This chica finally got to turn two. She was happy about it.

My husband and I threw a wrench into our normal birthday festivities by planning a non-birthday-related surprise for the kids that evening. This meant that we had the big birthday supper at lunchtime and the birthday lunch at suppertime. As if turning two on your eighth birthday wasn’t already confusing enough.

The birthday girl requested meat, meat, and more meat. (Did my husband set her up?) There were sloppy joes and hotdogs and bologna sandwiches and salad with ham. The kids ate like they haven’t seen meat in a number of days.

My husband took a second hotdog and said, “What! Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Why, honey,” I crooned. “I’m not looking at you like anything.”

There was ice cream cake for dessert: mint chocolate. I’m about sick of ice cream cake, but it’s a favorite with the kids.

Please excuse the blur. My husband decided he’d rather focus on the lamp instead of us.

For posterity’s sake, I ordered the kids to put their heads together while we waited for Papa to haul the presents downstairs. It just so happened they lined up according to age.

My older daughter gave her a small plastic horse someone left at a playground, and she and my son packaged it up a la those nesting dolls. (She’s holding the box in the above picture.) It took her a good number of minutes to wade through all the paper and ribbon and taped-up boxes. They had even placed one of our old, bunged up radios in one of the boxes to make the package heavier.
The girl wanted a “glass doll.” My mom, the thrift store queen, found one, cleaned it up, and mailed it to us. We paid for it, but we made it clear that Grandmommy scored it.

My daughter was thrilled.

It’s a fact that new mothers always have to examine their babies’ toes. Even if they’re just lumps of glass.

Birthday over, we moved on to Leap Year Day Partying, Phase Two: packing supper (I mean, lunch), getting kids dressed in “town” clothes, loading up the car with blankets, pillows, and water bottles. A couple errands in town, a stop for coffee, and we were on our way.

There was only one emergency pee stop. Yay, us.

I had packed a bag of clues which I revealed every half hour or so. They were, in order:

Clue #1: a roll of masking tape atop Papa’s head.
Clue #2: a book of piano music.
Clue #3: a newspaper clipping of an ad for a roofing business with the word “Broadway” highlighted in yellow.
Clue #4: a stuffed lion.

They were still confused when we got to the end, so I put the masking tape on top of the lion’s head. “Lion King!” they yelled, though they were still bewildered because they didn’t know what a Broadway musical was.

So as we approached Richmond’s Landmark theater, I explained it to them. Some of them had the benefit of seeing this clip (which I showed them before I realized we’d be going), so they had a slightly better understanding.

We entered the theater through a side door and an elderly woman attendant took us up the three stories in an old elevator with a sign forbidding more than 5 people to ride it. We exited the elevator and promptly got lost, walking down long, dark corridors lined with closed doors. Which would not have been so awful if I hadn’t needed to pee. But I did, and a full bladder made the situation feel much more desperate than it really was. After several turns, we came to a dead end and had to backtrack, randomly tugging at doors to see if any of them opened up into the balcony. I felt like we had stepped straight into the mansion from The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

Finally, we found the balcony and then our seats. We were perched almost at the very top. It felt dangerous.

The show was impressive and incredible and beautiful. The singing was amazing (Rafiki was my favorite). Except we really couldn’t see that much since we were so high up, and sometimes it was hard to understand what they were saying. So at intermission, I moved us over to the side, right by the balcony railing. We enjoyed the show much more from our new look-out spot. We could almost see the actors’ expressions.

Two and a half hours later and we were running through the pouring rain back to the parking garage. I divided out the cheese curls and bananas and grapes (the birthday girl’s request) and we headed home.

After a costly (time and/or money) investment, I always find myself pondering the big was-it-worth-it question. This time around, the answer was yes. Yes, because it was a good family experience and the kids enjoyed the show.

But I also learned that I’m not particularly fond of the actual Lion King story. I couldn’t help wondering if the actors ever felt like they were boring themselves silly, which is kind of a bad thing to wonder in the middle of a fabulous production—it does not bode well. Also, the dialogue was sparse and cliche. I longed for thoughtful and meaningful exchanges. And the biggest thing I (re-)learned is that I really am a front row sort of gal. The details are where it’s at.

I was pleasantly surprised to find myself thinking fondly about our Blackfriar’s theater. It’s kind of funny, I know: I drove all the way to Richmond to see a Broadway show and learned I prefer (at least in this situation) my dear Blackfriar’s. How sweet is that?

But I’m still saving up money to see a Broadway show when I go to NYC this summer. I’ll pay extra to sit up front.

This same time, years previous: potatoes and onions, red raspberry-rhubarb pie

Several months ago, I was invited to sit in a teensy-tiny padded cubicle and talk into a plate-sized microphone that was smashed up against my face. It was thrilling—so thrilling, in fact, that I kept waving my arms around and smacking my thighs every time I made a point. Finally, the tech dude stuck his head inside and said, “What is that noise?” So I sat on my hands, but they still kept escaping and slapping.

If you want to hear what I said, go here. (You get bonus points if you hear me smacking myself.) They worked hard to make me sound coherent (cutting back my 30+ pages [!] of transcript to a mere two or three) and for that I am indebted. (For all the info, go here.)

Monday morning, I spoke into another (smaller) fancy mic, but I’ll tell you about it in a few days when it airs.

I never did tell you what I thought about Forks Over Knives.

Confession: I waited to publish the post until after seeing the movie. I was afraid I might have to eat crow, and while crow is a staple of my diet, I’d rather not eat it in front of the whole wide world. (It’s rude to eat in front of people.) (Hold on a sec! Does this mean that I wouldn’t have to eat any more crow if I became vegan?!) I made a few tweaks after I watched the movie, but they weren’t substantive.

