The Pig Flu and Other Tales of Woe

Well, I have almost defeated the swine flu. My fever finally broke last night and I have been increasingly better today. Andre's IV's were very effective. Evelyn kept pointing to her arm and whining then pointing to my arm. I'd say, "do you want an IV too?" And she'd nod "yes." She was completely fascinated and wouldn't stop fixating on it.

Evey seemed well today. Rowan on the other hand woke up with little pink spots all over her. Plus, she was cranky and kept pulling her ear. Andre took her to the pediatrician and she had a rash caused by the virus she had, plus an ear infection. The pediatrician put her on medicine for her ear, plus flu meds for both girls just to be on the safe side. By this evening she seemed better too.

In other news, this is what we caught Evelyn doing tonight. She was climbing on top of her play kitchen so that she could kiss her own reflection in the mirror. She climbed up there by herself and quite fast too. The funniest thing was that she kept looking at herself, laughing, and kissing her reflection. If only we all had such a great self-esteem.


Rowan hasn't figured out how to climb on it yet and Evelyn is already at the very top. It just shows you that the girls have their own strengths, and sometimes Rowan will be the first and sometimes Evelyn will be the first. Every child is different.

She has amazing balance and upper body strength. She can hold onto ledges and almost pull herself up. She even carried my big heavy skillet to put it away today--I was helping her with it, but she was carrying most of the weight.

I'm feeling a bit piggish

So I've been sick since last Wednesday, and wouldn't you know--I have Swine Flu. Yeah, I can't believe it. I actually thought the doctor was joking when he said it.

The twins are both sick too, but they don't seem to be as bad. I took them to their pediatrician on Friday and she thought they just had a virus.

Poor Andre is playing nurse-maid to all three of us. He's hooked me up to an IV, so I'm getting plenty of fluids and I'm on meds. Being sick is the worst.

9-11-09

Andre played the bagpipes for the Annual 9-11 Memorial.

just playing

Play is underrated.

Kids understand the importance of playing. Of finding joy is the most basic thing. Of laughing. Of being silly. Of spinning around in circles, or making noises, or playing some funny game you just made up.

There are adults who don't know how to play. Who spend too much time trying to control the world around them and can't just let go. I don't really understand this. I've seen it, I've known these type of people, but it doesn't make sense to me.

My job, if anything, is a depressing job. People sit in my office and cry and tell me how their lives are falling a part. And I guess maybe its because of that, and maybe because of my own suffering that I value those moments when you can just run around the house chasing after your kids and acting like an idiot. I never once forget how quickly our lives can change.

So today after work, I let go of the fact that I was exhausted and played "duck, duck goose" and ran around the house. My favorite game to play with them is my version of Jack and the Beanstalk. I'll say, "Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum, I smell the blood of a Bolivian." As soon as they hear that they both start giggling and running. I'll walk slow and heavy like a B-movie monster repeating the line until I finally catch one and say, "And here she is!" By then they are in hysterics. Rowan always wants to be caught and usually runs away then turns around and runs right into me so I can catch her.

Playing is good though. Its a great stress relief for us and a good coping mechanism when times are tough. People often comment on how happy the girls are, how much they laugh, and I have to think that at least some of that is how much we play with them. I want them to grow up understanding how wonderful life is and how to create joy. They'll learn soon enough how sad it can be, how hard it can be, and how disappointing it can be.

The girls definitely have their own sense of humor. Rowan loves anything really silly. Funny animals, silly songs, she loved Chucky Cheese--that sort of thing. While Evelyn really likes slapstick comedy. If you accidentally fall, she'll start cracking up.

The other day, Andre was holding a bag of crackers and when Evelyn reached in to get a cracker he shook the bag and made sort of a barking noise as if the bag was going to bite her--she thought it was the funnest thing ever. He tried the same thing with Rowan and she got really upset. On another occasion, Rowan was intentionally hitting her head against the wall because every time she did Evelyn laughed. I think Evelyn's going to appreciate darker humor. It will be fun to see how much of their sense of humor will remain and how it will evolve as they get older.

