I say some weekend images, you are going to have to use your imagination here! Sorry, there were many times I wished I'd had my camera!
One day my little four year-old was walking into an adjoining room with me following, when she tilted her head to the side and looked at me with measuring eyes as if she were just noticing something for the first time. She poked a little finger in my direction and said "oh. Look at your ears. They're very small. That's why you can't hear good." (no trust me, I have just gotten really bad about tuning you out!)
We folded an entire weeks clothes, since we've been washer/dryer-less, to the sound of
The Black Cauldron (with lots of prompts from me to "listen
while you fold!" as little ones drifted into the story). We sat in our mess and ate pizza with a tired Grandma and Grandpa, freshly moved.
Our after-church lunch on Sunday was as goofy a blend of different-aged chiming-in humor. Somehow the conversation went from crowns (my tooth), to being dubbed a knight by the Queen of England (and turning to bite the sword each time it touched a shoulder). Huh? We were laughing so hard (me, sometimes in horror at things like the latter, or in horror at my own un-funny contributions, or at my husband's bewilderment that any of us could find any of it so funny-- ok, he did laugh a little).
We went for a walk on Sunday afternoon. The mountains were a gorgeous neon green, with clouds playing checkers on jutting grey granite and black spotted pines and white capped snow. The sky was a brilliant blue, slow-motion bumper-car puffball clouds, some melting into a misty grey almost as if they emanated from the ancient rock. We traipsed across the garden, lined with rows of sprouting green and mud, across a pebble path, through some weeds, and across our neighbor's lawn. We peered into a tree to see a magpie nest and tried to spy one of the baby birds before they've all left the nest, as mama bird perched anxiously on a nearby tree and crowed at us protectively.
When we were somewhat unsuccessful (sweet nest, I tell you) (only saw one baby, who wasn't very cooperative at giving us a good look), we scattered into various directions, little eyes looking at bugs or throwing rocks. I waded into some knee high grass under a bending white willow thick with the smell of hollow-soil-- rotting wet tree bits and the fresh twang of wet spring grass. We held our breath when we saw a fuzzy throated baby magpie just on the branch above us, hopping clumsily about on his branch.
Then we swashed back the way we came, leaving a winding tunnel of pressed grass in our wake, and undoubtedly a happy relieved baby and mama bird.
We decided to (redirect) a couple of restless little wandering littles and walked instead down the path in the other direction. The gravel crunched beneath our feet, the syncopated rhythm of big strides and little as we talked in breathless excitement and breathed in the late afternoon coolness. The sky to the north had a decided veil of misty grey reaching from cloud-tip to yellow, burnt orange, new green, and brown grasses. I wrapped my arm around a little four year old's protruding tummy and pointed, showing her how the water in the clouds gets heavy and falls down as rain. As we walked or skipped in our line of disparate heights and tempos, I breathed in the beautiful sky, the grass, as if saying hello to a long-lost friend. It hit me in that moment, how much I love all these big and little people I get to call my family, the people I get to share so many adventures with.
We walked toward the white house with the red barn where a man was feeding his chickens. And then it came. A few drops and then a whole sheet of gray had reached us just as we were anticipating some chicken feeding, made us stop in our tracks, laugh, wonder, and run! In a jagged line toward home, with shouts and laughs and littles boosted up on bigger backs.
We rushed inside and closed all of the windows one by one, a happy babble and dripping things. Then we enjoyed a little treat around the table as we watched the rain come down outside, shrouding everything and sprinkling the windows in happy tears.
One little girl went back out, unbeknownst to us, until we saw her streaking through the rain on her bike, with streaming wet hair and a smile on her face! (that girl!)
A do-nothing happy day.
