new video recording and Slovenians arrive! (358/365a)

charades

Video recording today starting at 8:30, that meant makeup at 7:30, that meant leaving at 7, that meant waking up...... too early, especially after yesterday's late night.

I got back from the recording right before Mary and Martin arrived with Agnes. The easter bread making was in full swing, eggs had been boiled (more than half of them had cracked!) shopping had been done.

then in the evening easter vigil mass (first time centa or i had been in a church here where "nobody did anything mean" ... )... i got there a little after 6pm for rehearsal, and mass finished a little after 10pm. theodore was still awake, ostensibly to wait for the easter fire, so we tried a tiny easter fire, that is, 2 branches of our dried out christmas tree, and i sang the melody from the ave verum, then theodore was off to bed. so from 10:30pm till 1am centa, brian and i cooked and cleaned so that pretty much everything would be ready for tomorrow morning. tonight will be another short night.

good friday (357/365a)

all the favorites

Almost not home at all today.... early morning rehearsal with quintet, we tried out new arrangements of wedding music, and also practiced some things for our next recordings. barely home, just for some food, although there was the idea of fasting... then good friday service. we played the 7 last words again, but Nadja played the cello instead of Olena, so we had to go through the music a few hours in advance. The church was in Gratkorn, very old fashioned, and very nice.

who cleans the cobwebs off the ceiling at church?

don't know how we're going to get all the family/tradition stuff done for easter.....

holy angry thursday (356/365a)

theodore and henry went to a chess course, 3 hours, in the morning. they learned cool things: first they played with only pawns, to teach them the power of formations, and the learned about castling, checkmate methods, and other details. together they would have probably won against me, if they hadn't distracted each other and lost focus.

the plot thickens.

everyone is maybe stircrazy, or starting to get sick? everyone fought with everyone all day today. I almost couldn't stand it anymore. i just wanted to have a quiet, calm, contemplative day. we finally got everyone together for dinner in the end, only a little after 8pm. 

freeee day! (355/365a)

i made up a story about a tree

i was awakened to the new story about a tree that gets blown over by the wind. :) we all have imagination.

i went for a long walk with manuela at night, and we stopped for some vegan fast food on our way home. :)

tired tuesday (354/365a)

happy again before bed

:) we almost didn't get felix to leave this morning, and he was sad all day, wherever he was, but he also didn't want a nap.

i went for a long walk on the plabutsch by myself while theodore toured the jolly company (they make colored pencils).

no matter how tired felix was, and how tired we were, brian and i went out to a social swing dance together, and walked home very late. i need new shoes. :)

musical monday (353/365a)

oh my joy! i got to play family string quartets... actually just a half a movement, but still, real, mozart.

rehearsing how to look at each other

give me your biggest violin smile!

we spent a few hours practicing the first half of the second movement of mozart's first quartet. he wrote it when he was 14. it's pretty simple, but not boring.

i still have my headache from yesterday, but oddly music doesn't bother it. squeaking (voices or strings) whining, jumping all do though.

i pulled myself together enough to take everyone to the opera so Theodore could try on his Midsummer Nights Dream costume, and then off to Irmtraud's to paint a few eggs. The idea was basically intended for adults to paint eggs, so I had the only children there, but they held their own for sure. We left when Felix told me he was so hungry he would eat up the house. We got home late, ate late, and went to bed late. The evil's of daylight savings time still follow us.

Felixäs first egg, flowers and cracks

the sun is negative space

the line-up: felix, henry, theodore, me

palm sunday (352/365a)

"palms"

daylight savings time part two. Man do I miss that extra hour already. I'll get it back for my birthday though!

i wanted to take the kids into town to be part of the blessing of the palms... and i did! except we had exactly 3 pussy willow branches and 3 sad flowers from the decaying funereal wreath tied with a string, all that i put together in the last possible minute on our way out. that extra hour! we came home to an absolutely glorious meal of fresh crunchy delicious vegetables that brian had put together. *living food* mmm... vitamins. 

brian fixed the dryer, by installing a new belt. unfortunately, the thing has a limited amount of life left. the bolt that holds the entire thing together, and that the drum sits on and spins on has been worn down from finger thickness to needle thinness, and broke off during the repair, so it's operating on kind of borrowed time. 

sunday bike rides and reading and playing music and other such fun things until i started to get a headache, which just got worse and worse until i went to sleep.

board game saturday (351/365a)

What better way to spend the afternoon of the first day of holiday? We got ready for bed early in all the excitement of having Manuela for a visit. She brought the game Tintenblut to play, but we were all (adults too) overwhelmed by the game play and rules, so we are saving that for another day.

