Why I Don't Twitter

The original title of this draft was "If I Twittered" because I thought I had like 6 short random things to share. But as you can see, 140 characters is never going to work for me, so maybe it's more of a micro-blogging day instead? Cora is napping, the big kids are playing outside, and James is "resting" partially because he did a 2 hour swim practice at 6 a.m. this morning followed by a trip to the zoo and a whole pizza but really because he doesn't want to make eye contact with any of the unassembled Ikea furniture pieces lying around our TV room.

the lion practiced his roaring and Cora roared back

Landon had what I thought was an infected bug bite and when it became red and angry and spread outside the line we drew around it one night before we went to bed (nothing like a little midnight-ish paranoia about the health of your child), I took him to the doctor. She took one look at it and said, "okay, that's Methicillin-resistant Staphylo--" "MRSA?!!" I interjected, "he has MRSA?! Like on House?" Yes. He does. He's on an antibiotic and we have to give him "chlorox baths" once a week for 6 weeks and then once a month for 6 months. He and my bath tub are now super clean. He will not be on the next episode of House.

calmly getting their flu shots a whole 72 hours earlier when there wasn't a 2" wide painful flaming red growth on his leg

Also on Monday, he performed a "selection of fall poems and songs" with his class after the PTA meeting. It was earnest and adorable as elementary school performances always are. Apparently he's the tallest kid in 2nd grade, so he was on the end in the upper far left section of the risers and had a weird red spotlight in his face, but I assured him being tall will come in handy later in life.

You know how facebook has that "on this day" app that shows you posts from past year's on that calendar date? Most of mine are cute pics of the kids looking tiny and adorable, or reminders of why I don't want to go back to the firm right now ("it's 3 a.m. and I'm still at my desk [sad face]"), but yesterday's flashback included the "I'm in hell" post from October 9, 2007 and BAM, I go from working on Cora's photobook to a memory spiral that left my hands shaking and my whole soul feeling fragile and sore for most of the day. Now I'm afraid to read my throwbacks until about November. I also realized that if that happened now, now that I am not a student, not 24, and not a daily facebook poster, would I have said anything? Would I have even blogged about it? Honestly, I'm not sure.

There's no good picture for his, so here's a dinosaur from Landon

Before facebook punched me in the stomach, James and I went to Claire's parent teacher conference yesterday morning and it was the best. We know very well that she adores Kindergarten, but I couldn't wait to hear how she was doing in class- what's her personality like in that setting? how is she with her peers? can you tell that she is more proud of being a Kindergartner than anything she's ever done in her whole life? because she IS. And Ms. C, the same teacher Landon had in Kindergarten, kicked things off by putting her hand on mine and saying, "let me just tell you, Claire is a JOY, and I don't think there's ever been a student who has loved Kinder as much as her." She said Claire is very well behaved and takes their new words/numbers/task of the day very seriously. She's studious and loves raising her hand and knowing the answer. She is the first to tell Ms. C if they're forgotten to do something that's part of the routine (James laughed and looked right at me when she said that; can't imagine why). Her speaking vocab is off the charts and her reading is on track. She is very careful with her work and puts a lot of love into her coloring.

It was a lot of what we knew about Claire (the beautiful and careful coloring; the task master) with a sprinkling of insight you can get from someone who isn't you and spends that many hours with your child. I love these talks. The strangest things about the kids starting elementary school is we went from detailed daily sheets at daycare to really only knowing what the kids tell us about their day, which tends to focus around what everyone else ate for lunch and where they played at recess. We get weekly worksheets for Claire and Landon has homework, but interfacing with the teacher and getting an inside look at Kindergarten-Claire was a special thing. Ms. C also told us that Claire's best friend was homesick every morning for the first month and every day Claire would hold her hand until the bell rang when she'd feel better. Claire never mentioned this to us, and honestly, it's not something I would have expected her to do (Landon, yes; Claire, eh, maybe). It was a fun 15 minutes and we got a list of sight words they're working on so we can make flash cards. I love flashcards.

I'm working on Cora's photobook and my love/hate relationship with Shutterfly continues. I adore the finished products; I sometimes like the process; I mostly hate the process. I was all ready to write a post about how I've reconciled my heart and mind to our family of five and then I spend 5 nights in a row documenting Cora's truly magical first year and I go to Carter's to pick up a few fall clothes and end up petting 3 month size fleecy sleepers with tears in my eyes. What a blessing Cora has been to our family. She's a ball of fierce, loud, fast-moving exuberantly affectionate JOY and it's almost stressing me out to try to cram all of her into an inanimate book of photos. She's our family mascot and she's adored more than is probably good for her.

I know that fall is here even though it's 90 degrees outside because the frito pie pizza is back at Pizza Snob. Other people have the PSL at Starbucks; I freak out when my friend texts me on a Friday night to say the frito pie pizza is here. 16 hours later, I'm ordering my own. It's possible I dreamed about it last night.

I hate to set us up for failure, but the weekend can really only go down from here.