Christmas in Miami

• I was immersed in Mrs. Piggle Wiggle when it was announced that the hot water was open, and all other pursuits were abandoned to rush our evening baths. As I directed Noemie into the tub, she informed me that she intended that I should give her baths until the day I died. I wasn't so sure how I should feel about that. But I didn't have time to dwell on the matter; the hot-water-hour had begun. 

  
  For several days, we'd been wondering about a funny hot spot in the floor tiles in front of the garage. My parents bought a new water heater to see if that might solve the problem somehow. The problem remained and we continued to scratch our heads and, eventually to call our family plumber. He explained that the little toasty patch of flooring was in fact the heat from gallons and gallons of scalding water continuoulsy issuing forth from a broken water-pipe under the concrete slab of the house. Ah. And then my dad, seeing to shutting off the hot water valve, discovered that it was not turning at all. He tinkered with the valve and wouldn't you know it, the stem twisted apart and that darn valve started shooting like a geyser! Well, I didn't see it myself but that's how I imagine it went because my dad started bellowing and by the time I ran in, he was coming back in from the side patio, drying himself off. And that is how, the day before my mom's Thanksgiving feast for 35, we found ourselves without any water at all! Our family plumber (who's known my mom since they were neighbors in Cuba) moved his Wednesday morning appointments to tend to our emergency. Hooray for friends! The water valve was replaced but the water-pipe is a different matter. An expensive, complicated matter. A matter that will be difficult to resolve with four young'uns poking around. So for now we just turn the hot water on for one hour a day, in which time we run the dishwasher and 7 showers. And so I had to tear myself from Mrs. Piggle Wiggle.
  
  I am reading Mrs. Piggle Wiggle because of an interesting problem that has developed. That is, Dominic and Noemie have become voracious readers. And I don't mean that lightly. Their literary apetite is ravenous! Dominic is 7 years old. Last week he sat down with The Boxcar Children....150 or so pages, written in the 1920s, a 3/4 grade reading level.... Done in a few hours. I think it took me longer to preview it! Dominic talked so much of the book for the next two days, that Noemie finally decided to pick it up herself. The next day she handed it to me proudly and said it was the best book she'd ever read. Five years old. Ahhh! Here's the problem: per educator and homeschool advocate, Dr. Ruth Beechick, grammar and spelling (in particular) are almost entirely useless "subjects" and are naturally (and painlessly) absorbed simply by reading. Following her methodology, I've chosen to eschew a formal English curriculum and just have the kids read. This, however, means that the kids HAVE to read well written books. No Junie B Jones or Horrible Harrys. As much as I dislike Magic Treehouse, Dominic did get hooked on them from church kids and I permitted him to check those out while I gathered some inventory. But after reading Bulla's Sword In the Tree, he isn't so impressed with the Magic Treehouse anymore. I ask librarians for help and they look at me cluelessly. First, I don't think they really believe me when I say that Noemie reads chapter books. And then when I say that Magic Treehouse isn't good enough quality literature, their jaws drop like they can't fathom the possibility that children's fiction can have sentence construction variety, or that their authors can refrain from beginning sentences with conjunctions, or finishing them with prepositional phrases. The librarians around here have been pretty useless. Have they never heard of George MacDonald? Edward Eager? Maud Hart Lovelace? So I have to resort to book lists from random websites, and previewing their recommendations myself. I can discern quickly if a book will be grammatically acceptable, but assessing the values of an author are much more difficult. And that's where all this reading has come in. One book I previewed was sad and somber, concentrating too much on death. Many of the more modern books assume that sibling rivalry and rebellion is a natural course of behavior. (My kids may fight from time to time, but the rifts are momentary and in the end, they are eachothers' best friends, like the Boxcar Children, Narnia's Pevensies, and The Littles. It matters to me that their books reinforce this.) Is marriage portrayed as intrinsically dysfunctional? Are parents generally portrayed as dupes? I stay up late at night trying to skim these books as quickly as possible and it seems to me the kids read them even quicker. I need to find some older librarian friends, the kind that used to know the books on their shelves.

  
  

  We had a moment of awesomeness in our homeschool today. We've been studying Ancient Israel in school so, for fun, I played Louis Armstrong's version of Go Down, Moses, lip-synching theatrically. My kids, who'd never heard the song before, broke out into their own melodramatic lip-synch of the echoing choir parts without missing a beat. Their instincts are genius. And ridiculous. I love it!

  
  Water-pipes, and children's lit aside, we have managed to survive 2 months at my parent's house. Or should I say, my parents have survived. As we head into the holidays, there will be a lot of things to distract us from missing Danny so much. There's the Kid's Christmas program at church this Sunday, where Dominic has a solo as a wise man, and the Cantata the following week, where I'll be singing in a few ensembles. There is the forthcoming Christmas tree, and the Christmas cards and gift shopping. There are ancient Phoenicians and Minoans on the homeschool horizon. There's my dad's birthday, and retirement, Noche Buena, old friends from out of town.... and then the promise of spending three weeks near Danny in Georgia where will be able to see him on the weekends and a night or two during the week. All is well!

