ella's new do

Ella's got a sassy new haircut (all her choosing) and a new bathing suit to match.


Oh, my our little girl ever looking big!

when you get it all.

Sometimes it just happens.

You have a PERFECT day.

Mt. Katahdin is one of my favorite places on the earth. Its rugged beauty, remote locale, its gritty trails made for the brave, the fierce, and the fit make me revere it. In short, it is just a bad ass mountain.

Here is the group of girls ready to climb. From left to right: Amy (of the Burlington marathon), Emilie, Becca, birthday girl Christine, me and Sandi. Two with enormous fear of heights, one whose never climbed a mountain, lots of water, trail mix, wardrobe discussion and a little trash talk and we are ready to go.

We met up with some of Becca's friends to make a party of 11 (including a 10 year-old boy!) for hiking and off we set.

Within the first tenth of a mile, we meet a guy embarking on the Appalachian Trail, heading north to south, and getting ready to summit Katahdin to begin his journey. In other words, he has to hike 5.5 miles in before he can officially start. Right away Christine quips, "I want to do that. I think I will put hiking the AT on my bucket list. But wait, does that mean I would have to sleep outside?"

We decide instead to go back to our plan to hike the 100 mile wilderness (the most remote and toughest part of the AT, 100 mile corridor from Katahdin to Monson) in 2 or 3 summers (since it will probably be a 10 day adventure we need a little age on our kids). Did I mention that I LOVE that my friends hike mountains to celebrate their birthdays and that instead of getting together to go shopping we plan other outdoor adventures?

We headed up the Helon Taylor trail (pictured above) which went from light woods hiking to woods climbing to above tree line kind of straight up. We summited Pamola Peak and looked out over this:

That is Baxter Peak (the summit of Mt. Katahdin) in the distance. And the only way to get there? Why across the 1 mile Knife Edge trail along the spine of the mountain of course!

This is part of our party coming down the first decent.

There are parts of the trail, especially the first part in the direction we hiked, where it is hand over foot, stop and search for the next foot or hand hold. It's hard not to wonder, and in fact I did, How do they let people do this? How is this not roped off? And a less welcoming thought, how many people have actually died doing this?

And Christine, happy as ever the next peak over!
Looking down at Chimney Pond, that little puddle in the distance:
Sandi, Emilie and I ended up hiking the Knife Edge as a party of three. Emilie and I had had similar experiences the only other time we had hiked it (for me 8 or 9 years previously). We had been less fit, heavier and terrified. This was my favorite part of the whole day and certainly my most cherished moments spent between the three of us. We laughed, we joked, we appreciated the utter splendor.

Hiking across, trusting my feet, my balance, the strength in my arms to lift me up when my legs were too short to get foot holds, feeling exhilaration instead of terror- it was a pivotal life moment for me when I realized just what a different human being I am now. Instead of carrying 25 extra pounds on my body, I was carrying 25 pounds in a back pack for starters. I no longer needed Sandi to hoist me up from behind on the trickiest of rocks (trust me, it wasn't pretty, hands on bum giving a giant shove), I had all my own strength, no tears just big smiles.

Nothing like a little adrenaline hiking to show you what you've become.
Did I also mention that being 33 kicks the pants off of being 25?

Nearing Baxter Peak and looking back at Pamola from where we came:

Did I mention that it wasn't only high and steep but kind of freakishly dropped off too?

The cairn on Baxter peak.

The birthday girl, first hike ever, summits Mt. Katahdin, making the whole thing look easy.

I'm telling you...it just doesn't get better than this. Or maybe it does. I would love to stand corrected.

All 11 made it, including the 10-year-old boy whose dad had to hold him back the entire day he was so speedy and sure footed. What a play ground for a boy!

Off the mountain and coming down into my most cherished place, Chimney Pond:

This place has always been special to Sandi and I from the first moment we saw it. When Ella was 10 months old we backpacked the 3.3 miles in (and her very willing family came with us) to do Ella's water blessing. We spent the night in a lean to with our little baby and blessed her life from this magical place. You can only take water out of Chimney Pond. You cannot put your body into it. It is a sacred spot to me, more holy than any church. Here I feel like I bow before the mountain in reverence and it fills my soul.

As Sandi said: How great a day to be swallowed up by a mountain.

I kept saying over and over all day that my contentment factor was super high. Here is the best photographic representation of that. Sitting back on sunny, windless part of Knife Edge enjoying a panoramic view and the company of two incredible women.
It had been 5 years since we had stood here. The enormous joy of this day was a promise that it would not be 5 more until we returned.

