dia de la madre

1. What is something Mama always says to you?

G: I love you.  And you’re my sweet angel girl.

L: Clean your room!

C: To do a job . . . unload the dishwasher.

2. What makes Mama happy?

G: A clean house, and sleeping.

L: When I do clean my room . . . or when I help her.

C: When the house is clean.  Oh!  Cuddles, when I cuddle her!

3. What makes Mama sad?

G: Fighting . . . and dirt.

L: When I don’t obey.

C: When the house is very dirty.

4. How does Mama make you laugh?

G: By telling jokes.  She plays pranks on us.

L: Tickling . . . or funny things.

C: I guess doing funny things like saying “boo!” and scaring me.

5. What was Mama like when she was your age?

G: She liked to read books.  She probably sometimes fought with her sisters.

L: Loved cats. Liked to play with her friends. Loved to play with her toys.

C: The things that girls sure like, like red – the color red.

6. How old is Mama?

G: 37.

L: I forget. 80 years.

C: Hmm.  Oh, can you give me a clue?  [Practically hyperventilating] 38 – is that right, Daddy?

7. How tall is Mama?

G: Five feet, thirty inches.

L: Almost as tall as you (Daddy).  Four feet.

C: A little bit shorter than you are.  How much is six feet?

8. What is her favorite thing to watch on TV?

G: The news, or the weather.

L: What’s that called again?  You know the one about the house.  It was called after that house.  Downton Abbey!

C: Wild Kratts.

9. What does Mama do when you're not around?

G: Eats chocolate and candy and watches movies with you.  And does printing (and cleaning and folding laundry).

L: Does the laundry.

C: I DON’T KNOW, ‘CAUSE I’M NOT AROUND!

10. If Mama becomes famous, what will it be for?

G: Being a great counselor.

L: The best Mama ever!

C: It will be for money, I guess.  She’ll be famous, so she’ll get a lot of money.

11. What is Mama really good at?

G: She helps me feel better, and she takes care of me.

L: Being loving and helping us when we’re sad.

C: Hmm. Folding laundry.

12. What is Mama not so good at?

G: Being mean.

L: Fighting.

C: Going in the attic.

13. What does Mama do for her job?

G: Watches us while we’re at home and you’re at work. We do chores, and school.  I sometimes watch tv, like Wild Kratts, and run errands.

L: Be a mother.  Teach us.  And do jobs around the house.  And prints!

C: She works in the house, she cleans the house. She watches Greta. And cuddles me.

  

14. What is Mama’s favorite food?

G: Stir Fry!

L: Stir Fry!

C: Stir Fry! [ed: the kids all hate stir fry, and refuse to eat it.]

15. What makes you proud of Mama? 

G: Because she’s so nice.

L: That she’s such an awesome [sings it] Mo-ther!

C: That she’s so tall and skinny.

16. If Mama were a fictional character, who would she be? 

G: Queen Lucy from The Chronicles of Narnia.

L: She’d be in a movie: “The Awesomest Printers in the World.” I’m not actually sure that there’s a movie like that . . . it’s like a slideshow and it shows the best printers, and it has a lot of Anise Press stuff.  

C: The girl that helped build the new plane in Porco Rosso.  They’re both pretty tall.  And skinny.

17. What do you and Mama do together?

G: Talk. And play games.  And go to Idaho.

L: School.  She teaches me how to read, and how to write.

C: Just me and Mama? We cuddle.

18. How are you and Mama the same? 

G: We both have blue eyes.

L: We both like red hair.

C: Does she have brown hair? We both kind of have the same, like, hair – the same looking-like hair.

19. How are you and Mama different? 

G: We have different noses.  She has glasses. 

L: She doesn’t have any red hair.

C: I have blond hair and she has brown hair.  [When asked about the discrepancy between this answer and its predecessor, Casper noted that “we don’t have the same hair, we have the same looking of hair.”]

20. How do you know Mama loves you? 

G: Cause she says it all the time.  And I can feel it.

L: Cause of what she does . . . and she says so.

C: Cause she says she loves me.

21. What does Mama like most about Daddy?  

G: You’re her husband, and you’re nice.  And funny.  And a good cook.

L: That you help her print. And she loves you.

C: That you’re her husband.

22. Where is Mama’s favorite place to go? 

G: To bed.

L: Out to eat at Burger House.

C: Costco.

23. What is Mama’s favorite song?

G: “Fur” by Wolf Whiskers [actually by Blitzen Trapper]

L: “Chinese Translation” [by M. Ward]

C: The little baby one.  “Baby” [by She and Him].  You mean the one that just came out last week, Casper?

24. What is Mama’s favorite book?

G: How to Start Your Small Business.

L: Are You My Mother?

C: A cookbook. The cookbook that tells you how to make stir fry.

25. What is Mama’s favorite show?

G: Parks and Recreations [sic].

L: Iron Giant.

C: I know what she would like, but I don’t know what the name is! I don’t know what it’s about! There’s a grasshopper in it. The grasshopper has an umbrella.  And there’s a whale in it. He tries to eat things – It’s Pinocchio!

