Cassie-Care

Cassie takes care of Greysen every day while we are at work. We have never had to worry about child care. And we feel so very lucky. I could fill this whole blog about stories of Cassie-care kids. There are five kids (not all at once) who are lucky enough to have Cassie love them. And boy does she love them.

Cassie has to run upstairs every now and then. And there is no way, with just one person, she can keep an eye on the kiddos while she's gone. This particular time, when things got suddenly quiet downstairs, she knew trouble was a-brewing. She was pleasantly surprised when she found this instead ...

Bennett, Emerson, Greysen and Dylan quietly reading their books and surprising the heck out of everyone. The only little one missing here is Parker. She's the little lady and seems to rule the others.








Commonly, the kiddos spend their time looking out the door window trying to convince Cassie they need not eat, sleep, or play inside. They love to be outside and even pine over the outdoors when they are inside. Cassie often hears, "Big truck," "hi" (to passersby), "Rain, rain go way," "deer." They get outside almost every day unless the weather doesn't allow. In the winter, this is quite the feat cuz they all get dressed in their snowsuits and by the time the last kid is dressed, the first couple have had multiple meltdowns. I can't imagine the challenge on a regular basis.


I can't even take credit for the pics in this post. It's another perk of the Cassie-care arrangement. The pics are here, like many things in the daily care of the kiddos, all thanks to Cassie.

B is for Boogers

The summer finally hit here in li'l ol' Helena and it has been D.R.Y. I forgot how dry it can get because we've had such a wet May, June, even July. And then August hit and the dried Boogers clung to the inside of noses everywhere.

Including Greysen's nose. And it's for this reason alone that he has become a nose-picker. Right? Okay, maybe truth be told, the whole family has been witnessed picking boogers in these dry times. Can't leave those dry nasty things to interrupt the flow of good ol' (forest-fire-filled) mountain air into the lungs.

The other day Greysen was picking voraciously. He stopped and said, "Help. Nose." I responded, "Do you have boogers?" "Yeah," he responded. I asked, "You need help getting them out?" He said, "Boogers. Out." So, like the good Mama who will also be witnessed one day wetting my hands and pasting down his hair (or encouraging it to stand taller, as it is these days), I picked his booger.

It took some wrangling but in the end I produced a HUGE ball of green, dry booger. I said, "Is that better?" Greysen responded, "Better. Da doo (thank you)." And he went about his merry way.

Adjectives of Adoration

Greysen is Amazing. An amazing little boy that can't get any cuter. I will unabashedly say that he is likely the cutest thing I've ever seen. How crazy is it that we just happened to have, of all the babies in the world, the cutest baby ever? Behold:

From henceforth, I do hereby declare that, this, the beginning of September (or thereabouts), is the beginning of the September Blog Challenge. (Insert official-sounding english accent...)

I will follow the difficult-to-fill footsteps of my sister, JDoc, who is nearing the end of her August Blog Challenge. This consisted of, nearest I can tell, theming your posts with a word beginning with the first letter of the alphabet and progressing through with a blog about a word beginning with the rest of the alphabet by the end of August. I will do this for September. And because there is no time like the present, I will get a head start.

Greysen is Astonishing. At a year and 5 months old, there isn't a day that goes by that I am not amazed by the things he can do, say and understand. Recently, he lifted his arm and asked me to tickle UNDER his arm after I'd tickled the top of his arm. "Arm. Tickle. Under?" How does he know what UNDER means? And though I could be Astounded by the three-word sentences, it is such a common occurence nowadays that I have forgottem to be suprised that my not-even-year-and-a-half-year-old can speak in complete sentences.

He has entered another phase of separation anxiety and mostly likes to be around his Mama and Dada. Yesterday Andrew went to visit him at Cassie-care in the middle of the day. He cried and cried and cried after Andrew left him there. He would finally stop crying and then look at the door where Andrew exited and start crying again. We decided that there will likely be very little midde-of-the-day visits so that we don't have to leave Cassie with a blubbering toddler.

I have no doubt we will continue to be amazed, astonished and astounded by the Little Mister. I really can't imagine, though, that it can get any better than this. And yet, many more in-the-know parents promise that it most assuredly does. P.S. For you arbiters of the blog challenges, shouldn't I get extra credit for multiple uses of the letter theme? I do hereby declare ...