Water

Aaron and I have been looking at buying a boat. Not terribly seriously, yet, as we'd like to get our finances a little more in order before we make a purchase like that. But we have gotten into fishing more and more these past couple of years, and you can't really graduate beyond pan fish from the shores of the nearby lakes. So I think a boat is in our future eventually.

Recently, a friend of Aaron's lent us a small aluminum fishing boat for use in getting off the shore line into deeper water. We had our first opportunity to take it out on Fox Lake on Sunday afternoon.

Aaron went over to the lake ahead of us, to take the boat out on the water and get comfortable using it. We followed behind a couple of hours later. The sun was shining (finally!) and the kids were jumping out of their skin to get out into the middle of that big ol' lake.

The boat fit our our family of 5 rather neatly; not a lot of room to wiggle or walk around, but room enough to cast and sit back comfortably enjoying the sunshine. With a top speed of about 10mph, and a water line high enough for me to trail my fingers in, we moved easily across the water and headed to the west end of the lake to try out a recommended fishing hole. For those not familiar with Fox Lake, it is roughly 1000 acres, with a maximum depth of about 20 feet. It's fairly large, as far as our local lakes go, and gliding along in the center of a small little fishing boat made it seem perhaps larger than it actually is.

About 15 minutes in, and halfway to our intended destination, the motor cut abruptly.

I glanced back at Aaron, a question in my eyes, and I recognized that deer-in-the-headlights look he gets on rare occasions when he feeling panicked. He fumbled with the motor a few times and it wouldn't even sputter.

The kids were chattering ceaselessly, about this that and the other, completely oblivious to the fact that we are a looooong way from shore, with only a single paddle in the boat, and not a single other boat in sight. Aaron was on his feet, playing with this, messing with that, trying this, loosening that, tightening this, and trying not to let his anxiety show.

I was oddly detached.

Detached because as soon as the motor cut, 27 possible outcomes of this problem flashed through my brain in about a millisecond. And before I could settle on any one plan of action, I had one clear thought.

Every time my husband has put me on the water, and I do mean every single time, something BAD has happened. And not little tiny "oops" bad things. I'm talking "Oh My God" bad things. (Pardon the swear word.)

Aaron has always been a boater; on our third date he put me in a kayak and took me down the river in Mankato. (I cried for about 45% of that trip, because I am a great swimmer, a trained lifeguard, and smart enough to know that you don't want to be swimming in any moving water unless you really have to be. And I was unskilled at kayaking; no way could I roll that thing over, and I knew that if I flipped it, I was coming OUT of that boat.) That day was mild, just tears mainly, but no serious injuries.

A year later I was navigating that same kayak down Boulder Creek in Colorado. I cried about 60% of that trip, because I DID come out of the boat on that one, several times, and they don't call it Boulder Creek for nothin'.

A few months after that, I was navigating that same kayak down the Blue River in Summit County, CO. I cried for about 99% of that trip, because I came out of the boat, got rolled in a rapid along the bottom of that rocky terrain, washed up on the wrong side of the river, and realized I would have to GET BACK IN the river to get my sorry butt home.

**Side Note: Aaron is an excellent boater. I know that he harbored dreams of me becoming one as well, and God love him for trying, but there is apparently a steep learning curve in this sport, and I could never quite get the hang of things.**

A short two years after that, we abandoned the kayak and put me in an inflatable sit-on-top hoping that would provide me with the stability I needed to stay in the damn boat. On that trip, I wrapped my inflatable on Raft Ripper, at the bottom of the Brown's Canyon Run in Buena Vista. It took three private boats, two throw ropes and 3 hours to get me out of that one.

That was my last boating trip with Aaron until Sunday.

So here we are, in the middle of Fox Lake, in a boat that is getting smaller by the second, on an evening that is getting darker by the second, with the three most important possessions of my life on board, and the motor stops. I admit it, I thought I might throw up for a second. My heart skipped about 27 beats and I was close to pulling out my phone and dialing 911 when Aaron realized that he had inadvertently leaned on the fuel line and cut fuel supply to the motor.

Within seconds, the motor was up and running and we were scooting along again.

I didn't say anything, just swiveled in my seat to look at him. My face must have said it all because he leaned forward and wrapped his arms around me and laughed that easy laugh and just said, "It's okay."