Labor Day Weekend

We celebrated Labor Day the traditional way, pool party and barbecue with friends.

I bought the girls new two piece swimsuits, which Andre did not approve of. I have discovered that the toddler bikini is a controversial subject. Where some people find it cute, others see it as a slippery slope to becoming a hoochy-mama. First the bikini, then the stilettos, before you know it its booze and late night partying. You really have to keep on your toes with this sort of thing. Luckily, Rachel came to the rescue with the explanation of the difference between a bikini and a two-piece.





All kidding aside, the girls are becoming more and more comfortable in the water. They'll jump to us from the side and Andre's been working with them to float on their backs. I really want to get them into a swimming class. The gym we joined has a huge indoor pool and several "water babies" classes. Actually, that was the motivation behind the two-piece. The girls are growing so quickly, I figured the two-piece would last through the winter until swimsuits went on sale again next summer.


Anyhow, Labor Day is an interesting holiday that no one in our group remembered the underlying purpose of. I told Andre it was to celebrate all women who had been in labor and therefore they should be honored on this most important holiday. He didn't buy it. Apparently, the day is in celebration of an 8-hour workday. I spent the Monday-holiday working only 5 and feeling like it was a great vacation. Poor Andre worked a full 24 hour shift.


The girls really love to walk around with things on their heads. Here's a picture of them walking around with their towels. They're so funny. They found my wedding veil and love to wear it. They'll even wear one of my skirts like a big veil. I guess if the "toddler bikini" doesn't work out they can always wear the "toddler burka."





After a day in the sun, they were completely worn out. This is two minutes into our ride home.

First Day of School

The girls went to their first day of "school" today. They are such big girls now.

We let them play for a few hours today. Andre said when he went to pick them up that Rowan saw him but wanted to keep playing with her new friends. They're only going for two days a week and I think they're going to really enjoy being around other kids.

Chucky Cheese

Its hard to say what the girls will be like as they get older--but they certainly have distinct personalities now.

We took the girls to Chucky Cheese for the first time this Sunday. We began to take a seat right up by the animatronics, but Evelyn took one look at the blinking mechanical dog playing a banjo and started screaming. So we sat on the side, where they could see--but not too close. I think this picture of Evelyn shows her complete and utter shock. She is actually watching the person dressed as a giant mouse--"Chucky Cheese" walk out onto the floor. She was not impressed.

Rowan is a completely different story. She saw Chucky Cheese and started waving at him from across the room, smiling and laughing, as if he was some friend at a party and she was waving him over. She bounced along to the silly music and couldn't take her eyes off of him.

Neither girl particularly enjoyed the rides, even the little bitty kid rides. They did like Skee Ball, but couldn't throw the balls hard enough to go farther than a foot.

We tried to take some good pictures of the two of them--but they move so quickly it's like trying to take a picture of a firefly.

Andre is against Chucky Cheese in general, and in particular. He wants the girls childhood experiences to be something you would see depicted on a box of granola or illustrated in a fly fishing magazine. You know, where the entertainment is learning how to tie nautical knots and identifying various animal droppings.

That's all well and good, don't get me wrong. I love to hug a tree as much as the next Austinite, but I want the girls to have a wide variety of experiences. I think you can appreciate the natural beauty of something like the Redwood Forest and also enjoy the complete gluttonous joy that is Disney World. Why does it have to be one or the other?

Parents make these kind of black and white, this or that choices on lots of things. I'm not talking about health and safety decisions, but rather the kind of things that don't really matter. Its the "parental snobbery" if you will. Such as, "My kid, will never, ever, ever, eat McDonald's, it's only (fill in the blank) food for my little one." As if one happy meal, and oops, there goes little Johnny's cholesterol, he's ruined.

You hear this kind of thing all the time. When my sister's son (and first child) was born she dressed him exclusively in ultra-cute, if not designer baby clothes. She'd say, "I'm not going to put anything on him that I wouldn't want to wear." Unfortunately, by the time he turned 2 he decided the only thing he would wear was T-shirts, shorts, and his favorite cowboy boots. ha!