Theodore and Felix comment on what the next moves should be.

We take a break to drink tea

Theodore uncovers his newest game. Brian listens to the rules

Types of cards with a board... The game has potential, only needs some tweaking

passion friday (350/365a)

the day began with a weird bomb thing. in world war ii the allies dropped lots and lots of bombs here, most of which went off. but every once in a while, we find one, i guess, and then people go nutso. they evacuated everyone within 100m of the thing, knocking on doors one by one. we were 2 doors away from being evacuated. instead we weren't allowed to leave our house or come back if we were already out. streets were closed and buses rerouted. it was a little over drama but also quite surreal. the school called and told us we had to come get our kids, and the police man didn't want to let brian and the kids onto our street. then they deactivated the bomb and somehow everything was back to normal in a matter of a few minutes.

roadblock.
they would drive down the street mumbling into airhorns, but nobody understood them.
ingrid next door heard we should "keep our windows open"
and i heard we should "keep our windows closed"
who knows?
also weird flashbacks to a time i didn't live in with german commands being given over loudspeakers

when everything was calm again, we went to the playground, and i chatted until the last possible minute, and left all mine there for a lasagna supper and i went off to change my clothes as fast as possible, put on my pretty stuff for a concert tonight.

TONIGHT!

detail on the door

i made it there in time, but everyone else was late ;) that meant i had time to look at the details on the big hammered metal door haha. we still got a little sound check in before the audience arrived. and i was so surprised! Theodore was there! He wanted to see the concert so much he left alone, took the bus there, and sat in the front row. After the first half he was already so tired I called Brian to pick him up, but he seemed to enjoy it. The Kaiser Quartet was really very well played, I think, but also more entertaining as a piece, especially for someone 8 years old. The second half of the concert, "The Seven Last Words of our Savior on the Cross" was a little more dark, somber, and consisted only of different types of slow movements.

Afterwards we went out for pizza. The place we had a reservation was already closed (what!?) and we ended up at an italian place with the slowest service ever ;) stayed out way too late, but since the service was so slow, i also didn't drink too much ;)

in which i study photography (349/365a)

but....

:) i sometimes get confused at my role in life. as a passionate photographer who has my camera on manual nearly all the time, i quite often without thinking take truly awful pictures, compared to my friends' one click auto-adjusted smartphone... yet with thinking i believe some of them turn out quite nicely. when i dare to agree to be the photographer, i want to be in charge. 

well, i wasn't allowed in this case, i was told mulitiple times that "you are the photographer, but...." (i think we should stand here, this backdrop is better, the light should be here, the shadows do this, let's turn around, etc) .....and eventually i gave in, and we got a weird shadowy overexposed color-diffuse picture, for which we had to climb over a garden fence and sink into the very damp ground in our high heels. what's done is done. 

i spent the early morning hours first making dinner for 20 kindergarten kids, 2 big loaves of bread, an enormous pot of soup, then baking a cake. brian called it a "fail cake" - an i'm sorry i didn't tell you that i would be late to my rehearsal (even though i did) ... then everyone else was late for rehearsal, so we didn't have cake until afterwards, when people were rushing out the door. at least we played through everything. i didn't get a chance to meet up with pauli, unfortunately, because the times didn't work out. i was glad there was still soup left over from the kindergarten, which meant i didn't have to cook *again* ... 

i really really really wanted to go see elke solo with an orchestra in leoben, but logistics of driving there so far and so late were too much for me (gone are the days where an hour of driving both ways is no trouble at all) .... instead i took theodore and henry downtown to see them play the eroica. well, henry left after the first half, and the eroica was in the second half. theodore almost didn't stay awake the whole time either. at home though it took over an hour to get him to bed, he was so cranky and tired. oops. i hope tomorrow isn't horrible.

rip hubert (348/365a)

it was a tough day for centa, she had to deliver the speech that ingrid didn't think she would be able to speak through, the eulogy for ingrid's father, hubert. the speech was beautifully written, and i cried many tears too. centa did a bang up job, and everyone was impressed.

the dinner afterwards, and then the cake afterwards was full of people i only kind of know, from seeing them go in and out next door. i was a little out of my element socially, even driving to the reception restaurant with hubert's grandchildren, and centa, in spite of me not being particularly close.

