from sun up to sun down {the cade and brennan show}

brennan: if i see a black widow i will put shoes on and turn it over. cade doesn't have shoes on. should he scream for you if he sees one?
cade: can black widows climb?
brennan: will we die if we get bit by a black widow? 
me: kids can die from a black widow bite yes.
brennan: do grown ups? would a grown up die? or would they just pass out?
cade: what is passing out?
brennan: it's when you go to sleep for a bit and you don't move.
cade: oh, my mom does that every day.
me: no, that's called napping.
brennan: no, it's NOT napping. napping is SWEEEPING. passing out is when you sleep like you have no bones.
cade: emily, when did you say the black widows come in the house?
brennan: WHEN IT RAINS CADE!!! they come IN when it rains!
me: i said i found a little ORANGE spider that was dead. there are NO black widows in the house.
cade: ohhhhhh, so can black widows dig through walls?
brennan: they can cade THEY CAN!!!
cade: how high can they climb?
me: there are NO black widows in the house.
cade: OHHH MYYYY GOOOOSSSSHHHHH. if you tell me more stuff i'm eating faster so i can get out of this house with the black widows in it!!!
brennan: CADE!!! they only come inside when it rains!
me: there are nooooo black widows coming in the house. i have never seen one in my house. {siiiiiigggghhhhhh}

...

inseparable just doesn't 

quite describe it.

from sun up to sun down.

now that's more of what it's like.

siblings.

it's more like siblings.

there's no other kid on the planet that feels more like family than cade.

sometimes i want to pinch myself because i love it so much.

because a friendship like that is once in a lifetime.

and for some people, it doesn't even happen that once.

i'm so glad brennan got to have his once too.

{ballet west nutcracker. at the sugar plum fairy party. 

1989?? stacie was my cade:) luckiest girls ever!}

just to be safe

teaching her the art which i love.

also, i didn't want the blueberries to go bad in the fridge.

she is my shadow.

and my best kitchen helper.

sometimes i would just rather cook alone,

in fact, most of the time i prefer it.

but this day was the best.

chase was napping, and brennan was at camp.

and max and i just settled into our afternoon in the kitchen.

and i knew it was going to be one of those days we would both remember forever.

the blueberry muffin day.

just me and my Goldilocks.

the first time we forgot the sugar.

at least,

it tasted like we forgot the sugar.

but maybe we didn't forget the sugar.

maybe it just didn't have enough.

so just to be safe, 

we made them again the next day,

and added a heaping 1/4 cup of sugar.

like i said,

just to be safe;)

oh boy OH BOY oh boy,

we couldn't keep our paws off of them.

...

 {note: added 1/4 cup sugar instead of 4 tabls}

...

breakfast anyone?!

dear max {bonus time back scratching}

dear max,

today you were super naughty.
like every time i turned around you were pulling someone's hair.
slamming a door.
spitting in someone's face.
or turning off the treadmill to get my attention.
we played princesses, balls, read books.
i mean, i don't think you and i have spent so much one on one time together in one day in a long time.
and still, by 7:15pm i was shooing you off to the bath to go to bed early after you threw muddy sand water in chase's face.
then you cried yourself to sleep screaming at dad and i, 
after i read you two books,
sang the ariel song twice,
gave you a cold drink of water,
AND let you bonus time back scratching.
man, it was good to spend so much time with you today.
but woman, puh-leazzzze don't turn off my treadmill in the middle of my workout again.
my OCD with numbers just can't handle restarting after i've already been going for 5 minutes.
also, i'm sure chase would appreciate not having his hair pulled tomorrow as well.
we love you bunches.
and man, i love it when you ask me to do your hair "just like" mine.
dream
come
true!

love,
mama

p.s.
a gigantic fly has landed on my head three times during the time it took me to write this letter.

p.s.s.
it's slow, and i think i might try to catch it in my hand next. except then i would probably just panic and let it go anyway.
the end.

lady and the tramp.

smooching the baby man on the tramp.

these are the kind of summer nights i love.

when you're not thinking about school starting soon,

and you're so fresh into summer that you don't have a care in the world.

full of energy to do whatever.

where you don't mind your kids ever going to bed at a certain time.

because you're just so new to summer.

and you're just so done with any sort of bedtime from the grind of the school days.

the kind of summer nights i don't love are at the end of the summer,

when you're just ready for your kids to have a decent bedtime,

like say before 10pm,

because you just want to have some time to yourself.

except there's one problem.

because you've {ehem "us"} have let your children stay up until 11pm every night since the beginning of june,

and now you're children can't go to bed before 10pm.

and you're just not in the mood for 10pm anymore.

so basically bedtime is rough rough rough around here right now.

rough.

lots of can i have a drink.

wait, i'm hungry.

i'm not tired.

will you scratch my back?

how about just ooooone more song?

please?

please?

will they please just all go to bed?

wah!