The boys share a bedroom, and my younger son’s allotted space is the tiny nook back in the corner. It’s just enough space for a single bed and a teensy end table. We put shelves on the wall for his stuff and stuck his dresser at the end of the bed and that was it.

One day the boys slapped together a loft (without permission, naturally), so now he sleeps up top. Down below, he has just enough space for a chair, his shelves, and that teensy end table. He spends hours back there, hot-gluing things together or carving or reading, all the while listening to classical music.

He took apart a drone and patched together some sort of remote control craft: propellers and popsicle sticks attached together with hot glue and masking tape, with matchbox cars strapped to the bottom for wheels.

It drove just fine, but when he tried to fly it, it didn’t end so well.

He’s starting to feel crunched, asking when he’ll get to have more space, poor kid. But one of the benefits of a too-little room is that he has to leave it — i.e. go outside — if he wants to do anything besides read books and hot-glue popsicle sticks.

For awhile there, he was thick into fort building, relocating a pile of sticks around the yard, using them to fashion first a treehouse, then a teepee.

Most recently, the sticks have been used as an addition to the deck. He said he wanted to sleep in it, and he and his friend outfitted it with a million pillows and blankets, but we said no.

Now the red tarp is gone, but the structure still accosts me every time I step outside.

This same time, years previous: beginner’s bread, the quotidian (4.11.16), when popcorn won’t pop, Mr. Tiny, an evening walk.

For quite awhile, I knew I wanted my girls to take some sort of self-defense class. Last fall, I called a couple martial arts studios, but they only had regular, longer-term martial arts classes. I wanted something quick — just several sessions covering the basic skills. Then this past winter, when I learned that the county parks and rec program hosted a women’s self-defense class — three evening sessions (Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, done) for free — I signed them right up.

The girls loved it. After each class, they’d push back the furniture and demonstrate how to knock a gun out of someone’s hand, or where certain pressure points are located (sending their father crumpling to the floor, much to their delight). The last class, they got to practice all their moves on a cop (who was fully swaddled in protective gear). I saw the videos of them lighting into him, screaming DON’T TOUCH ME. It was slightly unsettling — we are from a peace church tradition, after all — but it also felt deeply right. Girls need to know their power and strength, and that there are times when it’s absolutely okay not to be polite.

Ever since then, they’ve been begging for more classes, so I dug around some more and learned about a six-week kickboxing class at a studio on our end of town. For 120 dollars, a person can take up to five classes a week, and they get a pair of gloves thrown in, too. I agreed to pay fifty dollars for each, and the rest was up to them to cover.

The first class was a trial one, just to see if they liked it. My older son went, too, even though his schedule doesn’t allow him to sign up right now. They all loved everything about it — the intense workout, the coaching, the music.

After her second class, my older daughter came bounding in, her eyes sparkling. “My feet are bleeding!” she announced. “And I felt like I was going to throw up!”

Sure enough, blood was soaking through her socks, and her hands were all battered.

Since then, she’s taken to wrapping her feet prior to lessons (and bandaiding her hands).

So, no more bloody socks.

To wring as much value as possible from their investment, both girls are trying to catch as many classes as they can. They come home exhausted, sore from their push-ups, two-minute planks, squats, and punching bag and paddle work, and absolutely glowing.

Who knew getting your butt whupped would be so much fun?

This same time, years previous: the quotidian (4.2.18), caribbean milk cake, the quotidian (4.3.17), the quotidian (4.4.16), red raspberry pie, sun days, working lunches, warning: this will make your eyes hurt, cup cheese.