31 August 2026

 First day of school!  9th grade and 5th grade.  My sweet husband remembered to take pictures for me this morning, which made me feel very loved.  D was up at 1 am this morning because he was anxious, although his middle school is in the same building as the high school, so it should be a pretty easy transition.  Rosebud has had varying degrees of anxiety as today approached, mostly related to not being able to do everything that she wants to do, but I think she's ready now.  I'm excited for this school year for both of them!

30 August 2026

Walking home from the Wines' last night. Rosebud was enjoying her cloak and wand outfit and was trying to come up with incantations for spells. After some thought, she announced, "I figured out one for 'levitate'. Wave your wand and say, "Let's break physics!"

16 August 2026

Clearing off my dresser and found this award that D won this spring.

Rainy afternoon, and Rosebud and I watched birds out the window for awhile, with a camera and with D's binoculars.  Then she let me braid her hair in a loop around her head, and regretted it as soon as I accidentally pulled her hair for the first time.  It turned out pretty cute though!  I'm glad she agreed I could play with her hair today.  She usually won't let me.

Finished off the armadillo cake tonight.

13 August 2026

 For Nut Brown's birthday, he asked for a party that involved his friends and his family, so we had a cookout with way too much delicious food (hamburgers and chicken skewers, the best potato salad ever, so many chips).  It was fun to hang out with Nut Brown's friends, who are pretty funny guys.  They get along well together.

This is most of them.  Sam suddenly turned away to pick up some firewood right as I snapped the shutter.

Nut Brown asked for an elaborate cake for his birthday, so Rose Pink made him an armadillo.

Nut Brown and the guys took it on in battle in the basement (D&D).

They humored me very politely when I asked for a picture.  Also, as part of their game, Nut Brown had them sing a monster to sleep, and those of us upstairs listened to the whole group sing Backstreet's Back, all the verses.  

Then we sang and he blew out candles and cut the cake with Mr. Brown's treasured cleaver!

Happy birthday to Nut Brown.  It was a fun evening.

8 August 2026

 I planted onion sets in the front flower bed this year, because I figured the deer wouldn't eat them.  They didn't eat them.  But the onions didn't get very big either, just barely doubled in size, and most of them weren't big enough to even bring in.  But they didn't get eaten by the deer!

6 August 2026

Rosebud went to Sumobot camp for a week this summer.  She partnered with another girl to build and program a robot that would try and push another robot out of the ring, and they made a presentation to share with parents about it.  Their robot did pretty well, but Rosebud was frustrated that she didn't feel like she had enough time to do as well as she wanted.  I enjoyed watching the robots fight on the last day of camp!

Camp was close enough to work that I dropped her off and picked her up, and she came back to the office with me for an hour before the end of my workday.  Here's what my office looks like at the moment:

Rosebud drew stars on my board for me.

D also went to STEM camp this week.  He was learning about natural disasters, and came home and built bridges out of popsicle sticks.

 

2 August 2026

We celebrate Mr. Brown's birthday and our family birthday right next to each other every year.  This year, because Mr. Brown likes to get a pan of gyro meat for his birthday,  Nut Brown suggested that we wear togas while enjoying pitas and bubbly juice.  Fortunately I had enough sheets.

It was very silly and very fun.

For the family birthday, Rose Pink made a red velvet roll cake that was quite tasty!

24 years and counting!