"The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep."

~Robert Frost







Sunday, June 17, 2012

Father's Day....

My love,

Our girls are so very blessed to have you for their daddy. And they know it! 

How do you know when to tickle and tease, or when to be quiet and listen? I marvel at it. 

Our daughters instinctively turn to you already when they are sad, or confused, or overwhelmed. You are such a safe place for them, and the way that they trust you is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen.

Thank you for making them try the monkey bars at the park, and catching them when they fall, and making it all so much fun that they keep trying. Thank you for coming home from a long day at work or a long week of travel, and being so excited to play games and hang out with them that they don't even know how tired you are. Thank you for sitting through their dance recitals with every bit as much enthusiasm as you bring to their t-ball games, and for making them feel like the most beautiful princesses who ever took the stage. Thank you for teaching them to vacuum and making it fun by turning it into a cleaning party while I am out. Thank you for making the most delicious Saturday breakfasts in the world, and for not crowing about it when they tell you very emphatically that you make better breakfasts than I do. ;) Thank you for the barbecues, and the bike rides, and the books read before bedtime. Thank you for the love that fills our home.

I love that you love being a daddy. Happy Father's Day!


Thursday, June 14, 2012

"Real baseball stuff!"

Last night, Lamont and I had our first taste of multiple children having multiple events at the same time. Ashley had to be at the dress rehearsal for her dance recital on Saturday (Hannah's rehearsal, for the Friday recital, landed the evening before), and the girls also had a t-ball game scheduled for the exact same time slot. So Lamont took Hannah to the game, I took Ashley to the dress rehearsal, and Bethany got to choose where she wanted to go...the t-ball game where she could sit in the sunshine and play catch with Daddy won easily. :)

It was so weird to be texting each other updates instead of actually being there with both girls at their events! Being blessed to get to stay home with our little ones, I have been able to experience pretty much everything with them so far in their little lives. And while it's not like t-ball is a very eventful sport, and I didn't miss Hannah hitting a home run or anything, it was really odd to just not be there. I'm not sure I want to get used to it! Anyway, here are a few, slightly blurry pictures from the game on Monday that I did get to see....

This is what one does in the outfield when one is four years old. :)
Or you can flip your hat backwards like all the cool little boys on the team....
And this is a good way to make sure that you don't miss the ball if it ever comes your way.
Hannah told me after the game that she was doing "real baseball stuff!" out there. :)
Ashley is all serious business about this game until she's safely on one of the bases, at which point she will always look for me and wave or give me a thumbs up. Always, without fail. :)
I've been a little bit surprised by how much fun t-ball is, not just for the girls, but for us to watch as well. Sure, it's not at all competitive (they don't even keep score), but the kids are so serious about it and yet having so much fun at the same time, and it's just so stinking cute! When they take their turns in the outfield they are inevitably picking grass, or doing little dances to the music in their heads, or something random and silly that has nothing to do with the game. And yet just as inevitably, when the batter gets a hit, the entire outfield converges inward in a delighted scramble for the ball, and whoever comes up from the ground triumphantly holding it above their head has the most contagious smile on their face...so fun!

And in the midst of all the cute silliness, they are learning about the sport, and gaining confidence in their throwing and catching abilities, and getting the concept of listening to their coach and paying attention to what he says. Such a neat opportunity for them!

And yes, Bethany is mightily offended that she is too young for t-ball as well as dance. ;) Wait until I have to break it to her that she can't go to VBS this summer either...thank goodness for swim lessons starting up soon for all three of the girls!

Thursday, June 7, 2012

Sugar and spice? Yeah...no dice.

"You have three little girls?! Oh my goodness, your house must be just full of tea parties and dressing up like princesses!"

"Aww, little girls are the daintiest things, aren't they?!"

"It must be nice to have girls, so much more gentle than my boys!"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

These are all comments I've heard just this week from other moms, and over the last five years I've heard the same sentiment phrased different ways more times than I could possibly count...basically, little girls really are made of sugar and spice and everything nice, and they mince around on their tiptoes treating each other like delicate princesses all the time.

Well, I'm calling it. Little girls are rowdy, and dirty, and wild, and loud, and completely insane! Especially when they come in threes. ;-)

The girls play this game called "dead on the dock". I have no idea how this game started or who came up with its very evocative name, but the rules are simple. One of the girls is the fisherman, and the other two are fish. The fish run in circles around the living room, flopping their arms in what apparently is an imitation of swimming fins. The fisherman tries to catch them one at a time and wrestle them onto one of the couches, and once a fish is successfully forced onto a couch, they are "dead on the dock"!

And then...the fisherman eats the fish.

Yep.
Slightly blurry action shot of the fisherman at work, one fish dead on the dock behind her...
Standing proudly over her catch, who have their tongues out in a very convincing "dead fish" look....
Nom nom nom!



Charmingly dainty and delicate, right? Just oozing sugar and spice and everything nice? Yes, this is what we do before bedtime in our 80% feminine household. Now you know the truth. ;-)

Monday, June 4, 2012

On sometimes succeeding!

There are these days, occasionally, when I feel like supermom. Times like this morning, when the girls and I showed up to an 8 am dentist appointment ten minutes early -- nothing like that other time that will haunt me forever. And they all actually had their teeth brushed, after their nutritious breakfast of hot multigrain cereal and applesauce, and I got their hair done before we left, and all three of them were wearing matching socks. (Plus they all had on underwear. I'm not the only mom whose kiddos have snuck out of the house commando once or twice, am I?!)

After the dentist, we headed to the grocery store, where the girls squealed with delight when I put blackberries and corn on the cob into the cart, but were busy talking and giggling as we passed the ice cream and didn't start up the chorus of please-we-need-to-have-ice-cream-because-it's-summer-and-it's-our-right-or-we-might-die that has happened several times lately. And when the sweet old man who passed us told Hannah that she has beautiful curly hair, she smiled politely and answered, "Thank you, and you have a very nice hat!"

Then we were home by 10 am and spent the rest of the morning doing school work together, while simultaneously baking six dozen cookies for a bridal shower tomorrow. (Ok, four dozen are for the bridal shower...I promised Lamont we would make enough to keep some!) Having the girls "help" me while I'm baking is not something I am good about doing at all, and multi-tasking that with doing their school? Yeah. I impressed myself.

Now I know that tomorrow might go completely differently from today. For that matter, there are still plenty of hours left in this day for total meltdown to occur! Ashley and Hannah have their first t-ball practice tonight (assuming the predicted thunderstorms can hold off until later this evening), and so dinner has to be ready precisely on time in order for us to be ready to leave for that. And there are a couple loads of laundry left to do today, too. And, you know, there are five people in this family, each with our own failings, each capable of causing all kinds of issues for each other. (No, there are six of us! Our baby girl has been trying to poke her way out through my right side lately in the most creatively uncomfortable ways, so she gets included in that list!) I am intimately acquainted with some of the endless ways and reasons that a day can fall apart, and I seem to be good at discovering new ones all the time.

But for right now, in this moment, I feel like supermom. And that is rare and precious and worth celebrating!