When we buy a boat, I swear to God I will mortgage the house if I have to, but we are buying a 20' Glastron that is sturdy enough to SLEEP on if we have to. I don't care if it goes fast, I don't care if it's pretty, I just want, for once in my life, to feel safe on the water.

And maybe pull a tube for the kids.

And maybe catch a few fish.

Irony

Last summer we planted cucumbers. Lots and lots of cucumbers. Way too many cucumbers. Aaron loves pickles; he loves them passionately. My friend Melinda loves pickles passionately too, so I knew I would be able to make lots of pickles and have homes for them. So we planted 20 hills of cucumbers.

That's right, 20 hills. (Go ahead, snicker, I know you want to.)

20 hills of cucumbers makes a lot of cucumbers. A lot of cucumbers.

I made pickles. Dill pickles, Garlic Dills, Dills with Peppers and Onions, Sweet, Refrigerator-Style. I pickled and pickled until I couldn't pickle any more. (70 jars, 5 kinds!) But the plants kept making cucumbers. I tried to sell cucumbers, but I felt so guilty about charging for these unwanted veggies that I started giving them away. By the box. Pretty soon all my friends said, "We've had enough!"

And those dang vines kept making cucumbers. We were desperate to get rid of cucumbers, so we started feeding them to our chickens. It turns out that our chickens LOVE cucumbers. We would slice them lengthwise and set them on the floor of the chicken coop, and our chickens would get so excited they would run across the coop, fluff up their feathers and go to town on the cucumbers. I felt much better, knowing that they wouldn't be going to waste. They made the chickens happy, and happy chickens make really exceptional eggs.

But as the garden wound down last fall, I told Aaron that one thing was for sure: in future we would only plant 4 hills of cucumbers. I just could not deal with that many cucumbers again, happy chickens or no.

Fast forward to this spring.

We rotate our garden crops and spend a lot of time meticulously planning what goes where, how much goes in, when it goes in, whether we can get two plantings in per summer, etc. We tilled up our plots, which had been resting quietly under a bed of organic compost (thank you, chickens!) and began planting carefully according to the master plan.

Fast forward 2 weeks.

I went out back one afternoon to do a little garden maintenance last week. The potatoes and peas are already 8 inches off the ground; the carrots, onion, turnips, and beets are up. The tomatoes, green peppers and beans are going strong. Only one thing seemed strange...there was quite a lot of green in between our carefully planted rows.

I'm used to tilling up weeds; we have to till or hand remove weeds all summer because we don't use any herbicide to kill unwanted growth. But there just seemed to be an awful LOT of the same little green 2-leafed weed all over the place.

And that 2-leafed weed looked awfully familiar.

It took me a full 5 minutes to realize what it was. Cucumbers. And I'm not talking a few random volunteer cucumbers. HUNDREDS of cucumbers, and they were EVERYWHERE. It looked like a helicopter had dropped a bucket of cucumber seeds in my garden. They were in between the rows, in between the new plants, choking out my carrots, strangling my onions, and intertwining with my peas. They were in the middle, on the edges...they were everywhere. Every. Where.

I was so flabbergasted, I was at a loss for words for a few minutes. How can this be possible? We hadn't planned to put cucumbers in these beds; the four planned hills are in a different plot in the back. At first I thought maybe Aaron snuck a bunch of cucumbers into the plot hoping for another pickling extravaganza. One summer we had volunteer tomatoes, and I couldn't bring myself to pull out a perfectly healthy plant so we just let them grow. I had way too many tomatoes too, but I vowed that I would remedy that problem this year too. Perhaps he was hoping to sneak the cucumbers by me? Then again, Aaron is quite particular as to how things are planted (our rows are perfectly parallel, exactly 36 inches apart) and he would never have planted these in such a random, haphazard pattern.

I was just about to holler for Aaron and demand an explanation when it hit me.

We compost. From our chickens. And guess what our chickens ate quite a lot of last fall...?

The irony is almost too much for me.

Special

More than once I've been inspired to write about Carys, our middle child, our special one. I can't seem to finish a post to my satisfaction, though. If my goal is to paint a picture of who she is, to chronicle the moments that are important, I fail at every turn. She is so unlike any child I've encountered so far, that I truly struggle to make her personality come to life on the page. She came into the world in the most unusual way, in a hospital in Joplin, Missouri that would be wiped off the map less than 5 years later. She was born with a hearing loss in her left ear and an intolerance to lactose. She was born quietly and without fanfare, big blue eyes that stared intently at anyone who held her.

