We visited El Dorado Regional Park for the first time on Sunday.  What a treasure!  DH fell instantly in love with the place as it reminded him of the park he played in when he was a kid in Odessa.

We had a ball!  DD collected all sorts of dirt, played ball with Papa, watched ducks, geese, and turtles and walked all over.  She would chase the squirrels into trees while making monster growly sounds and then plead with them to be careful when they were at the end of a branch.  We scoped out the rest of the park — paddle boats, a choo choo train, several lakes, a wilderness area, bike paths…oh yea, we’re coming back.

One more thing.  We tried again to get that perfect picture of just the kids, or even the whole family.  Want to see our best photo?

Yah, I don’t think I’ll include that in the Christmas letter either.

I have just two photos to share.  All wordy posts are going to have to wait until I meet a couple deadlines.

Here’s the Birthday boy getting a kiss from his big sister.

Little Boo had fun playing with her cousins.

You see this hideous pile of laundry?  Ya, I see it too.  But here’s a secret.  You’re looking at a giant pile of math concepts.   We sort, we pair,  roll towels into cylinders;  we fold things in half and then we fold them in half again…we quarter them; we fold things in sixths.  If  ’socks’ are a set, then Kate’s socks are a subset of ’socks’ as are Papa’s. 

You’re also looking at singing time.  Today Kate and I listened to a cool a capella kids cd, but we’ve also worked our way through the kiddie classics: the Hokey Pokey, Old Mc Donald, Allelu, Jesus Loves Me, and rhythm chants with motions that we’ve learned at the library (Way up high in the apple tree, two little apples looking at me.  I shook that tree as hard as I could.  Down came the apples. Mmmmm, they were good.)   And who’s getting the benefit from all this?  Everyone.  Putting laundry away is traditionally a lonely job around here, but this isn’t lonely any more.  Kate gets mommy time and math and music ( I suspect that eventually, we could add poetry and scripture memory).  Everyone gets their laundry put away.  Everyone gets a tidier house.

Now, all that good stuff doesn’t mean that laundry is getting put away any more frequently that it was last month…but we’ll get there, I have no doubt.

Who ever guessed that the secret link between Math and Music was laundry.

Can I tell you why I love Jen?

First, she’s articulate.  She can articulate what I’m thinking even when I’m only half way there.

Second, she has a warm heart.

Third, she has good boundaries.

Fourth, she’s M’s mother.

Fifth, she’s a good wife to Paul.

Sixth, we have some history together.

Seventh, she’s beautiful.

You know how sometimes there’s a fight when you say they can’t watch TV?  Well, there’s also usually a lot more thinking going on when they play on their own.  It’s almost always worth telling them to turn the silly thing off.

Anyhow, I’ve been waiting for Kate to ask if she could put Oliver in her stroller since he was born.  But she’d never shown any interest until today–after we turned off the telly for the day.  And for all of you who are worried for Oliver, Kate was very carefully supervised.  And photographed.  And video’d.

Last Sunday afternoon, Rome and I drove out to Malibu.  We stopped at an outdoor playground where Kate played for about an hour.  We then crossed Hwy 1 to walk around the estuary by the beach.  It was a gorgeous day and our crazy daughter saw that Pacific Ocean and thought, “Hey, it’s November, let’s swim.”   Rome and I were admiring the view, and she was disrobing behind our backs.   She was so excited.  She’s been begging me to go back to Gram’s house to go swimming again for weeks and this was the first large body of water that we’d let her get near.   Now for those of you unfamiliar with the Pacific Ocean outside of California — it’s COLD — this is no Gulf of Mexico.  And if Kate goes in, Papa has to go in also (b/c Mom is the photographer).  Good old dad didn’t complain even once.

Eventually, she got cold.

Those cheeks are just so cute, you have to pinch them.

We then walked through the rest of the estuary.  Kate played with twigs and drew on the ground.  She even put a stick in Oliver’s hands and tried to explain to him how cool this was. 

He didn’t get it.

There are some who would criticize us for spending the money on gas to do such a trivial thing.

I just remember that we’re creating memories…and that God often uses those to get me through hard times.

I can only hope He will do the same for my husband and children.

Today I’m wearing Spring Fever by Origins.

Yesterday, Kate used her first gerund.  She came to me and said, “Baby cry”.  I responded with, “Is the baby crying?”  “Baby crying”, she replied.  Yippee: another step in the communication continuum.

This morning I picked up my BIL at his house at 6:30 a.m. and took him to the airport.  I’ve been flying high and happy since then.   This is one of those funny areas where God has matched my joy with other peoples’ need.  I LOVE going to the airport at the crack of dawn.  I get Pavlovian joy from turning into the departures lane and circling past the terminals when the air is crisp and the sun is just creeping over the horizon.  The great thing about dropping people off is I’m not the one double checking my carry-on for tickets and photo ID;  I just get the thrill.

This is probably because I have so many happy memories of arriving at LAX with no worries or stress because Mom had taken care of everything–she is a very confident and competent traveler– as we headed out to some wonderful location that Mom had researched and planned. 

Thanks, Mom.

Skirts and camels-- umm, I won't be trying that one again. The dismount is terrifying.

I’ve been Face-Booked.  My hope for you is that it doesn’t happen to you.  It’s a mind-bending experience.

I’m sure that when I get past October, I’ll do several posts about it.  I also Fly-Lady’d most of the week and tried a new schedule…which left me with no time for anything.  So I leave you with a picture of Kate who I’m hoping doesn’t grow up to be a Yuppie.  And yes, that is a resume she’s holding.

Bald men–HOT bald men–everywhere are breathing a sigh of relief today.  It has been reported that Little Oliver is starting to grow hair on that bald pate of his. 

Sean Connery, Patrick Stewart and Anthony Edwards were rumored to have gone into hiding with strategy teams — worried that their careers would be overthrown by the little O.  But Hollywood is back to it’s old self with the news that Oliver is unlikely to EVER be bald if that business about maternal grandfathers is true.

Others–mostly consultants who stand to make a profit by designing backup plans–suggest that the threat to these actors’ careers is still impending because Oliver could dethrone them all by shaving that cute little head.

Bruce Willis, Eat Your Heart Out