Our Bold Adventure Continues

Verbatim, as made up by M during a recent hike. (We're not sure what "including" means here, but this is the way she said it.) 1) Be careful, including. 2) Don't fall down the mountain. 3) This rule tells the other rules what to do: Be careful, including, and don't fall down the mountain or you could die.* 4) Be kind to animals you meet on the mountain. 5) Trees give us oxygen, thank you. * the origin of this rule may lie in that at school they are learning that silent letters tell other letters to say their names. As in, the silent "e" in home tells the "o" to say its name.

Our girls were born on THE cut-off day for kindergarten in Boulder. They will either be the oldest or the youngest in their class – anyone born a day later in 2004 will have to wait another year to begin kindergarten. At first, back when they were small lumps crawling around our apartment, I advocated waiting. People said it was better. People said they knew kids who grew up timid as the youngest in their class and kids who grew up strong as the eldest. “If you want leaders hold them back. If you want followers put them in early.” My mother-in-law teaches seventh grade and said she can tell who is older and younger in her class without looking at her pupil’s birthdates. It matters, and we wanted our kids to be their best, so we’d wait. Funnydad agreed. I was so sure that’s what we’d do. Now I put that decision in the same category as when, as a childless woman in my 20s, I saw preschoolers in mis-matched clothes and swore my children would not look like that. You just don’t know how y

Another post about being insanely busy. Feel free to skip, since you’ve heard it before. I swear I don’t like living this way, despite the fact that I can’t seem to change. (This is another post of 50-word-or-fewer paragraphs. Seems appropriate for the subject matter. Plus, you all seemed to enjoy it last time.) When I was younger, before kids, being busy meant that maybe I skipped going to the gym. Or I worked late instead of meeting a friend for dinner. Now, it’s an entirely different game. Been spinning in circles trying to stay balanced. During a recent trip to Virginia my sister-in-law, a mom whom I respect greatly, talked about the ways she works to build “margin” into her and her family’s schedule. That’s the word for what I’m missing: margin. Every minute is accounted for, busy, and if it’s not, there’s something slipping. I forget forms for school, I handwash undies the night before lest I go commando to work because I haven’t done laundry. People actually call to ask if I’m s