Wesley's First Day of School.

Gosh.

Three year olds are so much fun.

So here it is, Wesley's official 1st day of school 2010 photo.
Better luck next year.

Notes from Camp #3

We found chestnuts! Lots of chestnuts at our campsite. Their soft shells and gorgeous color enthralled me. Soon Clare and I gathered oodles of the nuts to admire and bring home to friends.

And then.

I got the idea to roast them. Thank goodness for Google. How did people camp before Google? I figured out how to roast corn on the fire and after a few minutes I was an expert in chestnut roasting. Who knew? My only previous experience with chestnuts came from a trip to NYC and the song.

Okay. To roast them over a fire you cut an X on the flat side of the shells. If you don't do this they explode and it took almost all of the restraint and composure I had ALL weekend not to throw a handful in the fire to just see what would happen. I still want to do it. Kind of like Ramona Quimby, Age 8 and the tube of toothpaste.Then you wrap them in foil 2X, poke some holes in the bottom, and put them over an even heat for 15=20 minutes. Open the foil up and Viola! Roasted chestnuts. So easy. So fun.

Unless...you happen not to know the difference between edible and poisonous chestnuts like a certain person writing this blog post. Yes. After tasting bitter chestnuts, letting my child eat one, and feeling an odd burning sensation in my throat, I turned back to Google. The Clemson Extension set me straight and I learned all about chestnuts and horse chestnuts. Turns out that we gathered oodles and oodles of poisonous to humans chestnuts. Bummer.

So much for cute little souvenir bags for our friends with instructions on how to roast the nuts. Instead we sent them to Clare's school for use on the nature table. They are still pretty and I have a few jars filled with them as fall decorations, but definitely not the same as those NYC chestnuts.

Feeding child poisonous chestnuts should secure my nomination for that coveted Mother of the Year Award for 2010.

Notes from Camp #2

The mini Diego tent came with us but we didn't attempt to put up our actual tent after seeing them go wild with this one. Our cabin had lots of green space to run barefoot in the freshly mowed grass, a total perk for our family.

Washing dishes was a family event. Clare scrubbed in the bucket, Mario rinsed in the cold water sink, Wesley ran each individual dish to me at the cabin, and I put them in the sun to dry. Both kids were very accepting of camp chores and even seemed to like them. Maybe we could incorporate a few into life here at home now that we got some practice.

We all swam in the pool. Pre-kids Mario and I visited this campsite with Bailey and always came in the off season. Using all of the facilities felt like a treat because they are usually not open when we are visiting.

Mario did a great job explaining the nuances of camp life throughout the trip. In the end they had fun, we had fun, and we all relaxed. All of us are looking forward to doing it again soon.

When we got home we filled a bin with camping gear and made lists of stuff we wish we had brought along. Hopefully this will make future trips easier and more fun.

Notes from Camp.

Home sweet home. Arrival Friday night. Location: Bat Cave, NC. Campground: Creekside Mountain Camping. 2 double beds. Primitive cabin. 1 picnic table. 1 fire ring. Table and resin chairs. Front Porch with swing. Creekside. Our first ever camping trip with kids!

Inaugural marshmallow roast in pajamas Friday night. Clare was adamant that we do s'mores and made sure that we packed the requisite graham crackers, marshmallows and Hershey bars. Wesley enjoyed the roast too...marshmallows are on his dairy free/soy free list! Both kids stayed up really late both nights playing bingo, running around and roasting.

Other evening highlights: flashlights, glow sticks, moon sightings, bat spotting, and frog stare downs near the bath house. Oh...and sleeping under a sleeping bag with the windows open and being COLD. I think we headed to the mountains because we needed a break from the heat after the dreamy New Hampshire summer temperatures.

Daytime activities and fun will be posted tomorrow. Stay tuned for family dish washing, campfire cooking, swimming, and creek fun.

A date.

Fact: I want to spent more time with the kids. Real time, not the, 'uh-huh' and 'I see' meager attempts where I'm trying to do something else at the same time. I would bet that at least 75% of my time with the children falls into that meager category.
Fact: Wesley has one more week left before his pre-school begins on August 30.
Fact: I spent most of last week doing what I wanted to do rather than what he wanted to do during our first week together.
So today I asked Wesley what he wanted to do. His response, "go and see Nemo and his daddy" at the zoo. So I mentally pushed away my agenda, packed a lunchbox filled with dairy and soy free snacks, and drove to the zoo at 9 a.m.

