Fall's gone

This morning I woke up to a layer of white on the porch. It was still softly snowing, and the snow plows were already buzzing down the street clearing the way for the morning commuters.
As I do every winter I was struck with the reaction of both- "Awh, how lovely..." AND "Oh, crap, already?"
I'm not a winter person. I don't even own a pair of winter boots. Finally when I turned 25 I got for my birthday a fabulously warm LLBean winter coat, but in most all regards I am ill equipped to deal with the temperatures and temperment of a Maine winter. Mostly because I'm in denial. Mostly because somewhere deep inside I still think someday I will escape to the south of France or North Carolina for the winter. Sigh. Not likely anytime soon.

Our fall was a lovely and full one.
Work, play, sleep, repeat.
The oldest of the wee ones began school again, very happily. Last night she declared herself a "bat nerd" and that she knew all there was to know about bats. She has also been semi-happily ballet dancing (but very beautifully and gracefully! I don't know where she got that!). Her little sister watches her with unadulterated adoration. It's the sweetest thing to watch, and something I understand completely having older sisters myself. It's been a beautiful thing to watch as their relationship grows and change. They truly enjoy one another and the company. I watch it very happily. Ah, my girls.

MIA

So, not sure what is going on, but for the past couple of weeks, I haven't had the desire to be here.
And I apologize.
Especially after I have had so much of my family applaud my efforts to keep them informed and up to date on the comings and goings of our lives here... not sure, but I guess just like in Your Midcoast Mama, I felt the need for a time away, a vacation, so to speak. And it's been nice. Really nice.

Not a whole lot has changed around here. A certain little one starts second grade in a few days, back to the school where she was two years ago. She is excited and nervous all at the same time. I foresee some tears, but I imagine she is going to be just fine. She knows what is coming...which is a whole new thing from a couple of years ago and she was a fresh fish. We bought her a new pair of lace of sneakers and she is proudly learning how to tie them and how to run beside me.
It amazes me to really stop and see her for all that she is...in all she is becoming. Beautiful, strong, smart and sweet. Watching your babies grow is flat out a miracle.

The littlest bean is also growing in leaps and bounds. Changing daily, as to be expected.
She's afraid of the train's whistle and the thunder, loves to cuddle and completely obsessed with fresh carrots from the garden and apples. And peaches. (which she calls apples). She adores her big sister, and all her baby dolls and spends loads of time kissing and cuddling with both.

Our house is coming along. Each step brings us closer to moving in...now we are looking at late fall/early winter... (trying to get as much done BEFORE moving in as possible...!)

Along with my month long break of blogging, I also have not taken any photos. But I will. That's next.

I hope the month has been sweet, summery and wonderful for you all, and that life is treating you well.
Thanks for reading.

A chapter

Dreaming of beach days...

When I was a wee one, or so my mama tells me, we spent the summer at the beach. And as a mama myself now, with my own oh-so-pale little one, who clings to me not only all day but night too, I choke at the thought of this. My very independent mama with me attached to her leg all day long while all she wanted was to jump into the ocean and shake me off...? Yes, I can imagine her gritting her teeth and wishing I would strike some independence and get off her leg. But it's funny, thinking that way. Because now, having a little one who is my every night dinner helper (if not in my arms, watching every movement on the stove or cutting board, she is perched behind the refrigerator door, playing with empty egg cartons and jabbering away to herself and/or the mice in the wall...) I understand the need of taking deep breaths, and not thinking anything of it. This is our lives right now. So here we are.
And something about that makes it feel less of a challenge. Once in a while, when you get to go for a walk by yourself, or go to the store alone- that is when you notice the solitariness of being with just your own thoughts.
I suppose that each of us needs that breath... those moments we can remember what it was like to be in our own skin and utterly unneeded by another.

But considering the beach. I know that when I go, I bring a blanket and shade of our very own. I know I bring sunscreen enough to last and sunhats and towels and snacks for my little fish (the big girl) who will only leave the water when her lips are blue and she is starving enough to fall faint on the blanket, teeth chattering and temper nearly bringing her to tears. Mama has the job of preparation, and don't you forget it. "Where is my water bottle???" she has asked me on countless occasion when I try and remind her six times to bring it to the car, and two hours later, she realizes she doesn't have it.
(ah...)

This is when I imagine other mamas. My own. My grandmother.
Watch my girls with all the love I would easily be able to bestow on a stranger, that somehow is bit more challenging when you live it day to day. I love my girls. I love them so much every single day my heart and soul ache with it.
And I have made complete peace with this is my life right now. I live this time now, another time later, and the times before this? They were before this. Every time will come to a close and something will replace it.
That's just it. That is how it happens.

