I Got Me A New Nephew!

Welcome to our family, Duncan James Peterson! Born 8/16/2011 at 1:52 a.m. 8 lbs, 6 oz, and 21 1/2 inches. We love you so much!

Here he is sleeping in his Aunt Tonya's arms:

And here he is with his already-favorite auntie:
Aunt Tonya does love a baby:
And his beautiful mom, who was in labor for 3 hours and got a wonderful baby out of the deal!
Welcome to the world Duncan. We're so glad you're here!

And One More Rose Got Some Ears Pierced

Rose #1 has a very expressive face. You can see how she went from nervous:

To unhappy:
To scared-ish:
To exceptionally pleased with herself (and very, very cute to boot):
Even though Rose #1 has technically been eligible for ear piercing for 2 years now, she told me this afternoon that she didn't want to go all alone, so she waited for Rose #2 to be ready. I thought that was so sweet. I always hope that my girls will be friends in addition to being sisters. I still hope that. I hope that they will remember back to days like this and feel really good about them.

I loved this day. I loved going as a family for a big adventure (OK, relatively big, compared to, say, climbing Mt. Everest) and feeling so happy that it turned out well. My memories of having my ears pierced are weird - my mom brought us to a doctor's office only after I demanded that since I was in second grade, I was old enough to handle the responsibility of earrings. I hope we made a different memory for our girls today.

Rose #2 got her ears pierced too!

Rose #2 was quite brave when she got her ears pierced. This is the girl who one time wedged herself between a doctor's office examining table and the wall because she didn't want a flu shot. She hopped right up into the chair and only squirmed a little while the young woman who pierced ears today at Claire's got ready for us.

I love this picture. This was Rose #2's second ear and so she knew what to expect. She only cried a teeny bit after the first ear and then she was fine.
Here she is all done, taking a quiet moment to breathe. Really, about 15 minutes after the ear piercing operation, her ear lobes weren't even red anymore.
And here's my smiley sweet girl.
I was so happy to bring them for ear piercing today. I just wish that Guppy was here. Why? Guppy wouldn't have wanted to go to Rosedale for an ear piercing expedition. Mostly just because things don't really seem like they have happened to me if I can't tell my mom about it. Stupid cancer and death.

(Nice how a lovely post about a beautiful rite of girlhood passage turns into an observation about death. Sigh.)

The Roses Got Their Ears Pierced!

Today we set out for Claire's at Rosedale to get us some ears pierced.

My rule originally was that the girls had to be going into second grade. We-ell, how could you look at this face and say no? My girliest girl would have been the only one who didn't get her ears pierced.

We let her. The young woman at Claire's was very good and reassuring. The whole process is very quick and the earrings come preloaded in these little cartridge thingies.

Here she is, all good and done. I really like the little clippies they put in her hair.
Rose #3 chose these little sparkly blue flower earrings. The starter studs are so cute, I had forgotten how little and sweet they look.

Author Pilgrimage #1

Today we went to Mankato, MN to visit the Betsy-Tacy Society's preserved Betsy and Tacy Houses. It was a really neat day.

On the way down to Mankato, we came across the Biggest Candy Store in Minnesota. It was really neat. There is a GIANT gumball machine that you can't miss when you walk in the store. The girls posed by it (and were pleased to buy a gumball before we left).

