There, but for the grace of God

My hands have finally stopped trembling enough to type.

Miss Cheeks fell down the stairs this morning. She pushed on the baby gate at the top of the stairs and it gave way. Riding the gate like a surfboard, Cheeks fell, head first, down six steps, skittering to a stop at the first landing.

When I heard the crash, I ran from the kitchen and Dear Husband ran from the other end of the playroom (he had been steps away when this happened). Cheeks screamed and screamed, but it quickly became apparent that she was crying from fear more than any injury. By the grace of God, she was fine, with the exception of a big bruise on her forehead.

By a strange coincidence, the fall took place 20 minutes before we were supposed to take Bee to the pediatrician, so we loaded both of them up in the wagon and rolled them down the street to their doctor's office (which is only two blocks away). The doctor checked Cheeks over and reassured us that she is fine.

She's napping now, but I cannot help but check on her every few minutes, in order to be reassured by her quiet breathing.

It is truly gut wrenching to think just how easily our little ones can be hurt, whether it's from a fall, or mischief in the medicine cabinet, or a car accident. Despite our best efforts, we cannot hold on to our children every minute. Accidents happen.

This is why I pray.

tuesday bluesday

It's after 9 pm and I'm still in my work clothes. I'm wrung out from a long day at work and two little girls who did not go quietly to bed tonight.

There are gardening gloves on the floor of my living room. I'm not quite sure why, but think that Cheeks deposited them there earlier in the evening. The washing machine is full of wet clothes that need to be switched to the dryer.

The gloves can stay where they are. The laundry will wait.

I have been hiding out on my little balcony, watching the very last rays of sun slip below the horizon. Swatting away the first mosquitoes of the season. Watching the cars drive down my street, their headlights ribbons of light on the pavement. Just doing nothing for a little while. A little nothing is some of the best medicine.

Appalled. . .with two Ps

My mother experienced quite a shock when she picked up Miss Bee from daycare last Friday. As they were about to leave, Bee said, "Wait, Mimi, wait! I forgot my billy club."

"Billy club?"

And indeed it was.

Miss Bee's special project of the week was to make a police baton/night stick/people whacker. And she had learned, as part of her unit just what police officers do with those batons.

"They hit people!"

I'm all for learning about community helpers, but hand painting carefully cut and glued paper towel rolls with multiple layers of black paint to make an authentic looking billy club, well, that's just going a bit too far. What's next, paper mache handguns?

And plus, if you're a four and a half year old with a little sister who gets on your nerves periodically, what would you do with a pretend billy club? Whack your sister, of course.

I know that as my children grow up, the world will rush in the the force of an ocean wave, washing away the sandcastles and fairy lands of childhood. But for a little while yet, I will be standing in front of that wave, diverting the water as best I can with my hands and feet and buckets. These early years are supposed to be the magical ones. Billy clubs have no place in my kingdom.

Small victory

Our washing machine has been acting up. It tried and groaned and tried and groaned but just couldn't manage to spin all the water out of the clothes in the load.

Due to a stroke of luck, we had exactly one week remaining on our one-year warranty and called a repairman without delay. We finally found one that could come on a Saturday.

Saturday morning, we shoveled the piles of dirty clothes out of the way so that the repair man could reach the washer. The repairman arrived (on time!) with a belt full of tools but refused to make any promises about whether he could fix the machine.

He had it fixed within 10 minutes. Evidently the inner workings of the washer were jammed with not one, not two, but FIVE baby socks. Whirlpool washers have got some powerful spin action.

For $3 at Target we were able to buy a mesh laundry bag that will prevent this calamity from happening again.

So let that be a word of warning to all you parents washing small socks.

TIme capsule

I got my luggage back from Christchurch on Friday. I had tracked its progress online all week, as it passed through New Zealand's rigorous customs inspection, traveled to Hong Kong to be x-rayed, and then on to Cincinnati to pass through U.S. customs.

It finally arrived, all my personal items, painstakingly gathered from my damaged hotel in Christchurch and packed back up into my suitcase. My favorite jeans. My passport. My house keys. My laptop computer.

My laptop had to be shipped separately, due to the lithium battery inside. Tne package containing my computer was covered with so many warning labels you might have mistaken it for a shipment of dynamite.

Once I figured out how to put the battery back into the computer, I opened the screen and it popped right back on. I evidently hadn't turned the computer off the morning of February 22 and my email inbox and news articles from that day were still on the screen. Eerie.

It's all back in order now. My suitcase has been put away, dirty laundry washed and folded. Although myc experience in the Christchurch earthquake is something I will remember for the rest of my life, I think that I can finally now say that I have come home.

En plein air

outside kids

Read Bee her bedtime stories out on our balcony tonight. You would have thought I had served her the moon on a silver plate, she was so excited. We read "Harold and the Purple Crayon," and if you don't know the story, there's Harold, he has a purple crayon, and he draws what the author narrates. Or the author narrates what he draws. It's a nice little literary paradox.

As we read "Harold" and watched the sun set on our street. We are soaking up this beautiful spring weather as much as possible before the mosquitoes crash the party.