We are learning to drum to the beat of a different marcher in our family. A few examples: she refused to sleep anywhere but in my arms for the first year and a half of her life. When other children were busy playing with toys, Carys was trying to take them apart to figure out how they worked. At pre-school screening, the evaluators had to take us aside for a special consultation because Carys wouldn't do the tests the way they asked her to do them. When they asked her to catch a bean bag with her hands to test her motor skills, she caught the bag between her knees. On purpose. She said she didn't want to catch it with her hands. When they asked her to list as many colors as she could (looking for the basic 8) she listed 14 colors and called them names like "lemon-yellow, and grass green, and indigo." Seriously. When they asked her how high she could count, she announced that she could count to 100. Then she said, "one, two, skip-a-few, 99, 100." I have no earthly idea where she came up with that, it was the first time I had ever heard it. The bottom line was that the evaluators were unsure how to score her development because it was on such a different plane than what they were looking for.

She says the most unexpected things at the most unexpected times, and Aaron will sometimes shoot me a look that says "who the heck IS this child?" And I don't have the slightest clue. Take last weekend, for instance. The weather has been crazy around here lately, and we had a little bit of thunder the other night. Carys and Cooper were brushing their teeth for bed when Cooper told me he was a little bit scared of thunder. I launched into a flowery description of angels bowling in heaven (we had just been bowling that weekend, and I was having a private little personal high-five at how nicely those circumstances appeared to work together) and the entire time Carys was just listening intently with narrowed eyes. In the middle of patting myself on the back for the smile that now appeared on Cooper's face, I was suddenly stopped short by Carys who panned, "Mom. That is not true. Thunder is caused by cold air and warm air colliding in the atmosphere."

Oh. Well thank you, Miss Meteorologist.

I anticipate that raising this one is going to be interesting. Of all her quirks and notions, however, the one trait that has devloped the most prominently is a soft heart. This child has empathy for others and for animals to such a degree that it is more than likely that living on the farm is going to make a vegetarian out of her some day. One day we passed a semi-truck on the gravel  down from our house. Carys said, "Mom, why is that semi full of pigs?"

Before I could answer, Emma says, "Well, where do you think bacon comes from?"

There was a shocked silence in the back seat and I was wondering how in the world I was going to get out of this one. (Thank you very much, Emma-Smarty-Pants.)

Carys gasped, "Mom! You mean, people EAT them?"

I still had no good answer, I just kind of coughed a couple of times, floundering.

Then, she saved me. With a choke and a sob, she said, "Well people don't eat them until they're dead, though, right?"

Whew. "No, Carys, we definitely don't eat them until they are dead. We wouldn't want them to go to waste, right?" And that seemed to satisfy her. She does still eat meat, and she doesn't seem to mind watching 60 live chickens get loaded into a truck and then 60 frozen chickens coming back in coolers, but maybe that's because she hasn't thought too much about the in-between yet.

Every time we watch a movie and the impending death of a character approaches, I need to be holding her on my lap and talking her through it. She grieved over the  Lion King's Mufasa for days. She even cried when the scorpion killed the ant in Honey I Shrunk the Kids. It hurts me to see her hurting, but I don't really want it to change. There is so little compassion in this big bad world sometimes, that a sensitive soul might be just what it needs.

I worry sometimes about the "middle-child" dynamic that I always read about. Being the oldest child in my own family, I don't really relate. But I am definitely sensitive to it; I'm on the look-out for times when she is separate from the other two. She is very unlike her siblings, which is a dividing characteristic already. I just make sure she gets a lot of mommy-time. I want her to know that I celebrate her differences, and love her all the more for them.

My greatest wish for her is that she is able to hold on to that sensitive heart; that the world outside will be unable to harden it when she encounters its obstacles. I'm sure somewhere along the line she will be hurt, maybe have her heart broken a few times. And that's not necessarily a bad thing; it builds character and makes us unique in our life experiences. But I just want the core of who she is to remain that free-spirited, forward-thinking, sassy, gentle, soft-hearted person that I was blessed with.

Nostalgia

I got a phone call from my friend Erin last night. These days we are long-distance friends; yet strangely, the distance has made us even closer than we were before. We mostly talk about where our lives are at and where they are headed, but last night she reminded me of where we used to be. And it got me feeling all nostalgic.

