No, just joking.

I am probably gonna die. How am I WORSE today that yesterday? I do not understand how illness works. 

Things are looking up!

We might not die after all.

Eleanor is still really sick, and I have to keep reminding myself that she's not being sick AT me. She just feels horrible, and it makes her really grumpy, and Geneva is now sick and SHE is really grumpy and I AM SO GRUMPY and anyway there's a lot of exasperation happening up in here. 

Also a lot of Cinderella and some more Pingu and then this evening I bullied Eleanor into going to dance class because I HAD TO LEAVE THE HOUSE. She is frankly terrible about getting out the door on a good day, even though she's always delighted to be at school or gymnastics or whatever. It's the tearing herself away from her projects, putting on her coat, she hates the whole rigamarole. 

So I hauled them both to dance and IT WAS VISITOR'S DAY which is the day we get to come watch the class and also TRYING ON COSTUMES DAY and basically I died. 

We drove there but she wanted to WALK home because she was all jacked up and I was like Hello that is not how cars work. Then she demanded FOOD ENERGY by which she meant supper, and even though she only ate like half of it, it wasn't cashews and oranges, which is all she's been eating till now. 

And tea. Duh. Now we just have to get through tomorrow and Thursday early morning because did I mention MY MOM IS COMING. My mom is coming to save us from ourselves, and all shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of things shall be well. 

Sick day: an itemized list

Things Eleanor refused to eat yesterday: breakfast, her pizza bun, the rest of her 'fancy cheese,' the rest of her tea, more than one cottage cheese pancake. 

Things we watched yesterday: Cinderella,The Jungle Book, almost Cinderella again but then just like three episodes of Pingu instead. 

Places we went yesterday: the store for sick-people food, the walk-in clinic just to make SURE she doesn't have influenza (we got our flu shots but also I am terrified of having to take my kids to the ER at like 3am when Joel's not here because then I have to bring them BOTH).

Times Eleanor woke up last night, coughing and wildly feverish: 2, unless you count the 8:30pm wake-up, which I do, because I was already in bed.

Time we were all up this morning: 5:45am. 

People who are sick in this house: allllll of us. 

Josie brought me some of her mom's chicken broth so I could make soup, and I drank some straight, from a mug, like a Victorian invalid. It was most restorative. Eleanor is missing a field trip today, she missed gymnastics last night. We are all missing Joel. 

We just have to get through all of today, and then all of three more days. 

Both my kids in bed before it's dark out.

Ughhhhhh yesterday was so great. Joel was sick so I took the girls to story time at the library, which Eleanor LOVES but which we never make it to now because the other story time days are preschool days and then Joel usually takes the girls out Saturday mornings and anyway, Eleanor was DELIGHTED.

I give them five minutes to fool around on the library computers and Geneva's always like, Hello yes, is this how I mouse?

And the afternoon was so warm, and everything was melting and there were rivers through the ice

and we spent like an hour sending sticks and twigs down the gutters

and then we had a snack outside in the playhouse, and then spent another half hour just, like, dumping snow into this puddle to see what would happen.

I am getting a ton of mileage out of these tiny snow shovels, I tell you what.

And this morning started off SO WELL (except for Eleanor's fever and cough, when she hadn't even gotten over the last cough yet. When will I feel better, she asked. I dunno, Eleanor. Maybe I'll feel better when I'm dead. Maybe you will.). LOOK AT DAT SUNSHINE.

We walked down to the farmer's market and got a brownie, and for some reason, every time she forked it, Geneva would scowl and say, scowlily, BROWNDIEEEEEE.

And then we went to the park and then got some samosas and walked home and everyone went to bed. Eleanor went STRAIGHT TO SLEEP because she is so sick, but Geneva just hung out in there, talking to herself and then telling me she had a poop and then CACKLING when I came in to change her and there was no poop YOUR PRANKS ARE NOT FUNNY GENEVA and then like two hours later I gave in and let her out.

HA HA LOOK AT ME I DON'T NAP. And then Eleanor woke up, and did I mention that I am also sick. And that Joel is gone for the week now. Anyway, Eleanor woke up sick and sad, and I cannot, so we had a Bonus Movie Day with tea.

Geneva is, like, incredibly serious about her tea consumption. Eleanor sits and sips it like a grown-up lady but Geneva doesn't even come up for air until her tea is gone, and then she refuses to relinquish her mug until you forcefully take it, and then she keeps glancing over at Eleanor's, saying Nohr! Tea! Drinkit! And I'm like, No you cannot drink Eleanor's tea. Anyway. That scene in Cinderella when Lucifer the cat is sneaking up on Gus Gus.

SO INTENSE, look at their leetle faces.

