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From banging my knee on one of the exercise machines, to leaving my nice headphones there instead of packing them up in my gym bag. My hair was kooky (OK, it’s always, kooky, but kookier than normal), my front driver’s side tire was low and I forgot to water the plants. Think I’ll move to Australia.

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Recently, while putting David to bed, he lamented to me the difficulty of being the youngest child in the house. Most of his complaints were along the line of, “everyone gets to tell you what to do and you don’t get to have any fun.” I tried to commiserate with him. Being an oldest child, I really haven’t any idea what it’s like to be a youngest child. I can imagine it’s probably quite difficult. Mostly, I listened to David and nodded my head sympathetically.

Further into our conversation, I tried to remind David of all his wonderful qualities, “you’re creative, you have a big heart…” David interrupted me, rolled his eyes and said, “I know all that Mom. You gave me that speech last week.” Oops.

We both laughed pretty loud after David reminded me of my tendency to rerun speeches. Oh well… sometimes in parenting, we hit home runs, sometimes we strike out and sometimes we’re the 7th inning stretch entertainment.

Blessings on your day, wherever you are!

The other evening, I walked up the stairs to Ana’s room to kiss her good night.  The door was closed and there were all sorts of angry noises issuing from the room.  With a sigh and a roll of the eyes, I knocked on the door.

“Who is it?”  Ana’s voice sounded frustrated.

I opened the door and walked in to find her bouncing from the bed to the wall, making exasperated “uhh” sorts of noises.

“Honey, what is the matter now?”

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In every family there are certain events that become bookmarks, placeholders in our lives.  When we relate the stories of our lives, events happen before and after these bookmarks.  Last night, Ana and I removed her “starter” earrings.  It went exactly as I thought it would, with her proclaiming, loudly, that I was “pinching her ear.”  The first earring took longer than the second to get out with many stops and starts in between.

When I had finally managed to remove both earrings, Ana was thrilled.  “That’s so cool!  I have holes in my ears.  Wow!”  She’s borrowing a pair of my hoop earrings until we can get her a pair of her own. After she put the first “new” earring in, she exclaimed,  “Wow… it just pokes right through!”  In the midst of all the excitement Ana managed to drop one of her starter earrings down the bathroom sink.  These were the earrings she was going to “keep forever.”  At least she has one left.  I don’t have either of mine.

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Today, after several years of becoming reacquainted with bike riding, it finally happened. I fell. I was actually heading towards the home stretch of my ride today, which happens to take me through a parking lot with speed bumps. I don’t like to take my bike over speed bumps so I cut the front tire to the right to avoid it…but I cut it a little too far.

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Last night, Ana sang in her first school chorus concert. We’re a little uncertain as to whether or not it will be her last. She’s not to sure she likes the teacher, and, from what I’ve heard, I’m not sure I like him either. We’ll see how she feels about it in the fall.

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Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.

So opens, Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy. It’s an interesting thought.  I’ve only just begun the book, so I’m not sure how this opening sentence might play out in the rest of the story, but I have thought about that idea quite a bit. Happy families are all alike. Do I know of any families I can say are truly, “happy.”  Maybe, but I think in modern times we have this idea of functional vs. Dysfunctional. I’m not sure that’s the best classification since there are now talk show hosts making their livings by saving “dysfunctional” families in neat 60 minute segments. This is probably why I don’t like talk shows.

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