Snippets of May and June

Scooping a few things from Twitter and Facebook for our family archives…

Beanie misreads “tapioca” at the grocery store, cries out in horror: “TILAPIA PUDDING???”

Rose has announced her new favorite snack: vanilla yogurt with red pepper flakes. I feel faint.

Beanie on Roald Dahl: “In a way, he’s kind of mean. He wrote books that are TOO GOOD, so now that I’ve read them all, I’m sad.”

Bowie on iTunes; Scott giving dramatic recitation, from memory, of HAND, HAND, FINGERS, THUMB in Patrick Stewart voice. #morningatmyhouse

A #booksthatchangedmyworld I forgot: Best Christmas Pageant Ever. Mrs. B in 5th grade read it aloud, hooked me on readalouds. (& that book!)

Also, possibly my first encounter with ‘unlikely heroes.’ Those awful Herdmans surprised everyone.

The 9yo asks, “How DO you fall unconscious, anyway?”

Scott is singing “Macho Man” to the baby, who is dancing like the Caddyshack gopher. I’m supposed to tear myself away from that and work??

Really, Amazon? There can’t possibly be anything in my buying history that suggests I would appreciate an email about a sale on Baconnaise.

“What happened to Alf’s girlfriend on Lark Rise” has surpassed “toddler nose blowing” as a top search topic bringing people to my blog.

Remark #905709 I never anticipated needing to make: “Please don’t kick people in your fake sleep.”

How Beanie, my early bird, greeted me this morning: “Mom, I was thinking. If you were in a coma for a lot of years, when you woke up, wouldn’t you be a GIANT? Because you do most of your growing when you are sleeping.”

Rilla is worried. Her sisters told her they are biking to Egypt today. From San Diego.

So at various points in this day I heard the baby referred to by his sisters as a minotaur and a ham. I suppose this is to be expected when his mother refers to him as her little side of beef.

Reeeaaaalllly wish I’d remembered the neighbors can hear outside my bedroom window before I started belting Don’t Cry Out Loud.

Today so far: a little Eliot, a little Plutarch, a little Skye Boat Song. Now watching Beanie fall into FARMER BOY for 1st time. #Ilovethis

Plutarch, by the way? Best kept secret when it comes to adventure tales. Those Romans, sheesh.

Beanie is astounded by FARMER BOY’s assertion that Almanzo & his siblings were not allowed to speak at meals. But she envies him his pie.

9yo: “Mom, I fear you have hooked me on Shakespeare. I keep thinking in quotations.”

Overheard: Rose, in a reproving tone: “Beanie, you’d CARE if you got your legs cut off.”

I could just stand here all day & transcribe. Beanie: “Beware, you creep-faced loon!” Rose:”You have to admire her creativity & desire to die.”

Listening to a Yale Open Course music class on the fugue. Fugue, from Latin fuga, flight: “One voice going ahead, leading ahead; another voice following it.” Yale’s Prof Wright is quite engaging.

Rilla: “When I grow up I want to be a goddess. Because I really want to know what clouds taste like.”

The 11yo just pitched me a six-book historical fiction series. I’m being roped in as research assistant.

A descent into madness and a brutal murder: that’s what I call an afternoon well spent. Love my kids’ Shakespeare Club.

Baby sits on kitchen floor chuckling, dripping water from a bottle onto his bare legs. Grins up at me all proud, like water’s his invention.

Scott has the day off; took big kids bowling. I’m playing dressup with Rilla but she had to pause for a pizza break. Signed, Mrs. Fancylady (mother of, apparently, a baby named Pickle Cheatman)

Rose is working on the last page of a Dover coloring book on dragons. It’s a “dragon questing license.” Wonderboy is driving her crazy by repeatedly grabbing her colored pencils. Laments Rose: “What I really need is a brother-maiming license.”

In the Awesome Baby Tricks department, he has learned to “hit the deck.” We are dying laughing.

Relieved to wake up and find that I did not, in fact, pay Clint Eastwood $1100 for a barrel of flour.

The 11yo says she is loving STARGIRL for its “imaginative, rich writing.” Future book blogger?

Children have constructed zipline for velcro-pawed toy monkey between closet and bunk bed.

The title of this conversation is “Not a Morning Person.” Me: “Good morning!” Rilla: “Mommy, I don’t like when people say that.”