just in time

When I was a kid I had a soft gray doll named Toofy.  It looked like a bunny, but I think it was supposed to be a kangaroo.  She had a little pocket on her front, where I would put my fallen baby teeth, and gently place it under my pillow.  I have no idea where Toofy came from (my best guess is my grandma made her for me).  I loved Toofy.  She may still be floating around this world somewhere, in my attic or my mom's.

The kids and I had talked about making Toofy dolls, but on this morning, we decided to do it.  I made a little sketch of what my old Toofy looked like, then Juniper drew her own design and I sewed.

 
Just in time.

She'd been chewing on a strand of yarn.  

Hazel's green eyes of envy.  She wants to loose a tooth SO badly.  Hazel will have her Toofy doll years before any teeth fall out.

But Hazel is unselfish and was quick to be happy for her sister.  Truly, this little sister is such a caring little lover, she makes my heart melt.

Juniper, being Juniper, wanted to keep her tooth.  We wrote a note to the Tooth Fairy, asking for a pro-rated amount, if she could keep her tooth.  Two quarters is what she got.  (Although I've heard the going rate in Manhattan is $17 per tooth.  The Tooth Fairy prefers Wyoming rates.)  A couple of days later, the second bottom tooth came out and now Juniper has a lisp.    

moment in time

This has been my desktop wallpaper for the last few weeks.  It's almost impossible to get a face-on authentic photo of this kid.  This image says so much about her right now: her smirky semi-hidden grin, mischievous eyes, thick fingers, and the hair: she's constantly chewing her hair and I'm constantly nagging her about it.  On the morning this was taken, she'd been slipping into my bed at night.  I was prepared this morning, camera on the bedstead.  When Juniper wakes she's like a rooster at dawn: feather's fluffed and ready to start cock-a-doodle-doing.  (Except fortunately, she doesn't wake at dawn.)  I pulled back a single curtain and told her she couldn't get out of bed until I took some pictures.

Now, it feels like months since either of my kids has slipped into my bed at night.  (Really, it's probably only been a week.)  I appreciate the more restful sleep but I miss their little snuggles.  Thanks Juniper, for allowing me to capture this moment in time.  Will you be sneaking into my bed tonight?          

The Princess and the...Firefighter

Juniper is not a shy kid.  Never has been.  She'll sidle right up to a rough-looking carney at the fair and bombard him with questions.  She does, however, get star-struck.  Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, Firefighters...she'll blush, runaway, or hide her face.

Originally, our family Halloween costume was going to be Charlotte's Web-themed (the first chapter book we'd ever made it through as a family).  Juniper: Wilbur, Hazel: Charlotte, me: Fern, my man: John Arable.  But as we were headed to the fabric store, Hazel suddenly declared she would be nothing but a blue princess.  And Juniper waffled around, landing on "A big green monster."  In the end, I ran out of time and scrambled for the costumes we already had or could easily acquire.

My mom had given her a firefighter costume and accessories for her birthday.  Juniper had owned it for a full two weeks without trying it on.  Whenever we suggested it, she reverted to her third-person saying, "I think Juniper's too shy of that."  A few days before Halloween, we got her to try it on.  And oh, my.  Her face turned pink.  She was bashful, proud, shy, elated.  She gazed at herself in the mirror, star-struck by her own reflection.  She was nervous.  Hazel sidled right up to her, saying, "It's okay Jun-i-per.  It's okay sister."  The little ballerina-princess consoling a tough firefighter.  So damed cute.

 

:: And a few more from a month of Halloween and Dias de los Muertos activities: 

Hazel's just always doing that^, regardless of the holiday.  

This is "Little Brother."  He entered our lives the end of September.  He was found to be without a heartbeat, so the kids made him a heart and gave him a few vaccinations.  

Trip to the Pumpkin Patch: 

Hazel is now the camera shy kid.  Plus, she cut her own hair a while back.  

We met up with friends at the patch; the kids were leaping and diving over the straw maze, causing all kinds of mayhem.  

Train ride. 

Kittens in the barn.  

They drew up plans and went to work.  

Halloween's Eve, we sat around the pumpkins, telling "witch stories."  

Halloween!  Behold: Fire, Elsa, Firefighter, and Hans

(Despite the time-crunch, I did manage to make my and Hazel's wool felt crowns.)

We do "Trunk or Treat" in our little town.  It's good for little kids, but when they get bigger we'll hit the neighborhoods.  

