The girl in the mirror

Naomi fed each of three bunny
statues a carrot when we left.

Did you know, there's actually a fourth child at our house? Her name is Emily, and she lives in the mirror. Usually the full-length one in the master bathroom, and she likes to make her appearances when Naomi comes to visit me as I'm hanging up laundry or brushing my teeth.

Emily is about Naomi's age and size, and she and Naomi always seem to be wearing the same outfit. Maybe they call each other? She lives in a house just like ours--in fact, she once gave Naomi a tour. Emily's mother, who also sometimes appears in the mirror, bears a striking resemblance to me. Her name is Katie. Emily and Naomi like to chat with each other, but mostly they like to run races. Naomi will back up to the very back of the (abnormally large) bathroom, count to three, and take off at top speed! As she passes the mirror, she'll notice that Emily is running right beside her. The race ends at the bed. Sometimes the girls only run a couple races, and other times Naomi brings in prizes (stuffed animals), and each race one or the other girl manages to edge out the other for a microscopically narrow win. Fortunately, Emily always seems delighted with whichever prize Naomi doesn't have her eye on. These two get along perfectly. ("Mommy, I hope Emily doesn't decide she wants to big dog as a prize, because that's the one that I want.")

Naomi asked for saber-toothed
cat facepaint because we're
learning about prehistoric
animals and she's a bit
fascinated. Also note that
this is one of very few dresses
she'll wear nowadays!

Of course, when Emily is off doing other things, just as Naomi sometimes is, there's always Holly, Naomi's large stuffed dog, to play with. In the past, Holly's been designated the mother of all the puppies, but lately she's been elevated to near-sister status. Holly wears all the dresses that Naomi has recently decided are uncomfortable (which is a lot--breaking news from one month ago). She often gets changed for bedtime, and usually has her teeth brushed, with Naomi's cast-off toothbrush, when Naomi does. She wears the purple headband, and Naomi wears the pink one, so it's a nice arrangement. Holly is also a lovely, easygoing playmate for Naomi, with none of the inconveniences that come along with in-the-flesh big sisters.

"One time, when Holly and I played Rat-a-Tat Cat, I got all zeros!" (Zeros are good--one would almost have to cheat to get all zeros. Not that that would ever happen, of course.) Holly's such a good sport, but I suppose most yellow labs are.

And when Holly needs a nap, of course, the Calico Critters house is nearly always bustling with activity. I get to see a reflection of just how 1950s our family is sometimes, as the moms of the little animal families generally do all the cooking, cleaning and nagging; the dads are often off doing something of their own; the boys cause trouble; and the girls, the true heroes, take care of the babies/toddlers, get all the best beds, and generally have lots of fun.

Naomi saved and saved and
saved and saved and saved
to buy this mechanical bunny.

Calico Critters are Naomi's absolute favorite pretend play nowadays, and she can get wrapped up for hours minutes [who am I kidding?] in elaborate stories. They've taken over half our piano room, mostly because Naomi is capable of imagining terrifying monsters or eerie emptiness in addition to sugar-sweet friendships, and utterly refuses to inhabit any level of the house another living human isn't also present on. And Emily doesn't count. She'll occasionally consent to running upstairs for something as long as someone waits for her at the bottom, which I do because I feel like it's a step in the right direction. And has been for eight months now. Still waiting for that next step...

Nothing, however, beats playing Calico Critters along with another human, whether an actual playmate from the neighborhood, or a particularly benevolent sister, me, or, best of all, Daddy. When Daddy plays, the daddy animals all do silly things, like make pancakes and accidentally flip them all around the kitchen. They're hopeless, and so is Naomi as she gasps for breath through her laughter. I can occasionally reach this level if I haven't already imagined a dozen things that day (like people getting their math done in a timely manner, or vegetables getting eaten, or rooms getting picked without me even mentioning the need). The moms, for instance, occasionally try to sneak past the kids to go get ice cream on their own (they're always caught!), and sometimes Mary Poppins shows up, courtesy of Kalina.

We tie-dyed this summer!

The Calico Critters visited cousins (the other half of the Calico Critters) shortly after we did. They also sometimes have to empty their house because the boys sprinkled "sleeping powder" all over it. They go out fishing, go to the pool, celebrate Christmas, chase the babies, play hide-and-seek, climb on the roof, fix broken things, go exploring, frequently change clothes, play music and have all kinds of adventures.

Then there's the little-sister doll, and all the bunnies, puppies, buffaloes, penguins, seals, etc. Still Naomi's frequent companions, they're not quite on the same level as Naomi herself and have recently become more charges than companions. They still come out all the time, whether for birthday parties or board games or just a ride in the car.

And sometimes she says, "Hey Mom, let's pretend that I'm a girl, and you're my mom [biiiig stretch, there] and you're busy so I have to take care of my little sister, and we go out in the woods to visit the magic unicorn, but we have to camp overnight. And then I'll call you on the phone to let you know I'm okay." This one is fun, because she gets everything ready, and she and her doll, or stuffie, or whatever, troop through the house until they reach the magic unicorn. And then they call me. And head home.

This baby Cooper's hawk
was raised in our backyard!

But other times we have, "Mom, I'm a girl, and my bunny is hurt, but you have to pretend you don't know, and then I'll help it, but you have to try to stop me because you don't understand, but then I do anyway, and I get in trouble, but later you understand, so then you let me help, and then we go out for ice cream. Okay?" Did you get all that? While you're trying to follow a recipe at the end of a busy day? These I fail miserably, to everyone's frustration. Eventually, she'll be able to hand me a script, and I think that'll take a load off of both of us.

Overall, I'm glad to see that Naomi's amazing imagination isn't going away anytime soon. I think I'd miss Emily's company almost as much as Naomi's pretending.

Kalina, age 11

And just like that, another year in the life of Kalina has gone by! It so happens that this year, Kalina's birthday fell on a Friday. She enthusiastically opted to invite friends over for a party that same day (which got my vote), as well as hold nature club, which conveniently fell on that date anyway. I knew it'd be a big day, but at least it'd pretty much be only one. Besides, it's fun!

