girls – Page 4 – Lemon Drop Pie

Ah, Saturday. It’s like the Death Valley of the blogosphere. Not very many people publish blog posts on a Saturday, and there are even fewer blog readers. But here I am, typing my heart out for NaBloPoMo. Pour yourself a cup of coffee and pull up a chair. I’ll tell you a story about stories.

Lily and Emmy love to listen to stories. Not just stories from a book, but stories that Ed and I make up. We each have our own character that we have developed over time. Ed’s stories are about Little Squirrel. My stories are about Little Goosey. Amazingly, when the girls beg one of us to tell a story, the character’s day mirrors our own day. For example, on the day that we visited the pumpkin farm, LITTLE GOOSEY WAS THERE, TOO! I know, the coincidence just floors me.

While we don’t actually see Little Goosey very often, we spot Little Squirrel all the time. She lives in our yard, along with her friends Chippy and Little Squirrelita. Little Squirrel also likes to travel. She hops on top of our minivan when we go visit Grandpa, and she even went with us to ride roller coasters at Great America. She’s a very bold little squirrel.

So bold, in fact, that she will come up on our front porch to eat our pumpkins.

View video here.

Lily and Emmy have asked me why I talk so funny to Little Squirrel. I do talk baby talk to her, I guess. But she’s just so darn cute! As long as she stays outside, that is.

Little Goosey prefers the pond to our yard. That’s why we don’t see her very often. The pond is across the street from Dunkin’ Donuts, so I would imagine she also goes there quite a bit. She just can’t resist a pumpkin donut in the Fall! Can you believe that she flew all the way up to Alaska with us? She looked rather silly sitting in the airplane seat, but her wings were just not up to that long distance flight. She is still quite young and her wing feathers are fairly new, you see.

Now that you’ve been officially introduced to two other “family members,” they just might stop by Lemon Drop Pie again!

Do you tell stories to your kids, or remember stories you were told when you were little?

The orange lights went up last weekend. When Lily was eleven months old, she would stare out the window at the orange lights. “Ights, ights,” she would say in her little baby voice as her chubby little finger pointed at the lights. The orange light neighbors were thrilled that baby Lily loved their Halloween lights.

A lot of people have Halloween decorations up, but the orange lights are special. When the leaves turn colors and begin to fall off the trees, the orange lights go up on the tree. The time of year has come when it is dark at the girls’ bedtime. We have a little tradition. If they put on their pajamas and brush their teeth, we go see the orange lights.

Last night the wet leaves clung to the sidewalk and the streets shone with rainwater. The girls had on their warm pjs and we headed outside. They skipped down the sidewalk ahead of Ed and me, and then we stopped for a few moments to gaze at the orange lights and the inflatable graveyard.

This time, it was Emmy who was enthralled by the lights. Lily ran on home before Emmy was done. “WAIT!” she cried to me. So I waited with her, and when she had drunk in her fill she ran after her big sister. “WAIT FOR ME!” she yelled as she ran in her little pink light-up shoes, her nightgown flying behind her. I walked behind her in the dark. Just as they reached our door, the girls both yelled “MOMMY!” and ran back toward me, slamming me with hugs.

The day had been so overcast, dark and gloomy and depressing. But now that nighttime had arrived, it seemed a little brighter.