   
   

Planes, More Planes, and Automobiles

Sorry for the delay... Government shutdown, you know.

Danny received his flag on Flag Day as expected..... Miami! I was so excited, I started dancing! No one was watching; I was listening in to the ceremony from the adjacent conference room hallway, carrying an antsy, fussy Giannina.

Thus our new adventure took a turn for the complicated. We celebrated Dominic's birthday by going to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum the day before Congress shut its doors. That night Danny took the older kids to see Disney's Planes. They had the theater to themselves. We spent the next week trying to balance life in a new, smaller hotel that was not so family friendly, and following the play-by-play on Capitol Hill. Could I feel any more disoriented? We decided it would be best to part ways so the kids could have a more stable, suitable living arragement. The next weekend, the six of us drove down to Miami. We arrived at my mother's house at 11 pm Saturday night; Danny was on his flight back to DC by 4pm the next day. 

The kids and I are now living in my childhood home with my parents until God provides an alternate arrangement. My mom helps with the cleaning and the laundry and meals. We help her by filling her house with joyful noises from sunup to sundown. Unfortunately, my mom's favorite sound is silence. We also help her to grow in patience and mercy. She doesn't appreciate this growth quite yet. In the meantime, I try to avoid accidents like Dominic falling in the pool on Toby's tricycle while carrying Lego sculptures. I try to keep Dominic from climbing the walls (handprints!) and I try to keep Toby from driving his matchbox cars on the furniture (scratches!), and Noemie from throwing dramatic, screeching tantrums (nerves!) Gia is a saint. 

Toby's had the hardest time with the transition. For the first week, he cried for an hour before going to bed, making up all kinds of reasons he had to sleep with me. At first, our trips back to church would get Toby whimpering that he wanted to go back "home" (meaning our old apartment). But I think he's starting to accept that abuela's house is "home" for a while. In any case, he stopped being afraid of the crickets he believes to be living in the ceiling.

We make the hour drive to Plantation about 3 times a week....church, house shopping, homeschool group, birthday party... There's always something! 

In other news, Noemie leaned to tie her own hair into ponytails. My budding fashionista is taking wing. Dominic also has learned to fly- he learned how to ride his bicycle without training wheels and there is no getting that boy to come inside the house. Toby got a haircut. Gia.... is a saint.

Now that the shutdown is over, Danny can start his training in GA. We hope to join him by mid-November, staying in a nearby town. That way, we can spend time with him on the weekends. Can't wait to see his face again.

Last week of orientation

As we kick off the last week of orientation, I am terribly sick. We even had to miss church in the morning, which we almost never do. But Danny faithfully made me chicken soup. The kids are busy today building forts out of armchairs and bedding, and dancing to A-teens. I'll be ok. Note to self for our next Oakwood stay:

- Bring plastic cups. Toby's pace of glassware destruction is unacceptable.

- Bring a step stool. The kids don't reach the sink to wash their hands or brush their teeth and the overturned laundry baskets aren't going to hold up much longer.

- Bring baby gate to keep "babies" out of the kitchen and out of the fuse box which is low enough to be both wheelchair and one-year-old accessible.

- Bring outlet covers if Giannina is still showing an interest in sticking hair-clips in electric sockets.

Tuesday is "flag day." For some families, it's the difference between finding out whether they're going to Mauritania or to Macedonia. For us, it'll likely be between Miami and Houston.  

Exploring the City

After the kids gave me such a hard time Thursday, I threatened to cancel our Friday outing. It turned out to be, however, just what we needed. Our timing was perfect- we made it, without incident, to the metro, then through the subway lines and on to the Mall. It was overcast, a little colder than expected, but as we stepped out onto the lawn, there it was, like out of a dream, the Capitol building. It was many football fields away, but even so, impressive. "Hey guys, look! It's the Capitol!" The kids gasped and squealed in excitement. What do they know about the Capitol? They were very excited.... I'm not quite sure why. But it did tickle the history-lover in me.

The Washintgon Monument was on the other side but is under reconstruction (probably from that earthquake a year or two ago) and appeared to be covered in tarps and duct tape. It was lacking in glory so we averted our eyes and, you know, gave it a little privacy. We dawdled, taking in the moment, till it started to rain lightly, which snapped us out of our lovestruck daze. We ran for the Natural History Museum where we met up with my highschool friend, Annette, and spent the next 3 hours wandering the museum. The kids got to lead and they were fascinated the whole time. I was a little disappointed in how little they remembered from last year's animal classification unit but I suppose all teachers experience the effects of summer vacation brain-drain with similar frustration. I would have reviewed the material with flashcards if it weren't that we have a box of items that we shipped here a week and a half ago that is missing in action. Also in that box, all our blank paper (a homeschool essential), our kitchen spices, and my only pair of black highheels. I am trying to be gracious.  I am channeling the patience of Job.

