Random Recent Favorites

 Hey y'all -

Friends of mine on Facebook will have already seen most of these, but since not everyone I know and love has jumped on the social media bandwagon (Hi, Granny Jack!), I'm posting some of my favorite recent photos here.

Post art class - paint freckles

Ella in repose

Backseat driver

Thor gardens

Don't mess with him.

That explains the water bill

...Because it's been 10 minutes since they've seen each other

Heart stopper

The last of the Mother's Day bouquet

And sometimes, for fun or for good karma, I take pictures of other people's children:

Dylan and Abby

Margot on the run

Iris, circa 1864

Happy Mother's Day to a fellow mom.

Speaking of facebook and photos, here's a little something I learned last weekend:

You can spend all the time in the world practicing your photography and photo editing, trying to create the coolest, sharpest photos around, and at the end of the day, the photo that will earn you the most "Likes" you've ever received will be a quick snapshot you took with your phone of a little pigtailed girl and the homemade sign she made to welcome her daddy home. 

Love,

Mom

Scenes From Single Parenthood

Hey y'all - 

Occasionally, I remember that I have a phone, and that I've taken some pictures on it. Here are some iPhone highlights from the past few weeks. 

Laney has written her name - in Sharpie - all over the house. In general, I don't get too bent out of shape about it, because it's her house, too. I called Thor to explain:

Brooke: ...and I couldn't even be mad because she teared up and said she was really sorry that she had used a 'primitive' marker.

Thor: What's a primitive marker? Like a charred stick?

Brooke: You wish.

In related art news, Laney asked if she would paint my face. When she was done, I asked her what she had drawn. "A snowman holding a kite that fell on the ground...obviously." "Ok," I said, "Then what is that on YOUR face?" "An invitation to my birthday party and you can only come to my party if you have this symbol on your face." So Laney's party's been cancelled for this year. 

Hagen's into wearing this jungle safari hat. Puts it on in the morning, leaves it on 'til bedtime. Resists all suggestions to take it off. Eh, it's less irritating than writing on the walls with a Sharpie, so he gets a pass.

Laney fell asleep in the hot tub last week. Talk about your first world problems. One minute, she was chattering away, and the next - silence. There was no waking her up. I had to lift her and her turtle out together as a unit.

Before he left, her dad promised to pay Laney a penny for every dandelion she picked while he was gone. With the money she made, she could almost buy a pack of gum. 

I made some questionable food choices for the family while your dad was gone. We had chocolate chip pancakes and scrambled eggs for dinner, and once I completely hit rock bottom and took you all to McDonald's. You guys weren't complaining, especially when we decided to stop at the barbecue place on the way home from school, and then lie on the couch and watch a Doc McStuffins marathon.

Your dad would occasionally send us messages and photos from his time in Ft Walton Beach, but I told him he wasn't eliciting any sympathy from me if he kept writing his "I Miss You"s in the sand. On the beach. Next to the ocean. In the sun. He should have gone for more of a sad-face-in-ugly-conference-room vibe.

One more note about Laney's art: sometimes, she'll draw something like that picture above that looks like a meaningless scribble, then she'll hand it to you and say, "This is a ski boot attached to a ski and the orange is my ski pants coming down to my boot." And then suddenly, that's exactly what it looks like. I don't know if she sets out to draw something like that, or if she scribbles around for a while and then makes up the most plausible scenario. I would almost be more proud if it was Option #2.

We went to the Children's Museum, where Hagen promoted himself to Fire Marshal.

I must say, if I were going to be single parenting any two kids in the world, I couldn't ask for better ones than you guys. You were (mostly) sweet and (almost always) cooperative and (relatively) patient with me as I made the best of an exhausting situation. 

Thanks for soldiering through it with me. 

Love,

Mom

That Time I Ruined The Egg Hunt

Hey y'all - 

I know we're halfway through May, and I'm just now getting around to talking about Easter, which means I should be sharing my pictures from Mother's Day right around Thanksgiving. 

For Easter, Peg Peg, Grandma Sue and I took Laney to the biggest egg hunt in town at the University of Montana. You may notice that Hagen didn't participate, not because we didn't want him to come, but because the hunt was held in the middle of the day and it would have disturbed Hagen's regular 3-hour nap. Seriously, Hagen is really into sleeping. In fact, sometimes I'll hear him stirring in his crib and I'll go in and ask, "Hey! Are you ready to get up?" And he'll wave me off, saying, "No tinks, 'ont want to." And then lie back down and just hang out in his bed for another hour or so. Some would call that crazy, but I would call it heaven, so I let him do his thing. 