Nearing the end, my tired feet wanted for the car, my back longing to shed the pack, but my body was still wanting and able to go, my heart not wanting to leave this place. I felt like I might have to be dragged from Baxter.

I said to Sandi, "This was one of my favorite days of my life."

When we left the park, I thanked the park ranger for letting us hike "his" mountain. And then Sandi and I laughed as we drove away, because we know that it is actually our mountain.

The ride home, Sandi and I, just like it was when we started this journey together 10 years ago: music at full volume with singing to accompany, eating sandwiches, sucking the last of the Gatorade from my Camelbak bladder, feet in flip flops, 10 amazing miles up and around my favorite mountain, hands on each others bare scratched up legs and my heart was swollen with love and joy and appreciation.

unplugged

Sandi and I are off tomorrow to hike Mt. Katahdin- one of our favorite places in our whole beautiful state of Maine. This trip, to celebrate my friend Christine's birthday, is no small feat. Having exhausted all familial childcare help for the day, we managed to secure our top notch, muchly beloved college babysitter for the gig.

I pick her up at 5 am and she will have the girls from start to finish tomorrow, wake up to bedtime, as it will take us all day to hike the Beast.

For the girls I've got snacks packed, beach bag stashed, instructions (almost) written, house (almost) organized, emergency back-up adults in place and we have secured the children some sleep. I put Ella to sleep with her crying big, fat tears into my shirt and sobbing, "Puh-lease. Don't. Leave. Pre-etty. Puh-leeeeeease!!!! I love you! I will miss you! Don't leave meeeeee!!!" It is flattering, truly, but so heartbreaking.

Especially when she asks if she can call me if she misses me. Ummm... not in the back country darling. I'm going to take a photo and put it on my cell phone and leave it on the counter.

It was a really very interesting thing to figure out how much to pay someone to babysit ALL DAY. When we came up with a figure it seemed generous enough, yet still startling small for all the work she will do. Strange to figure out what my job is really WORTH in dollars...

So, off to finish the almosts.

Sunny and 75 on the mountain tomorrow. A back pack. No cell phone. An 11+ mile tough hike. Sandi, my running friends and a birthday to celebrate. Trail mix with M & Ms.

Color me happy.

buddies

This is our beloved Brady. The most gentle boy I know. Brady of the best friend category of Ella's young life.

Ella and Brady literally spent 7 days in a row together last week. They went to art camp together which included bonus time before and, often, after camp. Last weekend we took Brady and his sister Anna all day and then all the Smith's spent the night PLUS an all day trip to Bar Harbor the next day.

These two never once fought. They never once tired of each other.

Did I mention that they are like two peas in a slightly shy, super sensitive, intelligent, creative and with a flare for the emotionally dramatic shell? We comment all the time that each is like a mirror of the other in the opposite gender.

Here they are building a dam together. It's like watching two worker bees in a Utopian hive. They encourage, support and inspire each other. And they thrive.

Being that they are so similar, every now and then one of them will have a crisis of confidence and get a nasty case of the "I can't do it"s but usually the unaffected one tows the line and they make it through.

Here they are having lunch at Geddy's in Bar Harbor. Ella dropped her precious pink poodle on the floor and Brady, very chivalrously climbed down onto the dirty floor to retrieve it. I tell you, it's love.

Once last year, Brady told his parents that when he grows up he wants to marry Ella. Then he wondered, "I wonder who she will marry?"

Hard to say at this early age, but if you watch them closely, it looks like a whole lot of love to me.

the five-year-old teacher

This is our Ella.

She likes to follow rules, put together unusual outfits, equally adores doting on and and screeching at her little sister. If allowed she still likes to swing in baby swings and lobbies hard to wear a pull-up like Maya. She tells me she loves me 10 times when I put her to bed at night, speaks often about how wonderful the world is, how beautiful our house is and how blessed we are by the people we know and love. She likes to roam the yard naked, she sings and talks to the vegetables in the garden to make them grow and builds fairy houses in the perennial garden. She is, relatively, an easy child who needs no more than a stern look and if she thinks she has disappointed you she dissolves in a pool of tears.

And sometimes, she makes me feel like plucking my hair out of my head one by one.