Kalina was in a cheery mood all week, which is somewhat easy to do when you're picking out decorations and tablewear for your party, and anticipating all kinds of good things. A few of the best moments happened on Thursday, when Matt and I each managed to hang with our birthday girl for a few hours on our own. I took her to Jason's Deli (her favorite) and then helped her decorate for her birthday (she wanted to make a tree out of streamers--always an artist!). She enjoyed dinner and a walk with Matt, including a fast walk back home to bring fishing polls back to potentially snag a catfish (no luck).

According to Elise, Kalina began her special day by waking her up singing a whispered, "Happy birthday to meeeee..." Cute. But maybe not as cute for Elise. The girls all devoured chocolate Lucky Charms for breakfast, but fortunately saved a lot of the marshmallows for later. And then forgot about them. Shhhh.

Sweetly, the sisters began shoving presents at Kalina as soon as everyone shared breathing space, although Kalina declined them all until she had finished breakfast. Elise had spotted her first gift for Kalina, donut erasers, in Target long ago and hid them away so she could come back in claim them. Which, amazingly, we did! Elise also gave her a pyramid Rubick's cube. Naomi had remembered a book Kalina had gifted to another friend, as well as the longing look in Kalina's eye when she gave it away, and gave Kalina a copy of that same book. Nice work, girls!

The day being hot after a beautifully cool month of summer, we headed to the pool as soon as a few rooms were deemed clean and ready for the party. This is how, by the way, wise moms manage to get kids to somewhat cheerfully work on their birthday. I felt so smart. The pool was lovely, as was a lunch of pasta.

After lunch, we opened a card game and played through it, with Kalina winning every round, Naomi doing a different activity entirely (thank goodness--it would've been a disaster for her), Elise trying her hardest to keep up, and me trying my hardest to fail without anyone noticing, just so we could keep the mood upbeat. Matt, working summer hours, soon arrived home and we enjoyed an hour or so of calm before the storm of activity that would soon follow. Kalina opened a music player, a world puzzle, a whole ton of books and cat pajamas, among other things.

Then it was time for Nature Club! We lectured the girls about the dangers of bacteria in stagnant water, and directed them to a spot we had deemed "safe" for them to wade in the stream. In truth, I know nothing about such matters--just that some places in the stream look really gross, and others look relatively okay. And they all totally believed it. The weather being so hot, we made the girls drink plenty of water, and then turned on the sprinkler for a few minutes. It's amazing how wet one can get in just a few minutes of sprinkler time. Matt went after a large catfish and a large carp, much to the girls' delight, and then started teaching everyone how to start fires. In a very safe, well-supervised fire pit, of course. Elise had the idea to try flint and steel, and Kalina, just when we were about to give up and move on, actually ignited her cotton in a burst of birthday magic.

The cotton caught fire just as
Matt was about to say, "Let's
try again another time!"

Although I'd planned for about 20-25 minutes to catch my breath between Nature Club pickup and birthday party dropoff, I instead got all of about 30 seconds. After letting Nature Club run late (so Kalina could ignite the cotton) and as Kalina was frantically changing out of her wet clothes, I was frantically searching the house for cash for the pizza delivery guy (their card machines weren't working) when I noticed people standing on the doorstep. Apparently, I'd missed the doorbell and both the first guest and the pizza guy were 10 minutes early. I literally had to tell the poor guest in our entryway to "wait here for just a minute, I'm so, so, sorry, what pretty flowers, I need to pay the pizza guy, I promise Kalina will be here in just a second" and the poor pizza guy to also wait, but on the doorstep. In the end, a birthday-girl-sister earned her keep by unknowingly lending me $27 from her envelope of allowance money. Thanks, Elise, hope you enjoyed the pizza! (As of the typing of this blog, it's already been repaid.)

After this hurried transition, however, I was able to get the table ready and welcome other guests a little more appropriately, and even catch my breath.

Kalina, meanwhile, was enjoying the outdoors with her buddies. When they came in, she was engrossed in a Harry Potter trivia contest with two of them. One would quote a line from one of the 7 thick books, and the others would compete to say which book and character the quote had come from. All this completely from memory. As two more guests apparently either weren't interested in Harry Potter or weren't allowed to read it, I reluctantly diverted attention away from the game. They all embarked on Two Truths and a Lie, practicing their deception skills instead of their free-recall memory. But who's counting? Actually, it was super fun.

One challenge during this time was to actually let Kalina enjoy her party without being too loved by her sisters. Although Matt and I felt a little terrible pulling Elise and, to a lesser extent Naomi, away, we knew our oldest probably needed a little time to feel, well, old on her birthday.

It helped that the escape room game we were playing was clearly rated for ages 10+. Normally I don't point to age ratings, but sometimes it's necessary so the birthday girl doesn't get drowned out by younger enthusiastic sisters. Meant in the nicest way, of course.

Kalina, who adores ice cream but, in true Odegaard style, is somewhat ambivalent toward cake, opted for a Dairy Queen Oreo blizzard cake this year for her birthday. I love making birthday cakes for my girls, but I couldn't help but silently cheer that I could bypass baking on this busy week with the help of a phone, a credit card, and a helpful husband on his way home from work. Plus, the cake tasted amazing. She lit the candles (fruit themed!), and we managed to sing before the cake melted.

After we ate and I whisked away the dishes and Matt whisked away the (reluctant) younger sisters, it was time to break out the escape room game. I explained the concept and the girls immediately insisted they actually wanted to be locked in a room. As most of the locking rooms are bathrooms, we settled on simply closing the door to the bunny's room. Then, they'd have a bunny and an escape room, so, win-win.

But first, snacks. I'd set out a big bowl of cheese balls, another of saltwater taffy and a third of veggie straws. Never mind the fact that the girls had just wolfed down pizza, watermelon and large pieces of very filling ice-cream cake. They devoured the snacks like a swarm of locusts, as though dinner and dessert had been a work of fiction.

Then, Kalina grabbed the timer, we opened the box, and they were off! I left them to it, delivering water, allowing endless snack refills, as though the previous snack had been a dream, and occasionally providing clues (many of which they didn't really need). I'd initially been concerned that the girls wouldn't be interested in an escape room--that it might go over their heads, or be too intense for a party. As it turned out, neither of these things were obstacles. The game's puzzles definitely took some figuring out, and I had to help them initially to learn what kind of solving to do, and occasionally we had trouble sharing/feeling left out, but overall the girls worked together, did an awesome job and had a ton of fun. As the game features an extra 30-minute add-on, we might just get together again to finish up.