Lest you think I'm kidding about Hagen and sleeping: Last weekend was BrewFest here in Missoula. It was fun in the park downtown with food trucks and kid activities and 50+ beers to try. I really wanted to go, but since Thor was out of town, leaving Hagen at home wasn't a possibility. So I took Hagen in the wagon. Surrounded by screaming kids and drinking adults and within 30 yards of a live band, behold: Hagen sleeping through BrewFest:

So like I was saying, Hagen couldn't make it to Easter, and it was just us girls. 

We got to the egg hunt about half an hour early, which gave us plenty of time to get the lay of the land. Eggs and candy and various prizes weren't hidden so much as dropped all over the ground in age-specific sections. 

We knew that most of the eggs held candy, but had been told that some of them contained tickets for even bigger prizes, like dolls or even a bicycle. Because we'd gotten there so early, Laney and I had plenty of too much time to strategize. 

She sat in my lap as we surveyed the field. I noticed that twenty feet in front of us, there was a little red plastic egg on the ground. You don't often see a red Easter egg. I pointed it out to Laney and said, "See that red egg? I see lots of pink eggs and lots of blue eggs, but that's the only red egg I see on the field. If I were you, I'd go grab that one first because it's right in front of us and it might be special."

So Laney lined up for the start of the hunt, eyes intent on that one red egg. I was already sorry I'd said anything. 

And then the clock chimed 1pm, signaling the start of the egg hunt, and the kids were off!

As kids were scooping up handfuls of candy and gobs of prizes 'til their buckets runneth over, Laney was intently scanning the ground for that red egg. With a laser-like focus, she stepped over candy and avoided picking up other prizes all in the pursuit of that elusive red egg that she'd lost in this sea of other 4-5 year-olds. We couldn't believe it. 

Peg Peg started screaming, "Just pick up SOMETHING! ANYTHING!!!" Another mom next to us turned to Peg Peg with a sympathetic look and said, "It's so hard not to become competitive for them, isn't it?" Peg Peg, ignoring her: "JUST PICK UP SOME CANDY!!!"

The entire hunt lasted less than three minutes and when we finally got Laney back to our little section of grass, we discovered that she'd gotten a balloon, a pair of rabbit glasses, and four pieces of taffy. Her basket basically looked like this:

She ate all four piece of taffy before we left the premises, and then declared herself done with Easter.

She was really a good sport about the whole thing, although I'm sure it took some of the edge off knowing that she was with not one but two grandmothers who would gladly take her to Costco and buy her candy in bulk. 

Last night, as I was going through my files, looking for where I'd stashed the photos of Easter, Laney walked past my computer and caught me looking at the images from the hunt. She shook her head and said, "I'm so sorry I never found that red egg."

I swear, at all future hunt-related activities, I will keep my damn mouth shut.

Love,
Mom

The Cavalry Arrives

Hey y'all -

Your dad left for a Navy assignment a month ago. I haven't mentioned it here before, because - while I'm hardly a stickler about internet privacy - it didn't seem like the smartest move in the world to advertise to the world wide web that I'd be home alone with two small children and the world's laziest sled dog.

Your dad spent his last morning before flying out playing Legos with you guys.

I can't really say your dad's been "deployed," because that usually conjures up images of Army infantry on patrol, looking out for IEDs in Kabul.  Your dad was taking a class and staying at a Holiday Inn on the beach in Florida. The closest I came to worrying about his safety was wondering if he'd remembered to pack sunscreen.

Still, the prospect of being a single parent for a month to two small children while working full time scared the bejeezus out of me, so I started calling around to see who could come to Missoula and lend a hand. Tex and Peg-Peg Poppins flew in on their umbrella, and were practically perfect in every way.

While they were here, Tex built us a new custom dining table, which required no less than 18 trips to Lowe's. I'm sure toward the end, he'd walk through the automatic doors and the whole staff would shout, "TEX!" and hand him a beer. The project also required a few design consultations from Laney.

The big breakthrough from this trip is that Peg Peg let me make her an appointment with the trendy salon downtown, where my favorite stylist told Peg she didn't need to use mousse, spritz, foam, a curling iron AND finishing spray on her hair. It was a low-grade intervention of sorts. But while my mother's mouth was saying, "Oh, yes, okay, I see..." her eyes were telling a different story...

They stayed for two weeks and helped me get you kids to school, reminded me to feed you, and noticed if you hadn't gone to bed by midnight, which was better than I'd been doing on my own. 

Thanks to Peg Peg and Tex for saving the day(s).

Love,

Mom