Memory, Birds and, Well, Me

I need to post about the big birthday party, but I'm waiting for our pictures to be developed (yes, I still use an old film camera). In the meantime, I was just playing memory with Berit, and thought to post about it. See, we had all the cards set up and we were both looking forward to the game, me because I love when she's interested in learning games, and she because she's been begging me to play with her one-on-one all morning and finally I could. So we get started, and she's doing awesome -- three matches to my zero. And then she starts flipping cards over, frustrated, clearly looking for something in particular, so I ask her about it. "I'm looking for the bunny," she says. I glance and her matches and see that she has the carrots. "Is it because you want to feed the bunny a carrot?" I ask. "Yes," she says. She then throws all of her other matches into the pile, messes them up so I can't see which one is which, and starts flipping the other cards, looking for the bunnies. When she finds them she lays them over the carrots and announces that she. is. done. Nice. Good learning all around.

I keep thinking back to Friday night. After putting the girls to bed, Trevor went over to his parents' house because his brother and his brother's family were staying there. So I put on my earbuds and listened to an audiobook while I made cakes for Berit's birthday party. Before I knew it it was 1:30 a.m. and I was wrapping up both the book and the cakes. It was so peaceful, so entertaining. I love the quiet of a sleeping house. And even though I love my husband and I enjoy spending time with him, I also really like being alone. For me, being alone and doing something like baking or cleaning while listening to an audiobook is completely restorative. I feel efficient and productive and totally relaxed. I should make a point to do this once a week, as it's only Monday and I keep wishing it were still Friday evening.

We have recently hung a birdfeeder on our sliding door; the kind that's see-through so the kids can watch the birds eating. It's great because the birds are already used to us peering in at them, and rarely flinch when the kids walk right up to the door and bang on the glass. This prompted a little red squirrel to be interested in the crumplins that the birds dropped on the deck, so we had to put a tray of sunflower seeds out for the squirrel, who doesn't care if Marta walks over, picks it up, puts it in her pocket and takes it to the grocery store. Seriously, it just hangs out there all day long, watching us watching it. But then we had a huge snowfall that covered the tray, so I put a big old roasting pan on top of the snow, and the birds and squirrel climb in to munch. I guess what I'm saying is that we've got a tray, a roasting pan and a bird feeder within two feet of our sliding door and it's a mess out there. I'm considering cleaning it all up, but really I'll just wait until the cursed snow melts and it's time for spring cleaning. I think I'll just keep dumping seed in the vicinity of the tray and pan and hope no one calls for a house showing.