Best Kalina quote during the game.

"Maybe it's not about what we see. Maybe it's about what we don't see."

They're breaking out of the
bunny room!

What a fun party! Kalina declared the day "amazing" and went to bed a super happy, well-loved 11-year-old. Mission accomplished.

At 11, Kalina is, ever, always, herself, and no one else. She was never an impressionable baby ("Look, Kalina, all these other children sleep through the night!"), nor an impressionable toddler ("See, everyone else is okay not being within arms' reach of their mommies!"), or an impressionable preschooler, young kid, or anything else. While she does seem to actually appreciate the well-timed tip every so often ("Maybe don't wear floral patterns on top of completely contrasting floral patterns"), she happily marches to the beat of her own tune. Which she has composed beautifully.

In fact, Kalina composes so many things beautifully that we can no longer tell her piano compositions apart from her regular pieces. She knows chords and note relationships with a greater depth of understanding than I've ever had, and is constantly amazed at what she can come up with. Starting the ball rolling on actually practicing piano...that's another story, for another blog. Not the birthday one.

When Kalina learns things, she learns them well. She immediately picked up on machine sewing this year, applying her skills to new and different creations. She's also taken crochet to new heights, crocheting fruit-themed bookmarks and actual picture designs that she plots out with graph paper, including a tree landscape and the solar system. She's much more adept at switching colors with ease than I am, and much more creative about her crocheting as well.

Kalina loves cacti, Harry Potter anything, watermelon, cold pasta, sushi (just what it looks like; she's never actually eaten any), swimming, biking, geography, tornadoes, knots, The Greatest Showman, camping, small children, thunderstorms, walks, tennis shoes and socks.

She likes to pretend to be a cat (sometimes to the annoyance of her sisters), can't take one nature photo without taking a dozen, and still considers "rainbow" her favorite color, because she just can't decide. Kalina does not like: pink, dresses, skirts, jewelry, spelling practice, most chores and amusement park rides.

The girl writes better than most adults, specializing in vibrant descriptions. She's nearly mastered the five-paragraph essay and plays cleverly with words. Lately she's decided that science writing, probably for children, would be a good career route, because she could incorporate photography, too. Her big ideas still usually cross the line into impossibility, but I'm glad she still has them.

Kalina still enjoys the "magic" of self-opening doors at places like the grocery store and the library, theatrically flourishing her hands as if she's in command and making me smile every time. She's an orderly girl and maintains a well-organized desk, bed, nightstand and closet shelf with no prompting from me. Thank goodness.

New this year is the whole idea that Kalina can "babysit" her sisters at home for short periods of time without me. When alone with Naomi, she often plays with Calico Critters, or other sweet little games. She's a bit nervous to use the phone, and she won't stay home completely by herself, but so far we've had no mishaps.

She'll happily spend most of her free time reading, but sometimes arranges Legos, crochets, explores the creek or helps me in the kitchen. Less happily, she antagonizes her sisters and has this passive-aggressive way of digging in her heels...but I digress.

Kalina's generally sweet, clever, helpful, creative, quiet, cautious and fun. She waffles between complete ambivalence and supreme engagement. This year we learned the word "introvert," which has helped her understand herself and her frequent need to recharge. She's very loyal to family and still generally doesn't mind if Elise joins in with her and her friends--just occasionally, which we all understand, even Elise.

We're ever, always so grateful this amazing 11-year-old is part of our family! Here's to another wonderful year!

Pull on your adventure shoes

Naomi packed two essentials,
other than bunnies.

"We could almost camp this weekend," mentioned Matt. And it was off to the races. The whole trip felt like a whim, but considering we'd been half-trying to camp for a good year and a half, we pretty much had the routine down. In fact, we'd already booked campsites two other weekends, only to have our plans destroyed by reasonable threats of tornadoes. You just don't do that with small children.

On Wednesday, I hurriedly booked the campsite for Friday and Saturday, at a park I'd dredged up using a single Facebook recommendation. I googled exactly 3 dutch oven recipes and jotted down a quick grocery list. And I told the children. Whenever you tell the kids, you'd better be serious, because they don't let you take it back. Only more tornadoes could stop us now!

On Thursday, I gathered food, pre-prepped recipes with Kalina and started packing. On Friday morning, I threatened to cancel the trip if no one could possibly manage to please just pack a bag with actual clothes instead of all stuffed animals. C'mon, guys, let's step it up. Meanwhile, Matt spent a solid 4 hours gathering, inspecting, packing and preparing all the other equipment. I was pretty sure we'd forgotten something, but a careful review of our lists revealed we were at least close. Not bad for such a fly-by-night idea.

And after our previously scheduled meeting of Nature Club on Friday, we were off! Into Friday rush-hour traffic, but nevertheless on our way. In a party kind of mood, I let the girls gorge on Veggie Straws and granola bars the whole way. After all, I didn't really care if they finished their campfire hot dogs or not.

And we arrived! "This isn't at all what I expected," moaned Elise.

What?

Kalina hangs the clothesline
while her sisters simply perch.
Sometimes all you need is a
fence to perch on.

Having actually camped twice before (aside from various backyards), and only in large group campsites, the girls were not prepared for typical state park sites. We quickly realized they'd pictured choosing their own campsite from a large meadow, or under a few trees, not backing in to a small gravel clearing. Nevertheless, they joyfully alighted from the van and immediately began exploring the small area, climbing things, and engaging in all too many narrow misses with the plentiful poison ivy.

While Elise and Naomi claimed perches on the fence that was to keep them from falling over the steep dropoff below, Kalina, still jazzed about the whole idea of camping, actually helped, helping Matt pitch our giant tent while I settled the "kitchen." In between assignments, she eagerly posted the clothesline. And fetched water. And even carried stuff. Elise and Naomi mostly buzzed around like houseflies, but that was fun, too.

Plenty of help around camp!

Soon, we were roasting hot dogs for supper (Naomi decided her "outside of a hot dog" would be better with chips and ketchup inside), and then shortly after, roasting marshmallows for dessert. Elise experimented with a stuffed marshmallow recipe she'd found in her Ranger Rick magazine, and Naomi continually asked for more. The girls relished washing their own dishes in the chilly dishwater, or at least didn't complain, which is new for us.

