Doll School

if you ever want to find me on a tuesday afternoon, get your shovel handy because your timing will coincide with Tuesday Folder day.  i will need to be dug out from under a pile of papers that come home; every activity they've completed in the past week -- every quiz, every in-class project, every practice sheet -- is crammed into those folders.  i usually give the contents a quick glance, sign my name that i have dutifully gone through them, and then, if i'm honest, put 99% of them straight into the recycling bin.

but recently susanna has begun requesting to keep many of her tests for Doll School.  so then that pile started adding up, to the point that i dragged down a plastic storage container from the attic leftover from my teaching days.  we relabeled the drawers to fit Miss Mann's needs so all these papers (and the necessary teaching supplies like extra pencils, paper, and rulers) now have a home.

today i lost track of susanna for a little while, until i heard her sweet voice coming from the dining room.  unsure who she was talking to, i found her in her educator glory, whiteboard in hand and globe within reach, hitting all the highlights of lewis and clark.  attentive students (and american girl dolls, fittingly) Caroline and Kit sat across the table from her, hanging on her every word.

the apple doesn't fall far from the tree, apparently.  (ha -- apple!  teachers!  how fitting.)

from the look on her face, the young teacher was annoyed at the interruption my camera caused -- but the students didn't seem to mind

wordless wednesday

one of my (many) new year's resolutions was to post on the blog at least twice a week.  one needs only to scroll a short way down to realize that hasn't happened.  (but i have been flossing daily!  score at least one upheld resolution for sara!)  so i thought i'd resurrect Wordless Wednesday, in an attempt to document our lives a little bit better than i have in recent months.

davidson joined richmond's conference this year in basketball, and while i don't know if this will always be the case, they wound up playing twice in january -- once at davidson, where they beat us by fourteen, and then two weeks later at richmond on a saturday evening.  months ago i bought tickets for the four of us to drive up and go to the game, arranging for us to stay with my college best friend / sorority sister alison and her family.  looking back, i now realize that chris accepted this proposal because he was confident it would be a fun game for him to watch; never did the thought enter his mind that his wildcats might lose to my spiders.

it was never even close.  the final score:  richmond - 89, davidson - 63.  (and husband - miserable.)

me with a spider headband (which garnered lots of compliments, i have to say), liam in his richmond shirt, susanna with a UR hairbow ... and chris with his davidson colors (and a forced smile on his face).  
yep, that ratio seems about right

susanna seems to have met her match in the creativity department with alison's three girls.  here are the winners of the air hockey "tournament" -- complete with medals around their necks and atop a makeshift three-tiered podium just like in the olympics.  elise won gold; liam, silver, and there must have been a tie between susanna and hunter for bronze.  
(and julia just joined the victors for a photo op)

roomies

i am in love.  with a dog.  more so than i have ever been before.  i feel sort of like i'm soulmates with little wonder wo ... even fourteen months after welcoming her into our family, i still feel the urge to shower her with kisses every time i see her.  if i ever happen to be sitting on the floor, she finds me and promptly reclines into my lap and flips for a belly rub.  and whenever we pull into our driveway, we always see her lounging on the front window seat, casually observing all the going-ons of the cul-de-sac -- and know that by the time we enter the house, she'll be standing in the mud room, her tail nub wagging as she serves as our welcoming committee. honestly ... is there anything better than a dog?

sadly, my children would say yes.  even though we've had dogs ever since they've been born, for whatever reason neither liam nor susanna are big canine fans.  this fact is always amplified whenever they have friends over who are dog lovers -- these other children dote on wonder, petting her and talking to her and even inviting her into their sleeping bags when they spend the night.  (she really is the sweetest thing.)  but liam and susanna hardly give her the time of day.  it hurts my heart a bit ... but wonder is undeterred.  she still follows them everywhere, attempts to coax them into playing with her, and yearns for their affection.  which, sadly, rarely comes.  hence my showering of hugs and smooches -- i try to make up for the lack of sibling love.

BUT -- we've recently made some strides, in a most unlikely way.  liam, for whatever reason, has recently developed a small fear of the dark.  the boy who has never once used a nightlight when going to bed all of a sudden is certain that someone is in his room.  right after we kiss him goodnight, chris and i are required to check his closet before firmly shutting the door.  he started requesting that the hall light be left on, and even after sweeping the premises for boogeymen, he is still convinced he is hearing things in the dark, unable to fall asleep.

so what is a frustrated pair of parents to do?  look no further than the four-legged brown friend in our midst, of course.  she lives up to her name: wonder wo mann to the rescue!

figuring that our superhero deserves a throne, we pulled in liam's old monogrammed stuffed chair from the playroom and set it up at the foot of his bed.  and now, every night after saying prayers, wonder crawls into it, curls up, and serves as liam's protector. a boy/pooch sleepover, every night of the week.  whether or not they fall asleep whispering about cute girls in his class, i'll never know.  

but the love is there ... 

liam decided to pretend he was asleep for this staged photo.  
for some reason, wonder wouldn't close her eyes on command.  must work on that