It is really true that our past shapes our present; we are who we are because of what we have been through. The hard times make us wiser, and the good times give us a reason to keep going. Erin and I  were new teachers together; I only had a couple of years head start when she joined our District. I had the pleasure of being her mentor as she got her start, but it wasn’t long before she and I were working side by side on everything from classes to coaching.

I believe that for 3 short years, we were living in a bubble of the best of the best of the best of times. Nothing will ever replicate it, and I don’t believe I would even like to try.

Our Language Arts department had 6 members, and it might be hard to believe, but we were 6 women who liked each other. Actually liked each other, genuinely and truly. In any other universe, 6 women together for any length of time would be trouble just waiting to happen. But like I said, we were living in a bubble…it was perfectly perfect, however brief. I write today in tribute to my colleagues, my friends, who built me and serve as the fondest of my recent memories.

We were led by Linda, the Queen, who knew what it meant to make every single day count. She came to school in costume, she had unconventional lessons, she used tough love, and when school was over she turned her ministrations to her coworkers and friends. She cooked for us, she hosted parties for us, and she taught me how to laugh. Linda interviewed me; she told me straight out in the interview that I had the job (despite the Principal’s attempt to downplay and remind her that there were other applicants left to interview) and then she promptly invited me to her house for lunch. Her wit was unmatched; she could pull an innuendo out of almost any innocent line, and knew instinctively when I needed to laugh, and when I needed her to put her arms around me and let me cry it out. I learned from her that teaching is only 10% curriculum and 90% love.

I taught alongside Linda and Mel and Kathy and Erin and Leslie for those 3 wonderful years, and the way that we collaborated with each other and spent time together inside and outside the walls of the school was the key to what made it special. We never did anything half way; when it was Dr. Seuss’ birthday, we sewed Cat in the Hat hats for every teacher in the school, we performed Reader’s Theater versions of his books, had green eggs and ham for lunch, and made a red and white paper chains that stretched down every school hallway. When we taught medieval civilization, we created a “renaissance festival” of our own in the school gym replete with shops and performances and costumes and music and props.

We hosted our own dress-up days, we surprised the students with projects and field trips. We planned dances and pot-lucks and family nights. We searched for ways to teach literature outside the room, to blur the lines between school and real experience. We took them to high-ropes courses in the mountains, we took them camping, skiing, swimming. We wrote nature poetry on the banks of the Arkansas River, we performed plays and sketches in the courtyard.

Outside of school we spent time together because we genuinely liked to be with each other. We made gingerbread houses at Kathy’s, went horseback riding at Leslie’s, had parties at Mel’s, had drinks at Erin’s. There were countless lunches and campfires and river trips and bike rides and walks between each other’s houses.

I don’t mean that we didn’t each have our troubles; of course we had our problems, our personal challenges. I, for one, certainly didn’t recognize at the time just how extraordinary this experience actually was. Marcel Proust said, “Remembrance of things past is not necessarily remembrance of things as they were.” Maybe I’ve got it wrong, or maybe others will remember it differently. But since it is my memory, it remains this way: perfect.

 It isn’t until now, looking back, that I can see with such clarity how amazing those three years really were. Those remarkable women made my first teaching experience as positive and welcoming and wonderful as one could ever have hoped for. Each one of them made life more livable, and work never felt like work. I left the house each morning and went to see my other family. Mel was the spunk, Kathy was the southern lady, Erin kept us young, Leslie brought the crazy, and the Queen ruled over us all.

Like all good things do, our time together came slowly to an end. It wasn’t a recognizable end at the time, of course, but as life evolves and moves and changes, the magic of those perfect three years faded and dissolved. I was the first one to leave; my husband took a job in Missouri and all too soon, it was time for me to go. Mel eventually left for Kansas, Kathy went home to Kentucky. We lost our Leslie to cancer, and the Queen presided until the time came for her to retire. Only Erin remained, and nothing since has ever been quite the same. This was the heart of our conversation last night, because she too, is moving on. She said, “Do you remember how good it used to be?” And yes, I do.

I miss you all, my dear friends, despite the time and distance between us. I keep a few photos from those days on the bulletin board next to my computer at school. One of my favorites is a series of photos we took on one of our many dress-up days, I have no idea which one. Linda is wrapped in multiple feather boas and is sporting a tiara and scepter. Mel and Kathy are arm in arm wearing cowboy hats, vests and boots. Leslie is wearing a red wig and enormous false eyelashes and she laughing out loud. Erin and I are in matching go-go boots and have serious 80’s hair. We are so young; we are so happy. I love to look at that picture when I need a little boost.

