Family Album

If you were to describe a day that brought people together in the most beautiful way -- family and friends, to celebrate, rejoice, convey the warmest wishes for the family that is about to take on a new member -- well, you would describe my Saturday.

You may think that I am backing away from a long post because it is so very late, but in truth, I just don't think my words here would treat this day well. And I don't think you would want details anyway. You're better off just catching the flavor, the feel of the day. For this, photos work well.

Here they are -- glance at them if you want. Enjoy them, puzzle over them. I hope they tell a story. Or at least give vignettes of a full day, well spent!

First, brunch with my younger daughter. Just she and I. To catch up.






Meanwhile, preparations for the shower honoring the soon to be born child are in full swing. My older girl has coordinated nearly everything. When I pull in to their dad's place, most of the work has already been done.





Young couple arrives...






They take in everything...






My two pregnant girls...






Snowdrop wakes up from her nap...






Family and friends...






(Some friends date back all the way to young school years...)






So many treats to sample!






Pictures to draw...







Pictures to take and have taken...






And in the end, when nearly all have left, presents to open.




Snowdrop rejoices: she will loooove that!


Yes, she will. And even more, the little babe and her parents will surely love having such a wide circle of people who care deeply about their well being.

Outside, the snow begins to fall. Wet, mushy city snow. It will all melt shortly. And spring will come and with it -- new life.

to Chicago

One consequence of travel for me is that during long connections (flight or bus, it doesn't matter), I often read things that I wouldn't otherwise read. I had already enjoyed a morning look at Prof. Tim Wu's  The Tyranny of Convenience in the New York Times and now, during the ride to Chicago, I am riveted by the New Yorker article, The White Darkness, A Solitary Journey Across Antarctica. Perhaps predictably, the NYT article is up my alley: breezy, mildly provocative, it describes something I'm all too familiar with -- the seductiveness of comfort.

If I may go back to the theme of how Ed and I are different, I can tell you that these articles spell it out right there: he is not at all seduced by the easy path. He, much as the hero of the New Yorker story, is seduced by challenge. It may be easier to call someone to fix the furnace, or to travel comfortably to a room with a view of the Gulf in Cuba. But that would be me. He, instead, will research, look for spare parts and toil over the damn machine himself. And he'll sail a small boat to Cuba solo and once there, sleep on someone's floor. Otherwise, what's the point?

And yet, at another level, are we that different? I like a clean room with a good view, and don't look to me to mess with furnaces, and yes, yes, yes, I am seduced by an easy path, but oh, I do love me my challenges! If a day doesn't have something in it that requires a huge push to get to the end, well then it feels like I've let it slip by, wastefully.

Still, there is that temptation of the easy path: the feet up, a glass of wine and a bite of chocolate, a browse through today's listings of dining tables, a quick laugh over a Seinfeld rerun, that tenth mystery in a series of French tales from the Dordogne... It's just so alluring! Fine, I tell myself. Indulge. So long as it is the reward after a day of struggle and learning.

Well, never mind. The weekend before me will place me in the thick of family life as seen from a perspective other than the farmhouse.  Time with beloveds is never time wasted.


The morning is brilliant! It's cold again, but the sun is out. Much of the snow cover has melted, but it's still very pretty out there.






We eat breakfast in the sun room.






And then Ed goes his way (to his techie meetings) and I go my way (grocery shopping) and eventually I pack my bag and catch that bus to Chicago. Several hours later, I get off the L train...






... and walk the few steps to La Colombe, a cafe in the neighborhood where the younger couple lives. A cup of coffee, a financier...






...a few minutes to scribble something here and then I'm off to their place!

(My, she's looking rounded!)





All of us (except for Ed, who is excused by virtue of cheeper duty) are gathering for a baby shower tomorrow. Actually big sister, their dad and I are hosting the event, but I have to admit that the organizational effort is hardly mine. I just say "yes" a lot, which is easy, because the ideas, mostly my older girl's ideas, are all good.

But all that comes tomorrow. Tonight is the easy comfy stuff of eating dinner with the younger guys and too, the in laws, who flew up for the event. We eat at Le Bouchon -- a local French bistro that serves the classics. And I love that, because a great French bistro with traditional foods is actually tough to find in cities like Paris. There are too many there that are tired, catering to people who don't know or don't care. Not so Le Bouchon -- it's fantastically, nostalgically, deliciously traditional French bistro food!