Geneva lost her mind at around 5 so I fed us all toast for dinner, which Eleanor did not eat, and then put the bird and her lost mind to bed. I talked Eleanor into eating like four saltines and having a bath, and then at 6:30 she was asking if she could go to bed, too. Now I'm waiting for her to fall asleep so I can go have my own bath, and go to bed, too.

THE WEATHERRRR

I feel like I'm not usually having this conversation until April, or at LEAST March, and I guess it's March now but IT HAS BEEN SO WARM.

I mean. Yesterday was like -30 and this morning was hella cold, but this afternoon! So warm! We walked home from Eleanor's dance class and our shadows were like HELLO IT IS SO SUNNY LOOK HOW LONG WE ARE.

We went to the park like every evening last week.

Joel was gone and we were feeling antsy and shiftless and mourning Cuba a little bit.

I feel like previous hot holidays have tided (tode?) me over, given me a little shot of warm to get me through whatever's left of winter. But I dunno. I just want to start putting my kids in short pants and flat shoes. I HATE MY BOOTS SO MUCH I COULD DIE.

Being in Cuba, having my kids running around with their little knees hanging out, their soft shoulders. There's something so intensely satisfying about your child's body, the shape of it and the way it moves and the way it holds still, and that's something I miss in the winter when everyone is clothed to the eyeballs. This grumpiness feels ungrateful in the face of the weather we've been having, and we are so grateful.

It's rainsuit season like half the time!

Stomp them puddles!

You do you, Geneva.

Gotta shovel dat sidewalk.

We walked to the farmer's market last Sunday! You can only do that if you're sure you're not gonna die, because it's like an hour walk.

The walk home is always dangerous because Geneva gets dozy, so I bought the girls a couple of flautas to keep them awake because I am a wizard of foresight. 

It is supposed to be positive degrees this weekend. Everything is gonna melt, there're gonna be so many puddles, I'm so delighted. 

We went to Cuba, part four

The food was terrible but THE BEACH WAS AMAZING. If I had any advice, it would be to bring something pink to wear or to put your kids in, because of how incredible it looks against the blue. Whether you are shell-hunting.

Or charging into the surf.

Or learning how to brace yourself against it.

It also makes you easy to spot when you are like GONNA CHASE SOME SEAGULLS BYEEEEE.

Most days, the beach was super windy and the waves were EXCITING, but there was one day where it was calm enough to walk way out to the sandbar. Hi guys! Hiiiiiiiiii!

Mom made the girls a blanket fort on the beach, mostly to help Geneva feel safe because even just being where the ocean could look at her was terrifying.

Geneva fell, like, five times a day, and scraped up her knees and then scraped up the scrapes and then she was twirling in the hallway and just twirled into a corner and bruised up her pretty forehead. DID SHE MIND goodness no.

Another family had some of those squirter thingies, and Eleanor used one to fill a bucket while Geneva just dipped hers in the water and then waved it around in the air, saying 'Swerrrrt!'

This is also how she squirted you with a water gun. You ain't swerting nobody, Geneva.

Mom and dad left, everyone was very sad, Eleanor was all, Now I won't have any fun and I was like, Eh, I think ya will.

Playing with a four-year-old in the ocean is fantastic, because they just want to fill a bucket full of water and then dump some sand into it and then stir it around, 'It's turtle soup!' and then dump it out again, and make little piles of 'food' by the tideline so the waves come up and eat it, or maybe they don't! Maybe the waves don't like sand-burgers! Also they are pretty into being mermaids.

I could have played with Eleanor in the ocean for DAYS but Geneva wouldn't let me. BE COOL, GENEVA. (No, it's fine. One day she'll be so cool she won't WANT to sit in my lap for hours at a time, and I will be sad about it because she still smells amazing and her solid little body is very satisfying to hold.)

Anyway. After mom and dad left, we made better friends with the kids with the squirty thingies, and Eleanor and the older girl spent HALF HOURS rinsing and drying and organizing their collection of shells.

Geneva kept luring the younger brother (he was like four) onto the bridge, she'd hunker down so she could peer up under his hat and she'd be like, Bidge? Biiiiiiiidge? Bidge. Bidge? And eventually Joel would take them both to the bridge and I'd lie back in my lounge chair and sun myself.

Geneva was, it has perhaps become clear, pretty needy on this trip. SO MANY NEW STUFFS, new bed, new food, scary water that moves, etc, so she would lug Snuggles around everywhere and once in a while, she'd nip out the door on the way to supper or wherever with him and we'd be all the way out of the building and I'd be like, HEY.

Which is how Snuggles found himself at the beach one day.

Geneva never really got the appeal of the waves, and here she is waving at the waves because she doesn't really understand homophones, either.

And then we flew home, and it was long and we got in at almost 1am and now we're home. Good trip, everyone!