As the sun set, we abandoned our marshmallows in favor of attending the ranger presentation on spiders. Although it was super dry (the weather, too), we nevertheless enjoyed our rustic wooden benches and watching slides projected outside under a darkening sky. Matt asked good questions, as always, keeping the ranger busy with her smartphone. By the time it was over, the fireflies were out.

The raccoons, meanwhile, had been busy throwing themselves at our hanging garbage bag, with some success. Their success would've been greater had their been more actual food scraps in the bag.

We made our last bathroom stop, brushed our teeth al fresco, and then waited while Matt set up cots. And waited a little bit longer. And then we settled in for a story and a good night's sleep. It worked! We were camping!

The next morning at 5:29, amid raucous birdsong, Naomi and I looked each other in the eye and mutually decided we'd try to go back to sleep. And then at 7:00, we woke up for real, and soon Matt, then Kalina, and finally our deep-sleeping Elise were rousted out. I was super excited to try out my first dutch-oven recipe, baked oatmeal. Kalina had measured the dry ingredients the day before, so I added just a couple of liquids and poured the mixture into the dutch oven. The coals, having warmed surprisingly fast, cooked our oatmeal by the time the girls and I had made the walk to the bathroom and back.

I prided myself on remembering chocolate chips for our topping. Naomi also added a little ketchup, and then a little more until it was just right. And then she actually ate it. Here we were thinking she was a picky eater, and as it turned out, she just needed a little more ketchup in her life. Lesson learned.

They all fit!

We'd brought Grandpa Tom's canoe, and wanted to take it out first thing. So we cleaned up the dishes. And got dressed. And put on sunscreen. And brushed our teeth. And melted down about something. And found all our gear. And packed food away from raccoons. And managed the fire. By 9:00, we were ready, and poor Matt had to shift his expectations for, "Let's get on the lake first thing!" But he survived.

The lake was tiny, but still and beautiful and full of life. We immediately zeroed in on goslings and on tiny frogs. In fact, I'm not sure Elise saw more than a few square feet of the lake in the first 10 minutes, her nose to the ground like a bloodhound seeking out anything slimy she could pick up or wallow in. I think we were all surprised when Naomi decided she wanted to ride in the canoe, despite having been informed that canoes are tippy. Secretly not wanting to let the shore go just yet, Elise graciously offered to let Naomi take her presumed spot. As shore patrol, I took my post by Elise, and alternately hauled buckets or watched for frogs as she carried out her studies.

In the canoe, Naomi shrieked only for the first 20 seconds or so, until she quieted into a calmly terrified state. And then eventually began to enjoy herself. Kalina, meanwhile, quickly learned principles of paddling and steering a canoe. She took to it like, well, a duck takes to water. And is now ready for a kayak, she tells us. After a while, we switched up seating arrangements, several times, until everyone had a turn doing everything they wanted to do--even me! By now, it was rather warm and the lake was getting busier--time to hit the trails.

A stream and a really long
crinoid fossil!

Since lunchtime was approaching, we tackled a smaller trail that we knew had a great stream access point, something that has become increasingly important lately. Naomi, Kalina and I shared the lead while Elise floated from snail to snail, admiring, naming, handling and subsequently "rescuing" each one. Each was precious, unique, and praiseworthy--a treasure, or a rare jewel. The hike was going to take three days.

We were able to convince Elise to speed things up with the promise of a stream, and fortunately the stream soon came into view. Naomi, increasingly adventurous, followed her sisters in and they all splashed around happily for a while. Kalina caught a crayfish and found her largest section of crinoid yet!

Kalina enjoying a camp lunch

All too soon, it was time to make our way back to camp and cook lunch and chill. I admit I was highly motivated to cook, if only to prove that you can actually camp and enjoy halfway decent food, too. We were soon chowing down on quite decent macaroni and cheese--even Naomi, once we pulled out the ketchup. In fact, the kids are still talking about that mac and cheese.

Elise pulled out her tooth!

It was around this time that Elise disappeared into the tent for a bit. She emerged a few minutes later with a big smile and a newly released tooth! The tooth had been loose for a while and Grandpa had said, a few days ago, that it only needed a few more days. Elise decided that the only thing that could make the camping trip any better would be to lose her tooth during it, so she pulled it herself. That's determination for you, right there. We put it in a baggie and, surprisingly, didn't lose it (again) before surrendering it to the tooth fairy herself.

The afternoon was spent embarking on a longer hike--one that was apparently out to get us. Naomi, refreshed and uncharacteristically gung-ho, proudly led the way for the first third. Soon, it became clear that only by walking nearly tightrope-style along the trail would be be able to avoid the poison ivy. This is when the hike became much less fun. The experience degraded even further when we started noticing ticks on each other. Lovely scenery, but we couldn't tear our eyes away from the edges of the trail and each others' bare legs. Fortunately, a stream halfway through kept our spirits up.

Chillin' with some bunnies
and a new favorite book.

In the stream, Elise found a jawbone with teeth! She wanted to keep it, but we reminded her that it's against the rules to keep anything from a state park. But, well, we all do it once in a great while, right? We ended up letting Elise remove one tooth as a souvenir. No sooner had she pocketed her treasure than Naomi's inner rule-breaker alarm sounded:

"Mommy, is it okay to keep things from state parks?" she worriedly questioned, confirming what she knew was true.

"But Mommy, Elise can't keep the tooth! She has to put it back! Elise, put it back!" We went on like this, with Naomi growing increasingly hysterical and Elise edging slowly away.

The decision hadn't been mine, but I was left to explain. Being a rules-follower myself, my answers were rather lame. Because we really should all just follow the rules, they're there for a reason and besides, then we all know what to expect.

Kalina's idea of relaxing: a
cot and a good book.

Soon, we needed to pull in the experts. I patiently explained the situation to Matt. In true Matt style, he fixed the problem in two seconds. Having Elise hand him the tooth (I'm amazed she trusted him at this point, but she did), he employed sleight-of-hand techniques worth of a magician to then quickly toss a piece of a stick far into the woods. Naomi's sobs abated immediately.

Unfortunately, he convinced Elise, too, who teared up as quickly as Naomi pacified. Fortunately, she's used to secret signals from me, being both a communicative and mature child, and soon thereafter Matt surreptitiously transferred the tooth back into Elise's hot little hand. Crisis averted, and Naomi can rest easy in her rules-following world a while longer, although I admit I'm still suffering a bit of cognitive dissonance over the matter.