I can't say that I am immune from my own parental snobbery. When the twins were expected I insisted on using only organic crib sheets. Why? Not because anything else was harmful, but because they were my babies and therefore needed the best and in my obsessive compulsive way I had decided that organic baby sheets were the best. Parental snobbery at its finest. I have since bought normal cotton sheets from Target. That's the other thing about parental snobbery, it fades with time and/or additional children.

There were other things too. Like bottles. We spent so much money on buying the "best" bottles and when it was all said and done my favorite were the cheap $2 bottles from the grocery store. What can I say? I was a victim of advertising and parenting magazines.

I can only begin to imagine all of the moments to come in which one of us will draw a line in the sand and firmly say, "not any kid of mine is going to ...". That is, of course, until the day when even our best intentions are overruled by our strong-minded children who already have opinions of their own.

Denver Trip

We flew to Denver this month making the girls fourth plane trip--and second fishing trip.

They are changing so quickly that each plane experience is completely different than the one before. What I have learned is: 1) babies are easier to travel with than toddlers; and 2) green tea has caffeine and caffeine is not good to give toddlers on plane trips; and 3) passengers who are already freaking out by being on a plane are going to become more annoyed by toddlers excessively trying to touch them or drop bottles in their laps.




Aside from the actual travel, the trip was quite nice. We bought the girls animal backpack/toddler leashes for the trip--which I know some people frown on. (I am certain that those people do not have two toddlers who move at the speed of light). The funny thing is that the girls love them. Evelyn actually started crying when I had to take off her monkey backpack to go through the x-ray machine at the airport. I had keep reassuring her that the monkey would come out the other side and that she would get it back.

We spent the first night at my Aunt Robin and Uncle Charlie's. Charlie is my mom's youngest brother, and they have two kids--Carl and Hudson. The girls had the absolute time of their lives. Not only do they have every toy imaginable, but the boys loved the girls and played with them the entire time.

My Aunt Donna, Uncle Jim, and their kids Claire and Duncan came over for dinner on our first night. Claire and Duncan are both so grown up now, its weird.

The next morning we all went to the Denver Zoo. It was their first experience in a big Zoo. I thought the girls may be a bit young to care about the animals, but they were so excited to see them. They would point at the animals and wanted to look at every one. Evelyn really liked the giraffes and Rowan liked the hyenas.



They had their first ride on a carousel too.


Our friends Amanda and Rachel met us at the zoo and we spent the rest of our trip with them.




These are our annual fishing trip friends, but this year the group went to Mexico and fearing the worst, we passed on taking the girls across the border. So we met up in Denver for a smaller, shorter version of our annual trip.









I really love these friends. They are the kind of people who make you want to be a better person. They are the kind of people who make you realize that your life is really what you make of it. And the crazy thing is, that they're all that way. We went to see a home that Chris (Amanda's husband) is renovating to be a professional kitchen for his catering company. It is awesome. I know its been an incredible amount of hard work and I can't begin to tell you how proud I am that he had the courage to follow his dreams that way. Amanda is the same with her solar power company. And Cris and Rachel are equally amazing in their lives.

The girls had a blast too. We spent one day hiking in Estes Park. I want the girls to have a love of nature. They stopped and picked flowers, they watched ground squirrels and chipmunks. It was great.













On the way back we stopped off at the Stanley Hotel which is the inspiration for Stephen King's novel The Shinning. We rented the film that night. Andre had never seen it. Its a great book, and the film was good--Jack Nicholson was great, but Shelley Duval? She's so annoying, halfway through you're routing for Jack to hurry up and do her in.

The next day we went fishing at another lake. Andre and I spent our time walking around with the girls and just relaxing.

Letting Go

Evelyn has had a hard time letting go lately and the truth is, so have I.

Leaving for work in the mornings is especially difficult. Evelyn starts to cry immediately and Rowan will go to the window with her little hands on the glass watching me walk to my car. Its heartbreaking.

