Playing Catch up: Fall 2013

I'm terrible at keeping up with this blog so this is not a surprise to anyone reading this. However, in my effort to keep some kind of journal of my life that i can easily look back on (or if the internet still exists and this blog too, the kids can look back at) and remember all the things i will completely and totally forget in short order.

This catch up is for Fall.

August found the kids starting school again. Asa in his final year of preschool at the YMCA. Esther in 1st grade. Asa was sad to leave his teacher from last year (we switched schools), but the new school is much more academically minded and organized and less of a "day care" type set up. Esther, is now an old hat at the school thing and for the most part loves it. Though from time to time she gets very bored. We had a final Hoorah at the beach in September.

 Generally speaking the fall found us traipsing about the woods in our usual fashion and soaking up everything until the snow keeps us sequestered indoors.

Asa's Field Trip to the Orchard

Esther ran in the Race for Education

Esther's field trip to the aquarium

Esther turned 7 at the end of October. In my procrastination fashion, i have forgotten to write her birthday letter but will try to write a late one some time. We had a rockin' big Halloween Birthday Bash at the hollow. There were costumes, games, food galore, and a pinata. The weather was devine and while i questioned my sanity while planning it, we had a great time!

The fall is probably our most favorite time of year. I recently heard of that some people feel fall is a sad time of year because everything is going dormant, but i love it. Maybe it feeds my hermit soul and love of preparing to hibernate.

In November, Ben and I celebrated our 10th Anniversary. We took the day off work and went out to breakfast and bought cookies and then snuggled and read.

Next up: Playing Catch up: Winter 2013-14

More on masks

This is Roger Harvey and his band The Wild Life wearing my masks. I plan on riding to fame and fortune on Roger's coat tails... via masks...of course...

bunny girl

i'm having a love affair with making masks.

taking stock...

Whole huge chunks of time are missing from this documentation of my life... it feels like every second of time goes by faster than the last until i feel like i'm living my life in fast forward. February was just yesterday and today, it is July... 8th... 2013... and i'm 33. Wasn't i just 16?

Since my last update, life has chugged along in it's usual fashion. Soccer games and kindergarten parent-teacher meetings, a couple colds or fevers, my cousin who battled a long war with leukemia left this world... small personal crises, and visits with people who (however inexplicably sometimes) love me...

Esther finished kindergarten and, as always, excelled. She is now so grown up it both breaks my heart and fills me up such intense joy... She devours books at an incredible speed and as always asks me questions i cannot begin to even answer: Mom, what are "other dimensions"...

Asa finished his first year of preschool, and while he didn't love it, he did learn to not hate it. He is at a wonderful age where his outlook on life is one i wish i could have somehow held onto beyond childhood: categorically simple, vivid, lollipops fix everything. See facebook for some of his amazing quotes...

Despite spring's bipolar rantings, it has finally gone to bed and summer has taken her place. We started off the summer with a camping trip to Deep Creek Lake. We took the kids kayaking, fishing, and swimming. We roasted marshmallows and reveled in doing hardly anything. Less than a week later found us at our summer haven, Chincoteague. We wallowed in sand and sun, mosquitos and endless bike rides. Despite a dismal 24-hour battle with food poisoning (just me, not the whole family), we tanned and salted the work and school stress out of our little bodies.

We've been home for a few days and are slowly eeking our way back into a normal routine. Me and Ben to our respective works, the kids to their daily routine of splashing in the kiddie pool, poking at each other out of boredom, trying to lick popsicles faster than the sun can melt them, and playing at Penny's house...

Ben and i began building our outdoor kitchen this past weekend with bits and bobs found around the hollow. I have vivid dreams of candle lit, fire-roasted dinners on the patio... things with hints of lime and sweaty glasses of jeweled drinks.

And here we are. another summer... another July 8th. a few people less (i miss you, jeni), a few people more (welcome Milo Rush, Juniper Frances Dymond, baby Bronco to come)...

and 33 years old. my favorite numbers side by side. or multiplied by 11. a fairy tale number of wishes. my own musketeers...

and all i can think to ask for for my birthday is cake. the rest is already here.

What the hey-hey

I know… you’re thinking what happened to the rest of December and all of January?!

And to that I say, you KNOW what happened to it… because the two people who maybe still read this blog are the two people who are part of my daily life and for some reason have not been scared away by my bipolar, narcissistic, dramatic, and in-your-face ways…. hi guys!

