~ Capturing the context of contentment in everyday life ~
Every Thursday, here at Like Mother, Like Daughter!
{pretty}
The bees are hard at work in the garden, and so are we. This is our first real spring in this house (we've been here almost a full year — can you believe it?), and it's fun seeing flowers pop up from bulbs that we didn't know even existed.
You can drive right up this little mountain near us (the road that winds up and around was built courtesy of the Depression-era Civilian Conservation Corps), and enjoy the amazing views at the top with very little effort. I think I've shown you photos from here before (and you'll see more, I'm sure); it's definitely one of our go-to activities whether we're on our own or with guests. It's also one of Pippo's favorite things to do: he loves to climb around on the rocks “like a mountain goat.”
Between the baby and the camera, I don't do much mountaintop scrambling. I mostly just take pictures.
{happy}
My Aunt Ellen is so good about sending mail — I don't know if she's ever missed sending a card for my birthday or any of my siblings, or now any of our spouses and kids.
When my husband was getting ready to deploy, she promised to write him letters no matter what, even if she had nothing to relate except the tides (She lives by the ocean, so is on top of these things.)
Sure enough, the Capt. was very happy to receive several chatty letters from her while he was in Afghanistan, with bits of news and goings-on from her neck of the woods — and of course, always the time of the next high tide!
Point being that Aunt Ellen understands that sometimes the nicest thing is to get something in the mail, even if it's not the Most Exciting Thing Possible (pursuit of which often keeps us lesser souls from ever actually getting the darn thing in the envelope).
She's started sending Pippo mail, sort of like low-maintenance care packages: care envelopes! I cannot recommend them enough for young far-off friends. (They secretly are the Most Exciting Thing Possible.)
The first time he got an envelope from her, he barely made it through the door with it, and settled down on the doormat to play with stickers. This time he made it all the way into the living room.
In the envelope was a coloring page of a cute bunny and two sheets of stickers (one of which I suspect came from some fundraising mail she had received herself. I would totally have thrown it in the trash in her situation; she recognized that it was pure gold for a little boy, and popped it in the mail!).
So simple, so exciting!
(Pippo is hilarious with stickers, actually. His priority is to get them all stuck asap — he really doesn't care where — and then he's done. The cashiers at Trader Joe's back in California would always give him a big long strip of them, and he'd studiously stick them, one by one, on top of each other on the knee of his pants as he sat in the carseat on the way home.)
{funny}
Molly is at that stage of early mobility where she often ends up backing herself under furniture.
I bought some Dixie cups at the grocery store to plant seeds in (we didn't have appropriate recyclables for the job, and I was not willing to stop at another store!), and they are a huge hit over here. Best toy ever.
(Molly loves them too, but eats them too quickly, so for unsupervised play she gets a more durable Solo cup, instead.)
So there you have it: a coloring page and some disposable cups, and the kids are happy for hours.
(They're not the only ones! At the science museum in Oklahoma City, one of the exhibits is a sort of building area with different stations for the kids to work at. There's a place where you can build your own roller coaster, a ramp with timing gear where you can race lego cars, a pegboard wall for making Rube Goldberg-like contraptions… and a table set with hundreds of Solo cups. I watched a half-dozen tweens spend an hour building towers while Pippo was figuring out the roller coasters the last time we were there.)
{real}
This is a bit of military-family reality here: my to-do list includes paperwork that we owe to DMV's in not one, not two, but three different states. Ugh. x3. At least if I actually get it all done this week, I can still wrap it into my Lenten mortification, right?
(Ok, in all fairness, I now feel compelled to say that every interaction we've had with anyone at the Oklahoma DMV has been nothing short of pleasant — we're not just talking polite, but friendly. Not just helpful, but problem-solving. And practically no waiting in line. It's mind-boggling.)
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Ellen says
My 2 year old is obsessed with red solo cups too! She’s playing with them right now actually…
Leane says
Seeing your little guy having fun with those stickers was inspiring! Good for Aunty Ellen! She’s right, there is nothing like receiving a letter…or something…in the mail for a little person! (A big person, too….as long as it’s not paperwork from DMV)! Thank you for sharing!
Christine Guest says
My little K used to seal-scoot too. Her brothers used to count down to her getting stuck under furniture. She never minded the teasing though, even as a baby she was such an extrovert she liked the company.
Ashlee says
My Aunt used to send me letters in the mail when I was a child. Oh, how I loved to get mail! I’ll have to remember the Dixie cups as toys as my little guy gets older. Grandma is on her way over this morning so I can go get some precious and rare alone time. Now that makes me happy!
