Segments from Claire's Letter

Dear Grandma,
     On recess I like to play with the nice boys and do their games.  And sometimes I play horses with Sara and Emma and Camber.  I like playing with Natalia and Camilla too.  When I play with them I like to do a game where one of us is the troll and the others get to choose what forest animal they want to be.  We play that because we did Three Billy Goats Gruff for our school play.  I was a bunny.  I loved saying my part.  My part was "We could cross over the rickety rackety bridge.  The grass is tall and green over there."  One of the blackbirds threw up at close to the end of the play.  (What I mean by "throw up" is barf.)  It was really gross.
....
      In study hall I really like making books.  I once wrote a book about a ghost named Todd and a ghost named Alli.  Todd ate Alli because he was at a funeral and there was no food.  He didn't want to eat the dead ghost and so he ate Alli.

Love,
Claire Margaret Bevans

Eden declared to me earlier today that "boys are handsome and girls are beautiful."  Trying to get her to reveal her little three-year-old crush, I asked her if she knew any handsome boys.  She thought about it for a minute and then looking at the little baby we watch, said, "Zoe's daddy is handsome."

"What about your daddy," I asked.

"He's not handsome," she told me.

"He's not!?"  I asked.  "Why not?"

"He's not handsome because he's beautiful," she explained.  "He's beautiful because he shares his Goldfish with me."

I haven't shared that conversation with him yet...I'll guess I'll figure out how he feels about all this when he reads this :)

Dance Recital

Pretty much the cutest dancers and choreography I've ever seen. 

No One

No One in my house:

Lost the bottom of the camping lantern when the power went off

Broke a vase from my wedding

Always eats all the cereal

Left dirty dishes in the office, not once, not twice, but 10 gazillion times

Took the zit cream from my bathroom

Returned the zit cream to the wrong place

Misplaced Claire's ballet shoes

Lost the H to the alphabet sound toy

Ate the food that spilled on the rug that kids are forbidden to eat on

Keeps eating the chocolate chips

Drew on the bench

Scratched the desk

Ate the rest of the Goldfish

Made any of the messes

Antique Dorks

In order to make sure I don't forget, I have to take a few moments to write down this story.  I went to an antique store with a couple of friends yesterday, and we had a laugh over an old framed daguerreotype (probably circa mid 1800's) which looked something like this (thanks to my photoshopping skills):

My friend made the observation that it was probably the only photograph this man would have in his lifetime and, as luck would have it, his eyes were crossed.  Ok, it was more likely a genetic thing going on with his eyes, but it makes a better story to think that during his once-in-a-lifetime photographic moment he made a dumb face.  Puts your bad middle school picture into perspective, doesn't it?


So then my friend is reminded of an ancestor's picture with a story behind it.  Evidently, the man refused to pose for a photograph his whole life, so when he died, someone drew eyes on his eyelids and THAT'S how he's represented for generations since.  I imagine (again, thanks to my photoshopping skills) that it looks something like this (and if I ever get a copy of the actual photograph, I'll be uploading it for posterity):

I'll assume you're intelligent enough to figure out what the moral of the story is.

You know those origami fortune tellers you used to make out of the program every week at church?  I found one Brooke made out of a worksheet she had in class.  

 Makes me think of a quote: "You have a dark gift, Sarah Baker"

Poopy Towel: The Sequel

I had hoped that the Poopy Towel incident would've been a one-time occurrence.  Then I found this:

(although I suppose this one should've been number one, and the poopy towel should've been the sequel, if you know what I'm saying)

Don't ask me why the person in the picture has both boobs AND a beard.  I don't know why and I would never venture that far into the psyche of the artist without leaving a trail of breadcrumbs.