Two little sweeties, after they'd been
scrubbed, soaped and inspected.

The hike dragged on. We finally made it back to the lake, where all three girls found fresh energy when it came to playing in a stream offshoot with a couple smaller children. After Elise, and then Naomi, took spills on the slippery rocks, we knew it was time to get back to the campsite. The next 45 minutes were spent on poison ivy and tick damage control.

And then another spectacular dinner! Despite pizza dough that didn't seem like it was going to cooperate, we ended up cooking up and polishing off two amazing dutch-oven pizzas. They tasted wood-fired, and restaurant-quality. We broke out another Ranger Rick activity at this point: filling in blanks to make our own spooky/funny adventure stories.

This shot only looks candid:
Elise is a pro at posing and
making it look natural (and
good!)

After a few good laughs and more campfire treats, and we raced down to the lake to try to catch the sun setting. We missed the actual sunset by seconds, having stopped to watch a deer watch us on the way. We nevertheless found a big glob of frog eggs, and then hustled back for the second half of a ranger presentation on snakes. And another night in the tent! This time we made it to sleep a little bit sooner.

I forgot one thing on this camping trip, and it happened to be the syrup for the hearty camp stove pancakes Matt whipped up the next morning while I trekked to the bathroom with the girls. They were still tasty with grape jam and/or leftover cherry pie filling from the campfire treats the night before. Powered up, we again headed for the lake with the canoe.

This time, Matt figured out how to get everyone but me into the boat--Kalina with a paddle, Elise with a net, and Naomi on Matt's lap. They chased frogs for quite a while. I got to be the on-shore frog-spotter. Then, after another hike down the nice hiking trail, and more fun in the stream, we had to break the news that it was time for lunch and tear-down.

Real mac and cheese, real
ingredients! And everyone
ate it! Super easy and so
fun!

As we hadn't initially planned on making it at the park until lunch time, we had to scramble a bit for lunch ingredients. Elise roasted the rest of our hot dogs, super annoyed that she had to cook them fully since we weren't quite confident in our cooler's ability to keep everything as cool as it needed to be, while everyone else began the process of packing up. Along the way we outlawed fence-sitting, since we'd made it this far with no one topping backwards into the "abyss." In the end, we pulled away with about 12 minutes to spare.

What an amazing weekend! I was impressed by the fact that all three rose to the challenge: Kalina really stepping up to take on some more grownup roles, Elise, um, just doing her thing, and Naomi trying some new challenges ranging from a different macaroni and cheese recipe to canoeing to leading the way on tricky hiking trails. Matt and I also felt a strong sense of accomplishment: not getting overly cranky (mostly), and planning a pretty awesome trip that will undoubtedly lead to more.

Happy Trails

Let's just say, for instance, that over breakfast you discovered a long, windy snail slime trail stretching for several feet down the middle of your large kitchen table that mysteriously ended at the (covered) butter dish. The snail is nowhere to be found, and the 8-year-old is insisting that she's down not one, but two precious pet snails. That were apparently left uncovered on the kitchen table all night. Would you:

1. Leave out food as bait (the 8-year-old's suggestion)

2. Dispose of the butter, clean everything, find a lid and a better place for the remaining snails, let the 8-year-old know that everyone is entitled to one occurrence of escaped pets but not really more, and then try to forget that there's a snail or two roaming the house. And not go barefoot. (What I'm doing)

3. Burn down the house. (What I kind of want to do)

4. Ruminate on all the unanswered questions. About parenting, life, and why there weren't two snail trails if two snails are indeed missing, why the lid was left off, why the snails were on the kitchen table in the first place, whether or not snails are actually attracted to butter, and what kind of predator must roam our house at night to have snatched away a snail or two out of thin air. And of course, where are the snail(s) and what will it feel like to step/sit on one/them?!?

Elise loves her snails. We've learned a lot already. Their names are: Biggle (the biggest one), Tiger (one that has a striped shell, except they all do, Billy and Bob (twins) and another few I've lost track of. Some are shyer than others, but their antenna are really cool when they sink into their heads. They like dark places and always climb upwards--to the point that I'm actually pretty amazed there aren't more snails roaming around our house. Yesterday the snails spent large portions of their lives riding around on her finger, being loved.

Meanwhile, Easter is totally Naomi's season. As soon Naomi and pink, furry, sparkly bunny ears crossed paths in Target, they were on her head--to stay (thanks to the allowance she'd saved up). She wears them everywhere. If the conditions become unfavorable to bunny ears--windy, for instance--she simply holds them in her hand until she no longer has to worry about them blowing away. And although she never notices the sidelong looks people give her in public, she readily accepts their comments and compliments with a matter-of-fact "thank you." Yes, I know they're adorable, thanks for noticing.

I hesitated to let her wear her bunny ears to various classes, and piano lessons, and even occasionally ran the idea past her teachers in case they felt like bunny ears might be distracting. Due partly to the fact that Naomi sees them as an extension of herself, rather than an accessory, the bunny ears cause no more ruckus than her regular ears do. And possibly because we homeschool, no one we come across seems to bat an eye at the fact that for several weeks now Naomi makes virtually every public appearance as a bunny. Or maybe they don't care because she's so stinkin' cute in them.

I enjoyed hanging out one-on-one with my little bunny a little bit extra this week as her sisters took standardized tests. It was a good, learning experience for everyone: Kalina learned that next time, she should make sure her ruler has centimeters on it (not really her fault--she just grabbed one!); Elise learned how to jump rope during testing, where a threatened bird species is nesting near the testing site, and good places to find snails; and Naomi learned place value. In one sitting. Well. And she thinks it's fun.

Which boggles my mind: how can a little girl who thinks she's a bunny and that her stuffed bunnies are her sisters breeze past 100 in counting (her goal was 1000, until Elise interrupted her) and laughingly tell me that I would need 10 tens to make 100? In addition to math, we scootered to the park and pretended to run away from dogs, worked on an Easter sticker book, braved glitter, and so much more.

For some reason, I'm not able to write captions today, but all of these photos came from our backyard photo shoot. Elise is posing in some of her favorite places (including the fort!), Naomi alternated normal poses for Mommy with bunny poses, and Kalina's pictures turned out beautiful despite the fact that she's hiding a very skinned knee.