Diane says
Love the “care envelopes”. I’m doing much the same with my Compassion International child. We can enclose flat things with our letters, so I’m sending a sticker book a page or two at a time, along with the corresponding stickers. Kids are so inventive; it’s hard to not let that get trained out of them!
shyla says
love the idea of care envelopes! makes me think of “pen pals” and how awesome that was as a child….can you imagine what toddler/preschooler penpals would look like: half of a worm, multiple small rocks, one piece of bird nest all in an envelope covered in stickers.
Amy says
Omg, the red solo cups!! Hilarious! But a good substitute; my #2 would totally eat the dixie cups up, too. My kids really like paper towel and toilet paper tubes (the cardboard thing inside), but alas, there is no eating-proof, plastic version of those!
Jennie C. says
I mailed little notes and stickers to my nieces for a while, but got out of the habit. I think I’ll get back into it!
Adrie @ ALittleWifesHappyLife says
Sending coloring sheets and stickers- that’s brilliant! With so many nieces and nephews reaching “coloring age,” I think I should really get on that! Of course, I’m terrible at sending mail, though… maybe if I put a reminder in my calendar or something…
Annie says
I spent 3 hours at the DMV last week myself and think that it would have been greatly improved by a table full of Dixie cups, or perhaps a roll of DMV stickers to plaster all over my pants.
Tamara says
Ha! That’s a good idea.
Julie says
Ha! I had to laugh at your comment on the DMV. After moving from California, where every DMV employee had the personality equivalent of an angry doberman, and treated you as if you may have just murdered a puppy just out of pure meanspiritedness. We were surprised when we got in line @ the DMV in Washington, and had all of our business accomplished within 15 minutes…15! I almost smiled on my drivers liscence photo I was so happy.
Tamara says
My kids are like that with stickers too! They are also quite pleased to get their hands on a roll of tape. We can get hours of play out of it!
Colette says
Had to laugh at the dixie cups. My children have scarred me for life (or I should say, one of my sons has)– I have visions of hundreds of dixie cups full of water! I know he would find a way…
Allie says
If you want to keep kids quiet for hours save a box of bandaids for a long car ride. get them on sale. kids will play with them for hours. It has been a lifesaver .
Margo, Thrift at Home says
love the care envelopes idea! What a sweet aunt you have.
I bought my kids boxes of cheap bandaids at that age. Best thing ever to the kids because they were Not Toys and had several fine-motor steps to getting to the sticky part. Kept my daughter occupied on an entire flight, once. . .
Stephanie says
We do all love handwritten notes in an email world. I love that your Aunt and your husband had the tides to share. Your children are so sweet, God Bless.
Jen says
Gorgeous photo of the flowers and the bee!
Both of my grandmothers are excellent at sending little envelopes throughout the year. My dad’s mom is especially good with birthdays and holidays and without fail there are birthday cards, valentines, Easter cards, and Christmas cards. My mom’s mom often sends postcards from her travels and a little bit of mad money for ice cream treats, etc. Just getting something in the mail address to you is so special!
Toni Graham says
Beautiful post. It’s the little things: stickers and coloring for a child (and the knowledge that “someone thought of me!”), and friendly faces at the DMV for an adult. To stop and be grateful for these really does buoy us through our days.
Kinga says
The hiking adventure looks amazing! Enjoy before it gets too hot:)
Paula says
My college buddy ran some camp for high school kids in OK for the air force a couple years ago. Not anymore–he’s finally retired. but still flying so not really retired.
He met a girlfriend there that is (much) younger 🙂
Lucy says
The hardest part about the DMV in OK was learning to call them “Tag Agencies” instead of License Branch. But they are all independently owned, which is why they are more efficient! I remember once sitting in one listening to another customer on his cell phone just going nuts over the fact that that particular Tag office had a little display of Christian stuff for sale (it was Christmas Angels or something like that). You know, separation of church and state 😉 LOL. I wanted to remind him the office was a private business and they could sell anything they wanted but he was so irate I held my tongue.
Becky says
I love the humor of the humor of the backward locomotion phase although, that probably makes me an evil mother. 🙂 I have taken to sending kindle books to my far off friend whose husband is deployed. I keep an eye out for books on sale that she will like (mostly funny, light, and distracting as she has 2 young children) and gift them to her. I have found it’s a quick and easy way to cheer her when she’s having a harder day.
Woman of the House says
When I read your posts, I always come away thinking that your children are having wonderful childhoods. You always have interesting things going on!