Sandal Season

The kids wake up and beg to put on sandals.  I can smell the heat rising in the air, the sunscreen on my arms, and feel the grit of sand tracked in the house underfoot.  Little shins are decorated with chalk dust and band aids.  The first juice pops were pulled from the freezer yesterday and the sticky hands left in their wake were cleaned off via garden hose.  Summer is knocking at the door.


Recent Tater Quotes:

(While putting stickers on paper) "A kitty cat!  Poofect!  A fwower!  Poofect!"

For reasons beyond my understanding, Grammy told Tater Tot that a toothbrush was a stick with bristles.  Umm, ok.  But it resulted in a pretty entertaining evening, because Tater chirped back, "Bwoostles!" until she went to bed.

When Daddy and I were mulling over putting Tater on her balance bike, I brought up my concern that since Spork isn't very fast on his yet, and I anticipate that Tater will be lightning quick; how's a mama to split safety patrol for 2 differently-speeded biker babies?  Daddy thought it over for a second and chuckled, "Yeah, she'll probably tell Spork to eat her dust."  Tater quipped back, "Eat dust!  Eat dust!  Want some dust?"
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After a really crappy month or so of the Nugget and Tater throwing parties til 10pm instead of sleeping, followed by really crabby mornings (and the kids weren't any better), we took a gamble and mixed it up a bit.  Now the boys are roomies, and Tater, who in the midst of the midnight melees learned how to nimbly clamber out of her crib, has a toddler bed (and a duct-taped diaper) in the smaller room.  We were initially worried about how the Nugget would feel to be ousted from the room he's known since he was a toddler, but turns out that he is attached to his bed but not the room itself.  Our other worry was that Spork's 5am soliloquy (he goes back to sleep after exercising his lungs cheerfully for an hour) would wake a roomie, but the Nugget miraculously sleeps through it.  I'm sure once we enjoy a few weeks of uninterrupted sleep for all, Spork will decide it's time to bid for freedom and we'll be back to the starting blocks.  But for now, bedtime is once again a blissful parental celebration!  Bring on the Netflix, the ice cream, and whatever wine was on sale!
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After a winter's worth of growth, we now have 3 fleet-footed children at the playground.  The biggest no longer calls for assistance with a darn thing.  He can even manage the zip lines by himself.  Spork is so confident and happy and Tater actually has interest in the location of a parental unit, so my sunny mornings are back to the bliss of packing the cooler and hitting a park 'til naptime.  It's incredibly satisfying tucking 2 little sleepyheads into bed and nuzzling sweaty curls into cool sheets.



The Nugget started farm league baseball season last week and got the pleasure of riding in a cattle transport truck for an opening day parade!  I have to find my groove of "sports mom" again, it's not my forte at all, but I'm trying.  Tonight I have his cleats, post-practice juice and snack packed, his water bottle's cooling in the fridge, but I still need to locate the mitt and I'm not at all sure I want to buy him an aluminum weapon bat, so I keep conveniently forgetting to ask coach what size he needs.




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