I’m not sad, though. To quote that tired old cliché, time cannot stand still, after all. Even if we tried we could never return to our former selves, never replicate who we were and where we were and what we were.

So I’m not sad, I’m simply grateful.

I think we had something kind of special, and it is sweeter because it was short, and rare, and ours.

Call Me

I did something I swore I would never do. Emma turns 9 in a couple of weeks, and I bought her a cell phone for her birthday. I know, I know. I can’t believe it either.

If you had asked me that question a year or two ago, I would have told you that she wasn’t getting one until she was in 7^th grade and that is that. And I was thinking that 7^th grade would be a generous concession. But the truth is I caved. I waffled, I conceded, I gave in to the paranoia only a mother feels when she is out of the immediate control of her child, and am buying her a phone at age NINE, an absolutely unheard of age for a girl to be getting her own phone.

Let me first qualify my decision a little bit. I’m not buying her iPhone 27 for heaven’s sake. She’s getting a Tracfone, prepaid with no contract. I’m going to monitor her usage with the same ferocious attention that I do what she wears, eats, watches and reads. (Good Lord, I sound like a Tiger Mother…)

Here’s the situation, friends. We live on a farm (you know this already) in the middle of nowhere (you know this as well) and drive in to Fairmont each day. Emma is at an age where she is involved in after-school activities, and also is expected to get herself (and her little sister) to daycare on the bus without any help whatsoever. She is also required to know which days she rides with Carys, which days she puts Carys on by herself, which days I’m picking her up, which days her dad is picking her up, where she is getting picked up, when she’s getting picked up and so on and so forth. (I got tired just typing that.)

We do our level best to keep everything on track, but life happens, you know? Sometimes something comes up at school and I can’t leave right away. Sometimes someone gets sick and Aaron and I have to shuffle who gets who and when. Sometimes somebody just forgets what day it is and where all the kids are. (This is when you are REALLY glad you got a spot in Julie’s daycare. She is on top of things and will call me immediately if some kid somewhere does or doesn’t do something out of the ordinary.)Have I told you yet how much I love her?

Anyway, in the last month, 2 different situations came up that caused a panic. First, Emma was invited to be a skills tutor in an after-school group for math. We then had to coordinate her pick-up time with my basketball practice schedule and Aaron’s work schedule. We were doing just fine until I went to an after-school meeting that ran long. All of a sudden I looked at the clock and realized I was already 15 minutes late to pick her up.

I can’t describe my panic to you; I ran to the phone and tried to get the teacher who was supervising on the phone – no answer. I then called one of my friends in the elementary building who happened to still be there who went wandering around the school looking for Emma while I drove like a bat out of you know where to get there myself. Turns out Emma was pretty cool headed; she went down to the CER office and asked them if she could wait for me in their office. (I teach a lot of Community Ed classes through them, and Emma is used to being there with me.) My friend in the office, Kris, promptly took her down to one of their after-school programs where she was busy doing arts and crafts and eating a sandwich when I finally dashed in, heart racing and breathless.

This is a great example of what kind of an environment I teach in. These people will do anything at all for anyone, any time, anywhere. It made me feel so good to know that my child wasn’t standing outside on a sidewalk wondering if her mother was ever going to show up. I still felt horribly, terribly guilty, and it took me a full hour to calm my heart rate the heck down.

We used to live in a world where kids could find a phone on a street corner; where kids could play on random playgrounds for hours waiting for a ride home. Remember when you could just let your kids walk home or to a friend’s house or to the neighbor’s? Maybe the town kids still do that; I suppose living on a farm gives me a distinct disadvantage in this arena. My kids don’t know their way around town because they’ve never walked anywhere or biked anywhere; I just drop them off and pick them up.

And I know we are in what would probably be considered a small town, and it is nice to believe that Fairmont is immune from the dangers of the big city. But too many days I read newspaper reports of children taken from their playgrounds, their bikes, their own yards, and I’m just not willing to risk it for the sake of convenience.

(Yes, I’m being dramatic. I know. I can’t help it.)

