the neighbor has kittens, little poufs of fur that hide in the bushes to be captured by my boys. max sniffs them out and barks, a rare sound from him, and the kids love on the kittens (”henry’s exact words were, “mom, dad, it’s A MIRACLE!”) until their dad says no way and back across the grass to their mother they bound. it’s for the best. we’re not known for having a way with cats after they’ve grown out of their kitten stage. i gave away (after a disaster involving lots of cat pee, a perfect vintage velvet sofa, a rather large sofa cleaning bill, and more cat pee) the first kitten we had to a man and woman who answered the ad in the paper. they came for the pick up and greeted the kitten with a pink rhinestone collar. a better life she’s having than we would have ever given to her, and i’m rather sure there were no perfect vintage sofas to be destroyed inside the home of that couple.

somehow we’re dog people now, little dog people, with a little dog. we still have a cat, but he lives outside, stretching in the sun on the front steps. but those kittens are tempting, little faces, little whiskers, a bundle of purr in the hand.

a few strings of garlands for the indie craft parade that’s sneaking up on me quite horribly. there is much, much to be done. like heaps of christmas ornaments and crepe paper flags and the glittering of a thousand little tags.

school makes the days go faster, a blur of work and play and endless chopping and cooking and cleaning. and restless sleep. i cannot sleep well lately and am contemplating large doses of drugs to take me into hours and maybe weeks of dreamless darkness.

henry called me in this morning to see the edges of a tree’s leaves turning yellow. the tomatoes are tired of growing for us, small and buggy. there are radishes and spinach coming up. in the mailbox was a postcard from the orchard telling me that now is the time to come for apples. it’s not too hot outside. there are pajamas being worn. i don’t want to rush in the winter rain and days of gray forevers, so i’m trying not to hurry the fall. but it’s hard to think summerly thoughts, even end of the summer thoughts, the promises of tomorrows speeding me through a real today.

it’s been awhile since i’ve made a list. what a shame.

dog days

last rounds of salsa with tomatoes from the garden. something i’ll dream about in the gray of winter. if you have eight or nine small tomatoes, a lime, a hot pepper, three cloves of garlic, salt, half a bunch of cilantro and a little bit of olive oil you can make some and have a dream ready for winter, too.

a super video by chris of the kid art show from last weekend. i’ve watched it about eighty five times and it’s not getting old. if you like me at all you will spend three-ish of your minutes and watch it.

school begins. i try to be sure the kids are at least wearing pants while they learn at the table. my good husband is overseeing most of the tedious work and i am ever grateful.

wishing i could snap my fingers and bookshelves would appear everywhere. shelves would make the house so much tidier, i just know they would.

swimming in this beautiful blog of happiness

enjoying walks with max since it’s not two hundred degrees out there

working away at pieces for the indie craft parade and for the october show at art and light

cooking lots of things from the alice waters cookbook i got at goodwill for a dollar. i know, a dollar! i nearly fell down and died right there on the grody tile floor.

my daughter sleeps, a nap she needs but one that energizes her for a long evening into the dark. she is up there in my bed, sleeping, charging batteries that i wish i still had.

the sky in the backyard grows black beyond the tired green of the trees. the sky in the front yard doesn’t know the darkness is blowing up behind, blue and the white silver backs of clouds unsuspecting. i hope that it rains, the summer in water overhead and underfoot. there is coffee in the afternoon, especially when there is rain.

i had almost forgotten the playgrounds and parks after most of the children are dressed in new clothes and carrying their new backpacks to the schools. mostly empty, most of the time, the soccer fields green and ready, the wind on the hill coming around as though he’s glad to be there just for us. i like to be alone, though it’s not always good for me, but the park in late august, abandoned and free, this is a time of alone that is okay, i suppose. the playgrounds were built for us, the fields were mown for us, those trees were planted for us, it’s all for us because we’re done with our books for the day.

nine years, almost ten. days and days and days. days that slipped like sand or water through our fingers. can it be this long? or has it only been this long? all the days before are nothing and there are no days after yet.

i’m glad i got this one. God is good.

the kids art show was a brilliant success! aside from the mistake of only having cookies for snacks and the thus promised sugar insanity and crashing that followed (hummus next time, anyone?), everything went off in a most lovely way. the kids put forth their greatest efforts and felt proud and warm all over when it was done.

we came home with a fish by helena to put in the kids’ bathroom. or just about anywhere since it’s so awesome. and the boys made some pretty pennies and are already dreaming up their purchases. i suggested new art supplies and they snubbed the thought. that’s what parents buy, i suppose.

i’m thinking that our kids could start selling their art and support our family soon.

my kids are participating in an art show tomorrow at white whale studios here in greenville. if you’re around, you should stop by. and if you know my children, you should especially stop by and encourage them in their artistic endeavors. details about the event can be seen here, on facebook. or you can just come from 6:30-8:30 and have cookies and play in the tent and with the sidewalk chalk and enjoy the kids and their pieces.

these are some sneak peaks of my kids’ work, but there are other brilliant children contributing, too. thanks to annie for curating the event!

i’ve had a couple of weeks of general cheerlessness, hurt feelings, and just a few days too many of the why bothers. and then we had friends over saturday night and the kids ran in the dark with sparklers and on sunday night we had a pizza party with our kids and we kicked off the school year with more success than i thought possible and the week has been looking up. it all sort of started with those sparklers, though, the shrieking in the dark, the corralling of dusty kids into the house for the night, little flickers of redemption that help me remember why to bother at all.

oh, summer. you and your blazing sun. could you just come along with your fireflies and tomatoes, flowers in battalions at our feet, ice cream and popsicles and the spray of the hose?

we started school this week. my days are full of reading to everyone and my mouth is tired. the house is forever a mess of schoolwork and unfinished games and puzzles and creations. it feels a little wrong to start school in august, to steal the summer away from my dirty footed children. but there were all of these supplies at the store. and the days are too hot to stay out for too long. and we don’t have a pool membership to splash out the mornings, the long afternoons, the gray blue evenings of summer. so something had to be done. there’s still time for sparklers after dinner, for my son to smell like the dog because they’ve been wrestling in the grass, for water guns, homemade salsa, butterflies swept up in nets.

they asked ernie and me to take pictures at vbs this year. anyone who knows about the churchy opportunities project we’ve got going (but apologetically need to update; we do keep up on facebook) seemed to run from me when i came near with the camera. i really do try to make the churchy photos anonymous or at least not unflattering, but some people just have an aversion to the camera.

vbs at our church this year is called Marketplace something or other and it’s a beautiful thing. they were there baking bread, grinding spices, learning something hebrew, making bricks. who knows what else? i love it when a good thing is pulled off well. it’s one thing to plan a good thing, it’s another to do it well.

the vbs of my youth is hardly remembered. i recall red koolaid and generic oreos, a hot parking lot lined up with forgettable games, songs that required shouting in places, and a kind of shame for not bringing a friend along to get some extra points. this is not that kind of bible school. no koolaid, for starters, and getting your hands dirty makes you remember things, so i think they will.