avablog

I remember plaid skirts and playing “Smurfs” at recess. I remember erasers and school lunches . . . the smell of Lysol and sweaty gyms. I remember feeling scared, shy, and homesick. Kindergarten and the early years of elementary school weren’t easy for me. I felt shy and socially awkward, embarrassed and overwhelmed. Welcome to [...]

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One room in his house was full of dusty clocks. There were tall grandfather clocks and round wooden ones. Mantel clocks and small alarm clocks. There was even a cuckoo clock with a tiny brown-and-white bird. And they all were set to go off at the same time, in a cacophony of chimes, dings, bongs, [...]

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That is all.
Posted via email from nicheplayer’s posterous

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Question: Is it okay for one spouse to make a major, personal purchase (for an item worth more than $500) without consulting with the other spouse? (Keeping in mind that the spouses have separate checking/savings accounts and split the household bills fairly evenly between the two.) What do all of you blog readers think? Acceptable [...]

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You’re starting to figure out how to coordinate them in your endless quest for trouble, little brother. Though you’ve been creeping and stomach crawling for a couple of months now, this afternoon we hit a milestone: You crawled all the way across the rug on your hands and knees! Huzzah! What a grand way to [...]

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Dear Ava,
Your dad always accuses me of never writing anything on this blog, so I thought I’d better log on quickly, at the end of this lovely Christmas Day, to document a few small, sweet moments from our recent celebrations. The first is a remark you made yesterday, after attending an afternoon children’s service at [...]

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My dearest little one:
Life isn’t fair, is it? Here we’ve spent hours and days writing odes of love to your sister, and all we’ve given you are some lousy “moment of cuteness” photo posts! I think this brief Emmett update is long overdue.

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Ava’s room is full of stars. At night, she turns on her special ladybug nightlight, and it covers the ceiling with either blue, green, or red constellations. She usually chooses the blue. Last night, after feeding Emmett, I went to check on her beneath her starry blue sky. She was huddled under her blankets, clutching [...]

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My dearest Big Girl:
A few days ago, you came downstairs in jeans and a fancy shirt, carrying a small bag of your “play-pretend” make-up. You said, “I want to look like you, Mommy. I’m a grown-up.” My breath caught in my chest at the sight of my baby turned into a little girl, wanting to [...]

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Neither Mark nor I has had time to post on this blog much lately. This summer, I suddenly realized that we both were spending more hours online than with our children or each other. I decided that moments spent in real time were better than moments spent documenting them–or trying to keep up on social [...]

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Leah just sent this along. I know it’s an issue close to her heart. Maybe a NOSSA membership would make a good anniversary present?
Short People Debunk New Study on Height
Short Men and Women Say They Are Butt of Jokes and Ridiculed Well Beyond Childhood

But a new University of Michigan study published this week [...]

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Whew. This morning was a doozy. Ava was insistent that she didn’t want to go to school, and Emmett’s fussiness from last night carried over into the daylight. At one point, both kids (weird…”both kids”) were crying away downstairs, Emmett on my lap and Ava to her mom on the sofa in [...]

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Her balled-up little hand pressed against my black shirt in the dark of her bedroom. She whispered urgently, “Mama, you are my dark sky, and I am your bright, white moon.” My heart cracked open and flooded my body with all the light in the universe. I said, “Yes, you are, little one. Yes, you [...]

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Leah has an ingrown toenail. Rachel recommended a good soak in warm, soapy water to help with the infection and swelling. You’ll never guess who absolutely loved the idea of soaking her feet in warm, soapy water:

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I caught Ava in a relative moment of repose the other day and asked her a couple questions about the unborn baby. She was as forthcoming as she ever is, which is to say, moderately.

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“There are two tragedies in life: one is not to get your heart’s desire. The other is to get it.”
–George Bernard Shaw
I think it must have been the sight of the newly assembled co-sleeper in our bedroom, bathed in soft light. I can’t say for sure what triggered the feeling, but late last night, after [...]

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No? Pity. Let me help!

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Leah hipped me to this just now, and I thought it worth sharing. It’s a wonderful little bit of writing.
That I almost cried last week upon reading that the Iowa Supreme Court overturned the state law banning same-sex marriage will therefore come as no surprise. I’m still struck by one thought: over the years, [...]

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I guess I might be more down with this whole Christianity thing if God had some firm boundaries in mind. I mean, the fact that there’s no sin or lapse I can’t confess or repent my way out of seems…well, not a great way to run a theology. Like there’s no bridge too [...]

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My dearest Ava,
Every night before bed, I lie with you, and you beg me to recount stories from my childhood. As I lie in the dark with you and cast my mind back to places and people long forgotten, I feel my heart breaking just a little bit. It’s breaking because my own childhood slipped [...]

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