So today? Well. It hasn't happened yet. But I would be willing to bet in about five years, when my little fish is 12 and my baby is 6, everything will be a chapter of a new story. Changing every day, slowly but surely. And so fast we had better not blink.

Pool-side manner...

My children? Manners...? Well... (They are relatively polite...but crazy? Yes. We've got crazy here.)

night rain

I woke up to the rain pounding down the windows. My eyes popped open and I lay there, thinking. A little body twitched in sleep beside me, with a slight shiver. I pulled up the blankets that I knew she would kick off again and tried to close my eyes again, to no avail. The rain sounded like a nightmare inside my head. I don't hate the rain and I am very grateful for it- at least today. At least right now.
But, as nightmares do, this one woke me up and kept me there. I'm not ready for this day to begin. I've a long history of waking in the early morning hours, and happily doing so. But this morning is too early...and a long day lies ahead. Nothing of particular circumstance, but long even if.
Tiptoe from the room, move the brick holding the door open so that it eases quietly shut. Turn the switch on the computer as I walk silently into the kitchen. Without thinking about it, open the freezer and put frozen bread on the skillet to toast. Modern day toaster. We've never graduated to the future with that one, and are very happy with our skillet toast. Open the fridge. Find that I polished off the mixed berry jam yesterday morning. Open the peanut butter and scoop out a glob. Spread it on the bread, carefully. Millet bread has the tendency to crumble with any stiff topping. Hesitate over the honey option, and decide it's a good one.
Bring my toast into the living room and sit quietly down at the computer screen. Sooo close to my sleeping beauties I have to be very quiet with my movements. Check mail and read the blogs I usually do. Check Facebook and make sure the world didn't end in the few hours I slept.
And as usual, it didn't.
Think about the days, the nights, the family that runs it all. My daughters who's very breath sometimes melts my heart. Think about my own parents who's lives suddenly are fragile. Those people who growing up seemed the least fragile. Think about my brothers and sisters, their lives, events and joy.
The rain. My gardens. My dear friends who's livelihood depends on the bounty of soil.

Ah, another day. Another June. Another night, another time woken up by the rain before the day comes.

Spring gardens

A year ago, I went to the Botanical Gardens in Boothbay Harbour with my dear old friend and her little one. It had just rained, and we meandered around, getting happily wet and witnessed the early summer garden coming to life. A beautiful thing.

Love this place. SO magical.

Tuesday in photos

blessed.

blessed is a walk, with TWO sweet little ones.

And the work of my sweet heart.

Days in, days out

Today:

I woke up later then usual. 
Which isn't really a big deal. I don't have a boss. (Unless you count the fifteen month old and the seven year old who pound me down daily. With their identical grins...) 


Making tea in my kitchen, alone, watching the light snake over the chair backs and through the wavy glass panes. Buttering toast, with a heavy hand. (I've been told I sure know how to spread on the spreads. Much to the toddler's enjoyment...)(As in, more cream cheese then toast)


Days begin here. 
And then they end here. 


There is space in between, but the routine we live in fills it. 


Many words spoken, diapers changed, laundry done. 
Food prepared, clothes changed. Doors opened and closed. 
Smiles, laughter, tears and nap times. 
Dreams had and forgotten.


Walks taken, hair brushed. (Or not)


Realizing the timelessness of this, and how someday, somehow, I will realize how much I took for granted and how much I didn't. 

sleep, sniffle, scuffle, spring

The week has been a bit of a challenge. New teeth coming, old ones falling out, fevers, SUPER runny noses, sore throats and one stressed out exhausted mama. But finding that is the way of mama-hood in some seasons. As my dear friend put it- "I want the days of happy, non-fevered, clear headed, etc children back..." Or something along those lines.
Yup.

Not to complain, but it seems like this spring coming has been all about spring cleaning of our bodies. Every spring my big girl has a mad rush of sinus cleansing, which I explain is due to her papa's sinuses. She enjoys they share something.
We try and live as dirty a life as possible so that her immune system can do some building. (However, as many will tell you, I am a complete freak about hand washing. Before eating. After blowing your nose. After using the restroom. ETC.) But we love the dirt outside. The mud. The soil.
And inside. Well. We put things away, but as I admitted to my friend's house cleaner a couple weeks back, mopping is not my strong suit. I try and do it more often now that one of us spends the majority of her days ON the floor, on her hands and knees...but...well...
Four people living in three rooms with no storage to speak of is not exactly a recipe for a spotless life.
Nope.

Right now seems like the perfect opportunity to pick my battles. And frankly, I'm not picking very many of them.

A Season

Well, somehow it seems like we skipped spring. I know this next week promises to be more "normal" temperatures, but around here it's been freakishly warm for days...hovering right around the 80's. Which for March in Maine is absolutely unheard of.