a beautiful quote from kafka:
one sees the sun setting slowly and is then shocked to find that it's suddenly dark.

ingrid insisted on everyone picking up their arrangements, so we took home 1000lbs of flowers and left them (a little morbidly) on our picnic table.

in memory

That night we had some comic relief in the form of Zoolander, while Brian and Kris went Lindy hopping. trading a eulogy for a eugoogalie was definitely a good idea. ;)

double booked (347/365a)

good morning!

felix in a great mood this morning. totally fun to get him dressed in 11 layers to go outside (it's cold again, boohoo)... he stole my scarf so he could "trick the kindergarten" and make them "think i'm you." that is, that he was me. the resemblance is startling.

brian fixed my bike for me, because he loves me! that means that i am again unstoppable in this city!

this evening i was double booked for a very clear cut reason. i told our violinist in the quartet (sms and phone) ... she responded, said she understood that i would be there an hour later than we had said, and when i got there, after stressing through my first rehearsal so i could leave "on time" (early) she was very upset and annoyed that i was "late" ....... she doesn't listen! anyways, we played through stuff, didn't rehearse so much, and all i wanted to do when i got home was watch an episode of frasier to take my mind off of my annoyance (in which frasier refuses to let roz be in charge and does not listen to any suggestions). zen, irma, zen.

all is calm.. (346/365a)

trying to get more likes...

:) monday was a kind of a holiday. school was out, kindergarten not. some government offices closed, stores open. bus lines normal, traffic weird. i don't know why there's this weird thing.

mostly theodore and i did nothing. i had cool ideas planned for our day off, but they were unanimously in favor of just playing quietly, and that is of course their prerogative. i brought them to chorus (still on for today) on my way to ui rehearsal. met thomas on the way to pick up music for easter. snow was lightly falling. is it spring is it winter? is it a holiday or not? just tell me, world!

we practiced for a few hours just four of us, and then again with sophia, as a complete quintet. it was actually very productive. barbara took some photos and videos and does all the social media stuff... i was generally uninspired to photograph anything at all.

then another lindy hop class, which was very good. THIS time (i hope) we'll practice during the week!

to the opera in borrowed boots (345/365a)

centa <3

I took Henry to see Theodore sing with the opera choir at a church service today, where I had the very embarrassing situation of sitting in the seats reserved for the choir because I didn't think they would need them. Once I was there, I was stuck. I got a few dirty looks from those around me, but really I was glad to be there. In that church, everyone past the first row can't see anything, and anything past the first few rows can't really hear anything.

picture stolen from andrea's facebook

I was going to go straight to quartet rehearsal, but that was postponed, so I got to enjoy sunday early afternoon at home, relaxing (i mean, practicing) .... I was already looking forward to Figaro in the evening... on my way to rehearsal, it dawned on me that since it was sunday, it was probably starting at 6pm, not 7:30 like usual, which meant I would have to go directly to the opera, and .. hmm.. i really wasn't dressed for it, but maybe I could leave early enough to fly home, change, and get there.

Instead, our rehearsal dragged on and on, got longer and longer, we didn't stop for a dinner break like we planned. Instead, we rehearsed up until the last minute, when one of the violins drove me directly to the opera. I borrowed a pair of her nicer looking old shoes, only 2 sizes too big, so I didn't have to wear my snow boots. The opera was sold out, so we stood the whole time... the first half was ok, the singers weren't really with the orchestra the whole time and vice versa. The second half was much better, and the only thing was very entertaining. Nina watched it all without knowing what was going on, and without access to the super titles, since we can't see them from the standing spots.

Afterwards we found Centa and Caroline who were there together in honor of Centa's recent birthday) and Centa came with us to have chinese food dinner (my first real food outside of a mango and a piece of chocolate, oh healthy me) ... the bar was closed though, so no fun drinks.

