100 Bulbs

For a few years now, Fall has brought a bulb frenzy at our household.  I mean, if you're planting bulbs, why not plant 100?  We went for 50 daffodils and 50 tulips.  We'll see how many make it.

This year, we managed to do it in the daylight. (Last year's was a midnight planting.)  Though the work will soon be forgotten (probably already is), it will mean added excitement when springtime rolls around.

Hats

Both of my boys are attached to hats.  Their particular hats, that is.

I guess it's not a bad place to show some fashion in the boy world.  And fashion aside (or amiss), they each take a stand:  Will to his unraveling pink plastic and John to his affiliation ("Daddy's Buddy").

Will's has nearly made it to museum status, and John's will soon be too small, but these hats will not soon be forgotten.

Beach Poem

We were lucky to go to the beach last week.  At the ocean with the kids, I always think of e.e.cummings' poem, "maggie and millie and mollie and may".   I've traced it here before.  My endless photos of kids with beach treasures cried out for a repeat.

will and clara and june and john 

went down to the beach (to play one day)

and will discovered some clams that opened

so slightly he could imagine their mystery, and

clara befriended a tangle of kelp

whose tangles magically mirrored her own;

and june was drawn in by a huge dead lobster

that spooked her enough to back away quick

john used every muscle to lift a stone

as small as a ball and as big as alone.

For whatever we lose (like a you or a me)

it's always ourselves we find at the sea.

More Canning

Clara has a tradition of filling mason jars around this time of year.  Sometimes it's with crabapples.  Other times it's with worms.  Usually there's a ribbon.  Always there is dirt mixed with color.  

It's a simple art form that I love to see.  OK, it's really simple.  But still, it seems that amidst these really simple expressions, all parents see the simple beauty in their kids.  Even, or maybe especially, with a head full of tangles.

Real Life Canning

Recently, I squeezed in some late season canning.  I was determined.  So blindly determined that let me warn you: this is not a post for the faint-hearted.  Nor is it one that will inspire you to can tomatoes.  In fact, if you come to my house and I offer you tomato soup, there's a good chance you'll decline.

One Friday afternoon, all excited to get going, the girls and I went to a local farm and got a big box of tomatoes.  Things got busy, however, and the box sat on the kitchen counter.  And sat.  And sat.  Days (weeks?) later, Clara and I cleared our evening calendar and tackled the huge box we'd long managed to block from our sight.

We salvaged about half the tomatoes, ignoring the mouse poop at the bottom of the box.  Given these self-made trying conditions, we had to work fast to keep up our resolve.   In other words, we didn't really have time to clean up the kitchen before we began.  Clara dove in.  Hands, feet and all.

The result?  Eight beautiful jars of canned tomatoes.  All's well that ends well.  Though we haven't yet made any soup.

Cartwheels

There are some phases that, as a parent, you have to treasure.  By that, I mean soak in the entertainment, grab the chance for an internal laugh.

Currently, we are in the "Cartwheel Era."  Here is some evidence:

Chalk

Chalk figures on the driveway were a mainstay this summer.  There were flowers and mountains and planets and butterflies, but my favorite were the action figures.  Here, body-tracing got dynamic.  The kids would lie flat and still, but in a running position.  After concentrated, ticklish tracing, they would would fill them in with hair flying, legs kicking, arms pumping.  The whole project became true to life.  In fact, even the act of filling in figures involves flying hair, kicking legs, and pumping arms.

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