We spent a super fun weekend with our friends, full on play the entire time with beach trips, meals out, staying up late and all sorts of ruckus. And this is how the scene unfolded when she got out of the bathtub at the end of the second day: she complained that I had not heated her towel in the dryer (a treat we do in winter because our bathroom is chilly). I explained that we don't waste the electricity in the summer when can go to the beach and eat ice cream cones. "But we didn't even eat an ice cream cone!" she protested. Now, in fairness she might have been stating a fact - we had gone to the beach but we had not had an ice cream cone. That day. She had had one both of the previous days. I was speaking in general about summer- we use the dryer less if it is warm enough to go to the beach and eat ice cream. What followed was me walking away and telling her I couldn't talk to her right then because I was really angry and her freaking out that I walked away.

What's a mom to do?

Likely it was a misunderstanding, but it didn't stop my quick fuse from being ignited. I have tried really hard to go for the calm walk-away approach instead of the screaming my head off approach. It didn't matter- the tired tears came streaming down (the inevitable cost of such a fun weekend) and she began yelling at me. For what it's worth, I have made enormous progress because my anger was contained and not exploding out. I did not argue or raise my voice. But even still, she could sense my emotion boiling under my fake calm voice, felt me pull away,and responded to it just the same.

I don't think it is a mistake that being a parent is so hard. I think it is some sort of built-in system to help the human race evolve- whatever limitations , faults, issues you bring forward in your life are exactly the ones your kids are going to set off in you. It's like the idea that your parents can push your buttons so easily because they installed them. I would also wager the converse. Kids know exactly how to get their parents going. Kids push parents buttons (intentionally or not) and, if this process is embraced, it is the prime growth opportunity for the parents to become better people.

See I didn't have easiest childhood. Our girls, by contrast to me, have it all. They have the love, comfort, security, possibility, encouragement and fun that was absent in my early years. As a result one of my biggest buttons (the one that sits on my chest with a big red blinking sign that says "PUSH ME") is when I think our kids are being ungrateful. It sends me flying each and every time. The awareness of it has helped, but all that has really changed is that I do less damage when I get upset. I aim to eventually just use those moments as teaching opportunities- speak with a calm, loving voice about why it isn't nice to essentially complain about a missed ice-cream cone rather than say thank you for all that WAS done that day.

I am one of the most impatient people I know. I like to have a plan. I like to be punctual. I like order and for people to do what they say they will. I like things to be clean and organized. Sure I like adventure and spontaneity too but I like to know their coming (hmmmm....) so I can relax into it and enjoy it.

Kids blow all of this out of the water. It seems like everyday, I am stretched further and further out of my comfort zone. And, for as uncomfortable as this makes me, I truly revel in it. I can now breath and wait for my children to climb on the stacked mulch bags EVERY time we get in and out of the car, appreciate their need to have a sock-puppet performance 5 minutes before bed, slow down and snuggle even though I have 100 things to do in half an hour, make 50 sand towers just so Maya can knock down each one and allow Ella to wear 3-4 different outfits each day. I have learned to be in the moment, sit still, go without a plan. Not always, mind you, but sometimes.

Essentially, my kids have (sometimes gently, sometimes with great and sudden force) whittled away my edges. Like sea glass that goes from sharp and jagged to worn and smooth. This process is at times incredibly painful while at other moments I feel like I watch my flaws emerge from the dark into the light of day and dissolve in the sunlight. I am better for it. As much as some days I wonder how I ever got into this job, and feel it is way, WAY too big for me, I like the person I am better as a parent. I AM more patient. I AM more relaxed. I AM more evolved.

I heard Ella come down the stairs for the day a few mornings ago and I knelt down on the floor with my arms open to hug her when she came around the corner. When she did, I almost feel over. My heart jumped ship into my stomach and the force almost knocked out my balance. She was so...so...BIG. Almost too big to fit into my arms easily. Almost too big to pick up, to carry. She paused and gave me a smile and then launched herself into my arms.

There. She is big. She is going to school all day next year. She has become, truly, a little girl. And I am still her mom, worn smooth from the wear and tear, the tears and love, the struggle and the beauty, with extra lines on my face and an even bigger heart because I am her mom.

all aboard the potty train II

We've been using some good 'ol fashion bribery in our house to move out of diapers once and for all.

Specifically 1 chocolate chip (Ghiradelli milk chocolate giant chips actually) for pee. Two for poop. Three if your an overachiever and you get it all done.

Maya earns these for herself for going. She also earns them for Ella. Yes, we are using the added benefit of peer pressure to insure success.

When we first started this a few weeks ago and Maya got one chip for going, she turned to me and said, "I want another." I told her she would have to go poop on the potty for more chocolate. In she marched and sat and sat and worked and worked. And wouldn't you know it...out it came. Cha-ching. Two more for each girl.