I spent my day from 6:30 this morning running from one task and place to another always in a frantic state of almost-late…  My life these days is very intense. Very time driven… very frenetic.

A thought drifted through my mind a few minutes ago as I was tidying up the kitchen after finally putting the kids to bed, “if I quit my job and became just a stay-at-home mom, I would have no excuse for the mess, the stress, the shortcuts… and what if I couldn’t do it? I’d have no excuse.”

Truth is that being a working mom (granted i only work part time) gives me an excuse (even if it’s only an excuse to tell myself) to hang the dirty house, the piled up dishes, the guilt for spending the extra money on buying all the frozen and just-add-water meals at the store…  It is a weak excuse. I know women who work part or full time and are the primary parent and still manage to do it all, and then some! Terri is even more of a food nazi than I am and I just can’t wrap my head around manning up to put more effort into making everything from scratch and/or talking my kids into eating quinoa instead of noodles…  I’m terrified of what it would mean if I still couldn’t cut it. If, with all the time in the world I still couldn’t do it all, couldn’t make it all work… just what would I do all day (aside from blogging more of course)? I have a list of things I want to do but being too busy to get to them is both frustrating and strangely satisfying. Satisfying because i have a reason that it didn’t get done or done well… I don’t have to be perfect.

And after days like today when I run from one thing to another with the erratic flight of a caffeinated bat, I look at my husband (I love you, honey!) and I hate him. His life seems so much more simple sometimes. I know I’m over simplifying it and his life is definitely NOT more simple than mine. But sometimes it really feels that way. It doesn’t bother him if the kids have a meal that does not include at least one vegetable, or if Asa has worn the same shirt for 3 days, or if 4 years old is when they should start having chores around the house. And here I am trying to keep a handle on all the things we have to do with and for the kids schools, the dentist and doctor appointments, the extracurricular activities, the veggies, the chores…

Ben has been picking up more work. The original idea was that he could get a job that would allow me to quit mine. But that proving difficult in today’s job market and with his limited qualifications, we’re now on a trajectory to try and make his “metallurgical arts” (as they say in O’ Brother Where Art Thou) into a viable profession an income producing one at that. It’s working out well so far.  And I think that his not being hired by any of the places he applied to will work out to be a blessing in the long run. Working for himself affords him some flexibility in his schedule and a great amount of artistic freedom. But it’s going to take some time to get him established. In the mean time, it looks like I will have to continue to work. I have been thinking that if I can figure out ways to lighten our budget I can cut back on my hours and therefore my stress as well. I mentioned to Ben that if I didn’t work so much I probably wouldn’t drink so much wine and maybe those two things would cancel each other out. Unfortunately we only buy $9 bottles of wine and I make more than $9 in 2-3 days so I don’t see that allowing me to quit my job…

I’m glad Ben’s building his business. He calls it Moonlight Forge by the way. You can find him on Custommade.com I think. I’d give you a link but I’m really tired and I want to go to bed and don’t have the energy to look up the link. Plus any time I spend in front of the computer makes my brain think I’m working and it starts whining at me.

I’m glad (and totally petrified) that we have a plan to transition me away from my current work and maybe work all together. I can spend my days cooking, raising goats, and even writing… someday…

For now though, the goals are to figure out how to do this telecommute/homelife balance, lightening the budget, and supporting Ben on his venture thing…

Also, need to figure out how to calm my frenetic energy… As a start I’m off coffee and dreaming of ways to add yoga to my daily life (that is without having to get up at 5:30am every day).

Instagram

My life in photos

Doing it at the Market

The weekend was fantastic. Truly amazing and truly exhausting. So the best news is, I PRACTICALLY SOLD OUT!!! Seriously, my ART made money. CRAZY!

I had a great time hanging with my sister all day and at least half the night for two days straight. The market was packed with vendors and patrons and babies and dogs and art galore. 

I practically cried when I sold the "taxidermy" fox head and then again when a lady bought the dragon i made two years ago for her autistic daughter. The dragon I wasn't even going to bring because after two years of craft festivals no one has ever even considered buying it...  It was the last purchase of our booth after hours as we were packing up on Saturday night. 

