Poor little neglected blog.
I think this is the longest I’ve gone without posting since the summer of 2005, when Wonderboy was in and out of the hospital. Nothing like that happening now; I’m just busy writing. Writing writing writing.
But I keep meaning to jot down daily notes, at least, since this blog has become our searchable family memory. What will I forget because I didn’t write it down? Rilla lost another tooth. Jane got some exciting news and is preparing for a busy summer—more on that later. The cover of my second Inch and Roly book is finished; I should get the go-ahead to post it here soon. I guess those aren’t really the sort of things you forget, except maybe the particulars of the lost tooth. We’ve seen a lot of lost teeth in this family. Rilla’s first one—did I write this here?—Huck pulled it for her. Not on purpose. He was wiggling it, inspecting it, and he inspected it right out of her mouth.
The butterfly picture up there: she’s been filling a notebook with these drawings. She copies them (copies, not traces) out of our field guide. Her older sisters, and just possibly her mother, too, are immensely proud of her artistic prowess. She can draw circles around me. And squares and triangles too. (Ba dum bum.) The finished drawing above was carefully labeled “PiPEViNE SWALLOTAiL.” With hearts dotting each i, of course.
Things we read this week—
More Brambly Hedge
Jamberry
Dear Mr. Blueberry
The Flying Garbanzos (oh how all my children have loved this goofy book)
Good Dog, Carl
Big Rabbit’s Bad Mood
Angus and the Ducks
Bink and Gollie
Other things I am forgetting. I’ll do a proper Rillabooks post later if I can, but I wanted to record the list before the books are scattered back to the ends of the earth.
Rose is reading Adam of the Road. Beanie: Caddie Woodlawn. Jane recently finished 1984. And a million other things.
I still can’t read fiction and it’s killing me. Thank goodness for garden lit and essays.
Oh! I have a post on poetry up at GeekMom today. Poetry is one of the things still happening regularly around here.
Another thing is spring cleaning! I have LOTS more to say about that—it’s all due to Lesley Austin and her beautiful, beautiful Wisteria & Sunshine forum. The house, which normally falls to pieces when I’m deep in a manuscript, is positively gleaming. I even did the floors. There are more rooms to go but I’ve done the bedrooms and bathrooms (and hall closet and pantry) and that is a thing that has never, in seventeen years of child-raising and novel-writing, happened during the crunch-stage of a manuscript before. Of course it means last week I neglected the garden, and oh, that’s right! I went over a week without blogging.
Jeanne says:
My youngest just had to read Caddie Woodlawn for history co-op. It was the only book he really didn’t like the whole year. I think he was too old for it. Some of the other guys in co-op pronounced it “too Little House” (gasp!), but he loves those, so I’m not sure what the deal was!
Have missed your blogging but am glad you’re writing!
On April 30, 2012 at 7:04 pm
sarah says:
Such a lovely happy post š You are doing better with the cleaning than I … but I did put my dishwashing liquid in a pretty jug (and then poured half of it out accidentally, the first time I used it) … and I lit a candle in my kitchen today. Go me! But, um, my closets are still a disaster zone. And I don’t even *mention* the bathroom. How you do it with such a luxurious number of children, AND the writing you do … amazing.
On April 30, 2012 at 8:56 pm
Ellie says:
Seriously? Leave the floors: blog more! ;-P
And here I was, thinking you might be doing something fun, like vacationing! No, just writing and cleaning and tooth pulling and reading! Life is lovely when it is busy in such a way.
Rilla’s butterfly is lovely! Calli could draw animals amazingly well from a very young age too — I’m predicting that with Rilla you have lots to look forward to!
Good to have you back {{hugs}} missed you.
On May 1, 2012 at 4:42 am
tanita says:
I always imagine you off on happier adventures when you don’t write — for myself, I’m hip-deep in boxes, sorting, shipping, and throwing away – and I hadn’t even read that blog post on cleaning?? That spurs me on further.
At present, there’s too much chaos for my writing to be working well – but I hope to see things soon improve…
On May 1, 2012 at 4:47 am
Fe says:
We had a tooth situation like that, here, in the last week. Puggle was showing his (loose, hanging by a thread!) tooth to Howlet (six months). I warned Puggle not to let Howlet put his finger in his mouth–because he might pull out the tooth… And sure enough, in went Howlet’s finger, and immediately, out came the tooth!
On May 1, 2012 at 7:23 am
Hannah @ Lovely Woods says:
Tell Rilla we have pipevine swallowtails here too, right in our very own front yard! We had a horde of caterpillars that, just yesterday apparently, all went into chrysalis stage (or hiding stage). Maybe they are cousins of hers.
We’re awfully excited about Jane’s exciting news. But you already know that. š
On May 1, 2012 at 6:39 pm