We walked part of the way home listening to cake, and part of the way in mostly silence, listening to the crunch of the icy thin snow beneath the soles of other peoples' shoes.

no gestiefelter kater (344/365a)

no show today

comfortable rainy saturday with a trip to the opera to see "Puss in Boots" wearing boots... we were disappointed to find it had been cancelled.... the decision then was to go home together and make pancakes instead. gloriously fluffy buckwheat pancakes. 

who needs passive entertainment?

more quartet rehearsing haydn today. i was sick and cranky inside and the world was wet and cold outside i took a taxi there... then listened to a 20 minute lecture on how taking taxis was the same as throwing my money away and how i could just buy a car instead. we rehearsed well though, and not even that long. i got home before kids' bedtime, and i even got to practice for a few hours.

no picture! (343/365a)

i took 2 cameras and 3 lenses with me everywhere today, like carrying around a bag of rocks, but didn't take them out of the bag, although i could have!

in response to theodore talking about simple fractions, brian wanted to get to percents/decimals...
asking theodore, what's another way to say a half
he says ... 3/6ths 4/8ths etc... all correct.
brian waits for another answer.. maybe 50/100ths...
then henry pipes up "four halves of a quarter!"

there was a milk today that smelled a little bit off and the expiration date was today. there's even a time of expiration. theodore was convinced that the milk went bad exactly on 16.mar.2018 at 19:05.

theodore and i did the last rehearsal for thomas' little orchestra today, and it was so long but we were both well behaved (not like the kid who was hitting his sister on the head with his bow!) we read a book aloud on the tram (der verlorene prinz von dombrowski) and found at least 20 constellations from the top of the LEND hotel at the end of our street. we decided against seeing an opera together on the way home. it was late and we were both falling asleep. instead i watched operation petticoat on my own and chatted with centa for a while when she got home.

two beautiful concert rooms (342/365a)

8am rehearsal for our 11am playing at a doctorate ceremony at the technical university.
klaus was busy overseeing auditions at the opera so he came just before our playing started, and left immediately afterwards, leaving us to our all-women post performance champagne reception.

sometimes the only pictures i get are horrible. i mean really horrible. i think i should give my camera away.

anyways, i saw a poster for a concert on my way home that was happening tonight at the congress, so i tried to make plans to go see it. i eventually found a violinist i know who wanted to go, and i found out it costed a lot, and was in the chamber music hall that i've never been in before. good thing i was with a music student, and she finagled us free tickets. cool! the room was astoundingly beautiful and the acoustics were perfect. afterwards over pizza we talked musician shop ;)

from the last row.

puk's birthday (341/365a)

we called tante puk first thing in the morning but skype only let us leave a voicemail for her birthday. our 4 part birthday canon was actually in four parts for once. not bad! a little sad of course that we didn't get to actually talk to them.

i'm pretty much fully sick now, cough-y and sore, and so i did my best to spread the germ love far and wide. took felix to chorus, picked up my newly rehaired bow, stopped at the library, walked home over the marketplace. the clouds were gorgeous!

clouds over mariahilferplatz

Then I was priviledged to have been invited to go see Max Raabe in the Stadthalle with Andrea, the mom of a school friend of Henry's. It was surely a fantastic show, and we went out for a glass of wine afterwards. Brian came and ran to me on the way home, and we walked the last km together. <3 

sick visit (340/365a)

my three are the active ones on the right
i got dizzy just watching them "wind up" the swing for spinning

I'm definitely sick! But not... suuuper sick, just a teeny bit. just enough to have something to complain about. the weather is so nice and warm and sunny but i'm cold and tired all the time. for days theodore and henry have wanted to "visit kindergarten" and go for a walk. our spring mushroom walk was me standing basically still and the kids climbing trees around me. we didn't go very far.

i drove home, and basically wanted to sleep, but spent the evening in a late night quartet rehearsal, that was a thousand times more productive than last time, thank goodness... now i self-medicated with some jack d. but my throat is like sandpaper.

it's not all about the food... (339/365a)

According to Nina, not all pictures have to be about food...

in this case, with fresh lemons brought back directly from spain, made into yummy lemon tart bars...

they were really that yellow!

....i just had to!

things moved around a little bit, quintet rehearsal was postponed to another day, and my elke lesson was much later, and a little shorter than normal. that gave me enough breathing room to live normally, and i even got to lindy hop on time. brian and i walked home, and looked up at the stars for a moment. well, that's not accurate exactly. i walked home, and brian did "high knees" the entire way home. after a lindy hop lesson that was entirely charleston hopping, that's quite a workout!

unfortunately, when we got home, we found out that our neighbor's elderly father, Hubert, had died today. he grew up alongside my grandfather (7 years younger) ... and at nearly 90 he quite often confused me for the neighbor next door named irma, who of course, was my grandmother.