And now is the time to rest up. Tomorrow is one big spin of activity. The challenge will definitely be the one I face all too often when traveling -- to find the time to write it all down before we all slip into the next day.

right side left side

Sometimes your right side just doesn't know what's out there on your left. You are so used to following established paths and protocols that you don't notice a whole new landscape out there, beckoning for your attention. I suppose this may well describe our morning.

It is a March kind of day. The air is almost balmy: temperatures hover just above freezing. Clouds roll in but offer nothing in the form of precipitation (thank goodness). And still, the snow is really melting fast. Cheepers are pleased. They broaden their path of navigation.






It's a slushy, wet world out there! We eat breakfast in the front room. Looking out, we see puddles and lots of very slushy snow.





Skiing will not work. It could be that we did our last (beautiful) run of the season yesterday.

Ed suggests we slosh on foot through a piece of land we recently examined on google maps. It borders Lake Waubesa and it connects the lakeside residential community with the county park where he and I typically ski. We had assumed it's private property (isn't most everything private property?), but closer inspection revealed it's a chunk of Department of Natural Resources land.

I have good winter boots. I'm agreeable.

As we plunge into the strip that is obviously frozen wetland, I consider turning back. It's rough going!

But then the terrain opens up.

(Lovely white oaks, scattered throughout...)






And some fifteen minutes into our slog, we come across trails. And signs, marking snowshoe paths.

We're now in a park!






We eventually reach the formal entrance to it: The Capitol Springs State Park! Here? Who knew?!

I imagine it's especially beautiful when the grasslands are in full bloom.





Well now, a whole "new" set of trails, less than two miles from where we live! A shocking and pleasant discovery!


We drive back to the farmette, passing empty cornfields now being picked over by scores of wild turkeys and a handful of deer.

Look, the turkeys scratch the soil! Just like the cheepers!
Yes, same family...






When I pick up Snowdrop, I remind her that we have a haircut appointment just in the neighborhood of her school. She hasn't had a trim since early spring (except for bangs, which I routinely chop down at home) and she hesitates for just a minute...






But, she is happy to scramble up and watch the hair fly every which way...






Close your eyes now, little girl!
She does as requested.






Done!






And now we're home and back in the world of play.






Snowdrop uses the farmhouse space well. She doesn't just stay in her play area. She'll take her games to the sun room. To the living room. To the kitchen.






She adds props...






She is spirited! In a short while, her hair no longer looks well tended. It looks crazy wild!

As usual, she is full of directives:
Grandma, don't poke Daffodil (that's her baby). You'll hurt her and she will break and she will be all over the floor, broken!
In a million pieces? Scattered everywhere?
Exactly! 

I smile at her choice of words.






Ed comes in. She asks for a ride. Duck under the door! -- he warns her.






We finish at the table. With (play) food. Of course.





And I think -- she doesn't really need her high chair anymore...


Evening. Ed has a working dinner out. I eat leftovers and think ahead to the weekend. I'm heading out to Chicago tomorrow. We all are, for a family gathering to celebrate the soon to be born grandbabe number two.

pink

There will come a time when Snowdrop will have moved on, away from her love of pink. Indeed, I saw tiny indications yesterday when, after rhapsodizing about pink for a goodly few minutes, she paused and said -- I also do love purple. It wasn't said with her usual "loooove," but it was put out there as a hint of things to come.

But for now, on this Valentine's Day, she still really loves to love pink.

The whole pinkness of her current bubble of dreams makes me think back to the play of colors in my younger years. As a mom, I never cared for any of it: pink dresses and lunch boxes with unicorns, fairies and princesses, pink carpets, pink towels sheets and quilts -- I stayed away from it all.

And then something happened. It started in the garden. I grew to really love pink day lilies. And roses. And lilacs and apple blossoms, asters and cosmos blooms. Pink sweet peas, pink peonies. Oh, not to the exclusion of everything else, but surely in copious amounts.

