Nate, after answering a (teeth-whitening solicitation) phone call, said, "This is actually not Liz." After, Nate described his accent as "Japanese-Italian." As the solicitor went on and on, I told Nate that this was one time he has my permission to interrupt.

I just went in to wake Anna up for a nap. (She had gone down late, and I had forgotten until it was dinner time!) When she'd climbed into bed, she had placed a piece of play cake on a plastic plate on Sarah's bedside table. So when I woke her up, I picked her up as well as the play food. "That's Sarah's cake," she informed me politely, "but you can have it." 

Mother's Jewels

Aunt Eleanor wears such diamonds!

Shiny and gay and grand,

Some on her neck and some in her hair,

And some on her pretty hand.

One day I asked my mama

Why she never wore them, too;

She laughed and said, as she kissed my eyes,

"My jewels are here, bright blue.

They laugh and dance and beam and smile,

So lovely all the day,

And never like Aunt Eleanor's go

In a velvet box to stay.

Hers are prisoned in bands of gold,

But mine are free as air,

Set in a bonny, dimpled face,

And shadowed with shining hair!"

Eugene Field

Anna, while eating her toast, commented off-hand, "I want lots of family." Intrigued at her perspective, I asked her what she meant. (After all, I thought we were definitely toward that end.) "Lots and lots and lots." Well, I bet we'll be there...in about 100 years.

I was tucking Anna to bed, when she pointed to her cheek and said, "You can kiss me here." "Thank you," I responded, with a kiss. "You're welcome. You can kiss me there always," she granted.

This is our one and only chance at mortal life--here and now. The longer we live, the greater is our realization that it is brief. Opportunities come, and then they are gone. I believe that among the greatest lessons we are to learn in this short sojourn upon the earth are lessons that help us distinguish between what is important and what is not. I plead with you not to let those most important things pass you by as you plan for that illusive and non-existent future when you will have time to do all that you want to do. Instead, find joy in the journey--now.

President Thomas S. Monson, "Finding Joy in the Journey"

Anna's cute words

1. shish (fish)

2. hooj (huge)

3. wellow (yellow) 

4. hairplane

5. hairport

6. chicken head

7. smarshmellows (Peter's word)

8. Sall (Fall)

9. doos (goose)

10. Livbuth (Elizabeth)

11. sweet! (as in "cool")

12. picy! (spicy, as in Grandma's soup)

13. itmeal (oatmeal)

'O dreary life,' we cry, 'O dreary life!'

And still the generations of the birds

Sing through our sighing, and the flocks and herds

Serenely live while we are keeping strife

With Heaven's true purpose in us...

O thou God of old,

Grant me some smaller grace than comes to these!--

But so much patience as a blade of grass

Grows by, contented through the heat and cold.

--Elizabeth Barrett Browning ("Patience Taught by Nature")

Julia was making salt and flour playdough. Peter came onto the scene. 

P: (Incredulously) "How did you make that stuff?"

J: (Matter-of-factly) I followed the recipe.

Julia, looking at her lump of playdough on the breadboard:

"This stuff looks like [insulation]!"