To make a long story shorter, a similar event happened just a few days later when Emma thought she had Choir practice after school. She didn’t get on the bus, and  by the time she realized she didn’t have practice that day, the bus had already left. She went down to the gym where she knew I sometimes have basketball practice and waited (hoped!) for me to show up. By the time I got there she had herself pretty worked up worrying about whether I was really coming and whether I would be mad that she had not gone to daycare on the bus.

So I bought her a phone.

It really does give me peace of mind to know that wherever she is, I’m just a phone call or a text message away. And honestly, if you had looked into those golden-brown eyes bright with unshed tears and seen the waver of her lower lip when she came running over to me, you would have caved in too.

Here’s the fun part of the story.

Her birthday is still 2 weeks away, but once I got the phone loaded with contacts and minutes we decided sooner was better than later. So we took the family out to eat at the Chinese restaurant in the mall last night. (I feel very lucky that my kids love Chinese food…yum.) We finished eating and the kids went over to feed the fish in the koi pond. I slipped the new phone into Emma’s coat pocket and then announced we were going to walk around the mall for a little while and do some shopping.

As we wandered through the mall, Aaron sent a text message to her phone that read “Happy Birthday!” She didn’t hear the beep of the text alert. So as we walked, Aaron repeatedly called the phone. Finally, she notices the music and says, “Mom, what is that sound?”

“I don’t know,” I replied. “It sounds like it’s coming from you.”

She held the coat up to her ear and went digging through the pockets. When she pulled it out, she exclaimed, “Mom! I think I got someone else’s coat accidentally! There’s a phone in my pocket!”

She was looking back and forth at us, and we were both kind of grinning and waiting.

“It says there’s a message! Should I open it?  It says, ‘Happy Birthday!’ Whose phone is this?”

When she got no response from either of us except stupid grins she finally says, “Is it MINE?”

And then the floodgates opened. She was so happy she was fighting off tears and Aaron was laughing and Carys and Cooper were actually speechless for once.

That made for a pretty awesome Wednesday night.

Of course we followed up the evening with explaining what a Tracfone is, how it works, and what the rules were going to be for having one. Maybe I’m just trying to justify this to myself, but can you really put a dollar amount on peace of mind? Or your child’s safety? (And hey, maybe I can swap some chore time for phone minutes – that might be a good idea…)

Despite all my resolve and earlier reservations, I think I can call this a win.

Job Security

We are reading The Hunger Games in my 8^th grade classes this year. I love to teach this book because kids are genuinely interested in it and cannot put it down. The action-adventure theme hooks even the most reluctant readers, and most kids don’t realize how much they are learning while we’re reading it. Before they know it, we are discussing really adult themes like Government Control and Social Classification and the moral value of Reality Television.

I have many Language Arts components that I am required to teach, but this quarter we are spending a great deal of time concentrating on providing textual evidence to support a theme. I have modeled several times the skill of responding to a question and then locating a passage in the story to support their answer. This is pretty much English 101; every class they take from now until the end of time will ask them to find text support. But these kids are brand-new to the idea, and it has been a struggle to get them to do it.

In case you are not familiar with the story, I will tell you that two particular characters (Peeta and Katniss) find themselves having to work together in the story. It is pretty clear from very early in the story that Peeta has strong feelings for Katniss. The question on my daily quiz today read like this: “How does Peeta feel about Katniss? Provide a page number and a quote from the book to support your answer.”

This one was kind of an easy one, I thought. I wasn’t trying to trick them on this first test; I actually want them to experience success so they feel confident moving forward into more difficult processes. There are easily 20 or 30 sentences in this section of the book that give insight into Peeta’s feelings. In fact, one line actually reads: “Peeta sighs. ‘Well, there is this one girl. I’ve had a crush on her ever since I can remember.’”

So there I am, correcting tests, and feeling increasing alarm over the answers that have been given. Some of them answer only in their own words. Some of them include a page number but not a quote. Some of them are even blank! (Blank? Really?)

But this one…this one’s my favorite. Here’s the unedited answer on the test paper:

“Peeta wants Katniss to die. Because in the chairiot (sp) when they are wearing flames on their costume he says they ‘suit her.’ So that means he wants to set her on fire. Page 72.”

After I finished laughing and wiping my eyes, I gave this student half credit. They were able to locate a page number…(yay!)….they were able to articulate a personal answer…(yay!)…and while there is no direct quote from the story, there is at least a reference to actual text.

