Category: family

(Money plants—birthday gifts for two people who claimed they wanted nothing, but deserve more than a little something.)

Today is my mom’s birthday. Friday was my aunt’s birthday. If you had asked any of us early in our lives if we would have ended up in a rural town in the middle of nowhere, we all probably would have scoffed at the question and pointed toward the metropolitan cities of our dreams.

Because of a job for my father, our family moved here. And then, some years later, my aunt moved here as well. And then I went away to college and my young life. But now I’m back.

I’ve thought loads about where we’ve chosen to live. I always pictured myself somewhere like Boulder, a liberal town teeming with progressive schools, immersed in art, culture, and nature. But what I ultimately came to is that I’d be sitting on my porch, surrounded by a beautiful view and my amazing town, but desperately missing my family.

So we are here. It’s not necessarily the town of my dreams, but there are lots of good things brewing. The community park is getting better each day. The arts center is gaining momentum. The food co-op is getting closer to a storefront, and in the meantime, the farmer’s market offers french pastries and good folks. Our friends Ben and Kate talk about the idea that if you can’t find the community you want to live in, you should build it yourself. So I’ve made it my mission to think about a few small things I can do to make this town a place I’m proud to call home. I know I can’t do too much right now, since I have very little free time, but there must be a few balls I can set in motion.

But in the meantime, I’m thankful I don’t have to rely on FTD to deliver my birthday well wishes. I can just walk down the driveway and celebrate the birthdays of two of the people I love most.

When I was young, I took Saturday art classes at the university. A series of classes taught by a head teacher and art ed students, I remember doing amazingly creative projects. And at nearly two hours, we had the chance to really delve into project in a way that you can’t do in school.

I was excited to find out these classes were starting up again this fall and that they offered a class for four-year-olds. I immediately signed Neko up, but it was a little unclear about whether, at this age, this was a parent-child class or a class she attended alone. So I didn’t prep her, which was a mistake, since a few minutes after the class started, all the parents hit the road. I left her with a few tears running down her cheeks. Normally, I wouldn’t have forced something like this on her, but I knew she would love it if she just gave it a chance. This class was right up her alley.

And, sure enough, she loved it. When I arrived to pick her up, she bounded around the class, showing me each project they did. However, she didn’t get a chance to paint her pet rock due to our rough departure, so they let her bring it home to finish. After quiet time, we found a few extra rocks, and she and Shep spent a long time painting their rocks.

Ellery sat and chewed on blocks. Blocks in vibrant colors with great aesthetic appeal.

Today we woke up with a plan. Most days we wake up with no idea what’s going to happen that day. Sometimes this works out great, but lately it’s kind of been a big disaster ending with lots of bad behavior and time outs. I think the kids are kinda wild and high-strung lately, and they need to channel their energy.

So we woke up and headed out for the Farmer’s Market. While we were there we ran into two different families we knew, which was fun for the kids and kind of a nice comfort for me. It’s little things like that that make this place start to feel like home. I have always maintained that you could live almost anywhere, but good friends and family are what make a place feel like home. We’re starting to feel that more and more, which makes me feel good about digging in our roots.

Plus, we’ve developed a relationship with the local coffee shop, and when you have a good, homey coffee shop, everything seems to feel a whole lot better.

Then we headed off to the state park for a morning hike. The kids ran and ran until Shep insisted on riding on Tom’s shoulders. Neko decared she was a Nature Expert and if we had any questions, we should direct them her way. She’d be happy to field them.

Sorry about this weird photo quality. We were using the fling camera, which is not so good in the morning light of the woods.

We did it. Not a tear shed between any of us.

Susie took Shep and Ellery in the morning so Tom and I could take Neko to a first-day-of-school breakfast. Then off to school. She was a little nervous and didn’t want us to leave. But then she saw her friend Gregory getting nervous, and according to Akiko, went up to him and said, “Don’t worry Gregory. Your mom is going to be fine.”

So off we went. And by the time we picked her up, she was beaming.

“Did you have a good day?”

“I had a great day!”

I admit…by the time the kids have been fed dinner and we manage to get them bathed and ready for bed, we’re pooped. All we want to do is sit in front of our laptops and pretend our only responsibility is to catch on celebrity gossip (me) or read up on what albums are being released next week (Tom). We ping-pong the kids back and forth until we finally get them in bed and then collapse in a heap of exhaustion.

After we got Shep settled, Tom went to put Ellery down, and I headed toward my laptop, when out of the corner of my eye I saw Neko, diving off the edge of the couch in an effort to gain my attention. Instead of communing with my electronic friend, I grabbed a blanket and headed for the couch. “I need a Snuggle Buddy,” I announced.

Neko and I buried ourselves under a blanket and tuned in to see what Elmo was up to today. And then Ellery decided that sleep was for the weak, so she joined us. And then when Otto climbed on the couch, Neko noticed we were out of blanket, so she thoughtfully went to her bedroom and got one for him. Because, clearly, you cannot be a snuggle buddy without a blanket.

We had this big plan that tonight one of us would take Neko to the fireworks and the other one would stay home and put the others to bed. But then the weather started looking questionable, and, really, who wants to be caught in a thunderstorm far away from your car with a four-year-old, hours after her bedtime?

So we stayed home. And then we started remembering that we actually have the perfect view of the fireworks right here in our own back yard because, duh, we live in the country. And not only can we see our city’s fireworks, we can see all the ones from several towns over across the horizon. It’s really pretty spectacular. Next year we should just host a big party.

For well over an hour, we watched fireworks. Neko arranged chairs for us all and found a perfect box to hold her bug jar so her newly caught firefly could watch, too. Tom made popcorn and we talked about how sometimes it’s pretty great to be the big kid because sometimes you get to stay up late and do neat things like this.

She’s still making noise in her room and it’s nearly 11pm, so I know I’m in for one grouchy preschooler in the morning. And I may not think so tomorrow when I’m ready to hang it up and it’s not even noon, but we need to do more of these kinds of evenings.

We’re home.

The kids were total troopers and made it the whole way without incident, only stopping for bathroom breaks and twice to nurse.

It appears travel with three children under five is possible.