Boys and Weapons

How did we go from the family with the absolute zero tolerance for guns, not even toy guns, not even water guns, to the family that shrieks happily through the woods throwing pine cones, I mean "sonic grenades" and "frag grenades", at each other until everyone is dead? How?
Plastic light sabers.
The gateway weapon.
So fake, so pretend, so harmless. So fun.
And now- now none of the pine cones and bits of bark collected for the nature table are safe. I think I need my own light saber just to protect my armory of horse chestnuts and dried dogwood berries from invading armies of boys come to pillage my sweet Waldorfy treasure trove, er... weapons cache.
I still haven't gotten used to having to make the choice, in my own boy-ravaged home, of a toilet seat that is either always up or always sticky, and now this! What's most shocking is that now I join in, and run, laughing and trilling just as loudly as they, flinging "grenades" and cheering "strikes".
And just like that, we've become, I guess, a family I wouldn't have let my own past tense boys play with.
All because of light sabers.
Light sabers and delicious, most serious, epic, hours long hot summer battles of boys in the park, scores and scores of boys, forming battalions and hierarchies, marching in formation, falling in battle, being revived, soldiering on.
Blast you, insidious light saber of doom!

The D-Day Piper

Bill Millin, the bagpiper at Normandy, passed on recently. We didn't know him, but oh! the tears sprang forth anyhow all across our house when the Economist arrived this week. Here's his obituary, you can read it too.

And we're back!

Wow! Apparently the birthday month really took it out of me, huh?
Well, in reality, we've had a most exhausting year, with sickness and over-workedness leaving no room for much else but simple maintenance.
But I'm back. We're started the new school year- this is week three already, and it's going great. Avery's so independent and interested, Miles is excited to have his own school time each day devoted just to him. Ansel is, well, Ansel, and pretty much happy for any scraps of attention a third kid can get.
Ah....

Month of Cakes, Done!

Carrot cake, Lemon Cake, Banana Cake, Applesauce Cake, Chocolate Cake, Carrot Cake, Brownies.
UGH!
No... more... cake....

For a year.

Right?

Gearing Up

... for the Birthday month.
I've still got a couple weeks before the 26th and the official start, but it's coming FAST.
Avery will be 10.
Then Papa's birthday four days later.
Ansel will be 1.
Then five days later Miles will be 4.
And eleven days later is my birthday, though who is kidding who here? By then we're all sick of birthday cake....

Speaking of birthday cake- everyone wants carrot cake, but that won't do- it's just too much of a good thing. But everyone deserves to have their choice of cake on their birthday, at least, right? And so I start my subtle campaign to convince the members of the house to change their tastes and minds. Oooh! Look at this picture of a cake! Doesn't THAT look good?! Wow! I'd LOVE to try that kind of cake....
So far... only Ansel has caved. He was chewing on a picture of a banana. Which clearly means he desires banana cake with chocolate frosting for his birthday, don't you think?

And then the parties... Avery always had these big, well organized and attended parties, with hand sewn party hats and homemade pinatas. He's chosen simpler things the last couple of years- a special dinner, a trip to OMSI in Portland. I have no idea what he wants this year, but hopefully it will be in that vein.

Miles has never had a real kid party, and this won't be the year it happens for him. I'm thinking a joint Ansel-Miles birthday party. Abraham Lincoln's birthday is the 12th of February, a Friday, right in the middle between Ansel and Miles. A good day for a party. And Mary Todd Lincoln was well known for making a special sweetheart's cake for old Abe, so that's a logical tie-in.

The problem with combined parties, of course, is that you're really just adding in another cake, since everyone needs a little celebration on their real birthday too.

And so... we're still at four carrot cakes in four weeks, plus a banana cake and a butter cake.

I guess we're all getting elastic pants for our birthdays, there's just no way around it.

Reasons to Homeschool: Harried to Happy

Morning could be hectic and harried for us- if we had to get everyone washed, dressed, fed, bundled up, out of the house and to school, daycare, work on time. They could be, but they're not, because we don't HAVE to be anywhere but right where we are.
This morning, when I felt obliged to give the baby an impromptu bath to wash the fistfuls of crusting-in mush and browning banana smoosh out of his hair, and the three year old decided to strip naked in the hall and take a running dive into the tub (no one in my house can stand missing out on a bath) I felt just a little put out. This wasn't on the schedule for the morning. But they're so cute, you know, so sweet. How can you stay grumpy with two little ones in the tub? All those bubbles and splashes, soapy clean smells and giggles. When the nine year old decided to join in the fun it just felt perfectly, well... perfect. Two little ones in the tub, warm and shiny, a big one perched in the corner, serenading (guitar practice without threats or shouting, check!) them with his entire play list while they danced and laughed, well, I was just glad to be home, free to enjoy such a lovely unscheduled and unplanned moment.
How many of those moments would be missed if we were caught rushing off to our important days elsewhere? How sad would it be if a baby's 6-grain hairdo were enough to start everyone's day off wrong (too rushed, late for school, late for work)? Those moments, simple and unstaged, are the ones that fill our family memory-bank, easy and quick to pull out on rainy days and hold on to during troublesome times. And so grateful are we, to be present here, filling our bank with memories we share, gathering moments of grace together.