I got invited to be a part of the Pittsburgh Artists Guild (but had to decline because i don't live in Pittsburgh).  I was given the address and number of a craft boutique where a lady thinks i should teach needle felting classes. And (the highlight of the weekend) I was told at least 4 times by 4 different people that I have a WONDERFUL sense of humor!  Usually, with my sense of humor I get a "whan, whan, whan...". My sense of humor tends to be not unlike that of a 6 year old minus the fart jokes (well, not always)... it centers around puns. Much of my art i make just because it cracks me up and it was intensely rewarding to have other people laugh at it too. I felt truly loved by the Pittsburgh community. The house next to my sister's is for sale for CHEAP (like 50k for a three bedroom) and yesterday almost as soon as i walked into work i stumbled on an artists grant in Pittsburgh and part of me wonders if it's a sign that we should relocate to that charming city... so now i'm fantasizing about being a city dwelling artist... 

anyhow... 

 Here's our Friday night booth set up. I sold so much that we had to take down the xmas tree (since there was hardly anything left to put on it) on Saturday.

So this was our booth set up on Saturday.

 And this is me Saturday night unwinding with a beer in one hand and some Dewar's in the other. Needless to say, i became very unwound very quickly...

and in other news, this is my brother-in-law in the Pittsburgh city paper(?) "singing" with his band, World's Scariest Police Chases. I still haven't seen them perform in person but I desperately want to... Anyone wanna set them up a show in Bmore?

work and pittsburgh and stuff...

This week could not be going by more slowly. And while i haven't been posting here very often and you probably have NO clue what i've been up so what is one more week, i finally feel i have the downtime and wherewithal to write something... or maybe it's the narcissism?

This Friday at 4am i will be driving up to Pittsburgh grabbing my sister and loads of her art and we're going to be hawking our wares at the I Made It Market at bakery square. If you're in the area please come and buy some cool stuff.  I have been felting my tail off and have come up with some very fun things (as my may have seen on instagram).  I'm pretty pleased with them overall... the little animal faces make me laugh and feel like doing puppet theater.

I'm psyched to spend the weekend with my sister. I miss her so badly, especially in the cooler weather when i want warm drinks and girl movies and someone else's clothes to borrow. I'm nervous about selling my stuff. Fairie festival is a completely different animal. I have never given it my all and gone all out and really created things that i fall in love with. I have to say the stuff i've made recently, i'm in love with. I will be sad to part with a lot of it. I will also be sad if the end doesn't justify the means and i end up having spent a fortune on materials and travel and time... I'm having a bit of a career crisis and am wondering if i could just make fun things for a living rather than this random jack-of-all-trades for a non-profit thing i've dug myself into.

In other but related news, my little family is a state of limbo. Ben is looking for full time work. One of the many things that came to him in Japan is that a full time job would feed him more than this part-time stay-at-home dad, part-time carpenter thing does. I understand it, I think: the difficulty in switching gears, the not feeling wholly dedicated to one thing and feeling like you're doing everything sort of half-assed, the disappointment in realizing how little $ you actually make when you only put in 20-24 hours a week. Though I'm realizing more and more (thankfully since it's no a possibility right at the moment) that I don't think would ever want to go back to a full-time working schedule. With Ben's job hunt in the works, my job is in a state of uncertainty.  I think i would rather work in the office or not work, but with Ben's background it's unlikely he'll be able to make ends meet on his income alone even working full-time. So it looks like i will be working from home for a while. Lucky for me though, i have made myself (not intentionally mind you) sort of irreplaceable in my current job and so my company (once again) is doing what it can to accommodate me.  I hated working from home while Ben was in Japan. It made me twitchy and really blurred the lines between work-life and home-life. I need to figure out how to separate those two things for sanity sake... too bad i don't have a spare bedroom to turn into an office, eh?  I'm hoping to focus the next 3-12 months (who knows how long it will take) to get the company to function without me so i can leave them all together (and feel good about it rather than guilty)... maybe just felt little critters for craft fairs in Pittsburgh with my sister (what? A Jones making art for a living??)  So now all there is to do is get Ben a job...

