Big girl

Agatha has been sleeping in a big girl bed-- or as she likes to call it, a bed shaped like a rectangle-- for two weeks now. The transition was seamless! She slept well in it the first day, and never looked back, unlike Henry who shuttled back and forth between the crib and the bed for a month or so. She is getting more imaginative all the time, singing little made up songs and telling fantastic tall tales, many of them about how she can fly like a bird. She still loves birds of all sorts and talks about woodpeckers, crows, and cardinals frequently. We got her sheets with a birdhouse motif for her new bed. She is very attached to Mama right now, and while this is sometimes tiresome it is usually quite magical to have this small, perfect, beautiful person gazing adoringly at me and talking seriously and at great length to me about all sorts of fantastical topics.

Train trip, and the slow beginning of summer

We've had a lot of fun stuff lately-- Mother's Day, my mom's birthday, and last Wednesday we took advantage of a day off from the kids' school to take a day trip into Philadelphia on the train. We not only took Amtrak there and back, we also rode in a taxi, two city buses, and a trolley. A thrilling day of transit for the preschoolers! We went to the wonderful "Please Touch" museum (for kids), and then the Philadelphia Art Museum. I had to carry Agatha a lot, and we were all pooped by the end of the day, but it was a lot of fun. Henry was alternately stubborn and wonderful: he refused to wear the little belt on the carousel, and therefore was not able to ride it (had to sit on a bench while Agatha and Daddy rode); on the other hand, he loved the audio guide at the museum and calmly went around, locating all the codes, typing them in, and listening carefully to the information. If this keeps up, we have an excellent museum companion in our future!

Now that Commencement is over, the whole family seems to be sinking in to a torpor of rest and rebuilding. Both children had fevers and were home from school a day this week-- Agatha with an ear infection, and Henry-- who knows? He refused to take any medicine and slept off his fever overnight. I'm letting him stay home this morning mainly as a reward for his courage and fortitude, and because I understand his desire to burrow in with Mommy at home and work on his paper houses in peace and quiet. (We have a book of E-O scale historic houses that Henry loves; he cuts out the dozens of tiny pieces, folds them carefully, and then we glue them together. We are amassing quite the 19th-century village!) The rain just keeps falling, which gives us an excuse to avoid gardening and house chores (except for Michael's labors at keeping the basement dry) for another couple of days. Legos, sewing, and baking are the order of the afternoons. Soon enough it will be hot and sunny and we'll be busy fixing stuff, writing essays, taking research trips and family vacations, and bustling the children around for summer camps and various activities. For now, though, things are slow, slow, slow. Which feels good, good, good.