The kids loved the museum. They look forward to going back. It left me wondering, why did I even bother with curriculum? We could just go to the museum everyday for the next month and we'd be set. Saturday we woke up early for a special tour of the Library of Congress. I think this may be the most beautiful building I have ever seen. There's a Gutenberg Bible there, as well as a handwritten copy from the same time period. They are housed in a room with painted murals depicting the history of the written word, which the kids and I had just studied on Thursday. Booyah! The Library of Congress, the biggest library in the world, has over 30 million books, over 150 million materials total, including films, historic manuscripts, and music recordings. That's what the tour guide said, anyway. The materials are housed in three buildings named after John Adams who signed the legislation that dedicated it; Thomas Jefferson, whose personal library formed the original catalogue; and James Madison, who is considered the primary writer of the Declaration of Independence. His monument is located in the library that bears his name. All the library buildings are connected to each other and to the House Offices and the Capitol by means of underground tunnels. Noemie was disappointed that she didn't see any books. Oh darn, we'll have to go back. 

Sunday we attended one friend's church in the morning, and another friend's church in the evening. The word of God is living, powerful, and sharper than any double edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit.... We memorized Hebrews 4:12 last week, and how true it is! The first church had friendlier people admittedly, better music, and the congregation was about 8 times the size of the other, but they did not preach the Bible. Rather, they preached a version of it, edited to suit their lesson. I was unengaged. I felt estranged from the fellowship there. The other church preached the Word, and we were absorbed, challenged, encouraged, we identified with the spirit of the people there. A much better launch to our second week.

Look Ma, No Roots!

Last week Tuesday, Danny and I watched as, for over 12 consecutive hours, 4 men took most of our personal belongings, piano and all, wrapped them in paper, and shipped them off to some storage facility somewhere in Maryland. I am afraid a small forest was felled in the name of preserving a sprinkler from my Tallahassee garden, the margarita glasses we've used once in 6 years, our AWANAs pine derby race cars. Reduced to just our clothes and select toys and books, we set off on this new life of adventure. We stayed with my mom until we left on Friday morning. Danny was up at 7 a.m. loading the van. To Danny's dismay, we wouldn't hit the road for another 3 hours. We said goodbye to abuelos and Tia Loida, and didn't stop till we hit St. Augustine. We had lunch with Danny's college friend Judy, then coffee with Karn in Jacksonville. We were in Savannah by 9 p.m. at which point the kids started with their "pio, pio!" complaining of being hungry. Good thing we packed abuela's leftovers! We spent the next morning relaxing at Forsyth Park, having races across the park and eating homemade popsicles. Saturday afternoon, we made it to Raleigh and stayed with Meredith, my best friend in middle school. Sunday morning we attended her church, which, as Providence would have it, is pastored by an old college friend. We got out later than expected on Sunday afternoon and didn't make it into D.C. until after night had fallen. We got lost and had to call my dear Rebecca to guide us to our hotel. Us old-school navigators don't bother with GPSes and smartphones. But a map would have been helpful. Or maybe not.

We arrived with nothing but a remaining tub of yogurt and granola. I found myself on Monday morning with an otherwise empty fridge and pantry, Danny off on his first day of work (talk about calling it close, I know!), just me and the four kiddos figuring things out on our own. Which in D.C. is no easy task. Good thing they speak English here! We did have a map with us now, but it turned out to be useless anyway. I tried to find the corner grocery store and ended up in another city. The streets in D.C. change names every few blocks. And none of them go in straight lines. This place is a labyrinth. I had to stop at a bank to get directions. Once I was properly oriented, it was nearly smooth sailing. Two hours later, I made it back "home." With much less than $120 in groceries, even though that's what I had to pay for them. Unfortunately, I got lost again in the parking lot of our complex. I couldn't remember which building was ours. I haven't braved driving since. But there's lots to do at the complex. Everyone staying here works for the same agency as Danny. People walk around on their cellphones saying things like, "We got Malawi!" or speaking in Croatian. When they speak in English, they speak in acronyms.. HHE, EFM, BSAC. You hear it at the pool, on the playground, on the tennis courts. Perhaps when we come back in March, the kids can take tennis classes.

There was an icecream social tonight but my kids were rotten today so I was the only one who deserved it. I had planned to go, but at the last minute Danny decided to give me a demonstration of how to walk to the Metro. It's a ten minute brisk walk. Which is how I found myself sitting on a bus bench with four kids, in D.C. at night, wondering, "How on earth did I get here?" And the thought occurs to me periodically. Because really, I just put a bullet in normalcy. I don't think I'm going to know normal for a long time. On the plus side, Danny went from shooing vagrants and arresting distraught, corpulent Bulgarian women, to crossing paths with four-star generals in the halls and wearing suits and ties. As Noemie says, he looks "fantastic." As Toby says, "fantastic carwash poops." Giannina says stuff too, but I don't understand most of it.