The big presentation

Kalina, a.k.a. Theodora!

It's not super often we have a firm deadline, a specific set of expectations and an audience for our schoolwork--unless you count "these three pages of math problems need to be finished before you eat lunch, and you need to have most of them right, unless you're really stumped, in which case you need to do what you can and then ask me about what's stumping you, but not wait, like, 30 minutes to do so." Can you tell we kind of need a lawyer present whenever we assign work in this house?

So when we do (have deadlines, expectations and and audience--not a lawyer), we like to take advantage. Or at least, I do. We figure out the steps we need to take. We begin well in advance so we won't be scrambling at the last minute. We hone in on the exact requirements. And we revise and reconsider at various points in the process. Or at least, I do.

Kalina and her class. She correctly
guessed that one of the two others
girls would be Cleopatra. Because
there just aren't that many others.
P.S., not sure why the formatting is
weird with these pictures.

And this is where my path diverges from my oldest's. In the beginning, we're mostly on the same page. Take, for instance, an assignment to write a paper and prepare a short presentation based on a figure from ancient history. With the unwritten, but generally understood, guideline that if you're a girl, you're likely going to want to choose a girl, since you'll need to dress like the person you present about. Yes, at this point, Kalina and I were on the same page: slightly disgruntled at:

1.) How few women in ancient history we could even think of. Outside the Bible, it was about two.

2.) How little information was out there about any of the women--even the rest of the 40 or so names we found on a list. Unless you count the mostly fictionalized Disney movie, Mulan, about a character who may or may not have been real.

3.) How little age-appropriate information there was about any of the women (or at least, I was disgruntled about this)

Still an animal lover!

I totally would've let Kalina choose a guy at this point, but she wanted to stand by the women. Because apparently virtually no one else did.

After some deliberation, she picked a woman for whom we actually do have one age-appropriate, but possibly somewhat fictionalized, source. According to the requirement, we'd need four more sources--but I figured one good one was probably all we were going to get anyway and we'd really be scraping for the rest (we were).

Armed with a choice, which can be hard to wrestle Kalina into any hour of the day, I nevertheless optimistically started searching...and searching...and searching. Surely someone, somewhere, has mentioned the great Theodora, renowned empress of the Byzantine Empire in the early 500s, in an additional children's biography, or overview of the era? We found a brief mention in a book on her husband, Justinian, whom  Theodora saved from virtually abdicating his throne as we later found out, as well as influenced in the writing of his famed Justinian's code; and another in a book about the Byzantine era. None of these added much to our overall knowledge. Theodora was just an interesting tidbit--a sidebar one could easily overlook. (Spoiler alert: Kalina changed all that.)

Kalina and her birds at the zoo.

I had some luck with grownup books but they were just that: not for children. I pre-screened some sections for her and called it good. And then we looked up all our bigger questions online, because you could occasionally get things answered via Google, which will one day take over all the libraries if the libraries don't find out a way to educate schoolchildren on obscure information they need for papers and presentations. (Can you tell I'm not wanting to type "Theodora kids" into a search box ever again?)

Step one, sources: check.

Step two: Outlines
Last year, for this same assignment, Kalina studied Sacagawea. There's hoards of information about Lewis and Clark, and a very respectable amount about Sacagawea: her childhood, her life as a whole, how she helped L&C, etc. Even as told through the eyes of a dog. The only stressful part about writing an outline last year was the physical act of writing it all down.

We saw two baby penguins
at the zoo!

This year, poor Kalina had to piece together small tidbits of information, some of which disagreed with each other, thanks to her overly-simplified children's book about Theodora. Which was the only source that was actually interesting to her.

I felt for her, but made her wrestle through it--the task was doable, just not as enjoyable as, say, petting the bunny or rereading Harry Potter. I gave her plenty of advice throughout the process, though. So that's something. Because everyone likes advice when their mothers think they're NOT FOCUSING or GETTING TOO DISTRACTED! You can imagine how my advice sounded but, to her credit, she got the job done, and done well. When she actually focused.

Step 3: Write
Many parents feel the need to sit down with their kids to help them write their papers. I've done that before, especially last year, but no longer can:
"Born in Constantinople, Theodora acted in the hippodrome." "Mommy, don't you think it'd be really fun if... tree house, and at the base is a secret pulley that... pet goat... maaaa!!!... hidden under the tree stump that folds back... maaa!!!... and then you could... one room of the house just for cats... meow!!!... *yawn* *stretch*... and how many locks should the treasure box... by helicopter... and when the... oh, but what about... and as you slid down, you'd..." etc., etc., etc. It's hard to write a sentence when ideas get in the way. Multiply that by a bare minimum of 20 sentences to make a (rather short) paper and you'd want to crawl under the couch cushions, too. Or at least start dinner.

Baby penguin!

(Yes, I realize that Kalina's imagination is amazing and shouldn't be stifled. There's plenty of time for her imagination to run wild when I'm not helping her write a paper.)

Seeing as Kalina's a very good writer, and I've seen her pull papers virtually out of thin air, I didn't feel too guilty leaving her to her own devices after explaining the process and making sure she knew what she was doing (which she totally does). "Go upstairs and work on your paper, not play with the bunny, and come downstairs and show me when you have something. And remember, this is your time for working on your paper, and there won't be other time later, so if you don't do it now, you'll have to use your free time. If you get stuck, come down and ask me, but don't sit there and stare at it for 20 minutes if you're not sure what to do. Give it 5 minutes, and then come down right away, or you'll be using up all your time not getting anything done. I'm totally happy to help you if you need it. And if Elise or Naomi come in, just tell them you're working and try not to get distracted by them. See if you can get a good chunk of this paragraph done--possibly even the whole thing, so you'll be in good shape for your deadline. I'll check on you later." (As you can see, this is not the first time I've sent Kalina upstairs to her desk to get some real work done.)

Ready for Easter, or bed, or
something.

The writing process took some time, because of bunnies and other distractions, or staring blankly at the paper and not asking for help, or just not really feeling into it, being annoyed about the project as a whole, or having too many other ideas, or whatever. Plus, we had the introduction to figure out (hook, bridge and thesis statement, Kalina, and "Theodora was intelligent and courageous" is not a full thesis statement!), the conclusion (restate your thesis--yes, now you have to say it a different way!) and the title (at the time of typing this blog, there's still no title).