It reminds me how so many years ago, the winter we spent in Virginia, I declared that I could "totally live with a winter like this." And now we've had it. With the exception of a few minor snowstorms, we had a very super mild few months and it makes me fear for the season ahead. Granted, we've already planted a few things in our garden (greens, peas, and sunflowers...) but something about it has me worried.

I've already plucked a few ticks off my littlest one, and not the pleasant sized easy to see ones either. They were teensy. And according to what I've read, this is promised to be another terrible year for ticks and fleas. Which means, of course, another year of rampant Lyme disease. Practically everyone I know has had some sort of run in with it, living on the rural coast of Maine as we do. The symptoms are easy enough to catch, if you watch for them, but ideally you catch the tick before it comes to that. Sigh.

Also, from what I read, one of the main reasons the ticks will be so bad this year is that they, like all the other bugs floating around, weren't given the chance to die off in the cold months of winter. Along with the bugs that have been making everybody sneeze, cough and sputter, the ticks have been just hunkered down waiting for the cold to wear off so they can bust out and climb all over my sweet little daughter's skin.  (and everybody else's too...) Yuck.
Somehow I can deal with a great many different daily nasty things, but ticks just push that button in me that makes my skin crawl. Eh. I guess that is just a part of living in the woods...something is gonna do it.

A few days back we spent the morning with some friends at the beach, which was just beautiful. The girls (my friend's five year old and my big girl) spent the whole morning trying to work out how to get completely soaked without their mamas really noticing that they were up to their waists in the freezing cold of March's ocean. Eventually the mamas stopped caring and just let them go. They had a wonderful time...and were completely dismayed by the fact that they had to somehow clean off the sand and get into the car in dry pants to leave. The babies were not so excited by the whole thing. Both teething, my friend's littlest one and my own, were the picture of baby frustration. They both wanted to be attached to their mamas' the entire time. Nursing, preferably.

So, the freakishness of an early summer is nothing to complain about, thus far, but it has me worried about what the rest of the season might bring. Global warming has me freaked out about what this might mean for seasons for the next generation. As a child I saw the Maple Syrup weekend as the first real weekend of Spring. And now, with a beach trip already under our belts and a few ice cream outings... what is it going to mean when it really is summer?
We went from winter hats to flip flops in a couple days. I guess I am a sucker for the slow gradual change- not to mention the tradition. On March days when it's already too hot to bake our weekly bread... well...

Is this something else we have to get used to? Will we have to adjust our traditions accordingly?

Spring!?

So, yesterday we went outside without coats on.
Amazing, incredible, sunny and windy.

and then found some adventures along the way.

waiting for winter

I haven't packed away the sleds and heavy winter coats yet. I thought about it last week. When I was sweeping around the mess of boots inside the front door and picking up (yet again) the tangle of snowpants that somehow landed on the floor. I thought about it as we squished through the mud on our afternoon walk back from the library. And it almost convinced me when I discovered the day lily bulbs peaking through the mud in our neighbours yard. But yes, I resisted the temptation.

And supposedly today we are supposed to get about 14 inches of snow. All the schools are cancelling and everybody is hoping for what we've always come to believe in as a good ol' fashioned snow day. This year hasn't really been much to speak of in terms of "winter." At least not for these northern states where in January the snow hovers somewhere around my knees and doesn't disappear until a good thaw sometime in March. Well. I guess that is me, stretching the truth again. That is how it USED to be around here. And admittedly we haven't seen anything like that in years.  I contemplated how useful winter boots would be this year, really hummed and hawed as to whether I should make that leap and become a person who actually owns them. And I decided my rubber boots would be fine enough for another year. I'm glad I came to that conclusion because they really weren't needed. Again.

A few years back (Ok, more then seven now...) when we were stuck in Virginia for a portion of the winter I decided I could really live with the moderate temperatures and ease of no snow that was there. I'd been living too many years buried in the stuff and shovelling out the door so I could tromp to work through the empty streets in Portland. And low and behold, here we are. Years later, and the weather (along with global warming) has decided to heed my wish. But you know, I want to take it back. I really miss the winters from when I was a kid. The just plain magic of being snowed in. A marvelous excuse to stay home and make soup and bread, sit by the fire and play games. Making snow men with my brother and agreeing reluctantly to go skiing with my mom. (In later years, however, I volunteered for that one all on my own. Sometimes. Alright, alright, I'm lazy in terms of out door physical activity, I know.)

So I hope we get a doozy today. I hope it snows so hard and long that we have to shovel out our neighbour's door.
I'm not holding my breath though.

last week

at the land

yogurt monster

cuteness.

As my mother in law (across the country) pointed out the severe lack of me here lately, there haven't been  photos in a while. So here is last week. Obviously, we've sort of been in hiding...