26. What would Mama do with a million dollars?

G: Have us move to Boise and start a business, like a bigger business, and teach classes on printing, like she said she wanted to do.

L: Buy a bunch of printing equipment.

C: Probably buy food – like carrots and vegetables, and a little candy.

pure hedonism

What better way to celebrate New Year's Eve than with chocolate?

numismatics

antiquities

I had offered to send some early Roman coins to a New York dealer (not to get into details, but it was a work thing), and the children were interested in getting a closer look at these early artifacts.

Christmas day

We may have gotten a later start on our Christmas festivities today than any other year.  By the time we finished delivering muffins to several friends in town, it was well past noon.  The children were very patient and invested in our deliveries, but were certainly ready to move into the playroom to see what Santa had brought.  Say what you will about delaying gratification, I just think it's nice to take things slowly.

Eve

Our Christmas Eve ritual is pretty standard.  We read and then watch a short film about Jesus' birth; we tell some traditional stories; we make some plans for our baked good deliveries the following morning.  And then we open a gift before going to sleep.  This year, the children had matching presents which they decided,  mutually, to open.  A dear family friend had made each of them a pillowcase with their names embroidered along the opening and special fabric chosen for their personal interests.  It was sweet to see each of them run to their beds to replace their pillowcases for the night.

baby selfie

Well, not really, but it is kind of funny to imagine that Greta took this portrait of herself, especially given the position of her shoulder and arm -- it looks like she could very well be holding up a camera.

Christmas jacket

weasel toe, positioned

the uses of weasel toe

Near the entrance to church, there is a tree with a large spray of mistletoe.  After I pointed it out to the children, it became something of an icon.  It also became the source of a game, by which they would try to surreptitiously position other members of the family (usually Mama) underneath the limb as we'd enter the building.  Casper, who couldn't seem to remember the name of the plant, frequently commented on the "weasel toe."  Since we've been decorating for the holidays, we found another growth which was somewhat more accessible, and the children gathered a bunch for our house.  We've placed it at the entrance to the kitchen, which may be the most highly trafficked area in our home.  Even that may not be enough for Casper, as these photos indicate.

turtlenecks

seats

Though it's true that he's starting to look for a way off her lap, Pudge was happily sitting with Margaret for several minutes before this photo was taken.  Their friendship (or, at least, his patience with her) remains a real pleasure to watch.  There's scarcely anything Greta likes better.

two nativities

ornamental

natives

We recently acquired this kinetic German nativity, similar to the one that my Grandmother (Nana) owned, which uses the hot air from the ring of candles to move the fins on the top of the spire, turning the central column and the levels of characters.  It's quite charming, and pretty captivating for the children.  (And another way we extend the excitement of the season -- by bringing out the decorations over the course of a week!)

lights up a room

One of our favorite photos of Linus is of a little ginger toddler crawling toward a string of Christmas lights.  We tried to  replicate the effect with this shot of Greta, which is as different in style as the two of them are in personality.  I'm going to have to get some pointers from Jeff about low-light photography -- but I'm most interested in the gesture, anyway.

formal sitting

Well, all right -- this is what we're going to go with as our official Christmas photo.  I don't know whether it's their ages or personalities (or simply the odds, given that there are four mobile children to wrangle now), but we can't manage to get all four responsive at the same time.  They're all looking in generally the same direction; that'll do.  At some point, maybe I'll post some of the outtakes, which is where the hilarity really lives.

curls

beaster

As we've continued to work on Gwennie's Battle Cards game, we've added a number of characters named for family and friends.  And now we've finally gotten around to adding the beasts we live with.  Here is a characteristic photo of "Spatsfoot" and the less effective photo of "Plumetail" we used on their cards.  I'm going to wait to present Pudge until we can get a picture of him when he gets startled and his stubby little tail bottlebrushes; it's the funniest thing, but we still don't have a decent shot of it.

fall tramp

cleanliness is next to the mirror

foliage

We don't get much in the way of autumn here -- a few chilly days, and a few  trees that improbably take up warm colors.  All the more reason to celebrate it, even if you have to do so in shirtsleeves.

finis

It took a bit longer than the afternoon of block print day, but Gwennie finished her Christmas card design, and is very happy with how it turned out.  (Next time, we may do more experiments with printing multiple colors from a single block, as we did with one of the kids' friends who cut a Rudolph card -- lots of possibilities there.)

ugh

I should also mention that part of the reason for our severe lag in posting is due to a run of sickness which we experienced at  the end of November: Linus contracted pneumonia (in Texas!), Casper had a hacking cough for several weeks, and Greta caught the croup.  The rest of us got the flu and passed it around for a while.  If I didn't have the benefit of perspective, I would say that it was the worst family pandemic we've ever had.

That, my friends, is known in the biz as "foreshadowing."

Image of memento mori woodblock by Barbara Whitehead courtesy of Cushing Memorial Library.

perspective

Just to provide another vantage on yesterday's photos, here's a shot of everyone in the tree just after I got those shots.