The long lost Birthday Letter for Ms. Esther Mathilde

I really wanted to write a birthday letter to each of my children on their birthdays, a letter that would highlight the things they did this past year, learned to do, new idiosyncrasies, stuff they hate and love...  unfortunately, i suck at keeping any sort of regimen. So here we are she just turned 6 years old in October and not only have i not written this year's birthday letter but i also failed to write last years. So this is it. Ages 4 and 5 (or at least the teeny tiny percentage that my sad little brain can old) rolled into one letter that could never ever really capture the dynamics of those ages in this amazing and brilliant girl of mine.

Dear Esther,
  I know i say this every year, but i seriously CAN NOT believe how old you are now!! Countless times since before you were even born hoards of people told me to enjoy every age, that it goes by so quickly, etc. And even though there were very, very LOOOOONG nights that felt like they would never end filled with incessant wailing, crying, carrying on, and cursing, the time has flown by. Just yesterday you were a tiny, funny little red thing wriggling in my arms and fussing and now, NOW you are this gigantic (well, comparatively speaking, but certainly not compared to your peers), intelligent, outrageous, funny big kid. I'm going to apologize profusely that i missed your birthday letter last year and even more so that my memory is just awful.  I honestly will not really be able to piece together the year you spent as a 4 year old though i will try. I hope you'll forgive me and my crap memory. I also hope you didn't inherit it, though it really doesn't seem like you have considering how clearly you seem to remember all the past slights everyone has ever done you... also ever treat you've ever had.
   So this section of this letter is for the birthday you turned 5 years old, to highlight the year you were 4 years old. You went to Maryland Line Preschool again that year. It was your 2nd year there and of course you knew all your classmates and teachers thoroughly. You really grew into your gregarious self that year. No more crying when daddy or i dropped you at school for the morning. You also had an extended day there. I think you stayed until after lunch Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Asa was three years old this year as well so he was much more of a playmate to you than ever before though still not able to keep up with you. For Halloween you were a gnome girl which i loved because it was an easy costume to make not to mention freakin' adorable. You decided on this costume after seeing the cartoon gnomeo and juliet. You were also sick a lot this year of your life. Some of it was, as usual, the germy-ness of preschool though mostly it feels like it's my and your dad's failure to keep your immune system running at it's best. You were sick on Christmas day this year, which was just sooo sad. You tried so hard to keep up the facade all morning but by the time half of your presents were opened it was obvious you were very under the weather. You had a wicked fever so we medicated you the rest of the day. Ever since that seizure you had a few years back we are terrified to let fevers run their course with you which is probably silly considering febrile seizures are considered harmless. This was also the year you got a new cousin.  Aunt Jessica and Uncle Eric had Emmett. Emmett who has since turned out to be a GIANT of a baby. Although we haven't spent too much time with them I am over the moon about you having a cousin. My best friends have always been my cousins. Where most people have life long friends that they met at preschool or kindergarten or in the neighborhood, i have cousins. I dearly hope that you will find people in your life like i have found my cousins. Let's see, what else can i say about you being 4 years old. You are an amazing artist and i believe you wanted to be an artist at the age of 4 same as now. The year you were 4 was a turning point for you and all of us i think. It was the official end of the baby years and a grand entrance into kid-hood. I'm think i'm melding ages 4 and 5 together here so i'm going to just jump right into 5.