Our First of Many Moves to Come

When the first details about Danny's new job and consequent relocation began to trickle in, I was overwhelmed with the complexity of the arrangements. Apparently, my mind is still swimming in this rip current of interminable logistics. The movers arrived at 9 a.m. yesterday morning to wrap our things in obscene amounts of paper and cardboard. Danny and I slept only a couple hours the night before, organizing, segregating, and labeling everything. But movers on a mission don't have time to read labels like **STAYS!**, and I now have perishable food items that will be perishing away for the next 7 months in a storage facility, next to my melting candles, a bottle of ant poison, and the condo owner's throw blanket, no doubt. Perhaps I would have caught the errors if it weren't for that, despite all our efforts, we were not done labeling before the movers arrived, and I was frantically trying to sort the Master bedroom, bath and closet while the movers did their business elsewhere. Another disadvantage to making split second packing decisions in sleep deprivation and confusion, is that you tend to have thoughts such as, " I shaved my legs this morning! I can put my razors in storage!" Twelve and a half hours later, the truck pulled off with our stuff. I don't know that I had ever been so sleepy in my life. And I will have hairy legs tommorrow to boot.

Danny returned to our semi-vacant apartment today to wrap up loose ends while I stayed home with the kids and did school. When my mom dropped us off in the afternoon, the apartment didn't look all that different from how it looked when we left it last night. I ran around in panic, gathering hangers, emptying trash cans, stuffing suitcases, but it was no use. There was more to do than could be done before church, where we were looking forward to seeing our church family one last time. Now it's midnight before our original intended departure date and we still have hours of work ahead of us to clear out the apartment. We're staying an hour away at my mom's house, which makes for long trips to deliver those random items that weren't quite "storage" but are not necessary in the next 3 weeks. There are an alarming amount of items that fit that description. Like my crochet rug-in-the-making. And all the food in our refrigerator. I packed our suitcases with the wrong time frame in mind so those have to be disemboweled and repacked. Otherwise, we won't fit it all in the van. Which we probably wont be able to do anyway. I'm desperately behind in school lessons (though we did get to a particularly appropriate reading on  nomads today). I suppose even now I still don't know what we're doing, or what I would do differently next time. I don't even know when we're leaving.

Saddles ready

Danny has been memorizing Scripture this year, according to a memorization plan. Tonight he recited the following to me:

Psalm 63

You, God, are my God,
    earnestly I seek you;
I thirst for you,
    my whole being longs for you,
in a dry and parched land
    where there is no water.

 I have seen you in the sanctuary
    and beheld your power and your glory.
 Because your love is better than life,
    my lips will glorify you.
 I will praise you as long as I live,
    and in your name I will lift up my hands.
 I will be fully satisfied as with the richest of foods;
    with singing lips my mouth will praise you.

He recited these 5 verses both as practice for himself and as an opportunity for me to hear words from God as I went about my business (extreme homeschool planning). After reciting it, he followed it up with the background of the psalm,"This was written while David was hiding from Saul in the desert, when Saul was trying to kill him."
 "What a great attitude!" I laughed, then had one of those stun-gun reflective pauses...
I was thinking back to this afternoon when I was cowering in the corner of the couch, suppressing indigestion at the thought of the task that lay before me. Danny and I were signed up to teach the 4 and 5 year olds at church for the evening service. It was our second time in two weeks, I just didn't think I could survive another "lesson." Now sitting in the office, considering David's plight, the thought of trying to establish order among 10 sugared up, attention-deficient, brain-fried preschool boys suddenly sounded like a walk in the park next to being a fugitive in an arid wasteland. I prayed as I cowered, that God would help me. And He did. (But I have to admit that David showed me that my perspective may have been a little warped.) Tonight there were only 6 kids. And they were just a notch below their usually explosive energy output levels. And I had much lower expectations of obedience, so I wasn't so distraught at their lack of respect. We read, we colored, took potty breaks, ate cheesy poofs. I think I might have even finished the night with a smile on my face. To God be the glory.

These past two days, God's been working overtime to take care of me. Yesterday was a particularly busy day. Noemie's gymnastics class had to be bumped up to 5pm on account of a furniture delivery that had run late. As I drove home, I was eagerly looking forward to hiding in my room for a few minutes while Danny finished the dinner I assumed he'd already started. But as I was rounding the corner of my neighborhood at 6:30, Danny called me to make sure I'd seen his text from a few hours earlier about a shooting incident in Hallandale.

"So....that means you're not at home making dinner?" "Nope." I was speechless. "I'll be home late. Reeaaaally late."

I got off the phone and checked my messages. Next to Danny's there was another message- my cousin Fanny, who I had not seen in many months, had texted me to see if I was up for company. Heck yeah! I called her up quickly and asked if she was still around and she affirmed. Fanny spent the rest of the night entertaining my kiddos, allowing me to bathe those that needed baths and cook dinner and set the table. Noemie, who was assigned the task of setting the table, spent 5 minutes looking for the corners of my round table cloth before I fired her. Having to set the table after cooking, dinner was cold by the time we ate it. At 9 pm. But...we all ate! And Fanny's got a gift for keeping everyone in a positive mood. She stuck around till Danny came home, tired and grimy, at midnight. God had provided! He also provided some much needed over-time pay to cover all these fancy suits Danny had to buy for his new job.

