Katie gets her first quote on the blog.

Mom: Where's my Katie?

Katie: I'm right here!

Mom: Are you happy?

Katie: No, I'm purple.

I'm not sure exactly what that means, but I thought it was cute.

And just now, as I was sitting at the computer typing this, she walked up to me, rubbed my shin, and said, "I wuv your leg." Then she rubbed the other one and said, "I wuv your 'nother leg."

Matthew the Chef

Paul walked into the kitchen the other day to find Matthew doing this:


Chair pulled up to stove? Check.
Pan on appropriate burner? Check.
Eggs cracked neatly into pan, and shells disposed of properly? Check.
Burner turned on? Thankfully, no. He doesn't know how--yet.

I decided to give him a hand.


I have got to get this boy signed up for some cooking classes.

Thomas is 9!

Here's the birthday boy with his cookies-and-cream cake.

Blowing out the candle while holding off his two younger siblings. (We ended up relighting the candle a few times so everyone could have a turn.)




Catey/Katie (we're debating the spelling of her name) thought the candle looked like a cookie.




Grandma and Grandpa gave him the old Lazer Tag set that Dad and the uncles used to play with back in the day. Those of you who know John and Nancy will not be surprised to learn that it was in mint condition.





A new Nintendo DS (half of which was his present, half of which he earned himself), Red Robin for dinner, cake, ice cream, and Lazer Tag in the dark until waaaay after bedtime. Life is good when you're nine.

Shout Out to the Lurkers

Sherise said to me the other day, "[Name changed to protect the innocent] told me she comes to our blog quite often and likes it. I didn't even know she KNEW about our blog."

This one comment has sent me on a quest -- to find out just how many people actually come to our blog. There are many crude devices like page view counters on people's blogs, but they don't tell you a whole lot. I decided to apply a little more technology to the process, and I've been amazed at what I've learned:

48 unique visitors have come to our site. A more accurate term would be 48 different web browsers have come to our site. At least four of them are ours (my work PC, my CrackBerry, Sherise's desktop, my desktop). But either way this means that the remaining 44 visitors are either people who like us so much that they check in on us from multiple computers, or they are unique individuals who have stopped by to see what we have to say. Either way, I'm flattered.

73% of our visitors have come back at least once. So we're not completely boring over here. Again, I'm flattered.

The "average" visitor views 1.5 pages while visiting our blog. Or another way of thinking of it, 1 in every 2 visitors looks at more than one page while they're here. Again, I'm flattered.

Our visitors span 5 different countries (in descending order of visitors):

1. U.S.
2. Belgium
3. China
4. Georgia
5. U.K.

Within the U.S., our traffic comes from (again in descending order):

1. Utah
2. Montana
   
3. Colorado
4. Washington
5. Virginia
6. California
7. New York
8. New Mexico
9. Pennsylvania
10. Nevada
11. New Jersey

I don't think I know anybody in Montana, New York, or Pennsylvania!

So please, leave a comment, let us know what you like, what you'd like to see more (or less) of. We want you to keep coming back.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning, I am not

My friend Kristy just posted here about a rhyming verse (I hesitate to call it a poem) that's always bothered her. It reminded me of my feelings about this one:

Two frogs fell into a deep cream bowl,
One was an optimistic soul;
But the other took the gloomy view,
"I shall drown," he cried, "and so will you."

So with a last despairing cry,
He closed his eyes and said, "Good-bye."
But the other frog, with a merry grin
Said, "I can't get out, but I won't give in!

I'll swim around till my strength is spent.
For having tried, I'll die content."
Bravely he swam until it would seem
His struggles began to churn the cream.

On the top of the butter at last he stopped
And out of the bowl he happily hopped.
What is the moral? It's easily found.
If you can't get out -- keep swimming around!


Every time I hear this, I think, "No, the moral is 'Always check your butter for dead frogs.'"

Whose kid are you?

(The Scene: I'm getting Matthew ready for bed, and he wants to watch a movie.)

Mom: Hey buddy, let's get your teeth brushed, and we'll read a book together.

Matthew: No! Books are annoying!

Good Parenting?

This is how I let my five-year-old leave the house to run some errands with me today:




Let's go in for a closer look, shall we?



Now, I think allowing a child to go out in public wearing shorts, a swim mask, and a hoodie says, "I allow my children to express their personalities in creative ways, and I'm confident enough in my parenting skills that I feel no need to force him to change just to avoid negative judgments from others we might see as we go about our business." Other people might read it as, "I'm way too lazy to find something else for my kid to wear."

I'll let you decide for yourself.