Updates

You may notice that one of my sections on the sidebar is gone, the Libby Shea Watch. Libby has been home for almost two weeks and is doing great! She is over five pounds and growing in size and strength every day. Her life has been so exciting thus far, I think she and her parents are enjoying the downtime.


Our solitary hatching is still the only one in the nest. I am less optimistic for the others every day. He has grown a ton, but always seems pretty listless, unlike the first day I saw him. I hope he does well, how sad it would be for that mama bird to not have anything to show for all of the work she did. I was able to snap a blurry, distant picture of her today and she yelled at me through a beakful of hay. (Really, Ma, the grill is crammed full, you can stop.) Can anyone tell me what she is?



Our weekend was really very nice. As you know, we went to the botanical gardens on Saturday morning, camera shopping on Saturday night, and fishing on Sunday. Fin was really, really, REALLY excited to go fishing and she was the youngest on the boat by 8 or 9 years. The boat was overrun with increasingly intoxicated, increasingly loud, increasingly cursing "fisherman". I use the quotes because many were so drunk they could no longer get the hooks over the railing without snagging them on clothing or skin, so they gave up and wandered around the boat engaging the sober people in what they perceived to be witty banter. That would be things like, "I'm from Boston, man! F----n', Boston! Whooooooo! Pah-k the cah! Whoooooooo!" Luckily, Fin was so absorbed in scoring Cheetos from the snack bar and catching a fish of any description or size that it seemed to go right over her head. Her initial fishing tactic did not work. That was dropping the line over then yelling, "Here, fishy, fishy, fishy! I got a surprise for yoooooou!" After we managed to catch one, it began to rain and we went inside the cabin where she promptly fell asleep for the last two hours of the trip. She was happy to have caught and released a fish and I was happy she didn't leave the boat saying, "I caught a f----n' fish! Whooooooooo!"

Sunday night we had a tasty and relaxing dinner at Nancy and Mr. Pat's. Fin invented a delightful game of Tickle Brandon. (I am not sure Brandon found it delightful, but he gamely played along.)


We are settling back into a busy, short week for us both. Summer is approaching and I have made all of her camp plans; some gymnastics camp, some summer school, some at the day camp she went to last year. I hope she will have fun.

She certainly is fun. I am finding that you can have surprising and interesting conversations with five-year-olds that you can never have with an adult. Tonight, we were having dinner and she wanted to talk about her little savings bank and how much money she has. Now that she knows money can buy things, she can get really obnoxious about it. Our dinner conversation went like this:

Fin: I have lots of money.
Mommy: Then you are very lucky.
Fin: I am going to buy lots of stuff with my money.
Mommy: I can't think of anything you need.
Fin: I need toys.
Mommy: You have more toys than you even know you have and there is no room to put anymore.
chew, chew, chew
Fin: I have more money than you.
Mommy: You may be right, but it is rude to say so. I want to stop talking about money at the dinner table. Money is not that important.
chew, chew, chew
Fin: How about mermaids? Can we talk about them?