I am writing this while waiting for my grandmother to die.

My mom called just as I was tucking Vivian into bed. She is with her parents. She says grandma has had the last rights and is lying in bed with grandpa. That it's a miracle. That she looks so peaceful. They are in bed together and all the children - they have 11 - are slowly gathering ( Read more... )

 Yesterday, Vivian found a black and white feather, stiff-veined and long as my forearm.  An impressive bit of plumage.

"What species is it from, Mommy?"

"I don't know, Vivi."

"We should take it home and investigate it with science."

"Um, okay."

"I think it's from something big. Like a goose. Or a velocioraptor."

Vivian, asked where her ukelele comes from: "Oh! Way under the earth its so hot that the rock melts and that's called lava! And something pushes up on the lava and it goes up in a crack and then it explodes! And then it gets hard again and it sticks together, and that's called Hawaii. And in Hawaii some girls wear skirts made out of grass and flays ( Read more... )

 Vivian spent much of Saturday coloring a cape made out of paper.  It has a big V in the middle and some brilliantly colored scribbling elsewhere, and ties around her neck with a purple ribbon.  She needs it, she explains, so that she can be "a superhero villain" and protect her friends Carol and Kaci from Carol's dad:  "He eats kids!"    Later ( Read more... )

( Read more... )

Viv and Nora are just back from getting haircuts. Nora got a bob. It transformed her little face and I croned at her: "Oh, Nora, you look beautiful!"

Eleanor preened and Vivian said: "Do I look beautiful too?"

"Oh boy," said James.

"Of course you do!" I answered.  (I had already said so.  Everyone in the room had already said so.)

"Do I ( Read more... )

It's been a busy week here in writing land.

The big news is that my ARC for Plain Kate came! (An ARC, or advanced reading copy, looks like a paperback book, complete with cover art; they are distributed to book reviewers and book store buyers and the like before a book is published.)

I was so excited! James was in a little hot water when I ( Read more... )

We struck out from Kitchener after Vivian's morning school on December 19, and spent three days on the road to Lincoln, Nebraska: 1500 kilometers and three states beginning with "I." Vivian and Eleanor were little traveling troopers, but I think these kilometers have somehow gotten longer since we had kids ( Read more... )

( self-indulgent pictures of the kids! )

James and I ventured from the home on Saturday, a rare thing:  we had a dinner out for our anniversary.  My other lungfish and I have been married 11 years.  Hurrah!  About our adventure, two things.

Vivian watched James putting on his tie and commented "President Obama wears one of those!"    She's got two writer parents who get news from the radio ( Read more... )