Is anyone else wondering how today is the first day of Spring already? I'm not sure how these things keep sneaking up on me lately... Maybe it's because I'll be twenty six in just a couple of weeks, which officially puts me in my late twenties, I'm slightly sad to say. Maybe it's because I haven't had a full night's sleep in a little over two years now. Maybe it's because I'm so busy trying to get through each day that I forget days turn into weeks, which turn into months, which eerily turn into years without us being completely cognizant of the passing of all that TIME. Dang, I remember being a kid and having to wait an hour or two for a friend to come over or for that birthday party to start and feeling as though time had stopped and the world was in limbo because it would NEVER get here! Now I am feeling, not old, but maybe as though I'm stuck in "Alice and Wonderland" and time is doing funny things like slowing down when I'm busy doing mundane things like tying shoes, fixing snacks, washing clothes, and scrubbing the toilet and speeding up when Mark is off and we have a weekend without errands to run. I find myself having to try harder to look for the "magic" things and fun spontaneity that I remember from childhood but have an increased difficulty feeling as an adult. If this is getting old or growing up, then I wish to remain a child forever. However, since we're given no choice but to continue to "mature" and before I got too depressed thinking about being "mature," I realized I should be grateful that Mark and I have our two little (quickly becoming not-so-little) messes. They might be messes, but they keep us young and continually spur us to seek out that magic and spontaneity. We try harder to relax, to look at things in new ways and from different perspectives, and Lord knows we try hard not to let the little things bug us, because if we did, we'd be constantly grouchy! It's nice sometimes to be reminded of the importance of everyday happenings like when our little scientist asked the other day if I knew that, "the rain sometimes makes its own music," and when the resident princess/diva randomly belts out "Jingle Bells," just because the mood strikes her. For example, we had some snow last month that brought the kids (and me) outside to make a snowman. (Or, as I called him, the morphodite, even though they argued and said his name was Frosty...) They were so proud of it. As they posed for me to take their picture, I was reminded of Jem and Scout Finch in "To Kill A Mockingbird." Kids look at the world differently. It's kind of a stripped down version of what we see as adults. It's black and white and sometimes transparent, whereas 'grown-ups' see gray and opaque. And yes, it's partly because they don't have all those 'adult' things to worry about like work or bills or errands or whether or not they have clean clothes to wear. And yes, that's partly what parents are for. We're in charge of those menial tasks like nutrition and shelter and rightly so. I sure wouldn't want the kids choosing our housing or making our grocery list. If that happened, I'm quite sure we would live in a tree house or maybe on a pirate ship and eat peanut butter and jelly and cookies for every meal. However, since Mark and I get to worry about all those things for them, they can simply enjoy the fun and magic of life. And kind of like the hokey pokey, that's what it's all about! And even though some things seem like magic at five; at twenty five, I understand that it sometimes takes a little more than pixie dust. So, with a little effort, a lot of flexibility, and just a pinch of pixie dust, Mark and I are trying. Some days, we would rather stay in bed and pretend we don't hear the footsteps on the stairs at the crack of dawn or that little voice calling, "Daddy!" at midnight and two o'clock and approximately fourteen minutes before the alarm is set to go off and some days we sort of wish we were old and retired so we could have breakfast alone... But overall, I don't think we'd change much. Except maybe the part where we haven't slept in two years. We could definitely use a good night's sleep. Or a nap. Anything, so long as our eyes are closed and there's no two-year-old elbow in my mouth....
In other news, the kids had their birthdays. They are officially two and five. We had a Cinderella party and a dinosaur party. (I have no pictures of them on the computer or I would post a couple. I'll have to send them out later, sorry!) We had a good time and were able to enjoy a weekend away together this past weekend. It was more exhausting than a weekend at home, but we had a lot of fun. We went to some fun places, swam in the pool, and got to enjoy the excitement of 'getting away.' That being said, we're glad we have absolutely no plans this weekend! Well, we're actually finishing installing the floor in our living room, so not exactly nothing... Nothing would just be too boring. HA! Ok, I will stop rambling now and let you go back to your scheduled programming. I leave you with this picture I took of the sunset a while back from the back yard. It looked like someone set the sky on fire. I watched it so long, I'm sure I probably burned dinner that night... Until next time, notice the important things, let the little ones go (they don't matter anyway), and don't forget the pixie dust!