spring forward, fall right back again, oops (338/365a)

after the late night (almost 2am!) my alarm clock rang out earlier than i really wanted... exactly an hour earlier. i groggily remembered that i had somewhere seen something about daylight savings time, and resignedly set my clock an hour ahead. i had slept downstairs alone because henry had been taking up more than half our bed when i got home. i told brian i was going to head out for my 9am rehearsal, and he told me, it was only 7. oh no! my computer had set itself by american daylight saving time, i had lost an hour of sleep, only to find i had gained back 2 groggy hours. a bad trade!

quartet rehearsal went fine enough, although i gave several good suggestions with good reasoning and did not feel listened to. they aren't all meant to last forever, i guess.

i did get really excited to find we still had 2 or 3 more kumquats that i could use to make pretty candies. unfortunately, not everything always works out the way we want to, i guess.

me: is something burning downstairs?
brian: yes, your thing in the oven
me: what? i thought i asked you to take it out
brian: i thought you said it was fine

sleep and outdoors are both the best medicine: pick your poison (337/365a)

family fun today included theodore heading out to do a stadtrundgang with fritz and some other kids from the asp (coming back covered entirely in mud, super tired, and extremely happy and eager to share all the things he learned with all of us)

in the meantime i wanted to take henry for his own walk and felix for his own walk... plans went by the wayside, because henry, apparently, was fighting something with his immune system and basically went to sleep for the rest of the day sometime after lunch... after napping most of the morning. we woke him up for his cello lesson thinking he should be well rested now, and when the half hour was over he walked right back up the stairs and fell into bed again.

so i took felix for a walk, and another walk, and then we went to get theodore and the three of us went for another walk, after dropping off theodore's backpack and bike at home. to say they were sleepy tonight would be an understatement. ;)

the two on the mur

we tried to catch the sunset, but waiting two light cycles to cross the street to get to the bridge was too long for nature and by the time we got there there was only the faintest glow left, nothing like the extreme colors we saw. sunsets are so fast!

the last of the sunset

at home again, theodore and centa and i started looking through the music of one movement of mozart's first string quartet (k80) which we want to play as a family because henry doesn't want to play in a recital "all by himself"... also because string quartets are fun!

then i headed to nina's to meet a new friend and have awesome girls night. so much funny conversation and good food and so many laughs. right after that i took nina along to a friendly evening at jackie's and andi's which had at some point turned into game night. we played a fun card game called "wizard" with the funniest looking cards ever. the explanation of the "history of the game" included a made up Dr. Hensch Stone who found these cards at... ... ...stone henge... 

i was surprised how late it was when i got home, but guess what? i saw stars again! clear skies!

viva la music (336/365a)

The entire morning and early afternoon was back and forth from competition to school to home to school to competition back home (ah the joys of being the mama shuttle)

Theodore did his best, and I think had fun. The judges were very nice, and gave very helpful feedback. Theodore won a 2.prize and was very proud.

The atmosphere was, however, for me, a little bit gross... a bunch of parents grooming their kids to compete in musicality, and the truth is, they are all approximately the same, give or take, except for one kid who far outranks for whatever reason, but is still within the realm of norm in terms of what's possible in the world. And all the kids are nervous and trained smile. I was glad we had just told him that it was a little "mini concert" ...

with his certificate.

It was a nice to balance that environment with the relaxing one of the abenteuerspielplatz, and some dadkidmade banana muffins for tea-time.

baking with 4 men in the kitchen. <3

Sunday Brunch on a Thursday? (335/365a)

mimosas and coffee and breakfast (and of course, the thing humans need most! water and sunlight)

three tulips from brian (because i wrote them on the shopping list ;) )

H is for Henry and Homework

Nobody is allowed to say a word or sing along or make any noise at all while Felix plays

It was a magical morning of spontaneous toasting to "WOMEN'S DAY" and to "Sunday" with Mimosas... Centa and Brian shared in some toasting, but then headed to work. Nina and I reveled in our non-working morning though eventually I had to leave to pick up kids to the kindergarten.

Brian was at his scala meetup that night, and us others had a nice relaxing evening going to bed a little earlier than usual. Theodore has his competition tomorrow morning, at 9am, which means he at least, will get to sleep in a little...

we don't have to do something every day... (334/365a)

bedtime for boys by the light of the globe

It's fine if some days are mostly "empty" ... even with our regular routine we have enough to do. school, kindergarten, choir, cooking.... we were supposed to go over to a friends' house after school, but they are sick and canceled, and somehow we filled the time just fine.