What new job? Ahhh! Yes, we are in! At the start of the Jewish new year, which also happens to be day 1 of my 2-day anniversary (long story), we will be embarking on a most intense adventure that will last for most of the rest of our lives. First stop: Washington D.C. Next stop (which is only 3 weeks later): I have no idea. But I'll be homeschooling out of a box! Isn't that exciting?! I keep telling myself that. And I pretty much believe it. It's like that Steven Curtis Chapman song I used to love as a kid:

Saddle up your horses, we've got a trail to blaze
Through the wild blue yonder of God's amazing grace;
Let's follow our leader into the glorious unknown;
This is a life like no other - this is The Great Adventure

 On your mark

Get set

Well, it's not quite go time yet but we are crazy-close!

Part of My World

Every so often I have a truly terrible day. Today was one of those days. I could see it coming early. I woke up in the early hours of the morning in a puddle of toddler pee. It was the second time this week. I stormed off in a semiconscious tantrum to sleep on the bed Toby was supposed to be sleeping on in the kids’ room. I was awakened a couple hours later by our nearly deaf downstairs neighbor hammering incessantly on my next door neighbor's door to advise him of a leak. This also woke up Giannina, who refused to give me any peace about her crib confinement. She screamed for 30 minutes while I laid there pretending to be asleep. Off to a rough start, I tried every approach I could think of to getting a fresh, cheerful start: devotions, prayer, a jammin’ gospel album, goofy dancing, and a fancy scrambled egg breakfast. I took Toby to the kids room to get a head start on picking up and Dominic and Noemie did their routine chores of clearing the table and sweeping the floor. The hour that followed was one disaster after another that all started with a cup of spilled orange juice that was left carelessly abandoned. Before it was all over, there was juice in my (reupholstered) chairs, in the dust pan, and on Noemie, who was not involved in the matter in the first place. There was also a wide trail that led to the kitchen. Giannina took advantage of the distraction to empty the middle shelf of her bookcase. Toby, meanwhile, found Noemie’s secret stash of Disney Princess stickers and began to decorate. Naturally, this threw Noemie into a fit of rage that resulted in her throwing herself into a dramatic heap on the craft table, but she overshot and landed her shin against the marble window sill. To make matters worse, Dominic spent the whole morning responding slowly, rudely, and half attentively because his nose was stuck in a Star Wars reader. (I hate those things. Their literary value is akin to the nutritional value of a marshmallow. Which I also hate.) Before the afternoon was over, Gia had thrown up, Toby skipped his nap by playing in my make-up, Dominic and Noemie had been banished from the lunch table, and Gia shattered a jar of baby-food.  I decided to lose myself in a book for a few minutes while I called for a global time-out, (I even texted Danny at work to tell him he was in time-out too for going to work), but couldn't remember where I placed the book. I found it when it fell on my head when I opened the freezer door. Then Dominic dropped yet another cup of water. Why?

Ten years ago Danny was sitting on a bench beside a lawn somewhere in the center of UF's campus, sending me an email on his brand new grad school laptop. Wireless internet? It seemed so strange. Almost suspicious. Here we are 10 years later, 4 kids later, 350 miles away. Who would have thought Danny would go into law enforcement? What a ridiculous thought. (He was supposed to be an engineer. And I was supposed to be an engineer's wife, living in an engineer's house. With a french au pair. But alas, I have to get by on a little less than expected. Most regrettably, the au pair. And I must keep my head high, my smile straight, and my composure firm as I carry wailing children from the minivan, as I carry on an adult conversation over the hysterical shrieks of a girl who muddied her knees, as I try to schedule appointments on my tablet PC while a toddler throws furtive swipes at the touch screen... to say nothing of spilled juice.)

And who would have thought, in a million years, that I would run a 5K? (And by run, I mean mostly run. But it was a tremendous feat nevertheless. A lifetime first. A lifetime best! Because I'm pretty sure I'm never doing that again. Oy!)

If I could witness today, 10 years ago, what would I have thought? I am glad that days like today are really not the norm.  In fact, there have been many more celebrations than anything else in the past few months. Noemie cried with disappointment when I didn't win first place in the race, but I was so proud to have been in it at all, that I gave myself a hearty pat on the back, once I recovered. We also had the opportunity to host friends from North Carolina, Afghanistan, and Argentina. And of course, Cristovan turned three this year so it was his turn to party with "Mi'Mouwh".  That was quite a celebration!

We made the traditional trip to Disney, but with the recent promotions they had, we ended up scoring 3 days of park action! With abuelo and abuela, we had enough hands to hold babies, a caravan of strollers, and hands to make yummy dinners. 

We had fun conversations while we stood in the lines and shared in some joyous experiences- like Dominic's Turtle Talk participation, Giannina's face on it's a Small World or Noemie's rollercoaster hysterics.

Despite the drizzly weather, EPCOT was a perfectly pleasant experience. We caught the tail end of the Garden Festival so the grounds were extra beautiful. In Magic Kingdom, Big Thunder Mountain was the favorite ride of all who went on it, though the new Barnstormer was a close second. Looks like I have some roller-coaster junkies on my hands. 

