Growing an Artist

Erica loves to draw and color. She will use anything she can find, which is no difficult task in MY house, unfortunately. I am always confiscating some sort of pencil, crayon, stick, fork, pen, and of course her favorite: markers.

Today she found the Holy Grail of markers: The Sharpie!

Is any surface safe from her artistic decoration?

The answer is NO....

....which she went around saying the whole rest of the day, showing us her tummy and repeating, "No, no, no!"

My new toy....

Over the weekend I ordered myself a new cell phone.

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Pretty cool, huh? It's the new BlackBerry Curve smartphone. It must be cool if it has the word "smart" in the name. I feel very hip and current with it. It has a nice key pad, with a big gorgeous screen, and even a not-so-lame camera. The only problem is....

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I don't really know how to use it yet.

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I thought I could figure it out myself. And since I got it without telling Eric first, I wanted to "show him" that I could be all smart and tech-y and get it all set up myself.

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I am so lame....

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Ummm, Eric.......?

Right Now.....

*Dora the Explorer is on in the other room, with no one watching it....

*Erica is putting her baby down for "night-night" on the step, after washing her face with a wet-wipe. She's such a good Mommy....

*I am waiting for the Verizon guys to get here to install our Fios. Their appointment time is sometime between 8am and 5pm today....

*I am thinking I should finish the dishes from last night, but they can wait, right?....

*I am debating if I should eat one of the cookies I made yesterday. I'm thinking the answer is YES....

Missing my Mr. Darcy

I really don't like it when Eric is out of town.....

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The nights are particularly the worst. After the kids are in bed and the house is quiet, I find myself pacing around trying to distract myself from my loneliness. I can never go to sleep, especially in such a vast, empty bed, and the books that would usually enthrall me can never seem to occupy my mind enough.

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Usually at these times, I endulge in my personal guilty pleasure: watching the five-hour BBC presentation of Pride and Prejudice. Since it drives Eric batty, I can only enjoy it when he is not at home, so it has become my standard distraction from loneliness.

So, I am off to press the play button and enter the world of Elizabeth Bennett....



Ahhh, Mr. Darcy, how I wish you were at home.....

White house, divided by two....

Eric flew out of town today to visit his family. As a special birthday present, we gave Heidi a ticket to go as well. And since she is still under the age of two, and therefore flies for free, Erica also went.


So our household has been divided in half for the weekend.


It already feels quite empty and quiet.


As a treat (and a shameless consolation prize), I took Ethan and Elise to IHOP for dinner tonight. It is Ethan's favorite restaurant. We sat looking at each other across the table and expressing how strange it felt, to be just the three of us. I said to Ethan, "Imagine if it was like this all the time." He replied, "It would be so boring!"


It's funny how absence doesn't necessarily "make the heart grow fonder," but it certainly does remind you of how much people mean to you. And in Ethan's case, how much you miss your favorite people to torment.

My Second-Born

Upon seeing Heidi with all her birthday money, and noting the amount she has managed to save from babysitting, Ethan was feeling a little poor.

He asked me if he will also be able to earn money when he starts babysitting.

I said yes, but also noted that wouldn't happen until he was responsible with the girls and I could trust him.

Ethan then said, with a note of exasperation, "But that won't be till I'm like 20!"

It's Just a Green Day....

A little green man sabotaged our refrigerator today.....

Heidi came home from school and upon opening the fridge door, asked "Ummmm, why is the milk green?"

For dinner we had green pesto pasta, green beans, and green-buttered garlic toast. Yumm!

Heidi Turns the Magic Number....

!!!!!!!!!

Yesterday Heidi had her fourteenth birthday! It's hard to believe she is getting so old!



Of course, I had to make a festive cake for the occassion.....

The kids enjoyed watching us light all those candles, and Heidi almost got them all in one breath.....