The follow-up lesson is going to have to address the fact that while the concept of citing textual evidence is indeed emerging, we must take care not to miss gigantic chunks of comprehension in the process.

Good grief.

It’s nice to feel necessary.

2012 Recap

My primary purpose in writing this blog is to provide a record of my thoughts for my children to read someday. I found a great website that actually prints your blog, pictures and all, into a hardcover book. I plan to have that done periodically. I’m not much of a journal writer, and too often anymore, I will forget the details and nuances of a family story. I thought this might be a nice way for my kids to remember some of our moments (good and bad) and to hear them told through their mother’s voice, for someday when I’m not here to tell it in person.

With this in mind, I’m going to shoot for a 2012 Recap that will provide the best picture overall of who we are, and what we were all about this year. This might have been one of my favorite Decembers we’ve ever had. The kids are really in that “sweet spot” as far as their ages are concerned. They are old enough to understand what’s going on, and young enough to believe in things they cannot explain.

One of my favorite moments came from Carys this Christmas. She told me that her daycare provider has the most beautiful nativity scene she has ever seen, and could we please get one so that she could hold the baby Jesus in her hand sometimes. (That was a precious moment to me; I’ll be on the lookout for a nativity scene for just this purpose.) Always a lover of a good metaphor, I took that opportunity to talk about how we can hold Jesus every day in our heart. However, I know exactly what she was getting at, so I went on to say that I still understood how much she might want to hold Him in her hand. (Especially when His figurine is so cute and tiny and carved and painted perfectly!) I hope I can find just the right one for next year.

We also took the kids to see Life of Pi in the theater. I loved the movie, as much for the allegory and its literary elements as for its amazing cinematography. The challenge posed at the beginning of the movie is to tell a story that proves that God exists. I got pretty swept up in the imagery all the while analyzing and evaluating the plot twists and turns, and looking for the connective threads that resolved the question. By the end of the movie, I was moved and inspired and emotional…all the things that really good story will do to me. I am pretty sure that the metaphor of the movie went right on over the heads of my little munchkins, but I tried to explain it to them anyway. Exposure to good works at any age is a good thing, says Mom, the English teacher.

Two years ago, we got an “Elf on the Shelf.” We named our elf “Sam” and he has been the most wonderful addition to our winter routine. The kids come flying downstairs every morning trying to be the first one to find his new location. Occasionally, Sam will bring a small treat or leave a message for the kids and they are beside themselves with excitement. Some of my favorites from this year included Sam dressing up in Emma’s Barbie clothes, riding one of Cooper’s tractors, and hiding inside Carys’ Christmas stocking. The best day, however, was Sam’s last day at our house. He always spends Christmas Eve with us, and on Christmas morning he has gone back to the North Pole to rest and get ready for next year. This time, he brought the kids one early Christmas present, and left a goodbye note. Throughout the day, the kids each wrote notes back to Sam and left them at his feet so he could read them at night when his “magic turned back on.”

Besides being adorable and sweet by nature, (“Bye, Sam, we love you and will miss you!”) reading those notes reminded me of how rarely we as adults allow ourselves to believe in magic anymore. Age and experience makes us hard and cynical; I find myself looking at life with such a critical eye sometimes. I don’t know how much longer they will believe in magic, but I will celebrate it for as long as I can. Life can get really REAL…no need to go there any sooner than we have to.

In 2012, Emma slipped gently over the edge of childhood and is tentatively testing some new boundaries as a “pre-teen.” I had hoped her innocence would last a little longer but I admit it is a little thrilling to chronicle this journey from the perspective of an adult who has “been there and done that.” She has stopped asking me for every little thing and has begun initiating all sorts of things that were previously off-limits.

As a small example, one night I was working in the kitchen and she casually opened the fridge, took out a soda and walked over and sat down next to me, preparing to open it. I noticed her watching me very carefully, and she seemed very reluctant to pop the top. I looked up at her, down at the soda, and back up at her. She didn’t say anything. The look in her eyes was almost daring me to challenge her. We don’t allow soda for the kids except on special occasions, so I was very surprised. When I reminded her of our rule, she sighed dramatically and returned it to the fridge. She poured herself a glass of milk and kind of stomped out of the room.