By day three I was dreaming of Mickeys. You know it’s time to go home when your instinctive reaction to a scraped knee is to say “bippity boppity boo.”  We were thoroughly exhausted by the time we left.

We also finished our year of Awanas Wednesday night children’s church program. There’s nothing like dropping off your crazy, sporadically obnoxious, whiny kids to get fed the Word of God by people who are much better equipped with fresh, patient spirits, while you escape to a grown-up Bible Study. Even if it’s only for an hour. I’m always wincing as I pick them up, expecting to hear of the horrors they’ve rained upon the workers, but find that everyone has only glowing reports of them. Noemie, in fact, came home with the Cubbies Excellence Award at the end-of-the-year ceremony last week. She was the only one to receive it of the 20 or so Cubbies in the program. One of the teachers testified that Noemie was a brilliant assistant, always prepared with her memory verse, and eager to help the other kids learn their own. “Repeat after me...” Noemie would say.

Meanwhile, my parents are on a grand tour of Europe. We have been enjoying tracking them on our map- Germany, Estonia, Russia, Finland, Norway… and going strong. They’ll hit up the Alps before their return.

We are expecting some changes for our family soon. We don't know what or how exactly things are going to change, but we know, the way the wind smells different right before the autumn, that a new chapter is getting ready to begin. We have some excited summer reading to go along with it. The list is based on a list of books that “build character” that I found at my in-laws house last weekend. If you have young children and would like to follow along (or like to read children's books anyway) here's our list for June and July. Hopefully this will expand their appreciation of civic virtues, as well as their vocabulary so they never have to resort to abusing the English language "irregardless."

The Selfish Giant (Oscar Wilde/ illus. Zwerger)

Sleeping Beauty (Mercer Mayer)

Marcella’s Guardian Angel (Evaline Ness)

The Little House (Virginia Lee Burton)

The Little Brute Family (Russel Hoban)

The High Rise Glorious Skittle Skat Roarious Sky Pie Angel Food Cake (Nancy Willard/ Watson)

The Boy Who Held Back the Sea (Lenny Hort/ Locker)

Clancy’s Cloat (Eve Bunting/Caulry)

And now it’s time for an Espinosa family soundbite. You can see my conversations with Noemie are getting more interesting.

Tomorrow we’re going to have visitors!

Ooooh! Is it Karn?

No, farther.

Tjay?

No, farther. 

Tia Amy?

Nope, father than that!

Abuela Marta and Abuelo Wilmo?

If you can believe it, even father than Berlin.

Prima Meli?

No, not that far. But it is another country on the other side of the planet.

Russia?

South of Russia.

China?

West of China.

Japan?

No, west is the other way.

A coniferous forest?

[awkward pause]…. The country is Afghanistan.

[Suddenly realizing who it is...] You know what? When I see them I am going to SCUH-REAM! I don’t even remember what Mr. John looks like!

Well, he has orange-ish hair…

YUCK! Carrot hair!

Butterfly in the sky...

The painted lady butterflies emerged several weeks ago. I didn't mean to leave you hanging in suspense....

But they emerged and we released them. Quickly.

I always killed my pets (by accident, of course) and didn't want to experience this failure again in front of the kids. My parakeet Teddy, my hamster Hammy, another two or three parakeets... I don't even remember their names they died so soon. There were two turtles as well, and my friend's pet monarch butterfly. That last one fried on a halogen lamp when I let her out to fly around my house one evening. Most of them died because I would love them to death, like Elvira on Tiny Toons. I thought Hammy loved going down the slide! 

Noemie, following in her mother's footsteps has already experienced a pet-fatality of her own.

 

Her precious millipede didn't even make it out of the strawberry patch we found it in. It was squashed by a nearby rocking chair. There were tears.

There were tears at Noemie's birthday party as well. She celebrated her fifth birthday with an elegant tea party at a park, alongside Giannina, who was celebrating her first. Noemie enjoyed herself immensely for most of the event. She was surrounded by some of her favorite people. We served lemonade and chicken salad sandwiches, and croquetas, pastelitos, and bocaditos. (It was a Cuban tea party). We ate blackberries out of a fancy sugar bowl, painted birdhouses,  blew bubbles, and had a hula hoop contest with dollar store hula hoops. (It was a modern tea party as well.) The funny thing about dollar store hula hoops is that they're not actually big enough for a child to hula inside of it. The winners were the girls who filled up the hoops the most, thereby providing the most friction against the hoop as it made its way to the floor. Noemie didn't win this awkward little game and she cried. So to make it up to her, I told her she could coordinate the goody bag station, where the girls filled their goody bags from a tray of assorted cookies. Unfortunately, no one heard Noemie's elaborate instructions (the process was somewhat self-evident) and this, naturally, made Noemie cry a little harder. Once most of the guests had gone, Danny, a friend, and I set ourselves to packing up the tablecloths and tea cups. Noemie had gone to the playground to swing on the monkey bars while we wrapped up. She came back down the hill with a broken humerus. And the crying would continue for a few hours more.