Now, REVISE the WHOLE THING! Yes, revise it. Because it can be better. (And yes, Kalina totally made it better, and it only took one day of non-focus and another of actual focus, and it wasn't painful, because she has a good eye for a poorly constructed sentence or idea and can totally handle a good revision.)

Elise created a recipe for her
own soup, and then made the
soup! We legitimately liked
it! Yes, she's wearing roller
skates while holding a pot of
soup.

Step 4: The presentation
It's one thing to write a paper, and it's another to present it. Kalina, infatuated with Theodora's (pretty remarkable) speech to Justinian, wanted the full text of the speech, and then to quote from it for her presentation. These were supplied, and she blew me over by actually copying a full note card's worth of speech onto a note card. I counted this as her spelling for the day but I didn't tell her that we could've photocopied and pasted instead. She was actually motivated, and it was such a great quote to copy. Mean mom? Maybe. Smart mom? Absolutely.

It didn't go this easy at first, though. With a relatively relaxed week, plenty of time made available for her to work, and a deadline of a practice run-through Thursday, I believed Kalina had all she needed to whip her presentation into shape--not a difficult task for this girl. Apparently, though, she was missing something: a sense of panic. This was evidenced by the full hour she spent producing half a sentence on a note card. Despite having everything she needed to get the job done in a non-rushed fashion, Kalina finished her presentation note cards in the van on the way on Thursday. She was a tiny bit stressed.

Naomi came up with the idea
of a unicorn puffball critter!

Step 5: The costume
The weekend before the big event--when all the kids in the class would present dressed up as their chosen people--Kalina and I made a trip to Hobby Lobby (after a brainstorming session at Dairy Queen). We hit up the clearance and sale section and scored some awesome trim, gold satin fabric, and other great finds to make a killer Theodora costume. Oh, and we painted a paper plate gold. We depleted a box of 50 safety pins, but the girl looked positively regal and fairly Byzantine. Kalina's favorite part was the sheer purple sashy thing. We totally nailed the costume, and with minimal nagging/suffering.

Step 6: Last-minute panic.
The week before the big presentation left much to be desired by way of actual preparation. And when the week of the presentation--a much busier, shorter week, I should add--began with the same lackadaisical approach, I decided to try again to instill the fear-of-deadline mindset that has served me so well all these years. This time, possibly because the deadline was real, she'd more or less missed the last one, and the due date was truly impending, she stepped up her game.

Every winter and every summer we all
feel like sewing for a day. It used to be
I who sewed for the girls; now they've
taken over!

Still, due to the craziness of the week, the girl ended up practicing her final presentation all of, like, 4 times. And the last time she got so interrupted by life that I'm not even sure if she quite finished it.

By time 4, however, she had the bulk of it memorized, including (especially) the actual quoted parts of Theodora's speech.

Good thing, because during this process she lost her note cards at least twice. She got very little sympathy from me. "Sorry, Hon, it might be quicker to just redo them than to find them." True story. At least one of these times, they were in plain sight on the kitchen table.

Step 7: Show time!
A nervous Kalina cared about her costume (she loved being Theodora--but try to get her in a dress any other time). She kept track of her notecards. She focused. She allowed me to put her hair in a bun.

Elise made this pocket pillow
on the sewing machine after
Kalina taught her how!

And she was Empress Theodora to the core. Kalina spoke with confidence, getting into character for Theodora's quoted speech, speaking to the audience instead of her note cards, telling a good story instead of reading a paper. She portrayed poise, confidence and clarity. She was intelligent and courageous.

And here's the thing--I've probably sounded uncaring, unrealistic, too hands-off throughout this process (with the exception of the nagging). But I've seen Kalina pull it all together at the last minute over and over again. I knew she'd do a fantastic job. Plus, she did actually get plenty of encouragement from me at the end of each step. Just not always when I caught her staring off into space over empty note cards. For the third time.

Kalina's paper was probably not the most polished of all the papers. Her presentation was one of the shortest. And she listed far fewer facts than some of the other kids. But hers was a memorable and engaging presentation, and she can truly say that she did the whole thing all by herself. Because nagging is definitely not the same thing as writing, and writing isn't even the same thing as performing. Many people can write, but it takes a true girl of character and confidence to wow an audience as she di. We're proud of you, Kalina!

Nature Club

This was the main image on
Elise's Nature Club flier.
Who could say no?

Last October-ish, Elise decided she wanted to start a nature club for girls her own age-ish. These types of ideas fall into three categories:
1.) Things that she'll forget about
2.) Things that she won't forget about, that are somewhat achievable, and that she'll politely bring up every chance she gets
3.) Things that are impossible, but she still thinks can or should happen and so she'll bring them up every chance she gets

As her mom, it's my job to figure out which kind of idea we're talking about in each case. For instance, when she was 3 or 4, Elise wanted to go to the beach so she could swim out to a reef, capture a clownfish and seahorse, and bring them home as pets. Never mind that the promise of an ice-cream sundae didn't reliably get her to even put her face in the water (and this is a girl highly motivated by treats...). This was a #3 type of idea, so she didn't really let it go and we did eventually get her to a beach, at least. She can swim now, but fortunately has realized that you don't just paddle out to coral reefs and collect new pets, and she enjoys chuckling about this idea when we discuss it. Outgrown (at least for now), so we can check it off the list, until she becomes a marine biologist or something and actually gets to go collect reef life for real, legally, as "study animals" (pets). Or worse, until she becomes a teenager and begins begging to enlist in a SCUBA course and spend her summer on a boat or island somewhere in a legitimate program that costs a fortune and raises a lot of parenting eyebrows.

She also tried really hard to actually fly, and believed for a while that she has. The idea still comes up every so often (most recently, as she spent Saturday developing "Plane-o-Shoots" for her smaller stuffed animals, and tested them off the balcony).

[Kalina, on the other hand, traditionally has two types of ideas: The impossible and the strangely convoluted. For instance, she's dreamed of a world in which everyone walks on the ceilings ("It's so clear and uncluttered!") and she wants her house when she grows up to have a bunny room with a ledge all around that the bunnies can't jump over. So people could come visit, and there would be little spots to put lettuce and treats, and, and, and...but I digress and so, generally, does Kalina. If she can do it the difficult, complicated way, she will. This occasionally makes life really interesting and complex and difficult, but most of the time her ideas last only for the moment. They're just fun to think about and build on, but there's no need to actuate them. Thank. Goodness. Naomi's ideas are still often based in imagination--for instance the idea that she's adopting her stuffed animals as real bunnies--but even then, she's often the most practical of the three.]