Unlike my usual self, I told each girl that she could get a candy and a soda. This was perhaps a mistake. There are about a million different kinds of candy there. We saw ginger chews. We saw gummy rats. (YUCK!) We saw clove gum, which reminded me of the one time I smoked a clove cigarette. (It was disgusting. And "smoked" is probably too strong a word. I took a puff off a clove cigarette. I think I ran and brushed my teeth for like 20 minutes right after.) We saw lots of other candy that reminded me of a friend I had my freshman year of college. Lemon Heads. Pop Rocks. Pop Rocks! Wow! Anyway, Rose #3 was like beside herself with excitement, trying to figure out what to get:
And Rose #2 was dumbfounded with joy and surprise. She told me that when she is an adult, she was going to live at the candy store. The friends we were with said they would visit her. By the way, Rose #2 came out of the candy story with a giant thing full of taffy. "But Mom, you SAID we could get ONE THING of candy!"
After the candy store and a nice picnic lunch in St. Peter, we arrived in Mankato. The way to the Betsy and Tacy houses is not marked. Luckily we had Google Navigation which brought us right to Betsy's House! The girls all posed under the sign. Reggie, our friend, read several chapters of Betsy-Tacy on the ride down. Rose #1 had read the book before, but Roses #2 and #3 had not. It was really nice to have heard the book a bit before we arrived.
After a rather stern docent gave us a tour, we went over to Tacy's House, where it turned out we should have started all along. Tacy had 10 brothers and sisters, and she lived in a tiny house.
Here are the moms by the Betsy's House sign:
Betsy and Tacy often took their dinner out to the bench at the end of Hill street. This is not the actual bench, but it is supposedly in the same place. It is in a nice little grove, with (unfortunately) lots of mosquitoes. We think that when Betsy and Tacy (in real life, Maud Hart Lovelace and her best friend Frances "Bick" Kenney) brought their dinners and sat outside to eat them, there were no mosquitoes. Probably there weren't any trees at that point. Here are the girls sitting on the bench:
And the mommies with Reggie and Rose #3:
Betsy and Tacy had another friend, Tib (Marjorie "Midge" Gerlach) who lived really just around the block. The Betsy-Tacy society does not own Tib's house, but someone put a plaque on the front door:
Here's a better view:
It was a wonderful day. No TV because we were out on an author pilgrimage. After the pilgrimage we drove over to the Faribault water park and went swimming, a great activity for this hot Minnesota July day. I loved reading the Betsy Tacy books when I was young. Now they seem so sentimental and sweet; Betsy and Tacy were just darling little girls who loved each other and were lifelong friends. We should all be so lucky to have such friends.

We want to go on other Minnesota author pilgrimages. Can anyone think of any and recommend them?

The Van Will Be Repaired!

I know that no one else cares about my van quite as much as I do (and truly, I don't care about it THAT much), but I just have to tell you all that the van is going to be repaired! The damages, while unfortunate and unpleasant from my perspective, do not exceed the cost to total the car. So, we will get our van back! Good as new, or almost. I am going to get it detailed. Who knows what those thieves were up to when they were driving it around? Oh yeah, they weren't just driving it. They were also removing the catalytic converter and the seats and the interior lights and the license plates. Jerks.

On a totally unrelated note, I sure wish the U.S. government would figure out the debt ceiling thing. I don't want to dwell on politics, but really people. Wouldn't it be better to figure things out in a manner that will not cause global financial problems, and then fight later about dealing with massive entitlement and other problems that no one has had the courage to face in 50 years? I'm not in favor of kicking the can down the road indefinitely - truly, I'm not. I just can't stand the thought of further economic damage and uncertainty at the moment.

The Van Is Back

At 11:00 today I was making chocolate chip oatmeal cookies with Rose #2 and the phone rang. It was a St. Paul police officer calling from West St. Paul, telling me that our van has been found!

I was shaking, literally shaking. The car is in decent condition. The DVD player and subwoofer are gone, the exhaust pipe is gone, the door lights are gone, and there are probably other things wrong with it, but it is drivable. We will have to see if it is fixable or will be totaled; I guess that's our insurance company's call. Oh yes, the plates are gone too. The police officer had to call in to dispatch to let them know that a minivan without plates would be driving back from the place where the car was recovered to our home, so that no one pulled H over. (I didn't want to drive it with Rose #2 and #3 in the car - I wanted to drive the non-formerly-stolen car with license plates home.)

It is very disorienting to know that something that belongs to you was temporarily taken and used by people with bad motives. When the car was recovered it had stolen plates on it; the thieves took off our plates and put on someone else's. Crazy stuff.

I am such a law abiding citizen, even coming in contact with this sort of thing makes me nervous. I am glad that our car is home. Now we're going to have to go about seeing if it is fixable.