I think this is having the added benefit of improving Maya's likability quotient in Ella's eyes.

It took Ella about a full year to be potty trained. Maya being a quick study shoudn't be surprising but I find it astonishing. I am SO ready to be done washing cloth diapers and carrying poopy ones in my purse. We have been dealing with excrement in the pants for 5 1/2 years. To think we could be nearing the end...

So here she is, working hard...



with a chocolate face to prove her success.

that music in my head

We have an old school ice cream truck in our neighborhood. If you can get past your fears about child abduction, it is really very quaint. It goes around probably 4 times a week, the tinkling of "The Entertainer" beaconing children forth for overpriced, frozen novelties.



Ella has developed quite an ear for this sound and, like a dog, she tilts her head to a strange angle when she hears it in the distance, a good 5 minutes before the rest of us. It's freakishly like that scene in "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" when the child-napper lures the hidden children with the jingling of bells and the promise of treacle tarts.



Anyway...dark and twisty thoughts aside, the ice cream truck had gone by and about 30 minutes later Ella said, "I have music in my head. Can you hear it?"



I told her I could. (I'm not entirely sure why.)



She replied, "What does it sound like?"



I hummed the tune of The Entertainer. Her eyes got really, REALLY big.



"How did you do that, Momma?!" she asked.

pot(s)

Ange and I did a flower-pot decorating project with the kids a few rainy days ago. My camera has been on the wrong setting, likely something Maya reprogrammed, and I am unable to fix such technological maladies. All my pictures came out blurry (like the play dough ones below) but some are worth showing just the same.

general silliness

We have an ant problem that we have half-heartedly tried to remedy with chemicals. Ella vacillates between squashing them on the bottom of her shoe and running from the room screaming.

So what would lead me to believe she would do what she did?

If you look very, very closely (get our your magnifying glass) you can see the hullabaloo is all for a deceased ant. This, friends, is a VIP only ant funeral, attending by only the best. Notice Elmo flew in for the occasion. I think the ant speck is somewhere in between the line of horses and the windmill.

I'm not joking when I say the girls spent 45 minutes on this charade.

Moving on...

Ella, with her skank face on during a recent trip to Home Depot.

We had a 3 day stretch where no mommies had to leave for work and we spent them almost completely outside working and playing in the yard. This is the attire required for such heavy duty labor.

And, sadly, Ella discovered that she did in fact need glasses to see more clearly...

Maya has been singing her version of the Itsy Bitsy Spider ("The whitzy bitzy pider...") on a continuous loop. On the way to my sister's house for my nephew's 2nd birthday, Maya sang if for a solid 30 minutes, at times yelling with some angry force about how that spider had the nerve to once again attempt the climb up the water spout. Ella said, "If Maya sings the Itsy Bitsy Spider, it will be a GREAT party!"

BUT...all good things must come to an end.

Today, Maya was singing it again in the back of the car (melodically: "down came the rain and washed the spider out" and then gutturally screaming to repeat for dramatic effect: "DOWN CAME THE RAIN AND WASHED THE SPIDER OUT!") and said, "You sing it Ella." Ella started in the first few bars and then caught herself, "No Maya! I will not sing it anymore! You're giving me a headache!" Maya paused than launched into "Twinkle Twinkle" (the only part of which she knows are those 2 words and so she repeats them in a twangly, repetitive, almost drunken fashion). Ella sighed and said, "Now that's better."

Guess it's all relative...

where the river runs

There are added benefits of long distance running. Such as finding this little gem of a place on a beautiful back road of Hampden. (I'm pretty sure no one but us, and the other couple that were there, know about it so I can't say where it is...)


When the weather soars to 90 degrees and you have little kids where do you go?

Fishing!
And swimming in 6 inches of water!

See the nets?

And the kitchen strainer?

Reed was very busy looking for "shrimp along the ocean floor."

Maya caught a lot of "fish." Otherwise known as dirt.

They got pretty good...


Ella insisted on bringing some home despite the knowledge that they would die. Last year on a similar beach trip we took with the Manharts snails were captured and I made her release them to prevent their unnecessary death. She was quite upset with my decision since Skyler was allowed to take her snails home. This time I let her decide and she watched her fish die their certain death in an old glass fish bowl. She seemed somehow vindicated and I wondered as a parent and human being just what to make of that. I asked her if she would choose that again having watched them die and she said, "I will take just one next time." I guess she can live with one death on her conscience???

Here they are in their last hours. R.I.P. minnows. Sorry to use you for parental teaching. Please forgive.