She would not cheer up again until we opened presents that evening. Among her gifts was her favorite movie (Peter Pan), a bathing suit that was both "a bathing suit AND a tutu!" and a Minnie Mouse T-shirt, purchased expressly for our trip to Disney in 11 days. "This is going to be AWESOME!" she exclaimed. She also got a purple cast. The cast was finally removed last Friday- praise the Lord. That girl spends more time on her head than on her feet. I was sure she was going to break her shoulder. Or the cast itself.

Giannina is unaware of the countdown to Mickey. She is also a whole entire year old! That was fast! Like Noemie, she enjoyed her birthday party very much. She broke no bones. She ate cake. And by the end of it all, I am pretty sure, she was more tired than she had ever been in her 12 months of existence. These days she's been working on walking. She will stand for seconds at a time without holding on to anything. Occasionally she will brave a step. It's imminent. And she seems to be giving up her penchant for mid-meal expulsion and observation of her food through its stages of pre-digestion. Thank goodness! 

At some point we fit in a trip to the Dade County Youth Fair. Dominic in particular enjoyed this extra time with us. We haven't seen a lot of him lately. We enrolled Dominic at our church's school for a brief season. Dominic needed the extra discipline. But really, Mami needed the extra discipline. I hate discipline. I hate waking up at 6:45 in the morning after having changed pee-peed sheets and shooed kids back in to bed at 1 am the night before. I don't care for the extra expense in gas. I could really do without having to plan breakfast, snack, non-perishable lunch, and dinner 7 days in advance. Except, the truth is I needed to be waking up at 6:45, with or without the traditional school-life schedule. If I had been spending the same amount of money in gas taking kids to the park, the museum, the library, the YMCA, or on field-trips  then I probably wouldn't have had to put Dominic in school in the first place. (One of the primary reasons we enrolled him is that this 6-year old, at home in a 2-bedroom apartment with no yard, had the countenance of a child in a straight jacket.) And having all the meals planned ahead of time helps me make sure we're all eating balanced meals at reasonable hours. Dominic is adamant about doing school at home next year. He misses the fieldtrips, the hands-on science projects, and building Legos in his pajamas till 9 am. But most of all, I know he misses being with us. On picture day, he jumped out of the van proudly with his dress shirt and slacks, gushing to his headmaster as he walked by, "My mom makes the best suits!" I had to laugh. I knew he meant that he is proud of the way I pick his clothes. I felt honored. I don't know what I am going to do come mid-May but I plan to enjoy him a lot more, that's for sure! Lessons learned.

And then there's this guy. 

Jumping out from behind a bookcase

 "RAWR!"

"Toby, I'm trying to read. Shhh!"

"rawr!" he whispers

Eleven days till the trip of his life. 

Noemie's right, it's going to be awesome!

The Artist

I have a propensity, when I stumble across a squiggled engraving on my dining room table or a pen drawing of a house on my bedroom wall or a pearl bracelet unstrung and scattered across my bedroom floor or my deodorant in pieces on the bathroom counter, to think that my kids hate me. (It has been a particularly destructive week. ) But honestly, I can remember a time when I "refinished" my dad's stapler in nailpolish and tried to do the same to his office desk using a permanent marker. My children (Noemie in particular) really are made in my image. I will be extra forgiving this month in honor of National Craft Month.

As it turns out, March is National Craft Month! I read it somewhere. On a related note, I've decided to recant my previous tirade against Pinterest; I've discovered its more noble capacities! For one, it's a goldmine of craft ideas. I've had a sewing machine sitting in a cabinet for two years that I've been scared to use. It was on account of "Pin-spiration" that I dragged out the machine and studied the manual word for word until I mastered threading the machine. I am such a novice, I didn't know I had to wind the bobbin myself! Of course, I can only work on my projects in 20 minute increments, usually while Danny is at Publix with a gaggle of children. I'm working on travel pillowcases for my sister and her hubby before they leave for Seattle. In less than a week. It was all quite sudden... I'm still crying on the inside.

March is more than national craft month, it's super-birthday month as Noemie, Giannina, Eva (our only niece), and my mom all celebrate their birthdays within a single week. What are we doing to celebrate? I've no earthly idea. Danny and I have been agonizing over this decision for months. Don't even talk to me about Easter. But Amy won't be there for any of it! [Hold back the tears. You can do this.]

School has been guh-reat! We trekked through our kingdoms of life and arrived at the animal kingdom, where we've been dissecting the taxonomic definitions of the major phyla, in particular, porifera, cnidaria, "worms", echinodermata, mollusca, and... well that's all we got so far. As girly as Noemie is, she wasn't squeamish one bit when we examined oysters. (She didn't care much for the octopus, though.)

 

Arthropoda is up next. For Christmas, Amy's [sniffle] mother-in-law, Betty Quinn-tastic, got the kiddos a mail-order caterpillar growing kit. Our larvae arrived two weeks ago.

Any day now I anticipate our family will have "pets"! 

 

I mean, we do have some earthworms in some plant plots from our worm week, but I haven't seen them since I put them in the pots and I'm not sure that they're still alive to be quite honest. That's gotta be bad luck, to have dead earthworms in your house plants.

