the smallest tea party you've ever attended

With a three-year-old Alice, life is juxtaposition.

Tiny little tea cups and tiny little tables nestled up against bigger-than-life emotion, a face filled with joy that can eclipse the sun.

And this, for April's poetry month:

On Turning Ten

-Billy Collins

The whole idea of it makes me feel

like I'm coming down with something,

something worse than any stomach ache

or headaches I get reading in a bad light---

a kind of measles of the spirit,

a mumps of the psyche,

a disfiguring chicken pox of the soul.

You tell me it is too early to be looking back,

but that is because you have forgotten

the perfect simplicity of being one

and the beautiful complexity introduced by two.

But I can lie on my bed and remember every digit.

At four I was an Arabian wizard.

I could make myself invisible

by drinking a glass of milk a certain way.

At seven I was a soldier, at nine a prince.

But now I am mostly at the window

watching the late afternoon light.

Back then it never fell so solemnly

against the side of my tree house,

and my bicycle never leaned against the garage

as it does today,

all the dark blue speed drained out of it.

This is the beginning of sadness, I say to myself,

as I walk through the universe in my sneakers.

It is time to say goodbye to my imaginary friends,

time to turn the first big number.

It's only yesterday I used to believe

there was nothing under my skin but light.

If you cut me I would shine.
But now when I fall upon the sidewalks of life,

I skin my knees. I bleed.

only in dreams

I've been dreaming of writing without thought, of writing without worry, of writing without pressure.

Actually, I've been dreaming of vampires wearing purple football uniforms and dancing through red brick buildings--- but in my waking hours, when my fingers hurt to the bone and my mind races with thoughts of finishing our taxes and work deadlines, there is a deeper part of me - a small bit of my soul, perhaps - that dreams while I walk.

And in those dreams, I am saying things in quiet wonder. Observing the miracle of sunlight and rain fall. I am telling you about the movies that play on the inside of my eyelids. And I'm unafraid.

big box of toys

When she turned three, there was this mental border I crossed in thinking of Bean as a toddler to thinking of her as this compact preschooler-child-person. It happened mostly because of the common "for ages three and up" warning on toys.

Not that I'm running around the toy aisles willy-nilly grabbing items off the shelves that previously I had considered out of Bean's depth only a month ago---- but what I have been doing is thinking of one word: LONGEVITY. Not many toys have it. They are awesome and fun and So! Darn! Fantastic! for about five minutes---- and then they sit in the bottom of the toy basket forever more.

I've done my best to avoid Quick Toy Death, but as Bean is at this weird precarious age between toddler and school-age, where she is more interested in her stuffed buddies than a doll, where she likes to play with Little People, but will only do so for about ten minutes and then loses interest--- I'm trying to figure out her Toy Personality and I'm failing a little. She's just not a dolly girl. But she does love to play mommy to Elmo or Olivia or her blue monster Hurp. She also loves tiny things: so even while she's ignoring the full-sized dolls in her bedroom, she carts around Strawberry Shortcake in her pocket - laying her down on tiny pillows and underneath equally tiny blankets next to small plastic figures of Elmo and Oscar the Grouch. She still loves the play food and dishes. They were great choices a year ago and great toys even now.

So what do you think? It's not like I have a birthday to shop for (we gave her a tricycle that loves but doesn't know how to peddle--- and if anyone wants to clue me in on how to teach a three-year-old to peddle a tricycle, that would be awesome). But I'm just curious. Toys on the brain, I guess. And thinking of Christmas about a million months away.

In your experience - whether it's your own or with your kids, what would you say are the best toys for lasting beyond five minutes for a three-year-old?

a poem for your pocket

April is National Poetry Month. It's also Monday. And I am tired from lots of sewing. I have been trying to get caught up on a million different care packages and sewing projects that I have promised people... in some cases it's been MONTHS. This week will mark the end of all the catch up. Which means that my brain will again have space for writing. In the meantime, in honor of April: The Journey -Mary Oliver One day you finally knew what you had to do, and began, though the voices around you kept shouting their bad advice--- though the whole house began to tremble and you felt the old tug at your ankles. "Mend my life!" each voice cried. But you didn't stop. You knew what you had to do, though the wind pried with its stiff fingers at the very foundations--- though their melancholy was terrible. It was already late enough, and a wild night, and the road full of fallen branches and stones. But little by little, as you left their voices behind, the stars began to burn through the sheets of clouds, and there was a new voice, which you slowly recognized as your own, that kept you company as you strode deeper and deeper into the world, determined to do the only thing you could do--- determined to save the only life you could save. (a quick note: I've tried to fix the formatting of this post a million times and technology is KILLING me. as well as Ms. Oliver's poem, for which I'm very sorry. perhaps tomorrow the kind people at blogspot will smile down at me and give me correct poetry formatting. until then...)

no foolin

There is a lot I could say to establish my craziness.

A lot I could say to prove my love for Bean.

There is a lot I could tell you about the strange small gestures of motherhood.

There is a lot. A lot of words for those things.

But today I will show you in pictures, just because.

I spent an hour last night making these.

Teeny tiny little blankets and pillows for Bean's small action figure-y buddies.

Because she wanted to put them to bed.

You're welcome.