Monday was just unremarkable and I relished in it. It was the most milk-toast, vanilla ice cream kind of day; not even anything worth preserving on camera. A nice change of pace after a busy weekend. I will say that last night was my evening to make a Wal-Mart run without the little people, and it was fun listening to the music I wanted and turning the volume up LOUD. Bet I looked funny jamming in a big ol' minivan...conveniently no photos of that.

I think I've mentioned before that most of Kate's vocab begins with a "d" or a "t" (as in "wanna dit down" or "have a touple mo'?"). Lately she loves to proclaim herself by shouting with gusto "I Tate!". I think it is darling, so I've started calling her Tate. This just pisses her off. This morning she became so irate with me that she started yelling "I NOT TATE, I TATE!!!!!" Later Kate demanded some "pocket porn". It took me a while to figure out she really wanted popcorn (of course, when I told Tracy about Kates' mislabeling of her snack he responded " they both sound pretty good"). This weekend, Kate enjoyed some "Dokken candy" aka cotton candy. That's a hard-core treat!

India had "practice" today for her preschool's graduation ceremony (she's not graduating but all the kids participate), and they rehearsed on stage at the high school. She feels very grown up. Perhaps this is what prompts her obsessive wedding planning. She informed me last night "Mommy, this weekend while we are out on the boat I'm going to ask Joe to marry me and we'll live with you. But if he says no, then I'll just marry William." (this is Joe in the boots). Little forward hussy! I discourage any discussion about boyfriends and/or marriage because it is just needless and tacky at her age, so I don't know where she is getting this stuff. Poor Joe and William are just boy-toy pawns in her eternal quest for a future husband.

India is talking about Joe a lot because he and his family are coming for a long visit tomorrow. Janice and Pat are very dear friends of ours who moved from the Shore to Durham in November, and we are sooooo excited to see them. He has a brother, Gus, who is 4 months older than Kate. On Saturday Janice's sister Lois and her family are joining us and we have a fun weekend planned. Should be interesting...6 kids and 6 adults all bunking here. I would worry about whether our house would survive, but it's weathered hundreds of hurricanes (I've personally ridden out 3 here) and generations of farm families so I think it's fairly tough.

I spent about an hour on the phone with my friend Cliff today. It was like old times; we used to spend hours on the phone in high school making fun of everything. We did a little of that today, too. Cliff is one of the few people besides my husband that doesn't mind my sarcasm. One of the best things about starting the blog is staying in better touch with old friends. Enjoyed catching up with you, Cliff!

Another fun moment today was getting the ball rolling on providing clinical supervision to a Master's in Counseling candidate. I often feel out of touch with my field now that I am taking a break from practicing so I'm excited about the prospect of working again, even if it is for a brief stint. We will meet once a week to discuss her progress in a practicum; it is a bit like "therapy lite". Even though I do love staying at home I find myself missing work. But if I worked full-time, I would miss moments like this...India and Katie Kate doing "Ring Around the Rosy" today: