A boy and his dog

George and Max have a very special relationship.  George loves playing with Max—throwing him his favorite red ball, playing tug of war with his stuffed animals, chasing him around the house.  I think Max has finally realized there is some payoff to these kid-things who invaded his home over three years ago.

In truth Frances and George love both Marshall and Max.  Marshall is just a little more “private” than Max and prefers to slink off to his man cave during the day.  Conversely, Max loves the kids and his sweet side comes out even stronger when they are around. 

George and Max play a lot on those mornings when Frances is in school.



I love this one - they both have the same smile.



 

Frances is eager to join in once she is home for the day.

I feel very lucky that the children are growing up with our first “boys.”  I find that teaching them to be gentle with the dogs (George needs this lesson a bit more than Frances) has taught them to be gentle with a lot of other fragile treasures—flowers, plants, breakables, and most importantly the new babies in our family.  I also see the love in Frances and George’s eyes when they are with Marshall and Max; all four of them have learned to be more tolerant of each other; and it makes me smile to think that they are building memories of their first dog to carry with them through life.  It’s not always easy to have two dogs and two children (and some days I wonder why we do??), but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

And no post about the dogs would be complete without a picture (or 3) of Will and Marshall—the other gruesome twosome in the family.

Talk about a boy and his dog!

Monday, Monday

Monday was a little rough, I won’t lie.  All three of us just seemed grouchier than normal (or maybe I was the grouchier one and Frances and George are 3 ½ and 1 ½ years old) and things that would normally just roll off my back got stuck there, festered and then exploded.

So, rather than bore you with the details of our arduous day, I thought I’d post some pictures of our last outing to Lewis Ginter Botanical Gardens.  I can’t look at these without smiling and feeling immediate appreciation for our gorgeous city and my (mostly) well-behaved children.

This trip we made our way to the conservatory building first, which has been under construction and difficult to view with small children.  We were the only three people in the entire building and we had a blast.  I didn’t take nearly enough pictures because I was so concerned that my little gardener-in-the-making (or maybe plant killer) George was going to overturn the rare orchids.  But he didn’t and all three of us truly enjoyed ourselves.



Some of the many orchids (these safely out of George's reach)





Stargazers - one of my favorites





Hydrangeas just make me happy





One of several huge rooms - this one houses the Christmas tree and train set in winter.





I've always loved this little house




You can't go in, but you can see what is inside through this glass wall.  There is always something different.




Something for the adults!



We eventually made our way down to the children’s garden as we always do and made a beeline for Frances’s favorite part, the sandbox.  Frances was a perfect angel while George and I had a battle of the wills when he started throwing sand for no reason after I told him several times not to throw the sand (why do they do that??  And it’s always in front of those nice parents that you are thinking would be lovely to meet and make friends with; after George’s behavior and my necessary reaction I was too horrified to approach the subject).

Another great outing to “the flower garden” as Frances calls it.

Ahhhh, thank you.  I needed that!

Maintenance

“We're doing maintenance, but things should be back to normal soon.”  This is the message I keep receiving on blogger as I am trying to upload pictures. 

So, for tonight I am signing off and heading to an early bedtime.  Maybe blogger is trying to tell me that I need a little maintenance myself!  Although I can't promise that things here will be back to normal anytime soon.

Good night everyone!

Never, ever

If you had told me four years ago that I would have voluntarily purchased this bathing suit for a certain three-year-old I would have likely rolled my eyes, laughed and thought to myself that no daughter of mine will don a commercialized image of a singing mermaid no matter how much she begs.

It’s shiny.  It’s purple.  It has Ariel on the front.  In other words, Frances loves it.  And my true confession?  I found it for her while I was browsing in the girls’ bathing suit aisle with Frances and George safely playing with the store toys.  I could have escaped the wrath of Ariel and Frances would have been none the wiser.  But the minute I saw it, I could picture Frances’s sheer delight in wearing it.  Ariel is her favorite of all of the Disney Princesses because she “likes her red hair.”  How can I not nurture that simple affection?

While I am in no hurry to buy more theme-related items (much less have Frances actually see some of the movies where these princesses first make their appearance.  In fact, if it weren’t for her friends at school our poor neglected child would have no idea these lovely ladies existed in cartoon land), I also can’t help but be lured into her world of princesses and princes, queens and kings all of which live in our house (Will and I are sometimes the king and queen, but sometimes the prince and princess.  Marshall is always a prince.  Max is often a prince and strangely enough sometimes a princess.  Frances is always the princess and George is always the prince.  I hope you could follow that).

She is most definitely my princess; in every wonderful way imaginable. 

I hope I never forget

I hope I never forget the way that George feels sitting in my lap reading a book.  The way he rear-ends his way into my crossed legs to signal that he wants to read.  The warmth of his body against my stomach.  The easy access to ruddy cheek kissing I have in between verses in the book.  The sweaty boy smell he has at the end of the day.

I hope I never forget Frances leaning over George and asking him in her sweet Minnie Mouse voice if he wants to play something and George giving his classic nod.  “Okay!” says Frances and off she runs with George bounding behind her.

I hope I never forget the sound of George calling me Mimi.  I am certain that in a few short months (or even weeks), he will change his ways and call me simply “Mommy.”  And I am certain I will get a little bit weepy when he does that.

I hope I never forget that Frances uses the soft “g” sound when pronouncing her brother’s name (the same “g” sound that comes at the end of the word "beige") – very French!

I hope I never forget that every night I sing Irving Berlin’s “What’ll I Do” to George as I am putting him to bed.  It’s my small tribute to Bea Arthur who sang that tune on an episode of The Golden Girls and I have loved it ever since.  Yes, technically it’s a love song (and a sad one at that), but it fits our evening routine.  George puts his head on my shoulders as I rock him back and forth; sometimes he looks right in my eyes on the last verse as if to say “good night.”  That's when I really need to get a tissue. 

I hope I never forget that Frances calls my dress heels my “tap shoes” and always asks me when I am wearing them again.  It is inconceivable to her that I don’t voluntarily wear them every day as certainly she would if she were an adult.

I hope I never forget the sound of unrestrained giggles that my children make when they are playing.  I am forever grateful that (at least for now) Frances and George adore being with each other dare I say more than they like being with anyone else, including their own parents.  Frances begs to wake George up from his nap if he is sleeping longer than expected and George races to get in the car seat (I know!  I promise, it’s the only time he does that) if he knows we are picking Frances up from school.

I hope I never forget what Frances and George are like at these perfect ages of 3 ½ and 1 ½.



Can we just freeze them here, please?



Back to reality

Frances, George and I are slowly easing back in to our pre-3-day weekend, pre-3-trips-to-Lynchburg-in-a-row routine.  We are doing this “slowly” because I seem to have forgotten what exactly we did on a daily basis before we camped out at Nana and Pop’s house, hosted family, and enjoyed Daddy for 3 whole days in a row.

Katherine, Henry and James drove down for a short visit during the holiday weekend while David flew out to California to pick up Katherine’s oldest son, Ian, after his first year of college (how is it that I have both a niece and a nephew who are in college?).  Frances and George loved showing their cousins their hometown and Henry and James loved playing with all of their old toys again (50% or more of the toys in our house are hand-me-downs from Katherine; the other 50% are gifts from grandparents.  Our children (and their parents for that matter) have it made). 



Saturday morning breakfast of champions



On Saturday, we swam at our local pool, watched movies, played on the playground and held a highly competitive baseball game in our backyard.  By 5:00 pm, we all piled into our car and headed to dinner at Mexico Restaurant where the adults ordered margaritas and the kids had their fill of chips.

On Sunday, the Hamilton troop had to head home but not before a visit to Maymont park to see the animals (all of which made their appearance – thank you!).



The gray fox




The bald eagle




Daddy and Frances at the waterfall



George at the koi pond (his favorite)



This was the best picture I could get of the four cousins who seem to be looking at four different cameras
(James, Henry, Frances and George)



All in all, it was a terrific visit and so wonderful to see Katherine and crew again (sans some important folk, of course).

As I am typing this, I can feel myself slowly fading into an abnormally early bedtime.  I have a sneaking suspicion my sleepiness has to do with the fact that Will and I had our annual Memorial Day “date day” on Monday (yes, an entire day without Frances and George – or at least from 10am to 4:30pm, which felt like both an eternity and a half-hour.  Strange).  Rather than spend that time relaxing by the pool, reading a book, or lazily lunching, we kicked it into high gear and hiked the Belle Island trail and North Bank trail in downtown Richmond.  This is yet another (maybe 1,238^th?) reason why I love my husband—he and I both prefer active outings.  On a cool day, our adventure would have been tough; but when you consider that the temperatures soared to around 97 degrees by 12 noon I am surprised we are both still here to report back.  It was a fantastic day and I can’t wait to do it again next year!

But for now, the four of us will be rediscovering our daily routines and heading slowly in to summer.

Happy Tuesday!

Happy Memorial Day!

We are happily exhausted after a very busy week and weekend (playdates, Katherine and her boys visiting, pool visits, playground romps, Maymont and many, many errands); and the 3-day weekend is still ongoing!  Will and I are looking forward to our “day date” tomorrow while Grandma and Grandpa watch Frances and George.  More on all fronts very soon, but in honor of Memorial Day, I am posting some pictures of my grandfather, Leon Johnson, a Navy veteran.  While he didn’t die in combat (the true honorees of Memorial Day), he did die earlier this year to join my beloved grandmother, Frances (my own daughter’s namesake), who left us ten years ago.

My grandparents remain the most handsome couple I have ever known:

Throughout their lives, they were dashing, happy and full of life:

This is my favorite picture of their young family (including my mother and her brother, Dibby):

I took these pictures from an album my mother made for her parents on their 60^th wedding anniversary.  Her caption says, “The secret to a happy marriage” and I couldn’t have said it better myself:





If you look closely at the last two pictures, you will notice my grandparents standing in front of the same house.  They lived in that home for over 60 years—a home that my grandfather built from the ground up.  They raised two children, accommodated years of grandchildren visits, grew their own garden, hosted countless holidays, and lived, laughed and loved through 63 years of marriage all in that home.  My grandparents continue to remind me (even in death) that you don’t need material things to be happy—you only need gratitude for what you do have and a love of family.

Happy Memorial Day everyone!