Secret Fact: It WAS fun to just be with Wesley. We brought the stroller along to avoid the 'carry me' syndrome that recently hit him hard. Using our unlimited passes I got to say yes! to everything that he wanted to do. Initially I had visions of running through the zoo in an hour and still having time to do what I wanted. Thankfully I let that go within the first 1/2 hour and we just hung out.

We (being Wesley, me and Baby Owl) went on back to back carousel rides and two train rides in the caboose. We also saw the 3D pirate movie, which I do not recommend for just turned three year olds, and spent a lot of time in the aquarium. I am so glad that school is in session and our regular haunts are back to normal crowd levels.

I don't know what we will end up doing tomorrow but I do know that Wesley is much better at planning an entertaining morning than I am. I may follow his lead just to see where we end up.

Weekend Joys

• sleeping in
• riding the merry go round
• church
• a MYO pizza party
• talking on the couch
• family meetings
• planning a camping trip
• visiting the library
• 1/2 price $1/lb Goodwill
• reading my book
• Friday nite workout
• Sonic shakes
• uploading NH photos
• snuggling Wesley this morning
• leisurely coffee
• freshly mowed lawn
• dreaming

Dissonance

I took piano lessons for three years in college. Once credit hour each semester brought me great joy and a reason to retreat to the rooms filled with baby grand pianos in Ewell Hall. During this time I fell in love with the compositions and finger plays of Bela Bartok (a Hungarian composer known for folk music).

His music had this wonderful way of weaving sound that went together with surprising notes that didn't seem like they fit. The finger plays exemplified dissonance. The sounds were creepy but beautiful and always interesting.

Between these collegiate lessons and childhood piano lessons I never mastered the piano. Most likely because I never really managed to master reading music. I figured out that I knew enough to play a little bit, the rest I figured out the patterns, copied them, and applied them. I knew that the note C was a certain place and if the next note was a line above it then it was 2 keys up on the keyboard, not that it was an E. (Ummm, and I never practiced enough.)

So back to Bartok. I loved him because none of the the pieces sounded like they were supposed to sound. My ear liked the sound of this, but it also gave me a greater allowance to miss notes and mix up notes without compromising the piece. I could screw up and the mistakes weren't as obvious (though I'm sure he would differ on that point).

The dissonance and the room for error appealed to me. Lately though in my own life I am feeling more and more of this dissonance between the life I want to lead and the life I currently lead. My journal pages continue to fill with ideas about what is important to me individually and as part of a marriage. Each night Mario and I spend time talking about what matters to us, what wants are changing, and where we think we are going.

Figuring out what we want is just part of the puzzle. Implementing those plans may take a bit more time. Meanwhile, we are both considering changes to decrease the dissonance between our ideal and our reality. What small things can we do to our present lives to bring them in alignment? Why does the dissonance feel uncomfortable? What do we do about dissonance between our own ideal goals?

The differences here are serving to clarify our current dreams. The dissonance provides room to try and attempt many different things but we are both excited about focusing in a bit. And to be totally cheesy, finally learning how to read our own music.

MBA with Honors!

Gigi did it! Last Thursday Gigi graduated from Simmons with her MBA. We are super proud of her. She gave up oodles and oodles of time to pursue her degree these past few years. Now she can relax, date Pop Pop, spend more time with us each summer in New Hampshire, and bask in the joy of being officially done with school.

I've always dreamed of attending my mother's graduation ceremony. Being there and seeing her walk to get her diploma rocked my world.

About that laundry.

Clare: Mama, what's that grey stuff?

Mama: Dryer lint.

Clare: I don't know about dryer lint, I only know about belly button lint.

Mama: Oh.

*Most likely inspired by Pop Pop's repeated reading and reference to The Flim Flam Fairies by Alan Katz.

Back for School

We rolled back into town after a retreat to New Hampshire just in time for Clare to start school. I dropped her off at the montessori school this am and I'm pretty sure that she didn't even say goodbye before she ran inside. This girl LOVES school. She was really excited this morning to go back.

As for the rest of our family: we are also glad to be back in town. We had great fun on our trip but there is just something wonderful about being home. Currently our house is in the state of 'unpack' where we have bags and suitcases strewn everywhere. Our refrigerator is empty and a grocery shopping trip is imminent. The kids are in love with their existing toys and wary of the car. I am rediscovering tidbits from home and finally plugged in my laptop. We sorted through our mail and the car is overdue for an oil change.

The house is really quiet without Bailey and while unpacking we had the odd experience of not barricading everything in case he would find some treasure not intended for him. We talked a lot about Bailey, dog heaven, God's funny bone, and other pets while we were gone. Furthermore, they somehow collected enough stuffed animals to start their own plush zoo.

I'll post more about our adventures soon. In the meantime I'm going to tackle the laundry.