Blog? What blog?

Hi. I'm Kim. I'm sure we've met.

It's been a humdinger of a month or two here. We got a new house. We love it. The garage is stacked to the ceiling with boxes, yet we seem to be living comfortably. This means we have too much stuff (and also, I apparently can live just fine wearing the same three skirts over and over again). But the boxes loom on my mental horizon like a boogieman. Someday, I'm going to have to vanquish the box boogieman.

A's fourth (fourth!) birthday was last month. It's the first one he's ever anticipated. Grandma and Grandpa came out to visit; we got a bounce house in the backyard and everything went smoothly. Now he's bemoaning the fact that he's got a long time until he's five and can have another birthday.

It's been a rough patch here. C is working late, late, late, including the weekend, for a thirteen-day stretch, and I think it's fair to say that we are all feeling the strain. If he had not taken last weekend (you know, the one that ended yesterday) off, I'm not sure how any of us would have done. Sometimes it sucks to be all grown-up and independent.

Watching kids full-time, without a break, is really hard manual labor. Babies need fed; preschoolers need direction. And they don't take breaks, not easily. They notice as well as I do when Daddy's not around. I'm building a support structure so I can have some breaks, but it's summer and people have vacations, bike trips, and broken hips. I feel intensely time-crunched and constantly needed.

But. I try to grab breaks and focus on the good. A has started making up jokes. L has three teeth now and three more making a break for it. He's decided he loves cereal and sweet potatoes. We have breakfast and dinner on the patio in the backyard. Two mornings ago, some wild parakeets flew into our neighbor's tree during breakfast. Two nights ago, as we were eating at dusk, an owl swooped into our tree, sat for a while, circled our yard, then swooped onto another tree.

"That owl is cool," A said. "I'm going to tell Miss Rita about that owl." And I'm telling you.