The Wizard of Oz

Tim is reading The Wizard of Oz to the girls. They love it. I love that they love it. I grew up reading all the books and loving them (except I don't think I ever read the first one, relying instead on the movie, which is very different than the book). I think Tim was skeptical of my love of these books. But now I believe he is as excited to read to them as they are to hear the story. I think he may be slightly disappointed when I sneak in a chapter to them, so that he doesn't get to read it.

Ready to BBQ.

Making bread with Grandma.

Enjoying her gooey hands.

Taking a walk with Grandma.

They love shoulder rides.

Tim's parents visited last week from Oregon. We had a great time with them, swimming, making bread, and taking walks in the amazingly cool spring weather. On Friday we leave for Tucson to visit my sister and her family for Tempie's 3rd birthday. This year, May is for family!

Mostly, it's the Books

And the internet, or lack of it. A few weeks ago, something went wonky with our wi-fi, and I had no internet for several days. At first I panicked. No internet? What was I to do?

The house suddenly got cleaner, the food more elaborate (except for the recipes I always pull off the 'net), and I started reading again. Then, I got hooked on books and it was back to toys everywhere and fishsticks for dinner. I still didn't get back online, for the most part. It's been a long time since I've read like that, but in the past few weeks, I've read several excellent books: The Girl With the Dragon Tatoo, Child 44, and The Likeness.

On Tuesday night, I got home from a coffee at 10pm, and Kate was crying. She hurt her elbow while wrestling earlier in the evening, and she had just woken up because it still hurt. I tried sleeping next to her, but she couldn't fall back asleep for more than a few minutes before waking up again crying. So, at 11pm, we went to the ER. Along with everyone else. She had 3 x-rays, to rule out broken bones, and when the PA saw us around 2:30am, he confirmed nursemaid's elbow, which is the radius dislocating from the socket. Kate has likely had this several times before, but it has always fixed itself. This time it didn't and we had to get a doctor's help. He showed me how to fix it, so that if it happens again, I can hopefully pop it back in at home.

So this week has been sort of wacky, with lack of sleep and trying to get back to a general feeling of liveliness. Tim's family arrived last night for the next week or so, and we look forward to spending some time with his parents next week, after they are done with the class they are taking.

I can't promise that I will be writing again in the next few days, but it could happen. Except I just got The Girl Who Played With Fire, so . . .

I think she can read

Over the past several days, Kate has pulled out random books...and read them to us. The first one was a story from her brand new Highlights magazine, one which no one had read to her yet. She gets stuck on multi-syllabic words, but I think she can read. My baby's growing up.