Even going to the gym is a problem. "Oh, she'll be okay," the daycare girls say. Then Evey will cry and cry until eventually we'll hear our names announced over the speaker to come pick up our children.

The thing is, I would love to be home with them. They are just a day old in this picture, sleeping soundly in the hospital bed next to me. At that moment, it felt like we had so much time together. And all those cliques about time passing are sadder and so much more true than I realized.

I do believe that its good for the girls to see their mom pursuing a career. And I strongly feel that a woman should always be able to support and provide for herself and her family. I would want them to do the same. Yet, our separation is no less heartbreaking.

I begin to wonder why Evelyn is taking it so hard. Perhaps, she wasn't quite ready to be born. She was so angry and surely I should have waited another week or so. Then nursing--she wasn't ready to stop that either. Or moving into her own room. It is all somehow my fault, my inability to provide her with security and comfort.

As soon as she cries I pick her up; holding her close to me, then switching to hold Rowan, then back to Evey again. Making up for all the time I can't be there, trying to stretch our time together. It seems so unfair. I imagine them growing up to be lawyers going to work with me. But that's unrealistic. I hold them and tell them that I'll never leave them. (Though I know one day they'll leave us--and we should encourage them and prepare them--and I remember those cliques about time again.)

Andre says they'll outgrow the separation anxiety--I doubt I ever will.

Jamie's new baby and Visit with Pete

Jamie had her baby on the 13th, so the girls and I went to see baby Caden. He is so amazingly beautiful. I really loved holding a little baby in my arms again--Rowan and Evelyn; however, did not enjoy me holding a new baby and cried whenever I tried to.

On Sunday, we went to visit my friend Pete. The girls had a great time chasing his dog around and Pete seemed to have a good time just laughing at them.

Jamie's Baby Shower

Yesterday we went to Jamie's baby shower. She's due this Monday.

Jamie was just glowing and looking so beautiful. I can't wait to meet the new little baby. The doctors say she's having a boy this time.

Matthew and Evelyn. Matthew was the first little kid that I spent a lot of time with and took care of if his mom had to go out. He's the first kid I saw grow up. I remember seeing him in a sonogram, holding him as a newborn, and now he's almost 17. Amazing.

Ranch Dressing

This was too funny not to post. Evelyn licking ranch dressing off her table mat. Umm, ranch dressing. What a Texan.

Andre's Birthday

Andre had a low key birthday celebration this year. In years past we have had huge parties, but it just seemed to creep up on us this time.

So Andre and Tim, who's birthday is the day after, decided to have everyone get together at the Draught House. My mom came too and then took the girls with her to her house for the night.

I made cupcakes and we ordered pizza. Unfortunately it could not have been hotter outside. Even in the shade it was hot.



The following day we had dinner at the fire station. In the fire station tradition, Andre made his own cake--he made a pineapple upside down cake. The girls enjoyed running around the fire station. This picture is blurry, but it was funny.

The Royal Orchard

I need to catch up a bit because some really cool things have happened this summer.

This past June, our friend Fred invited us to spend a week at his family's castle in Virginia.

Fred's great grandfather made an insane amount of money in railroads at the turn of the century. So he built a summer home in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virgina. This wasn't their every day house--which was also a huge mansion in Richmond (I don't think the family still owns that house).

The great grandfather decided to tear down the existing house and build a castle. He also built several cottages in the same stone, three tennis courts, horse stables, and one of the first private swimming pools in the US.

He and his wife traveled to Europe via titanic-style cruise ships and brought back 17th century tapestries, 15th century chairs, paintings, furniture--you name it--even armor. This is Andre with an armor helmet and Fred in the main entry way.

The ceilings were ornately molded plaster in the Tudor style. A fresco of a hunting scene went around the top quarter of the walls in the dinning room, and a mural of St. George and the dragon went around the top quarter of the walls in the living room.