I had to think about that for a little while. She pushed the edges a little, but didn’t argue when I held the line. I guess I should be thankful for that; I suspect it will only get more dramatic from here. Emma is one of those people who feels things passionately, but tries to hold her emotion in check in front of other people. When it finally spills over, it REALLY spills over.

The next morning I could hear her yelling at her sister upstairs. I couldn’t understand all of the words through the ceiling, but she was definitely YELLING. When I was able to calm her down and get her alone to talk, I said, “Emma, it is not like you at all to scream at people when you are upset. What is wrong?”

Tears pooled in the corners of her eyes and she wailed, “I don’t know! I think I have anger issues!” I laughed out loud and hugged her hard and told her that feeling irrational was a completely normal feeling. I told her that I hope to teach her better ways to manage it than just blowing a gasket. (However, if you had been there when I found a bottle of pink nail polish soaking into the carpet you would see that’s a skill I’m still learning too.)

At 8 years old, Emma is a reader, an artist, a crafter, and the best mom-helper around. She takes care of everyone smaller than her, and delights in small pleasures. She has wonderful attention to detail, and asks me really introspective questions. She keeps me on my toes, and it is such a delight to watch each new milestone unfold.

Carys, my little peanut, provides the soundtrack to our lives. She is drawn to music in the most remarkable way; she is constantly humming or dancing or singing some little tune. She sings in the car, in the bathtub, while coloring, watching TV, and more nights than not I will find her sleeping in bed with her Hello Kitty sparkly headphones on.

Carys will never be a good poker player; she wears every emotion all over her face. You never have to guess at what she’s thinking. She laughs easily and hard, she wails with utter despair, and she has the most empathy of any 6 year old I’ve ever met. She especially loves animals, with horses being a notable love. We were at her cousin’s birthday party in early December, and her cousin opened a present with an American Girl brand horse in the box. Carys’ gasp was audible from two rooms away; she clapped her hands over her mouth and whispered, “oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh” over and over.

We honestly aren’t into American Girl all that much at our house; my daughters each have a doll, but that’s about it. And I certainly wasn’t thrilled about spending $80 on a plastic horse, but if you had seen the look on her face, you would know why I went home and ordered one. And it was completely worth it on Christmas morning.

My little man Cooper is all boy. I marvel at how he can be surrounded by feminine influence in the form of a doting mamma and two sisters who want him to play dress up and still turn into a rough and tumble superhero flying, race car driving, dinosaur loving little man.

He has a competitive spirit that I’m not trying to squash, necessarily, but I am trying to channel into something constructive. He hates to lose anything, especially a board game or a video game. He gets frustrated when he can’t do something, and will practice over and over to get it right. I’m not sure where that comes from, since I’m generally content when things just sort of go my way. But his father is a little more of a perfectionist, so maybe that’s where he gets it.

He is extremely observant, and always surprises me with his strong vocabulary and his desire to have things just “so.” One of my favorite Cooper Moments of the year came at Christmas.

First, a little back story: I teach and coach at Fairmont High School, home of the Cardinals who wear Red and White. It just happens to be the rival of my hometown Blue Earth Bucs, who wear Maroon and Gold. All of our family still attends Blue Earth so Cooper has naturally picked up on the fact that his cousins are Bucs and we are Cardinals. While I make no outward mentions of the rivalry, somewhere along the line he has come to understand that we are adversaries when it comes to sports.

At Gudahl Family Christmas, Cooper’s Grandma Gail bought all of her grandsons the same outfit. Cooper opened his gift and pulled out a beautiful Minnesota Gopher sweatshirt and pants (maroon and gold, by the way.) He sat there, staring down at the outfit with a scowl on his face. At first I thought maybe he was disappointed to open clothes and was hoping for toys. But before long he picked that sweatshirt up by his thumb and forefinger and declared, “I don’t even GO to this school! I’m a CARDINAL!”

The whole room erupted in laughter and it took me a good 10 minutes to explain that it was okay to wear maroon and gold if it was a Gopher sweatshirt. I still chuckle every time I think of it.

I love that he can be wrestling on the floor with his dad one minute, and climbing up in my lap the next. He can be charming and exasperating and serious and silly, and a more expressive set of brown eyes never existed anywhere else.

Aaron and I continue our journey toward sustainability on our farm. He’s adding to our menagerie outside, and I’m expanding my prowess in the kitchen when it comes to canning and preserving. In 2012 we are happy and we are healthy. What more could a girl ask for?