and kept me rapt for the very few days it took me to read it, but it did. It is full of complicated friendships, and codependency, but the kind that feels good even in its unhealthiness. And one totally inappropriate sexual relationship (legal! just inappropriate, age-wise) so if that kind of thing offends you, don't read it. (I thought it was sexy. For what that's worth.) Anyway, five stars. I even cared about the sports part! RECOMMEND.

Other than that, we just sat around the pool today (the kids are swimming better and better! jumping into the deep end without fear and swimming to the sides, like people who like swimming are wont to do!) then went and ate Mexican for dinner. We joked that we should re-enact this horrible family photo because if anything, we looked even worse than that today.

Also, the big kids decided they are now old enough to sit on their own side of a booth. Like, not next to Mark or me. They were very whispery conspiratorial about it. And then they sat and managed their own food which is actually totally normal and I don't know why we haven't been doing this for a while, but there you go. NEW RESTAURANT BOOTH ERA. (It is possible I make note of too many Eras.)

Tomorrow - Frankly, I am dreading church in the morning. I'm feeling very disillusioned about things over there right now, which has many layers, most of them far more than I would ever say on the internet (when it comes to church leadership, it gets political doesn't it?) but most of it boils down to low energy (our pastor being gone for a month, and Another Nathan being gone - those things make a big difference, we are learning), and all of us slogging through the end of the summer, and my choir (which is normally my favorite thing about church) has just been sort of... down? off? - which makes me miss Nathan very acutely. It's funny how when he was in the process of leaving, people at church kept asking after our family and how we were doing, etc etc, which was nice on some level but also struck me as weird -- knowing that I would miss him at church, of course, but that he's so much more to us than a choir director, sometimes the church part felt like an afterthought in our friendship, like any close friend's job might become just a peripheral thing about them -- that missing him as our friend would surely be so much worse. But NOPE. Turns out he is still very, very present as my friend (he is still in my phone! we talk and text all the time! we know about each other's days! it is very fine and normal actually, or getting there), and very very absent at church.

And anyway so all of those things, plus the looming of a new school year and ending of a hard season, are adding up into some miniature spiritual/existential crisis about whyyyyy I am feet-draggy about church, and basically I have spent a lot of time trying to remind myself 1- I love God, 2- it is okay to miss my friend as my friend and as a faith leader, 3- I do not need to sleep through church tomorrow, right? Right? I just feel super-checked out, and super overthinky about why, and also so freaking tired. (See again: terrible week of sleep = exhaustion = overthinking = self-doubt = existential crisis = hide from the world. But I won't.)

Anyway! So that I don't end on a churchy blah note, here is a cute picture of Charlotte! She climbed in the pews and waited patiently for Mark to clean up and sort things a few weeks ago when he was the deacon in charge, and people kept checking on her and making sure she was okay sitting there alone, but she just wanted to sit her bum in that pew, and smile, and go church, as she says.

So, some things are still churchy lovely as always.

And even if I am dreading tomorrow, and with it, dreading (longing for?) (no, dreading) the end of summer and the start of a new year, I am so glad that we had some easy family fun this weekend. We terribly needed that time together to be out and be summery, and I feel happy about it.

And now I shall go seek out my next hopefully-delightful book, and pray for good sleeping.

Lake Wateree, Another August

Mark and the kids went to Lake Wateree to see his dad last week for his birthday (and also left Nathan for a long weekend). Ali and I stayed home and sorted bookshelves, which was its own brand of thrilling, and no that is not sarcastic. (We would have loved to have gone, but Ali isn't quiiiite sleeping through the night, and their house isn't quiiiiiite quiet enough for four kids, when one doesn't sleep through the night.) We were fine at home, but it means I have to live vicariously through Mark's pictures.

Nathan and Anneliese are still besties, of course, and this photo makes me melt.

This one too OMG I CAN'T STAND IT MAH BAYBEEEES, this is just so them.

Okay, also, Charlotte apparently went fishing:

And drank a sprite??? Who gave my baby SODA??? *side eye Oma*

Here's a thing I'm glad I didn't know was happening in the moment, because HASHTAG: TERRIFYING.

But Opa has a sweet gentle side too.

And the short version of this post is: my people are pretty cute on boats.

And also happy birthday Opa!!