From there it was just a hop skip into the occasional pink sweater, then t-shirt, then a dusty pink pair of corduroys (I got those ten years ago and they now have a big knee hole, but I still wear them... for example on this day). And when I began to shop for Snowdrop, I found to my great surprise that pink can indeed be beautiful. I don't especially look for it, but across the ocean, pink is omnipresent in children's clothing and when I bring back anything pink the girl is always very very happy. It's so so beautiful!

So here we are, on this gorgeous day of pink hearts and love and no, not just a Hallmark love -- but stuff that creeps in on a morning of bluejay skies and warming temperatures, emotions that swell when you think of kids and grandkids, genuine smiles that come from glancing on the sweetest card ever from Ed, and when you hear from friends far far away... love, love, love. How can you not love a day that is, in the middle of February no less, so totally pink?!







The cheepers would agree: it is a fine day. Too much snow for them, but hey, the icicles are dripping away in the heat of the sun and the last I glanced, the temps are a couple of degrees above freezing!






We have breakfast in the sunroom. Of course.






And we ski. On the disc golf course, because it faces the south and when things begin to melt, that lovely landscape will be the first to lose its snow cover.






A selfie. Of course! It's Valentine's Day!






The beautiful weather continues into the afternoon. Indeed, when I pick up Snowdrop, she complains that the sun is too bright! I don't remember those words -- not since summer!





She traipses through the snow piles and I am tempted, oh so tempted just to play with her now, outside, absence of jacket or mitts notwithstanding. I mean, it's 41F (5C)!






But we have stuff to do. Valentine's Day books to read...






And a ballet class to get to.






But first, that Valentine macaron on a stick!






We arrive at the dance class in plenty of time. I am so proud of us!






And as before, I join the string of parents and grandparents that watch from behind a one way window. I see that Snowdrop is gaining confidence. She understands now the rules, the procedures, the protocols.






She tries everything.





And it pleases me no end that she isn't pushy. But nor does she retreat.

Their story for the day's dance is Little Red Riding Hood and I think that perhaps this will not play well with the little girl. But the story must have been tempered to the sensibilities of the most impressionable little ones, because she minds not at all, and trots off to dance with a roomful of other red hooded girls.






The free form dance...






Her smile speaks plenty.






And today the class ends with a Hershey's chocolate kiss.






In the evening, Ed has his volley ball game, but before he goes off to play, we eat a tiny lobster tail with potatoes and a voluminous salad. And we split that piece of chocolate, saved just for this day.

Oh, to let go of the details of the news! To wish for a better day for those whose days didn't end with a piece of chocolate, to say nothing of a four ounce wee lobster tail, split in two. Pink hopes for a kinder gentler world, a healthier happier outcome for all.

With love.

to the point

Somehow the evening ran away from me. Something to do with a lost package, a complicated chili and a funky furnace -- all inconsequential and eventually resolved, but certainly standing in the way of a contemplative evening of writing.

So a quickie post!

First, early, oh so early, I venture out to rescue the cheepers yet again. You have to stop these daily expeditions to the garage. You haven't the stamina or winter smarts for them!






I herd them back to the barn.






Breakfast. We're waiting for the sunshine. It will come, but a tad later than expected.






We ski in our county park. Note that promise of blue skies (and do you see the Capitol on the horizon?)






Lovely, familiar landscape...





... with a touch of red.






And now I bring Snowdrop home to the farmhouse. Yep, no jacket. No mitts. No cap or scarf. That's our girl! (But just so you know, we're hitting a heat wave! We reach near freezing today!)






After a run at the usual: read, play, read, eat, read -- she wants to engage Ed in a game of school. Unfortunately, he is on the phone, sequestered in the sun room. She is loud. I think she must be making his conversation (which concerns getting a new part for our old-er furnace) difficult. So I break down and bribe her. I offer her the gift I'd been saving for tomorrow, Valentine's Day: a pack of glitter pens.






To say that she loves them is an understatement. (Though she does repeat -- I loooove the pink and the purple and the red... A rainbow of glitter colors.)






Eventually she passes a "school snack" to Ed...






... and he rejoins us for a spirited game of "grandpa climbs the ladder."






It's a beautiful day, it really is. Inside and out.