For extra bonus fun, the toilet in our most-used bathroom has been making a sort of moaning noise when flushed. I, of course, called our trusty contractor to ask him to come fix it. (Technically I called our trusty contractor’s wife and asked her to pass on the information.) “The toilet sounds like a fire engine’s siren when we flush it,” I said, and I thought this was a clever description of the problem. Accurate. Colorful. Clearly communicated the nature of the sound.

And then Owen came to investigate, his face shining and his voice filled with awe. “Wow,” said he, “our toilet sounds like a baby dinosaur!”

“Mama? Can you still catch hiccups when you’re dead?”

I love when they ask questions that I can answer. Honestly. Without making anyone cry over the world’s turkey population. (Not that the question didn’t freak me out, because it totally DID. But still. Answerable.)

Lesson of the day:

You MAY drink rain falling from the sky, but you MAY NOT drink it as it runs off the roof.

Or at least, that’s the new rule* at our house.

In case you were wondering.

*Only new because no one ever tried that before. Until now, I guess it was an unspoken rule. BUT IT’S A GOOD ONE.

Last night, we were sitting around the dinner table trying to figure out what was weird about the soup. (Too much garlic? Too raw of garlic? Not enough salt? Not enough water in the broth? No idea. It just tasted a little off.) This is how we spend our free time, critiquing our team-effort cooking. Very fun.

Abigail—having given up on the game of What’s With The Soup—turned to Dane and I and asked, quite seriously, as though the thought had just occurred to her: “Hey, is it ever hard for you guys, having four kids?”

We allowed as how certainly, on occasion, four children can be difficult to manage.  Dane was quick to add that everything is hard sometimes—sometimes having one child is hard work. Sometimes having no children is hard work. Plenty of good things (work, art, reading, writing…fill-in-the-blank-ing) are hard sometimes. Not all the time, but sometimes.

She wasn’t surprised, exactly, but she hadn’t been sure.

I don’t know if that means we fake competency really well, or if it means she just thinks we’d be the same crabby old grown-ups regardless of how many kids (and how much sleep) we had, or if it just means she had never thought to imagine life from our perspective, up until that very moment.

I’d like to think it’s the first, but I fear it’s the second and suspect it’s most likely the third.

In other news: hey, look, we got a tree! And then we made the nine-year-old carry it, for asking impertinent questions.

Just kidding. That’s not even our tree, she just wanted to see if she could stand one up. Also her questions weren’t impertinent, but you know, why else would we be making her carry a tree twice as tall as herself?

Yesterday I found myself sitting at the sewing machine, Sadie on my lap, sewing… doll clothes for Sadie’s doll. Because it’s December, and that was clearly the wisest way to spend my sewing time. Not on, say, Christmas presents. Sigh.

Still, I meant to sew this doll a skirt when Sadie first got it. For her birthday. In October. And I just now got around to it.

Isn’t she cute? I didn’t make the doll. (It’s from BlaBla.) I also didn’t knit the sweater. (Also BlaBla.) (I don’t even know how to knit.) (Now I feel compelled to point out that I didn’t make the kitchen counter either, but you probably knew that already.)

I got about halfway through sewing the skirt before I remembered that doll skirts? Take pretty much as long to sew as people skirts. Same number of seams, just smaller. Sigh again. I think I lack the Planning Gene. There’s a gene for that, right? For making good and logical plans? Because that’s the one I think I’m missing. The one that leads you to get your Christmas gifts in order by November, the one that causes you to have seasonally-appropriate meal plans, the one that means you never run out of clean socks on cold days because you planned what you were going to wear ahead of time.

That’s the gene I lack.

Or maybe it’s just self-discipline?

Or maybe it’s that, instead of me teaching the kids to be competent planners, they’re teaching me to be more impulsive. (Sew now! Doll clothes! Because Sadie wants to!) Or maybe we’re meeting each other halfway.