   Ok. Today is November 27th 2012. Almost exactly a month ago you turned 6. For some reason from 3 to 4 seemed really big to me. And now from 5 to 6 seems huge! You are a very amazing kid. You are so complex which is for some reason startling to me. When i was a young adult or even teenager i loved to spend time around younger kids. I felt like the simplicity of their worlds could some how rub off a little bit and remind me that i didn't have to take myself so seriously. I (and i see how wrong it was of me) truly believed that being a child was somehow so simple. But you my darling girl, are a very deeply philosophical, curious, complicated, and emotional being. I suppose being the daughter of two very serious, very introspective, very emotional people has something to do with it. I worry so much for you. I worry how much your emotions will be a burden in your adult life. I worry that you will take yourself far too seriously and that you will end up suffering for it... and so we have introduced you to the knock knock joke.  I bought this book for you for your 5th birthday. However, it wasn't until last week you truly discovered this book. Some of it has to do with your new found ability to truly READ. You've been sounding out words since you were about 3 years old. However, in the last two months or so you have really hit a stride. You are interested in all books not just ones with pictures, you read full sentences and absorb their meaning without needing clues or memorization. You barely stumble on new words. So the picture-less knock-knock joke book has been torturing our house for weeks now. I think your father has taken to hiding it every now and then just to get a break. Last year was your last year of preschool and this past september you started at Kindergarten. This was a very crazy adjustment for all of us. Not only the stress of changing schools but a whole new routine including a much earlier wake up time, riding the bus, a full 5 days at school for a WHOLE day which is just crazy to me. And in the midst of all this your dad went to Japan. This was tough on all of us. He was there just shy of a month and your first full month in school too so i think we all had some behavioral issues. In a show of your father's true timeliness, this was also the month Aunt Ceci and Monong Miah were in the hospital giving birth to Addie and healing from the infections that came with that. Lali and Grandpa were camped out with them up in Pennsylvania helping out as they could. So it was you and me and Asa doing our thing and holding down the fort. It was a tough month. But we got through it. Let's see what else. Oh my favorite thing about last year in preschool was the circus day. You were a tightrope walker and you took it so seriously. It was wonderful. So now i want to buy us a slackline to have in the backyard so you can practice tightrope walking.  Being 5 years old has made you more independent than i ever thought possible. You spent quite a lot of time at Oma's house with out us the last couple of years. You have a blast and always come home with more clothes and shoes than you left with. You and Oma are quite the pair and I'm glad for it. I think that you two have a very special bond. Maybe it's because you're the first grand child. maybe it's because you are a girl... maybe it's just because... but it's very wonderful.  Now that Asa is older you two have formed a very love-hate relationship. You fight pretty incessantly. It drives me up a wall. I still haven't figured out any secrets to get you two to get along.  I think my mom really enjoys it in a way though. My brother and I used to fight A LOT and it drove her crazy so i think this is a what-goes-around-comes-around kind of thing.

I don't know what this new year will bring for us. Things are on the cusp of changing for us as a family i think. Daddy is looking for full time work and I am trying to transition to at-home work or possibly no work. Asa has started preschool this year and you of course are an elementary schooler now. I think that we are all waking up to how we are not parents of babies or toddlers any more. We even figured out the trick to a fun family vacation last summer so i think we are looking to travel more and hopefully figure out a way to move to the Philippines for a time. But as with everything that i have learned from being a mom, there are no plans that go as planned.

Esther my baby, whenever, if ever you get to read these birthday letters, i hope it's incredibly obvious how much i love you. As my oldest child your dad and i inadvertently do a lot of learning with you. I think because of this i feel very guilty. I think i also expect more from you than most people do from a child your age. which i also feel guilty about. Regardless of my silly guilt, i love you. I think you are amazing and i am so very, very, very thankful that you are my daughter. You have taught me more about life and myself than anyone ever has. You challenge me and help me to grow. You make me laugh and scream and inspire such creativity in me and everyone around you every moment of every day. Thank you my sweet girl.

Love,
Mama

The Lost Month of September

I'm sure you've all been dying to know how Ben's trip was. But i'm not going to tell you. Go ask him.

What i am going to tell you is how Ben's trip was FOR ME (open acknowledgement of narcissistic issues).

Ben left on Sunday, September 2nd at around 4am.  He tried to get out of the house with only a brief peck on my cheek and a quick wistful glance our our peacefully sleeping children.  Course, after i heard the door close and it registered in my sleep-addled brain that he was leaving FOR A MONTH... i ran out the door in a tank and undies and up to the car park to jump on him and hold on for dear life. When his father's headlights came down the driveway to pick him up and take him to the airport, I let go and ran back to my house hoping that my father-in-law did not see my desperate undie-only goodbye...

That morning the Lost Month of September began. I went back to bed though couldn't fall asleep and lay there waiting for the day to start in earnest.

Death:
When the day did begin, it was a whirlwind of getting ready for Jeff's Wake. A dear friend of my family's died from an unexpected heart attack at the age of 49 only a few days before leaving his wife, son, and all of us to wonder what in the hell is happening to the world.  Jeff was one of the most generous and sweet people i have ever met. We put up giant tents and tables. We moved furniture and hosed out coolers. We strung up lights and hauled wood for a giant bonfire. That evening many, many people (most of whom i didn't know) came to say goodbye to a man who had already left.

Life:
A few days after Jeff's wake, my niece made her long-awaited debut into the world. Unfortunately, it was not smooth entrance and resulted in both her and mom staying in the hospital for the better part of 2 weeks. My parents went up to the hospital in Pennsylvania (2 hrs north of where we are) to support my brother and his girls and help in anyway they could. I stayed in the hollow.

