Six-year-olds and Santa

Six is a magical year for Christmas. Reindeer on the roof, sleighs that fly around the world, jolly men who vaporize into your house looking for cookies, not to mention the sack full of presents! This is the stuff of six-year-old fantasies. Even cookie baking is a grand adventure, for you never know when the gingerbread men are going to make their move and come bursting from the oven. Luckily they only bake for 8 minutes, which isn't too long to have a sentry stationed at the oven door. And even that, it seems, isn't enough. One minute our gingerbread cookies were cooling on the rack, and the next they were arranged on a plate on the table. How this could have happened, we may never know. The fact that I was holding a spatula just seconds after the miracle occurred doesn't diminish the mystery one bit. This miracle on Wagner Street has led to some interesting bedtime ponderings: if the gingerbread men hadn't been decorated with eyes yet, how did they see where they were going? Did they prop each other up to get on the table? Do gingerbread men have knees?? O ye of little faith ...

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Lucie and the Problem of Evil

Lucie has suddenly started questioning things. And by things, I mean eternal things. It all started when she asked if I would read her a bedtime story from the Bible storybook. The book opens innocently enough with the story of creation. There are lions and tigers and bears, and naked people being created from dust. (At this point in the story you’d think questions would arise, but no, kids just seem to go along with it at face value. Which is exactly the reason I've had to work so hard to convince Lucie that turtleneck shirts are not actually made from the necks of turtles.) Anyways ... "Do you know why Adam and Eve are sad?" I asked, pointing at the picture of them sorrowfully leaving the garden. "I sure do, " Lucie assured me. "They are sad because they don't have any parents." Impressive, huh? Clearly, she’d been processing and following along. "Well there is that," I prodded her, "and also they have to leave the ...

I and Love and You

The kids and I spent the day road tripping home, and listening to this song on repeat. It perfectly sums up what our lives look like at this very minute, with one foot in California and the other in Maryland, heads spinning with details, dreams and tie cutting. Just can't get enough of those Avett Brothers. The Avett Brothers - I And Love And You (Official Music Video) . Watch more top selected videos about: The Avett Brothers Load the car and write the note. Grab your bag and grab your coat. Tell the ones that need to know. We are headed north. One foot in and one foot back. But it don’t pay to live like that. So I cut the ties and I jumped the track. For never to return. Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in. Are you aware the shape I’m in? My hands they shake, my head it spins. Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in. . . . Dumbed down and numbed by time and age. Your dreams that catch the world, the cage. The highway sets the travelers stage...

Motherhood - Not for the faint of heart

My picture of hell: one soggy rainy day, two healthy energetic children, three solid days of DVDs, one dog that needs to pee but refuses to get wet, and me. Alone with the carnage and contracted to get 4 hours of work done. And just to frost the cake, Lucie can take off her pooy diaper now, which delights us all, but especially the dog, to no end. These days it is sort of a toss up for who has left the pile on the carpet. Lucie? Dog? The fact that it landed on top of a princess high heel is good indication the culprit was of the two-legged, shoe-loving, Oreo-eating variety, which makes it only slightly less disgusting to remove behind a 28-ply Kleenex. Pray for sunshine.

Montecito Mama

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