What I learned:

*Eating plants is awesome for me and I should do it more often. Hallelujah and pass the kale.

*The movie’s vegan rah-rah bandwagon didn’t hold much water for me, mostly because they skated over inconvenient information, such as: a)  not every one who eats meat and dairy pigs out on it, b) there are lots of very healthy cultures in which the people eat dairy and meat, and c) the incredible health benefits of fish.

*The message to eat more vegetables is an excellent one, but it would’ve been strengthened considerably if they had limited their variables. When you take sick people, people who are gorging on fast food and eating whatever they want, and cut out all sugar, fat, and animal products, push them exercise, and pump them full of collards, there are going to be huge and fabulous benefits. And that’s wonderful! But there’s too much going on in those situations to draw a clean conclusion.

An aside: One of our foster daughters was obese. Shortly after she came to us, I had to take her to see a nutritionist. Her blood sugar numbers (or whatever they’re called) were through the roof. Six weeks later (or whenever it was), when I took her back for a follow-up, she had lost ten pounds and her sugar numbers had dropped drastically (so did the nutritionist’s jaw). This could be because she went from drinking only soda to drinking only water or because we were in the middle of salad season or because she wasn’t lounging around in front of a TV or because she was more emotionally stable and secure or because we were going for walks together, etc. My point is, there were a lot of changes happening simultaneously. End of aside.

I don’t jump on bandwagons but my husband does. Or at least, he likes to try. Usually, he gets his feet stuck in the wheel spokes and falls on his face.

When we started watching Forks Over Knives, I turned to him and said, “You’re totally going to buy this movie, you know.”

And I was right. He said things like, “So why don’t we try eating a plant based diet? Maybe it would make a big difference. What do you think? Huh? Huh? Huh?”

When I didn’t bite, he started hitting lower. “I bet you couldn’t do it! You couldn’t give up all that butter! You cook with all that dairy and that’s why my stomach hurts all the time. Plus, our grocery bill would be much lower if you didn’t buy so much butter.”

So not only do I have no will-power, but I’m also hurting my beloved with my cooking and destroying the family financial situation. All because of some butter. Wow.

It drives me nuts when he starts acting all better-than-thou, as though it’s me shoveling the pizza and buttered toast and ice cream down his throat. But I haven’t been married to him for fifteen years for nothing. I know how to play his game, oh boy, do I ever.

“Fine,” I said, smiling widely. “I’ll make a nice big pot of oatmeal for breakfast just for you”—he hates oatmeal—“and I’ll make sure there will be lots of lentils”—he hates lentils—“and sauteed spinach”—again, hate—“and brown rice.”

The next morning, he made a big show of eating his yummy oatmeal with berries, two big bowlfuls. He determinedly ate the lemony lentil soup, the brown rice, the spinach, the black beans, the chickpea peanut butter soup. He even ate his Sunday evening popcorn minus the butter. For that he wore his very best brave face, but, just a secret between you and me, it was a very miserable brave face.

This morning, I noticed he chose granola over the leftover oatmeal in the fridge. I don’t think he’ll last much longer.

Darn. Cooked oatmeal is so easy.

For two days last week, my son went to work with my husband.

If you take a boy to a job site, he’s going to need to build something, right? It’s just logical.

My husband had brought home some of the scrap lumber from the house they were tearing down, so my son decided to build a fort (of course).

For the next couple days, he worked his tail off. He had big plans. Two stories, maybe three.

But after the first day, my husband came home and put a limit on the tower—no more than two stories.

Look at my husband’s posture in that picture. Arms crossed, head bowed. It does him in, all these slapped-up forts.

“When I was his age, I built a fort, too,” he told me later. “And you know how long it lasted? Twenty-five years! They had to use a tractor to pull it out of the tree!”

It’s legendary, that club/tree house is. It had bunk beds, a front and back porch, and a glass window. It was wired and insulated and sturdy as all get out.

“He’s having fun,” I said. “He’s just a kid.”

“He has no plan! He never measures anything!” my husband wailed.

“He’s not you,” I said. “And that’s okay.”

“He did use cross-bracing, though,” my husband said, brightening slightly. “He must be learning something.”

I liked the fort well enough. It kept the kids busy and out of my hair.

They climbed over the framework like a pack of monkeys, and I realized that the jungle gym I’ve always wanted my husband to build is entirely unnecessary. The kids are old enough to build their own jungle gyms.

Within a couple days, the fort was 16-feet high.

There is a shift that takes place when your kids gain the skills to construct monumental forts that reach truly frightening heights. I’m not exactly sure what to do with their newfound ability to threaten their physical well-being.

What if one of them falls and gets hurt? It’s not like injuries never happen.

So we set limits. My husband gave them the two-story limit, and he made them clean the old, poking-out nails out of the wood.

I yelled sage advice such as, You better not fall! I don’t want to spend my afternoon in the ER!” and, Broken bones hurt! You really don’t want to get one! and, You only have two eyes so they’re kind of important! And then I went back in the house and avoided looking out the windows.

And then the fort fell over.

It started to fall while the two oldest kids were working in it. When they recount the adventure, their eyes light up and their words hurry together. They make lots of sound effects. “This huge gust of wind came [sound effect] and there was this really loud [sound effect] and the fort started to tilt [sound effect], and I yelled, ‘It’s falling! Get out now!’ and we jumped out of there as fast as we could, and man!”

And so another fort bites the dust.

The end.

Update: Lenore Skenazy, author of Free-Range Kids, showcased this post on her blog!

This same time, years previous: buttery brown sugar syrup and cinnamon molasses syrup