{All the photos in the post except the last one are from Sarah.} Last week, when Wednesday the 25th was only 52 minutes old, my niece was born. Meet Waverly Lou. She was almost born in the car, but my...

I turned 36 today. I have to admit, 36 feels...old, well, old-ish. It feels a lot closer to 40 than 35 felt, although I am looking forward to turning 40 because Jason and I are going to Hawaii with our...

What's the story morning glory? What's the word hummingbird? How about some bullet points for this Sunday evening? I do not know why I can't get back into the swing of blogging. My mind seems to be filled to the...

I love new beginnings. New day. New week. New month. New school year. New season. I just love that feeling of starting over, however small. The feeling of anything is possible. But a new year? Especially this new year that...

Even though I didn't manage to chronicle 2011 very well in written form, it still happened all the same. (Proving that if a tree falls in the forest and no one writes about it, it still happens.) We got to...

A few (but by no means all!) of the highlights from the Christmas season...also, I'm not being quick at all about it. It's what comes of trying to cram a month of blog posts into one post. : 1 :...

{Okay, so I've been absent from writing much in the past, oh, two months. I really haven't even been on the computer that much either. I know! It's crazy. But I'm getting back in the swing of it, so here...

Dear friends, the presents are wrapped and under the tree, two Christmas gatherings have already been had, and many many Christmas cookies have mysteriously disappeared. Children are sleeping. An interesting book is waiting for me on the Kindle. Hot tea...

Hmm...where were we? I was posting everyday, and then November came along and I vanished into the dark and rainy November night. Some might call that fair-weather blogging, except that I don't blog that consistently even in fair weather. So....

: TRICK : I had to take Sydney to the doctor this morning to have a swollen lymph node checked out. I wouldn't have thought anything of it if both lymph nodes were swollen, but just one? Seemed odd. Our...

The summer before Addie was born, I decided to spray paint our bathroom light fixtures. They were gold, and I'm not a big fan of gold. So, I took the light down, labelled all the wires so I could put...

The girls went to a candy carnival tonight (ie: not trick-or-treating, but just fun and games at a church where they also hand out buckets of candy). They made it home with most of their candy, but I did have...

: 1 : I finally got the girls' silhouettes framed and hung above the piano. The silhouettes were printed at Costco, and the frames are from IKEA. I love how they turned out. : 2 : It's three days before...

Even though Jules' behavior has improved over the last few months, we've had a rough few days with her since taking her off a homeopathic medication. It is what it is, but it doesn't make it less exhausting. After she's...

When I walked into my class yesterday, I announced in typical obvious fashion, "It's cold outside!" One of my students remarked that he had started to say "It's refreshingly brisk outside" instead of "it's cold" because then it sounded less...

Even though I wouldn't say I like my commute--the first 70 miles isn't too bad, it's the 70 miles coming back in traffic that's less than fabulous--I do love one aspect of it: Radio time. Specifically, NPR. When I'm at...

A few weeks ago, we decided that we would do some significant upgrading to the house. Some new floors, tile backsplash, and a new tub are just a few of the several things. Since then, approximately "not much" has happened....

What do you get when you carve two faces into one pumpkin (Sydney did a face, and Jules did a face) and light it up on your back deck that's enclosed with glass? A jack-o-lantern and a jack-o-lantern ghost.

Two years ago today, my grandma passed away. Earlier in the week, I had sung at the funeral of one grandma. On a Wednesday morning, my dad called to tell me my other grandma passed away. Two funerals. Two grandmas....

: 1 : Jamba Juice's Pumpkin Smash smoothie is back, and if you haven't had one, oh my goodness, you should. (Unless you don't like pumpkin pie, in which case, nevermind.) If you, like us, love it so much that...

Here in the Pacific Northwest, I think our dialect is considered standard English. Obviously we have certain words that are regional (granola isn't just a food; pop isn't just a sound; skookum isn't just a random made-up word), but otherwise?...

We find blocks in our shoes. Find apple slices in cups, the cups neatly stacked in a bottom kitchen drawer. Our toothpaste mysteriously vanishes and then shows up in the bathtub. A lone shoe snuck into a trash can miraculously...

Jules loves to take pictures with my phone. Even though most of the pictures are a little bit out of focus, I still love to look at them. I love seeing everything at her eye level. Yesterday, I picked Jules...

I have two really great classes of students this semester, but for the life of me I'm having a hard time keeping their names straight. In one class I have three Emily's and two Amanda M's (and one of those...

A few months ago, I decided to hop on the Pinterest bandwagon. (Pinterest, for those of you who don't know, is virtual pinboard where you can "pin" all the fabulous things you find online. Any image that inspires you, that...

Some say there's nothing sweeter than a newborn's accidental smile. I'd agree. And when that newborn gets too old for accidental smiles, I'll happily settle for a well-timed funny face. Oh! she says, over and over. Oh! How about that...

: 1 : I found it. This is THE KITCHEN. And wouldn't you know it, it's Martha Stewart's kitchen line (this particular line is called Ox Hill, named after, I suppose, the oxen that Martha raises on organic greens and...

I mentioned last week that I wanted to make silhouettes of the girls, frame them and hang them over the piano. I had a general idea of the steps I would need to do it, but wasn't sure what method...

Today's happiness: getting new boots and umbrellas. Last year, I didn't start looking for new rain boots until the stores had replaced rain boots with snow boots. Snow boots are not practical around here since we don't have that much...

(The above photo is from 1973. None of the structures are still standing except the mobile home, which was moved to its permanent location at the end of the red line.) When my grandparents moved to the Family Farm in...