There was so much attention to detail that everyday I saw something new. The banisters on the stairs had hand-carved animals and a shield, each representing one of the nations involved in WWI. In addition to this unicorn, there was a bear, lion, wolf, eagle, and gargoyle. Rowan wanted to kiss the bear every time she passed it.


Many of the windows were stained glass. This is one part of a larger stained glass window. This inscription is also on stained glass at Henry Ford's Fair Lane estate. It reads "To no one is given right of delay; Noted in heaven passeth each day; Be not thou fruitless; Work while ye may; Trifling were bootless; Watch thou and pray."

On either side of the inscription was the coat of arms for the great grandfather's family and then one for the great grandmother's family.


I believe they had almost 400 acres and they grew this special apple that the Queen liked. Thus the name--Royal Orchard. They had gardens too. The girls ate raspberries off the vine.

One of the most interesting aspects of the house is all the family history that is everywhere. In most families, people have a handful of pictures and one or two stories about their ancestors. But for Fred's family, this castle has been a place to keep memories. There are volumes and volumes of photo albums. Guest books going back to the original owners. Some entries were about the country going to war (WWI) and some were even poems. They even had Christmas cards from Lady Astor who was friends with the great grandmother. The great grandmother's engraved hair brush is still on her dressing table and all of her silver with her engraved initials. The dishes they used, the piano they played, everything all still intact as if they left just yesterday.

And so to visit the castle is to take a step back in time. In the more modern styled wing that we stayed in they had pictures from family members' weddings. Many of them held at the Royal Orchard. There were group photographs, reunions and just being silly pictures. So you can see how the family line has grown and all the happy times they have had together.

Today the castle is set up as a corporation. Only direct descendants can own shares, so if you're family by marriage and get divorced then you're out. A share allows the family member to rent out the castle or the cottages and it pays to keep up the castle and grounds. Its not open to the public and the family has only allowed the public to see the castle once in 1968. Afterward some items were stolen, so now you can only go by invitation of a shareholder.

This is our group (photo by Bobby Malone).

The girls had such a great time. The first day they ran through every room. They didn't touch anything, just looked, sometimes spinning around. There were lots of things for children at the Royal Orchard. Lots of games, bicycles, a nice swing set, a pool. I think we found three different croquet sets, bocce ball sets, tennis rackets, board games. They'd have a 15th century ornately carved cabinet and you'd open it to find a monopoly game and some cards.

And they had high chairs from every era. The first night the girls sat in chairs that must have been from the 1800's. I don't know how people kept their children seated back then. The next day some of housekeepers found some high chairs that probably came from the 1950s, so they were safer and easier to use.

The castle had just as many cribs to choose from. We had our own wing of the house--it was a more modern servants wing. Every room has a name engraved on a gold plaque, and we stayed in the Grandchildren's Room. It was really two rooms separated by french doors. And the bathroom had a little built in child sized tub that was perfect for the girls. We even found two toddler big wheels for them to play on.

Andre played the bagpipes almost every night which definitely added to the overall castle-feel. He played on the top of the castle--which I think for him added to the overall bagpipe-feel. The last night everyone (well almost everyone) went up to the top of the mountain and Andre played the bagpipes. I stayed behind with the girls, but the sound carried so well we could still hear him playing.

I developed a love for playing croquet and one night we set up little lights at each wicket so we could play in the dark. Andre was winning almost every game so during some games the other players decided to change their goal from trying to win to keeping Andre from winning. He had his ball knocked down the hill so many times it looked like he was playing golf. Of course he'd still manage to make a come back.

At night everyone played various card games, board games, scrabble. We relaxed on the huge wrap around porch, talked, and laughed. It was great.

Evelyn and Rowan at the Royal Orchard

Our good friend Bobby Malone took these pictures on our trip to the Royal Orchard.

The girls and I

I love this picture. Our friend Bobby took it when we went to the castle. I've been meaning to get to our trip to the castle, but I've fallen behind with work, etc. I need a vacation to catch up from our vacation.

Happy Birthday Andre

I think the video says it all. Happy Birthday Andre! We love you!