The clink of fork against tooth

That little girl, at 14 months old, has a couple of teeth to show for herself. You can see that she put them to good use given that piece of bagel she had bitten off and is on the right side of her tongue. Normally, she would prefer if we didn't pull her lips back to see her teeth, but when I asked her this day if I could look at her teeth, she willingly came over and offered up her face.

I can't help but be in love with those 2 crooked bottom teeth. They make a little carat sign ^. How adorable is that? You can't see it from this photo, but she also has one of her front teeth, on the right side, and it's looking like she will have a match to that one any minute now.

(I love how she has her hand on top of mine as I pull her lip downand Lise snaps the picture. Her hands are a perfect replica of mine in miniature. It is that feeling, that connection of like/like that makes me feel like a mother.)

She's working hard on using these new teeth to take bites from bagels and other food she normally had to suck on until it was soft. Take note of her excitement at using these new teeth. She took Mommy's fork at breakfast the other day, and used it to spear bites of pancakes and shuttle them to her teeth.

She's definitely a bread girl, so pancakes are right up her alley. Thank goodness for coconut oil and rice milk, that she may experience the joy that is Sunday morning breakfast in our house.

She's gotten quite adept at wielding utensils. I like to think it's all the practice she's had unloading the dishwasher. Her "job" is to take the utensils out and hand them to me, one by one. This is not because I make her do it.

One of my morning jobs is unloading the dishwasher, and she is very clear that she would like to be doing everything that we do. So she enlisted herself as the utensil specialist. She's stellar at it, too. Her favorite utensil is the butter knife, of course. It's easy to wield and it makes a really excellent noise if you tap it on the inside of the dishwasher. Besides, you can carry fistfuls of them at a time, once you've mastered the ability to pick up more than one at a time. (I have a photo of this, but I just can't seem to find it.)

I am grateful for breakfast at the table, for a motivated child, for familial connectedness, for beautiful blue eyes, and for the joy of discovering new things every single day.

Eggsplosion!

One of my favorite traditions is our annual Easter egg dying day with the boys. We always plan the day before Easter to spend hours and hours at the boys' house with Tim's sister and kid(s) and we attempt to replicate the beauty of our eggs from the previous year. We usually have the Easter edition of Martha for inspiration. Nancy brought it this year, along with electrical tape.


We usually order pizza after eating way too many eggs and realizing we need a meal. And so we did this year, too. Of course, this year, we had to get part of a pizza that was vegan. LJ was thrilled about the olives, however. She likes putting them on her fingertips, like little hand sombreros and eating them off her fingers. I love watching her do it. We ate on the brand new deck at the boys house, because the weather was so amazing: sunny and comfortable.


The electrical tape worked wonderfully well on the eggs. Lise had some stickers that she wanted to try too...they worked, but the gummy paper backing was tricky to get off after the eggs were dyed. The love egg was made with stickers and the starburst was made with electrical tape.


We are blessed enough to have dear friends with whom we spent Easter brunch/afternoon. LJ missed the egg hunt (she slept for 2 hours!! this morning, so we were late arriving). Joyce always has the best brunches...the food is delectable and today was no different. The boys brought homemade bagels from neighbors up the road, Emily made a salad, and there were baked beans, several casseroles, some grilled asparagus and other sundry yummies. She has a great backyard for social gatherings and the day turned out to be another beauty. (I rode my bike to and from the party, while Lise and LJ met me there. I love this time of year.)


It's been a friend-filled holiday weekend.

I am grateful for dear, dear friends, for traditions, for my family, for crafty time and for gorgeous weather in which to celebrate the first four things.

Good Morning, Starshine.

LJ has recently become fascinated with my knitting bag. Perhaps that's because I'm toting it around more often than I used to... this afternoon, after we returned from getting haircuts, she sat on the sunroom floor and systematically took each set of needles out of my bag, used them to drum or simulate knitting, and then exchanged them for the next set. It was truly endearing. I'm looking forward to teaching her how to knit, though Melissa assures me that she will be the first to teach her! I'm okay with that...Melissa has mad skills!


Lise informed me that LJ woke up this morning, sat straight up in bed, pointed to the bedside table and said "Book." When I slipped back into bed, both my girls were reading The Everything Book by Denise Fleming. I turned on my side, and when Lise was done reading, she turned on her side, and LJ sat there in the middle, reading aloud to herself. I don't know why this should surprise and thrill me as much as it does; after all, she's been watching us read in bed from the moment she was born. For that matter, I was using her in my belly as a prop for my books!

After we got out of bed, I made the coffee while LJ explored shoes, mosied around the kitchen and eventually ended up in the sunroom, headed straight for the book basket. One of her favorite things lately is going to the book basket, picking one, then bringing it to me or Lise and pointing to our laps. "Up," she'll say. Pick me up and read to me mommy.

I am grateful for sunny morning personalities, natural curiosity, kids imitating life, dear friends, and a spouse who recognizes and points out some of the coolest things about life.

My beginning 5.

There is a photo of me around this age, bending over a child on the playground and smiling; I, too, have pigtails on either side of my head. This is the first time LJ's hair has been long enough to put pigtails on either side of her head.

I am grateful for her beauty.

Her gorgeous blue sweater is a homemade creation from Melissa, who has some of the most amazing knitting talent I've ever seen.

I am grateful for dear friends.





Last weekend we were able to make it Salisbury Beach on one of the most gorgeous spring days we've had thus far. It was the perfect day for a beach visit, and the first LJ has taken at an age where she really enjoyed herself. She squealed and took off running in the sand.

I am grateful for unfettered joy.

She didn't want to leave the beach, and when we came down the ramp on our way back to the car, she wiggled to get out of Mama's arms, turned around and started walking back toward the beach. Fortunately, she was distracted by the post and turned it into a game of peek-a-boo.

I am grateful for peek-a-boo.

When I left for work the other morning, I asked LJ if I could have a hug. She turned to look at me, said "Yeah," and walked into my arms. To know that this child, who pushed away from snuggles since the day she was born, feels empowered because I asked for snuggles instead of imposed them and willingly came to me, makes my heart feel large.

I am grateful for choice.