what's up weekly.

Hey hey!  Long time, no see.  You can now rest easy, knowing I am, in fact, still alive.  (You're such an alarmist.)  I know it's been a minute since I last filled you in, and I'm planning on writing and backdating a couple of posts about the previous few weeks, but for now, let me just cover this past week.

On Saturday, Todd and the bigger boys joined our friend Josiah on a trip to the WWI Museum in Kansas City - it's the largest WWI museum in the country.  (Who knew Kansas City was home to anything even remotely notable but Worlds of Fun?  I surely didn't.)

The boys are both in awkward smiling stages.  Because all kids everywhere are always in awkward smiling stages.  WHY DO KIDS DO WEIRD THINGS WITH THEIR FACES I ASK YOU.  Luckily, our kids are definitely cute enough to overcome these shortcomings.  I'm not saying yours aren't, but I'm also not saying they are.

I stayed home with the rest of the progeny, and we had the most quiet, restful Saturday in the history of ever.  Once the littlest three were down for nap, and only Laurelai and Penelope were still up and around (and coloring quietly at the table), it struck me that some people only have two kids.  Two big kids.  Two big, quiet, girl-kids who sit and color quietly at the table all afternoon while their mom sobs her way through the last Harry Potter book.  Weird stuff.

This picture, taken in the wild, sums up what it's like being a girl mom right now:

Girly book with a girly cover on a girly bed, left there by a girly girly.   

Also, I bought a dust ruffle for the girls' bed this week (the word "girl" is really starting to weird me out the more I type it  - girl. girl.  Isn't that a weird word?) and it is white eyelet and the granny-est thing I've bought in a while, so you know it did my soul good.  Then I used a staple gun to attach it to the bed frame, which you should also know did my soul good.  (Now "good" is starting to get the side-eye.)

Janky phone photo, but that's the best I could do.

And yet more pictures of the prettiest parts of life: daughters!  Here is Juni, rocking a headband AND a tutu AND cable-knit tights.  (Finneas bought her this dress for Christmas; is that not just the most adorable thing you've ever heard?!)

We have been on break from school this week, which means lots of rest, reading, and hanging out with friends and college gals.  On Monday, it was 70 degrees out, so the kids spent most of the day playing outside.

On Tuesday, I cleaned out one side of the laundry room because no nightclubs were open that early but I was in the mood to party.  (As I was scrubbing down a cabinet in there, I was wondering when the last time was that that particular shelf had gotten wiped down, and at that exact, precise, very moment my sponge knocked loose a receipt from 1974.  I guess that answers that question. Gross.)

My laundry room is nothing special, but I do like being in here when it's clean.  PTL for this Urban Outfitters rug and the Picasso Print That I Will Try To Smuggle With Me Through the Pearly Gates When I Die.

By Wednesday, it was in the twenties and we were totally snowed in, so again, the kids spent much of the day playing outside, but in very different conditions.

We're shooting to make it up to the Amish today, since we haven't been able to get out before now.  I should probably also grade papers, which I should have done on Monday but I've been procrastinating because *shudder*.  Also, I plan on spending the entire day feeding the kids, because Whole30 has ramped up their metabolisms so much that all they do is win win win.  I mean, eat eat eat.  (Plus, Juniper is now eating solids at the table with us, in an attempt to fatten up, so literally all I do all day is make food for myself, then the big kids, then breastfeed, then feed Juniper at the table, and then start the whole process over again.)

One more picture of pretty Juni, just because this is my blog and I get to call the shots.

See her beautiful double chin?  That is a soon-to-be-fat baby right there.

And, just because, here's what's been capturing my attention lately:

Reading:Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling
Angels in the Architecture by Douglas Jones and Douglas Wilson
Liver Rescue by Anthony William (who is a certifiable nut)
Bone of my Bones by Douglas Wilson
The Green Ember
Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson

Watching:
The King's Speech, which is so beautiful it hurts
Frasier (with Todd, because we're fogeys)
Scrubs

And there you have it.