matching tracksuits

fun in threes, sometimes fours

the girl

14th Celebrations

Tuesday 15 December 2020 | 0 Comments

The Girl turns 14 tomorrow. She’s taller than her mother, faster than her father, and (some days thinks she’s) smarter than us both combined.

Some things have changed in 14 years; some things have not. She’s still very particular (some would say OCD) about arranging things, and so she places the candles on her cake herself.

She’s still very particular about mixing foods (she doesn’t) and sauces (she doesn’t) and vegetables (except for peppers and cucumbers, she doesn’t), but she’s increasingly open to new things. For her birthday dinner, though, there’s only one option: crab cakes. I think we’ve done them for her three years in a row now.

Some loves have come and gone (dance and gymnastic have run their course and are now only memories) while others have stuck around (we’re now into our third year of volleyball).

Tomorrow she officially turns 14, but I might need a little convincing.

Sunday

Sunday 13 December 2020 | 0 Comments

Though technically not all the pictures are from Sunday...

Cleaning

Friday 04 December 2020 | 0 Comments

It’s that time of year — spring Christmas cleaning.

I’ve written before about K and the level of Christmas cleaning she requires:

The Dirty Stairs

The window is not dirty; it’s fogged from the gas in between the two panes doing something funky.

That required level of cleanliness now drives the Girl mad. “Why are madre’s standards so high?” (She’s been calling us madre and padre for about a year now. Why? Because.)

“Because they are.” We try to reassure her that it’s good practice for “real life.” “You might get a boss with impossibly high standards. You’ll be used to it.”

I don’t know if she buys it.

Advent 2020 Begins

Tuesday 01 December 2020 | 0 Comments

Today is the first day for the Advent calendars K has kept under wraps in the basement. L made sure to label hers to ensure the integrity of her 24-treat treasure, only to find that the first treat had an almond in the center of it.

"I can't eat almonds," she sighed.

Don't worry -- someone took care of it.

Forbidden Island

Saturday 28 November 2020 | 0 Comments

Out of the blue this evening, the kids decided they wanted to play Forbidden Island. At least that’s how I understood it by the time they made it down to the livingroom with the game. I’d wager it was more L’s initiative than the Boy’s, but they were both excited about it when they came down.

I was less excited. About playing the game, that is. I don’t understand the game. It just seems to be a bunch of randomness pawned off as a prize-winning game. “How many drugs did they do before coming up with the arbitrary rules that make up that game?” I laughed with K once the Boy was in bed and the Girl had retreated to her friends on Facetime.

But none of that really mattered — here we were spending time together without any fussing, without any arguments. The kids are at a tough age: E is young enough to derive joy from irritating people and the Girl is not quite old enough to be patient with it all. These moments, while increasing in frequency as the kids grow up, still feel relatively rare some days. So we make the most of them when they are here.

Family Game

The Day After

Friday 27 November 2020 | 0 Comments

“Friday, it’s going to be beautiful — warm, sunny, inviting,” K proclaimed earlier this week. “We are going on either a hike or a bike ride.” We headed to Dupont State Forest, which has 40 miles of cycling trails. Off-road trails. I currently have 25mm tires on my bike for commuting (ask me how many times I’ve ridden this year…), which can make any offroading a bit of a challenge, to say the least. What I’ve found is that it’s not a problem going uphill: I can power through most things, and the tires are not that slick (even though they would appear to be so), so keeping up is not a problem. Going downhill is a different story, though. Our nearly-fourteen-year-old leaves K and me behind; our eight-year-old does the same.

I blame it on the tires.

The Girl, 2010

Wednesday 11 November 2020 | 0 Comments

Ten years later and games with balls still hold a central spot in her orbit.

I look at three-year-old L and remember thinking, “What’s she going to be like in ten years? How will this young face develop? How will her personality develop?” Now we know, and we see all the seeds were already sprouting in the three-year-old L.

Chatting

Tuesday 10 November 2020 | 0 Comments

Living with a thirteen-year-old is a challenge. “I don’t know how I survived your eighth-grade year,” Nana told me when I got my job teaching eighth graders. Now that I’m teaching them and living with one, I see her point. Their astounding knowledge puts to shame everything I ever thought I knew, and often they realize it’s just not worth it talking to an idiot like me.

Until they do.

Until they sit at the dinner table and chatter on and on about their school day simply because I told a story about playing dodgeball as a kid with the hard, unforgiving kickball balls we used.

“Don’t worry,” I tell L when her behavior frustrates me. “You won’t always be thirteen.”

“You always tell me that!” she responds.

“I’m not saying it for you; I’m saying it for myself.”

Those moments sometimes seem like the dominant moments in a family with a thirteen-year-old. And then, out of nowhere, a perfect dinner conversation that’s amusing and warm.

“They turn normal again,” one of my colleagues said to me today when she asked how school was going for our kids and was shocked to realize/learn that L is now in the eighth grade. But this is normal — for her age. And it is frustrating — sometimes. Yet we know we’ll miss this version of L, so we hold on while we can.

Sunday in the Fall

Sunday 08 November 2020 | 0 Comments

A perfect Sunday.

We had a lovely morning breakfast.

The Boy got a new bike.

A couple of friends came over for a bonfire.

All Saints’ Day 2020

Sunday 01 November 2020 | 0 Comments

We got a late start today, even with the time change. We weren’t home until so incredibly late that even K slept in a little

In the early afternoon, we went to Nana’s grave to clean a little and try to set some new candles. Of course, we didn’t have the proper candles that are ubiquitous in Polish florist shops this time of year, except for this year. The cemeteries were closed for three days, including today, in order to minimize the spread of the virus.

Which led to the circulation of an amusing joke: “For everyone planning on jumping the fence to the cemetery for All Saints’ Day, please remember that the hours of six to eight are reserved for seniors.” Translated as best as I can recall the original.

We had our own adventures at the site, though: we’d planned on giving the marker a good scrubbing, but then left all the supplies at the house. Sounds about right.

In the afternoon, a family meeting to help L make a big decision: she got accepted into two volleyball clubs, and in each of them, she’s being recruited into the highest-level teams. She tried out for Carolina One again this year, and she’s leaning away from their offer for a number of reasons. One of them: they didn’t choose her last year.

“Typical thirteen-year-old logic,” K and I laughed, acknowledging, though, that it’s ultimately her choice.

Covid-willing that is. There’s a high chance, I think, that everything will be canceled before it starts, with rising numbers everywhere but especially here in Greenville. The teams all have very strict covid protocols in place, but things might reach a point that even that is impossible or impractically dangerous.