Cinco has arrived and my mom is 88

My daughter's baby Cinco has arrived and she beat me. My biggest was 9 pounds 1 and a half. Cinco was 9 pounds 7. Wow! I'll be going to help out on the fourteenth but it will be hard waiting to see him. But I had to wait seven months to see E who was born in Prague and she was worth the wait.

My mom's birthday is today so the baby missed it by one day. I'll be calling her today and hope to talk to GL about her new baby as well.

Migraine is into day number three so I'm not having a whole lot of fun here. The headache isn't that bad. It's just like having someone kick you softly on the back of the knee repeatedly instead of searing pain. Too distracting for words.

I have writers' critique group today which won't be a riot with a headache and then a meeting with a financial adviser. Some days are just more fun than others, I guess. But getting the news about the new baby and having my mom celebrate her eighty-eighth makes everything worthwhile.

Summertime

There hasn't been a lot of summertime here. We only took the kids to the outside pool once. Brisk and cool weather does not make for a pleasant swimming experience, IMHO.

But on sunny days, nothing beats Rita's. Behold a vanilla custard caramel sundae and a wild cherry ice. Both enormously good. We took the kids out for ice cream several times. I have already mentioned that this is "sprinkle" land. When we went to the best ice cream stand at Knoebels, it had a big sign that said "No Sprinkles." I guess they had had way too many requests. (Other ice cream stands there did sell sprinkles.) M and V went for sprinkles every time.

When we went to the Crayola factory in Easton, PA we were surprised by a very tall Civil War monument with a bugler on top in the square where the factory is. I've been doing the research on Civil War music so I was thrilled. We also have a "bugle-shaped" object for the kids to blow on here. My daughter pointed it out to V and said, "What's he holding?" She instantly responded, "A Cwayon!" Natch!

The silence is deafening

My daughter and her family left for a short New York City visit on Friday. From there, they'll go back to Europe. It's hard to say goodbye. I don't post recognizable pictures of my grandkids on this blog but I think you can get an idea of some of our activities from these pictures.

V loves cooking. Any time I was in the kitchen, she wanted to be in there on her stool, helping. Reminds me of someone else who was always in the kitchen. Her mommy was my best kitchen helper. M is working on an art project at the Crayola Factory. It's not really a factory but they pour some crayons in a little mini-factory and then there are oodles of art activities to do. It was fun but he (and the rest of the guys) preferred the upstairs museum on canals. My daughter and I loved the store best, believe it or not. Neither of us are big shoppers but they had Crayola stuff there which you can't buy anywhere else. Totally amazing. Plus they have the world's largest crayon (it's blue.)

My favorite V prank was not the goldfish and presser foot. It was stuffing Playdoh into Grandpa Bond's tuba mouthpiece. He had to soak it to get it out. She also gave me the "I'm not playing with scissors" line. She cannot say "r" or "l" but has an amazing vocabulary. Only her brother could understand her when she said that at the end of the Empire Strikes Back, Darth Vader does something "pwopiat." Read "appropriate." My daughter thinks this is because she hears "your behavior is not appropriate" a lot. For those of you who know the 10th article of faith of the LDS church, try it substituting all the r's and l's with w's. It's a wiot. It's also amazing that V can recite the whole thing word for word.

E was a barrel of laughs. She makes amazingly cute faces and I managed to catch several of them with my camera. She does cute nose crinkles and pulls her mouth up into a little bow. She also has a tiny dimple over one corner of her mouth. She tried very hard to learn creep while visiting but didn't quite get it. M's wiggly tooth also didn't fall out in America and so he'll have to wait and see if there is a tooth fairy in Europe. His friend "Sven" thinks so but M is not sure.


I can't decide whether it was more fun watching M watch Star Wars for the first time or helping his dad blow off some very mild fireworks. He is a serious K'Nex and Lego builder and he spent a lot of time on the sun porch making things. He and I learned to play UNO (I had completely forgotten) and he also ran my sewing machine with his mom's help. He quickly got tired when she wouldn't let him run it at high speed all the time.

We had a great time. The house is so empty now. Michael took me out to see the latest Harry Potter film after a few hour's rest yesterday. We enjoyed it although it was shocking how much they left out: Bill, Fleur, the Dursleys, the Prime Minister, Scrimgeour, Percy, Morfin, Hepzibah Smith and even, sadly, Celestina Warbeck. An artist named Katerina has done "A Cauldron Full of Hot, Strong Love" though for those of us who wanted it in the movie.

Has it been three weeks?

Sorry blog fans. Can't believe it's been three weeks since I've posted but it's been a tad busy around here. The kids have had a lot of fun. MF has enjoyed a secret craft project, NL has been swimming coach to the kids, ML has had vacation days off for the first time since September and I'm on a first-name basis with all the grocery checkers in Kingston, Dallas and Shavertown.

The weather has been extremely mild and the kids have been able to see robins fledge, squirrels do bird feeder gymnastics and chipmunks hit land speed records in our very own backyard. We've made rhubarb from the garden into pie, picked blueberries at a farm, used parsley and basil from our very limited garden and made our own pizzas.

Baby E is a hoot and a half and she has made incredible progress. She's learned to wave, scoot across the floor and feed herself finger foods this past month. I've never seen a baby who can be instantly distracted from crying by her favorite song. "Eensy weensy spider" never fails to calm her.

ML got to see "Star Wars" for the first time while he was here and has been singing the theme song ever since. His sister, VC, was fed up the other day. "Stop singing that song!" We can all relate.

Busy, busy, busy

Well, it's busy here. We've got a wildly curious five-year-old, a mischievous three-year-old and a very hungry seven-month-old on our hands. Keeping M intellectually challenged, V out of trouble, and E full up is turning out to be full time work. I couldn't be any happier. The kids have been reading, swimming, going to the park, eating lots of new foods and generally learning what American children do. They've been to a patriotic concert played by their Grandpa Bond, had waffles, earned free ice cream for reading books, been to the Crayola Factory and Canal museum and seen baby robins in the nest right outside our front door.

V doesn't get into stuff at home but here everything is exciting and new. Our favorite prank (for which she got a timeout and during which it was all her mommy and I could do to keep from laughing) was putting a Pepperidge Farm goldfish under the presser foot of my Bernina and lowering the foot. It's a perfect fit, by the way. I am reminded of a friend's child who rewound a flattened frog in the VCR. No harm done to the Bernina but we are having to keep a close eye on her. Her mommy caught her out of bed this evening and her first words were, "Mommy, I'm not using scissors!"

All in all, a grand time is being had by all.

Grandkids have arrived

They're here. My daughter, husband and three children. The baby is all I expected and more. She's extremely chubby, friendly and even has a dimple when she smiles. The older children are a delight. They're just about through jet lag so they should hit the road running today.