I got a visit from Nina, and got to meet Michi for coffee afterwards. The sun was shining for the first day in 2 weeks. The little lendplatz cafe was open for the first time in months. We sat outside and basked in the sun before I had to go back home.

In the evening I drove Nina to pick her parents up from the airport... like the "tomorrow diet" ... I will leave on time next time and not stress anybody out. I may be just a little too relaxed about getting places at the correct time. But oh joy, I got home early enough to see my guys all snuggle up together in the attic reading stories. <3

We also had the fun luxury of leaving for a little bit, and walking over to Jackie&Andi's for some wine, and teaching them some bridge - we played two hands, and discussed about 3% of all the rules. ;)

Ersatzkindergarten (333/365a)

so much snow, so much wind! a slow start in the morning, and then the phone call from Brian "I can't get the car up the hill to the kindergarten, are you doing anything this morning?"

So kindergarten was moved to our house for four kids...

We built snowmen and a gigantic igloo, we had snacks, and I played the guitar in the soft snowfall. We sang kindergarten songs, and stayed outside the whole time (in spite of occasional whining)... I made a big pot of soup, and we ate together on the porch.

"We should have ersatzkindergarten every day!" they shouted....

reading in the snow

lunch time (i think felix packed a book for lunch...)

When theodore got home I took him to his last mini rehearsal for the competition... it's good for him, but exhausting for him too to do all these extra little things.

Typical full Monday (332/365a)

barbara's selfie

I am so glad that Barbara does all the social media updates for our group - I wouldn't want to do all that. She takes the pictures, posts at opportune times, answers comments, likes other people's stuff... I just have to go to rehearsal and everything works out. :)

At Theodore's lesson he was getting ready for his competition on Friday...  (the word competition screams YUCK to me, but it is what it is.. we just tell him a little concert, and afterwards people will tell him suggestions for better playing.

Centa read the kids to bed while Brian and I were at dance class (I was ontime for once!) ... it was a particularly good class, I thought. Maybe we will start practicing together during the week if we don't get so exhausted from living through Monday...

keep praaacticing... (331/365a)

felix asks: how did you take a picture of yourself?

(eta: i am catching up on being a bit behind on blogging... it's important to me that I take a picture every day and write something about it, but I don't always get around to posting, and now I feel like i'm insurmountably behind, but I won't let that stop me from trying to finish out the year!)

Mondays are lesson days for all of us, and that means Sundays are extreme practicing days. ;)

The whole day was free of scheduled stuff, and instead I had the luxury of hiding myself in the living room with a computer, a viola, and several cups of coffee and several cups of tea. 'Twas wonderful, and I practiced (productively!) until very late into the night.

my first model airplane! (330/365a)

Working against family traits - staying organized and reading directions

and staying patient

Manuela gave Theodore a model airplane kit last week. Every day he wanted to make it, but I told him (reasonably, I think) that we had to have enough time together to start and finish it - leaving it half finished would be a bad idea. So he waited and waited, until today. he practically rolled me out of bed and told me he had cleared off a table in the living room (still covered with confetti from the party ....) and saying "now we have time"... So we made the airplane together. In between times, the other guys were at the farmer's market, and Nina came to visit. Theodore painted the whole thing (with the "correct colors") and at the end expressed pride - a rarely expressed feeling from him.

and me? I'm very proud of him!

djembe (329/365a)

After Theodore's orchestra party I decided I really really really wanted an african drum, and then I found the perfect one - it's small, kid's sized really, but a properly made, traditional one from Kenya - on austrian craigslist (called "willhaben" which means "wanttohave") .... of course it was way out of the way for me, all the way in puntigam, which is a 15 minute drive from here. when we lived in wilmington, everything was a 15min drive, and i would have thought myself lucky to find something i wanted so close! but now i could barely motivate myself to go there, and the whole time i asked myself if it was worth it. --- it was! everyone wants to touch it all the time!

can't stop!

at kindergarten pickup, i tried to tell a relevant story about Almanzo Wilder staving off frostbite in the Long Winter, but that kind of story seems to really get lost in the translation, and there is so much backstory. To me, the Wilders are like kind of a part of my own family, I grew up with their stories.

I'm happy to have arrived at a Friday night where we have nothing scheduled and I can have a chance to get caught up with Mary and with Nick online. Hooray for chat and hangouts.