Somebody's checkin' in!

Hannah had a sleepover birthday party yesterday, and I had forgotten what little-girl sleepovers were like. Hannah estimates it was *2 AM* before they went to bed. That is after I went down after 1 AM and told them no more tv and lights out. When one of the moms came this morning for the pick-up, she brought me roses from her garden for my bravery in being the first parent to host a sleepover party for Hannah's same-aged cohort. Sweet.

I can't say that the sleepover helped my day-long headache of yesterday, but at least it was gone when I got up this morning. The girls got up at 8! Crazy! Hannah and I have been acting like pot-heads all afternoon with the lack and poor quality of sleep--everything has been 10 times funnier than it should be. We are going to bed EARLY tonight!

John left at 10 AM to pedal his butt down (up?) the Neckar. At 4 PM, the thunderstorm that was predicted hit us here at the house, and it's still raining over an hour later. We'll see if he made it as far as the hostel this afternoon. If not, he may be on the train headed home already today instead of tomorrow afternoon.

I don't like driving in the rain or when it is dim out, but I may be forced by the storm to do both. A family's got to eat. Hopefully I won't whack into anything this time. Wish me luck!

House of Lazy, Yo

So remember when I had the entire month of March off, and somehow I didn’t get around to doing anything on my to-do list—such as writing a 20-page paper, doing my taxes, or finishing any stories? Here are the fruits of my dicking around.







Yes, it is from a kit (which I got for a zillion percent off after Xmas while in Texas), but since my homemade baked gingerbread houses have been uniformly a disaster, I thought something more permanent might be in order.

I also decorated Easter eggs using directions from a 70s-era craft book (groovy!).



Hannah is having a sleepover birthday party this evening. She wanted a brownie cake, so I baked the brownies and let her do the decorating.



And in other news, the coriander seeds *did* grow into cilantro, or a weed that tastes exactly like cilantro, so John is in seventh heaven. We will be attempting some pico de gallo at the first possible opportunity.



And I guess I didn’t need to worry about my cherry tomato plant. Now if it will just put out tomatoes, all will be right with the world.

The Hannah Beneath My Wings

Hannah was watching The Jerk yesterday while John and I were busy, and when it was over, she said that it would have been funny if Navin's first girlfriend (the biker) had shown up at the end and run over him with her motorcycle. I didn't concur. Today, she decided that on review, maybe it wasn't so funny after all.

Then on the bus today, she told me about her idea for a commercial for a sports bra. Just as the mom is about to go for a jog, the sitter calls and cancels on her.
Me: "So the mom stuffs the baby in the sports bra?"
H: "Exactly! That shows how stretchy it is!"
She's going to hit it big with one of her weird ideas one of these days.