For weeks Juniper had been afraid the firefighters would recruit her and she'd never come home again.  When he noticed her costume ("No way!  You're a firefighter!") and invited her to tour the fire engine, she backed away, stammering, "No, no, no!"  

a magical, multi-layered cake

Not every night--but often--after the kids are in bed, I pull out a fresh clean sheet of drawing paper and tape it to Juniper's art table.  Sometimes I lay out crayons, sometimes markers, sometimes watercolor paints.  It's a simple act, imbued with love.  I delight in the act of quiet, invisible giving probably more than she enjoys waking up to a fresh sheet.  It gives me extraordinary joy.
Lately, it's the simple things: spreading peanut butter on Juniper's sandwich while she builds a "nest" of miscellaneous toys, books, pumpkins, blankets and dolls in the living room chair and Hazel crawls around eating crumbs off the kitchen floor...that's when I get the feeling that what I am doing, right now, feels so right.  Like I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be, doing exactly what I'm supposed to be doing, right now.  It's a good feeling.

:: Our weather has gone from that^ to this,

And today, this:

 

Tomorrow (Halloween) is supposed to be in the 60's.  Oh, we'll try our best to send some of this warm, dry mellowness to the east.  From what we hear, much of our family is under a heavy mulch of snow.  

:: The birthday.  We saw family, then gathered friends to celebrate Juniper's 3rd birthday.  We are relatively new arrivals to a very small town.  I stay home with the kids, my man's job is mostly solitary.  It's not easy meeting new folks.  Which makes me all the more grateful to this new tribe of ours that gathered to celebrate my girl's three years on this planet.  

The trampoline was a huge hit (I grimaced and averted my eyes most of the time) as was a "maze" my man had mowed in the back field.  Last year I didn't get a single photo of J bug's party--too busy playing the hostess.  This year I got smart and handed my camera to an extra dad.  

Last year, J bug nearly dissolved into a puddle of delight when we had a little party and everyone sang Happy Birthday to her.  And for the next four months I think we sang Happy Birthday at least 37 times a day.  When Hazel was born and we were trying to get her to latch-on, we sang Happy Birthday because we figured she'd heard it so much in utero, it would make her feel home (it worked).  This year, Juniper had told me she didn't want people singing Happy Birthday.  We did a birthday morning test-run and sure enough, she ran crying, "Nooooooo!  Not sing Happy Birthday!" and disappeared into her room.

So when the moment came, I did a real quick, "One,two,three HAPPY BIRTHDAY!" which still melted her into tears, but at the prospect of pumpkin cupcakes with maple cream cheese frosting, she quickly recovered.  

Later that night she opened gifts, danced, and played doctor.  

 :: A couple days later, we hit up the pumpkin patch, complete with straw bale maze, scarecrows and train ride.  And see that awesome sweater?  Thanks, I made it.  Juniper's birthday sweater--that's what she calls it.  

::  Two weeks into it and I have this to say: "Three" is a magical, multi-layered cake alternating between fun, frustration, willpower and a heap of thick, creamy, make-believe frosting.  

Juniper's first day of preschool(!).  She adamantly refused to wear the ladybug backpack she'd chosen herself.  And, after weeks of saying, "When I turn three, I will start my preschool!", when the day finally came, she crossed her arms at the breakfast table and said, "NO.  I don't wanna go to preschool.  I just wanna STAY HOME."  Somehow, I convinced her to step out of the car and into the preschool building, but I ended up staying with her all morning.  She refused to take off her jacket.  As soon as she got comfortable, there was a fire drill.  And as soon as she got comfortable again, they did ring-around-the-rosie, which is normally her favorite game, but with 18 kids it sent her into a fit of tears.  Two months ago, she would have run straight into that ring.  This is the new Juniper.  Three years old, a little more self-conscious and self-aware of life's "scarier" situations combined with a staunch willfulness.  Staunch willfulness.  

 :: Wondering about Hazel?  Girl's been crawling for a few weeks now.  We've taken a lot of video, having forgotten how friggin' cute the stiff, stilted, jerky, slow, wind-up-toy-like first crawls are.  Damn, it's cute.      

 She still just has those two bottom teeth.  My man carved a pumpkin in her two-tooth honor--I'll try to get a photo for you, but that pumpkin's been living outside and is already a bit worse for the wear.  Oh, we have more from the trenches coming soon.  In the meantime, it's Halloween!!  

    ^Not to worry.  We bought Juniper some glass crayons for her birthday.^