And you know, Sadie loved sitting and watching the needle go and pulling the thread off the machine while it was sewing so that the thread tension went all wonky. (I enjoyed that last one somewhat less than she did.) And we’re both thrilled with that little skirt, even if maybe I could have knocked a couple of things of the holiday to-do list in the time it took us to make it.

It’s supposed to be about joy, right? Mine, hers—that’s what I wanted to plan in the first place. Not particular sewing projects, not any particular accomplishments. Joy. Time and space to find the joy.

Right. I remember now.

Remember that gift list, the one of cool stuff for under $10? Yes, that one. I know, I know, you’re done shopping and have plenty of cool stuff, thankyouverymuch. But just in case you’re not or you don’t, Café Sheri has compiled yet another list of fabulous. This one is made up of goodies under $20. Including this, which I have wanted forever, despite my utter lack of counter space.

Plus there’s this (custom! classic and modern at the same time!), which I might need. These are pretty darned cool. And I kind of want to buy a pair of lace-up shoes just so I can use these. Also: who on my list needs tiny terrariums? Someone, I am sure.

The thing about pasta is this. You make your pasta, you toss it with your stuff—your sauce, your sautéed mushrooms, your roasted red pepper, your black olives, your shredded parmesan, your toasted pine nuts, whatever—and then you sit down to eat. But the thing is. The thing is. The thing is this: it’s hard to balance all that good stuff in every bite, right? You start eating, you have too much stuff, not enough pasta. For a while you’ll get the ratio about right, and then the balance of power will shift, and you’ll be left with mouthfuls of pasta plus just an occasional mushroom or stray shred of cheese. For example.

My life? It is a bowl of pasta, I tell you. And right now it’s too much stuff, all the time. (Partly this is because Dane was off work last week and we drove around trying to cram a year’s worth of field trips into one week, and now there’s a lot of catching up to do at home. And partly it’s because December is never long enough for how much holiday prep there is to do. But it’s only partly because of those things.) I know it sometimes happens—and will happen again!—that we’ll have too much time and hardly anything to do with it. All pasta, no exciting bits. Right?

Because that’s the theory of pasta.

And because I need it to be true. So we’re going to pretend like it is and see what happens. It’s a strategy, anyway.

Okay, don’t tell anybody this, but technically I still haven’t started any holiday shopping. Well, except for the kids’ books, but that hardly counts. However! The marvelous Sheri Reed of Cafe Mom has assembled a really cool gift list / slide show with 25 suggestions of gifts for under $10 each. They’re mostly handmade and all awesome, and I kind of want every one of them. Especially this. And this. And this for my kids. (And obviously this and this.) Check it out, yes?

Did you know that at Disneyland, between Thanksgiving and Christmas, it snows soap fluff on Main Street? (At least I hope it was soap. Something similar, anyway.) And did you know that Small World now blows bubbles at you when you get to the underwater room? And that the Winnie-the-pooh ride continues to have that terrifying part where you go through Pooh’s very loud, very bright nightmare about heffalumps and woozles?

Ask me how I know.

Oh yes. We loaded up the kids for a day of Disney yesterday. (Said Owen afterwards, “What IS a Disney, anyway?” Interesting question.)

We hadn’t been in years. Sadie had never been at all. And we maybe didn’t do enough to prepare her for a day of giant plush characters and rides, though I’m not sure how you can ever adequately prepare anyone for that. She loved the rides, right up until they stopped. Lines, she was not a fan of. Sitting in the stroller: also not a fan. Wearing her sweater: not interested. At the characters, she would yell: “You can’t take my daddy! You can’t have my Owen! You not touch my Audrey!” and etcetera, until we took our picture and walked away. Other than that, a good time was had by all. Including, presumably, by the vendors who cheerfully collected our $21 for fresh fruit and a bottle of water. That is some kind of magic right there.

And now… drumroll, please… it’s December! Which means we get one of these:

*Faint.*

Or, if you prefer, one of these:

Oooh. Darthy. ***

This can only mean one thing. No more mandatory weekend posts.

*** That’s an adjective, not a creepy term of endearment. For the record.