rolling along

went to see the-rapist yesterday. (was it yesterday? yeah...yesterday was monday, right?) and that was good. nothing major that i needed help working on...just went through a bunch of stuff. she listened. commented when she felt like it. i listened. it was good stuff...

spent yesterday cleaning my house up. well, first i ran errands with my eldest. (who my youngest calls the teenager) bought plants for his experiment for biology, dog food and rabbit food, and then ice cream. just the essentials, you know? THEN i cleaned house. and bathed my dogs. just the little one, really. the big one is, well, too big and i don't like to bathe her a lot. so eldest brushed her while i bathed the little dog, miss kitty. now they're inside, which is where they belong, but since moving a year and a half ago, it has not been a smooth transition for the dogs. we have carpet and it's just generally sucked trying to bring them in. and then i get tired or overwhelmed and the dogs keep living outside, only coming in at night, which is not the way we roll. but it has been the way we've been rolling...so we've not been rolling very well, very true. and bringing the dogs in helped that. (why does it seem i was spiraling around this concept? spreading it out further and further, making it longer and longer, getting near the point, but then making another loop?...i dont' know...maybe it's just me.)

i sort of prepared for co-op last night. and i helped my children get all of their homework done. mostly it was eldest who had homework. it has just been so busy. and there's my spouse, all

"so why are we doing this so late on monday night?"
and i'm like, "don't be an ass."
and he says, "well, i don't mean to be an ass and i realize it's not really inspirational, but it needs to be said so that he'll think about this next time."
and so i say, "yeah? when do you think you'll get to your research project due this year, dear? last minute like your whole life? maybe some people will think about it but others are just looking for their chance to be the ass, ok?"
and we laugh. (thank god we laughed...hehe)

today was co-op. and rock climbing. the rock climbing teacher is trying to find a way to get eldest on their climbing team. it is entirely too expensive for us to finance this. we are stretching ourselves to remain members of the gym and let the kids take the class. but he was commenting on what a graceful climber eldest is. graceful. he's been my kid his whole life and i don't think he's ever done a thing that someone would call graceful. he has always been so challenged in balance and gross motor stuff. but he does climb gracefully. with this big old body he's growing...i mean big young body he's growing, it's like his wings are finally in.

and that is the best part about rolling along right now. when they were babies, i remember not wanting to look away from them for a minute...fearful i'd miss something. i wanted to absorb it all, remember it all, be there to see and feel it all...mostly because i had a sense of how fleeting it was. and when i'd see other babies, i'd remember mine being babies, too..and that sense. but now i look at them, and i feel remarkably the same way. like i need to memorize every aspect of them because they are growing and they are changing...they are becoming their own people...in ways so different from when they were babies...deeper...more complex. listening to their words, hearing their humor, watching their eyes. this is all so fleeting, too. i enjoy my children in ways i never anticipated. they are amazing people. i am so proud of them and happy for them. they are not perfect...and indeed, their imperfections and how they handle that are some of the things i'm most amazed by. i guess we hold on to these times because we don't know what the future holds. but so far, the future's been a good place. and we just keep rolling along...

peace