November-ish

But I digress. Judging by the fact that every conversation within earshot of the 8-year-old eventually veered off in the direction of nature club, and it didn't involve capturing live clownfish with just a net and no permission from any wildlife regulation agency, this idea was probably the second type.

Actually, I liked the idea of a nature club. We've struggled--a lot--to get anyone much older than Naomi to come play, and the older girls, who'd enjoyed a vibrant social life a year and a half ago, were pretty bummed. And so was I, honestly. Plus, there's nothing better for kids than trekking through (safe) woods with a pack of peers and the illusion of freedom, independence and mystery. But if we planned it, would they come?

As with every one of the kids' relatively realistic ideas, I gave it the true test: making them exert at least as much effort as I would have to. Rather than wave my magic wand and start making things happen, I immediately adopted a support role and guided Elise (and eventually Kalina as she hopped on board) to realize that if a nature club were going to happen, lots of other things would have to happen first. Worky things.

Naomi insisted she was fine
with just shorts.

Plus it was November, and beginning anything new in the last two months of the year is about as likely as an 8-year-old soaring through the skies with nothing but construction paper and tape for support (although to be fair, I think she was 6 or 7 the last time she tried).

So I tried to make sure lots of other things happened--and as it turned out, Elise persisted. She and Kalina discussed survival skills and plans and first aid. We studied edible plants. Elise convinced me to swap out her regular spelling words for nature-themed words. (Sometimes loosely nature-themed, but as long as I used each word in a nature-themed sentence, she didn't much notice.) The girls spent time in the woods devising schemes for a fort of some sort. They were inspired by the Native American lifestyles we were studying in school, and passed the time nicely.

Every so often, though, Elise needed more meat. So I handed down the assignment to make a flier I could send out to the moms. We set a date and time based on my memory that sometimes the weather briefly gets warm in mid-January. We also talked about audience, and how it'd be easy to get her friends excited, but tougher to convince the moms to make time in their schedules, and especially on any kind of a regular basis (as I'd well learned in the past year and a half). But I figured that a cute, non-threatening poster made by an adorable and enthusiastic 8-year-old might send the message better than any run-of-the-mill text from me.

Elise decided that the goal of the Girls Nature Club would be to "equip your child to survive in the woods in case they got lost. They should be able to make shelter, find food and live in the woods." This sounded ambitious to me, but really perfect as well.

Bursting at the seams, Elise started spreading the word among her friends and I'd heard a lot of sincere-sounding "that sounds fun!" from the moms. By Christmas, I'd texted out two fliers, knowing I'd have to re-text in January. And by mid-January, we had a lot of yeses!

In the week leading up to the day, we all washed our hands a lot to avoid spoiling all the fun with germs. And there was weather to watch, too, as a potential Friday afternoon ice storm made its way towards our house. We stocked up on supplies to make survival bracelets (Kalina had given Elise some supplies for Christmas that Elise was happy to share with her friends), discussed snack options and rules, learned how to teach survival-bracelet making and kept the house clean. Elise made me text everyone's mom to have them bring/wear muddy-weather clothes, due to the cold, rainy forecast. Elise spent a good deal of time fretting about whether everyone else would be adventurous as she is. I assured her they probably wouldn't, but that's part of organizing a group.

I'm not sure Matt or I actually expected Nature Club to happen, but sure enough, the day arrived, the hour arrived, and people started showing up--including a friend for Naomi, whom I'm pretty sure Naomi scared with her wild exuberance at having so many people around.

Elise's original idea was to hold Nature Club entirely outdoors. I'm a huge fan of this idea (as long as I can reasonably well supervise without literally having to stand outside the entire two hours) but the cold, wet, muddy, snowy landscape prevented this. Elise was disappointed, but consented to setting up in the basement. So after a visit to the bunny's cage (which apparently everyone got into at some time or another), the girls holed up in the basement and begin cranking out survival bracelets from paracord. Naomi and her friend bounced around the house, and Naomi's friend's mom and I didn't hear much from the older girls for like an hour--or not until they needed help finishing their bracelets.

Then the girls dove into the trail mix ingredients, nearly annihilating the M&Ms before I even noticed--and put a stop to--half a dozen hands reaching directly into bags of ingredients. Yikes. They each eventually assembled a baggie and then headed outdoors in their various boots or old tennis shoes. Or, unfortunately, new tennis shoes.

Many of which turned out to not be sufficient for actually keeping out the stream as the girls trekked directly through, as I soon found out. Elise, later: "I just thought everyone would all enjoy adventuring through the stream the same way I do." She proudly led them to the peninsula, to the log and to other favorite landmarks, and to her credit, when I called, back home (although she sent back one girl's brother who'd been sent to fetch them). By then, several girls were "freezing," and at least three had thoroughly wet feet, socks and shoes (including Kalina).

The moms had mostly arrived by the time the girls were coming in the door, along with several siblings whose shoes were also wet. With no chance at fitting on our 3x5 doormat, our entryway soon became one big muddy puddle as girls attempted to round up their belongings (a large portion of which got left behind), say goodbye and head out, with me apologizing profusely to the girls' moms for the wet footwear.

10+ inches of snow in January! Matt,
Kalina and Elise get all the credit for
building these snowmen: Naomi and
I were warm inside.

Important lessons were learned:
1. I learned to be very specific about the rules regarding each and every questionable activity Elise and others could possibly dream up. Even the ones that I thought were obvious. Laughingly saying, "and don't go in the stream!" a week before the event apparently isn't going to cut it. But no one in their right mind would go through a cold stream on a cold, wet day in January, would they? Except a whole pack of girls following Elise.
2. Elise learned that visitors can occasionally be difficult and leave large messes in bunny cages, on floors, and elsewhere.
3. Elise also learned that it takes time and patience to teach something new to a group.
4. Yes, people do respond more favorably to an adorable flier made by a sweet and enthusiastic 8-year-old than they do to an everyday text.

Everyone assured everyone else that it was a great time, and we hope they're telling the truth. After all, Elise already has the next one on the calendar.