In other family news, I tried to start exercising again. I joined a running group with friends from church. Running is my number one least favorite form of organized wellness activity. I hate running. I hate running almost as much as I hate stumbling across Noemie's newest masterpiece on the back of the 2nd row of leather seats of our minivan. But I joined the group in an effort to be disciplined, to get a break from the kids, and to be healthy, I guess. Three weeks in, I have run a total of seven and a half miles or so, replaced my 15 year old pair of cross-trainers with brand new running shoes... and totally busted my knees. After a particularly brutal workout on Monday, I thought to ask our coach why my joints were all hurting so much and he made me aware that I was running incorrectly, that is, on my heels. Now I hobble up the stairs like a 70 year old. So much for healthy.

Milestones:

 

 Dominic lost his tooth!

 

And Toby, is POTTY TRAINED. 

I thought it might never happen.

 It happened. 

Praise the Lord.

________________________________________________


An Espinosa family moment:
As I'm driving all the kids home from who-knows-where, Toby calls out from the backseat, "cwuhaveguhugunet?" (Because this is how he talks).
Me: You want a gub nugget?!
Dominic, Noemie, and Toby: hysterical laughter
Dominic: Toby wants a gub nugget! What's a gub nugget?! TOBY SAID GUB NUGGET!
Noemie proceeds to sing a song about numbuggets, as I'm pulling into our parking space.
Toby, realizing that he is the object of ridicule, starts to get angry and yell, "Fwop it! FWOP IT!"
I get out and open the sliding door and Giannina is looking at me, as she often does, with an expression that reads, "Are you for real? You're the family I got stuck with?"
Yes, Gigi. This is it.

 

Amy, what will we do without you?!?

Chicken: Head Missing

Hi. I'm still here. Barely.... but still here.

If I thought life was a whirlwind before, I think I've reached a level of natural phenomenon of apocalyptic proportion. And, in keeping with the metaphor, it's a speed that I can't survive.

Tuesday, for instance, I dragged all the munchkins in pajamas to church (in Plantation), where I dropped Dominic off for the day. I drove back home (to Davie) where I fed the kids and cleaned up from breakfast, and from an incident that involved a prematurely-cast-off poopie diaper, and the trail of footprints that followed. By the time we finished the morning clean up and sang a few songs it was time to coordinate snacks and naps, before I ran off back to church to pick up Dominic. From there we headed to Noemie's gymnastics class (in Weston). I left her there while the rest of the kids and I checked out the Weston library two miles down the road. After gymnastics, we rushed home and I started dinner while tossing children into the bathtub. When Danny walked in the door, home from work, I had just enough time to bury my face in his shoulder before grabbing a fistful of almonds and running out the door for a Ladies in Prayer meeting. On my way I pulled out my phone to text my leader, letting her know I was running late, and found that I had 7 missed calls from a friend. When did I silence my phone? She'd been calling me all afternoon to tell me she needed a ride. I detoured out east to Lauderhill, then raced north to Tamarac; we arrived twenty minutes late. Before the day was over, I'd been in or through 6 municipalities, logged about 100 miles, and was sporting a killer migraine. Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday were much of the same, with some volunteer teaching, vocal team rehearsals, and church thrown in. My back hurts, my brain hurts, and the mess is beyond acceptable. I haven't seen my bedroom counter-top in over a month. And thanks to Toby, my alarm clock is coated in a layer of diaper ointment. Something's gotta give. Sometime between homeschool co-op, playgroup, a dental appointment, and potty training Toby, I'm going to have to schedule in a schedule-deconstruction.

We celebrated Danny's birthday last month with a trip to my favorite South Florida beach. We had a lovely picnic and walked the beach looking for washed up sponges and man-o-wars. I was devastated to find I'd left my camera at home. But there wasn't much time for pictures anyway; we were run off by a rain cloud before our parking meter time had run up. 

In school we've been learning about the classification of living things. Last week we covered monera, protista, and fungi. We devoted this week to plants. Noemie and Dominic enjoyed nature journaling, making detailed drawings of species like the richardia grandiflora and swietenia mahagoni in our parking lot.

I solemnly swear he is up to no good. However, I will commend him for his progress in enunciating. He is beginning to use consonants!

 

I had the opportunity to visit with one of my best friends over the holidays and meet her baby, born two weeks after Giannina. She took this fun picture of Giannina doing what she does best: making me happy.

Dominic got a bike for Christmas, one without training wheels. He has been unsuccessful so far, but we keep this photo as our desktop on our computer to let him know we believe that he will master it soon. And if not, at least it will help him finishing off that wiggly bottom tooth. 

My favorite soundbite of the week:

Dominic: I'm Davy Crocket, and you're Chief Red Stick!

Noemie: No I'm Davy Crocket, and you're Red Stick!

Dominic: No I have to be Davy Crocket!

Noemie: I'm Davy Crocket. I'm going to shoot mami so all her pennies fall out!

Dominic: You're Red Stick!

Noemie: No, no, no. I'll be Davy Crocket's wife!