A few days after that, my first cousin-once-removed made HER debut into the world, though with less drama than my niece (though not without any).

Living:
With my parents camped out up north, I took care of their dogs and home. I took care of my home. I got the kids up and fed and ready for school every morning. Asa started preschool and cried every day of it because apparently, being 3 years old and having your father go off to Japan (may as well be mars) for (what is to you) an inconceivable length of time can open up some abandonment issues. I worked from home and was at least spared the drive to and from the office. I wrote e-mails to Ben every night (and most mornings and some afternoons) cataloging the events of the day, trying to make sense of how alone i felt.

Snakes:
And then there were snakes everywhere... eating toads and laying in the middle of the path AT NIGHT. This makes no sense and so i feel i need to share it in an equally nonsensical way.

On Being Insane:

All the girls got discharged from the hospitals. My parents came home. I waited for things to slow down, take on a rhythm... And perhaps they did in a sense, but more like a crazy jazz rhythm than a steady heartbeat rhythm.

Toward the end of this Lost Month my day looked like this:

6 am- wake up
7am - feed kids, pack lunches, log-on to work computer
8.10 am - put Esther on bus
8.15 am - take Asa home to poop and get ready for school
9.00 am - try not to cry as i watch Asa sob while leaving him at school
9.10 am - drive to j's house to pack her cesarian wound
10 am - work in earnest
1.20 pm - pick Asa up from School
1.30 pm - put something on stove for dinner (x 2) and put Asa down for a nap (or in front of a movie)
3.00 pm - sign out of work
3.10 pm - finish up dinner(s) put one to cool and pack one in basket
3.20 pm - pick up Esther off bus and head to my brother's house
3.50 pm - bring m&c dinner and sniff my niece
5 pm - head home
5.40 pm - re-heat dinner and feed kids
6.40 pm - pack their backpacks for tomorrow
7 pm - bathtime
8 pm - bedtime
8.30 pm - write to ben and put in some un-clocked time in to work to make up for any time during the day i couldn't put in because of driving or fit-throwing


The Surprise:
Ben and I had talked about him cutting his trip short before he even left. Having purchased the travel insurance he thought it wouldn't be a problem to just change his ticket to whenever they had another flight home. This was not necessarily the case and after several long, arduous, and not-a-little close to tears hours on the phone to airlines and expedia and who-knows-who-else, it seemed he couldn't come home early. The mistake i had made was telling the kids when I expected Ben home everytime we got a new possible return date. This resulted in a couple tantrums... on all fronts...

And then one morning i received an e-mail from Ben (3 actually, and a text) saying "i'm on my way home to you".

And then he was home.

Photo re-cap of our summer...

before i cut myself some bangs

Gettin' ready to go to work

At the New Freedom Carnival

I've been on an ice cream making bender... This here is blue berry ice cream sweetened with agave and of course blue berries

Not sure what this means for his future, but man he's a cutie!

This is their new favorite thing to do when it rains

Asa's summer uniform. briefs and boots

Baby chickens in a tree at SidebySide Farm

Large alien plant in the hoops house at SidebySide Farm

This is how we've been picking up the CSA. We hook Thor the dino-dog up to the kids wagon and make him pull us on the bike hike trail... 

Asa's monster mouth from a Sunday breakfast/brunch outting with Lali and Granpa and Miah and Ceci and Lollo and Jocelyn

Punk rock hair

Do-it-yourself aerial yoga!

or maybe i'm just pretending to be a silk worm

reunion after Esther spent 5 days at Oma's house. Longest trip away from home... 

They really missed each other

More home-made ice cream joy... this time it's just vanilla with a couple grain sweetened chocolate chips on top for fun!

And this is Mommy and Daddy's special treat, Guiness Floats

Delectable

Such funny faces...

Jesy's beautiful belly. It's been so cool to watch  her and Ceci grow with babies...  They're both due any day now... 

This is me trying to fetch a frisbee out of a creek... I'm waiting for it to float down stream



It's been a very laid back summer. I'm a bit tentative about the fall, like i said in my last post. It helps to re-cap the summer and remember just how much fun and low-stress we made it for ourselves. Maybe i can make the fall fun and low-stress too...