…I give you, lil’ monkey’s second first day of school. See the image at right, from yesterday’s post, for a glimpse of the stalwart toughie, her first first day. �
Note above, by stark contrast, the relaxed demeanor on this year’s model. �What a difference a year of loving community-building can do. �
Note the lack of [...]

Who’s having more fun: kid, or babysitter? You be the judge.
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One of the lil’ monkey’s two childcare-for-voice lessons caregivers cared for her for the last time today. Most likely. She’s a recently graduated high school senior, virtually matriculated college freshman. She’s off to Boston any day now.
They had spent the morning together [...]

  
I don’t come to my sister’s cabin nearly as often as I could.  Not nearly as often as I should.  It’s beautiful; it’s above 5,000 feet elevation; it abuts a state park and is just a few miles from a beautiful national forest.  She has always extended me and mine an open invitation.  Conifers hundreds [...]

We’re cuddled under a make-shift tent on the couch, while her brother naps. I’ve draped a knit blanket overhead, and it filters the sunlight into tiny granules that dance whenever we move the blanket. We are listening to the original cast recording Sondheim’s Into the Woods, a masterful retelling of fairy tales, a story about [...]

Stop the presses our daughter’s a frickin’ genius! (Bet you never heard that out of a proud parent’s mouth.)
And we aren’t the only ones freaking out about it. I think she is, too. Just got a call from the preschool that she is on a hunger fast, and won’t leave the [...]

[Happy Valentine's Day! Day three of Robin's Some/thing old, new, borrowed, blue funfest, in honor of Freedom to Marry week. More folks have joined the party -- take a peek.]
Oh, these people. They’re borrowed.
We’re not even borrowing them, really. They’re staying with us for a while. Leaning on us as [...]

(Or, Monkey develops what my sister affectionately calls “Husband Hearing”)
Baba: Okay, sweetie, it’ time to get ready for bed!
Monkey (in a petulant tone): Nnnnnnnnnnnno!
Baba: Now why would you be cranky like that? When I’m being all gracious and civilized.
Monkey: My feeling is that I don’t hear so well.
Baba: Oh really?
Monkey: Yeah. Like my [...]

It’s been such a busy news week at Casa LD that it’s been a slow news week at the blog.
Which is to say, most of the household attention has been paid to the turning three of a certain someone, plus the matter of that two-going-on-three-year-old beginning (and staying a whole morning at!) preschool. [...]