A break

It has been nasty here. Our fair town was ravaged by a sudden cold snap, and meanwhile our family was ravaged by the sniffles. No one has been sleeping well, even at naptime, so I've been a bit too exhausted to do anything but crash on the couch with a warm husband and some Office reruns at the end of the day. I apologize for not blogging, because the world needs more sugary blonde-boy goodness to make it a better place. I should know.





We have also been quite busy with various mind-occupying efforts:

* We're experiencing an uncharacteristically large amount of people tromping through our house; we've had a family of friends over for dinner recently, and are hosting another family for dinner Sunday. With Thanksgiving will come Mamaw and Dadaw, all the way from Indiana. They bring with them untold riches of vegetables and pumpkin pies, as well as four new eyes for baby-watching, bless them.

* While not remodeling our downstairs bathroom to look like something teleported from Starbucks, Dada is giving serious thought to seeking tenure a year early. He has been given the okay to do so, if he wishes to subject himself to such horrors, by his department chair and dean. When not working on at least forty billion completely different papers and teaching a brand-new class, he also entertains the idea of taking the four of us to Austria, and the Canadian Rockies, before the next school year begins. As a "research vacation".

* My third book with my publisher is due at the end of the month, and I am uncharacteristically close to finishing. I blame all of my organization and progress this time around to our new babysitter, Aly. Isaac has informed me that she is "a cool girl". Each week she comes for two hours and kicks me out of the house; Isaac and Jacob could care less whether I come or go anymore, they are so in love with her. So I go to Starbucks and get overcaffeinated and write about horses for 2nd graders.

*Isaac has moved on a bit from his painting obsession, mainly because he runs too quickly out of red. His new favorite way to express himself is in online coloring. He can work the mouse like a pro and especially enjoys coloring Lightning McQueen and the gang over at the Cars site. He has decided that his favorite color is red, and if he can't wear his favorite red Lightning McQueen shirt and his red underpants everyday, life is (VERY LOUDLY) not worth living.

*Jacob only speaks now in mini-sentences of at least two words, such as "Here, Mommy", "Hold it!", "Daddy working", "Isaac going?" He loves to learn qualifiers for his nouns. For example, one of his favorite stuffed critters, a Care Bear, is not "bear" or "teddy bear", but "Sunshine Bear". He likes to qualify with colors, and though his color naming is improving daily, he does enjoy calling everything "yellow". He also eats salad and dislikes cookies, because he is a freak and not a real boy.

Somehow it surprised me that they grew out of all their spring clothes, so we are still working out the kinks with our jackets, tuning our wardrobe to coordinate size and weather simultaneously. Today we had a break from the rain and the cold, and I took the babies outside to splash in some puddles on the sidewalk, that the blog faithful may enjoy their antics.