a very good way to get a workout is to relocate a snowbank approximately 5 feet tall, 6 feet wide and 15 feet long off of your perennial bed.

spring is inching towards the adirondacks, and we are all pretty thrilled. every day we go outside, get completely drenched in the melting snow, get very muddy, and then do a HUGE load of laundry at the end of the day.

we started some seeds indoors two days ago, and that was fun--added to the mud, that is for sure.

ava is over her mysterious illness, and seems to be fine. thank god for dvds though. i let her watch little bear, then caillou, then thomas the train, which promptly put her to sleep. carter ADORED thomas the train. he stood there laughing and laughing. he also like caillou. why kids love caillou so much, i will never know. but every child that i have ever met seems to be completely enamored with him.

carter still does not speak english, but he definitely now loves music. grandma sent us a cd with all sorts of dance-able music and he goes berzerk every time he hears it. he runs in circles for a bit, then bops his head, then runs over to me and grabs my hand, leading me to the dance floor. then we all spin around to the music. the 'can-can' is on this cd, and both kids thought it was a riot when i started dancing the can-can. ava mastered skipping as well. she yelled "mom, watch this!" for the thousandth time, and i sort of said "mmmmm-hmmmm" and slowly turned around, then saw that she was actually skipping, something we have been working on forever--she has only managed to do it with one foot so far, and i suddenly yelled "AVA!! YOU'RE SKIPPING!!!" and this stopped her dead in her tracks to stare at me and my impressive reaction, then she burst into a fit of skipping glee and went around the room yelling "i'm skipping!! i'm skipping!!"

next: the jump rope.

carter skiied today! not only did he ski, but he went on the big lift with dad! he reacted with a general attitude of "well, when exactly were you going to let me do this?" -- he just stood up and went down the mountain like there was nothing to it (of course, he was on the tether--we are not THAT crazy).

ava was very cute--she was absolutely determined to teach carter: "mom! dad!wait!! i have to teach carter how to get on the magic carpet!!" "i have to show him how to go down the hill!" "watch, carter!" "see? you make a wedge...and then you tuuuuuuurrrrnrnnnn..."

it was great.

well, i finally got a cable to link my ipod with our stereo. now, i can listen to it. so wonderful! i was so happy to just hit shuffle and see what came up. ava likes the talking heads, lou reed, gwen stefani (specifically hollaback girl), any and all electronic music--especially kruder and dorfmeister, phish, squeeze, beck, and she thought tom waits was interesting. not so keen on liz phair, but we did not get the best selection yet...then sgt. pepper came on. "what's this one mom?"

"sgt pepper, ava"

"who is sgt pepper?"

"well, that is the song and the album, but the band is the beatles"

"oh! i know them! daddy told me about the doobie beatles!"

it took me about 5 minutes before i could stop laughing.

ava was so pleased that she had made me hysterical that she started screaming "doobie beatles!! doobie beatles!!! doooooooooooobie beatles!!!!"

carter continues to mime his way through life, though we get new words here and there, but he just seems to prefer gestures. and he has a very communicative gesture language. however, the one word that he loves to make is 'tickle,' which comes out as tckltckltckltckltclklklktckl...in fact, most of his favorite things to say are sounds. thus a siren sound is an emergency vehicle, different vrooms mean different types of trucks, and a very specific zzzzzing is for plane. unfortunately for me, his request to drink is to open his mouth and stick out his tongue and say "aaahhhh ahhhhh ahhhh" -- this includes his request to nurse, which is rather embarassing when i am holding him since he bends over to make sure i know exactly what he is referring to. and then so does the rest of the grocery store.

i am so curious to know what he is going to say when he finally does talk.

oh boy. more than 12 hours of airport time alone with 2 small children can be pretty darn difficult. we have all spent the day recovering, primarily by rehydrating ourselves.

it was not THAT bad--honestly, the kids did wonderfully, given the circumstances, and tomorrow we should all be back on track. the first flight was 3 hours, and ava spent the majority of it watching Little Bear on the computer, and Carter slept for 1/6 of it. Then we had a long layover in Baltimore where we saw the Shamu plane, got a 'smoothie' (aka a milkshake) from Starbucks, and ran around like crazy. Then we got on our next flight, whereupon Ava experienced difficulties buckling her Shamu into his seatbelt. Suddenly she uttered a relatively benign curse word (phrase). And I will say that is was NOT one of the many non-benign curse words I yelled at the rodeo that start with F and S. Nevertheless, we were on a plane, with other people, and after I recovered from my shock, I told her that it was not a nice word. She then said "is SH..... (oh, god please don't let her say it)....UGAR ok?"

"yes, sugar is fine"

"is hammit ok? mammit? gammit? how about bammit?"

and thus began the curse word rhyming game. i finally recovered from my shame to glance around at my companions, and was so relieved to note that most were 20-ish with a lot of tatoos. who knows what they were going to be doing in albany, but i was happy they were with us, and not some 40-ish uber-parents.

we landed in albany, went potty in a big way--"dum-de-dum -- are you finished, ava?" and then went to baggage to retrieve our luggage. got the smartcarte, found our bags, loaded them up, headed to continental to check in for the flight to saranac lake. technical difficulties at continental, can you please use the kiosk over here? ok, so we wheel over there. no luck, more technical difficulties. as i am trying to get the customer service rep to help me, ava managed to upturn the smartcarte and all of our carry-on luggage (heavy) on top of herself. she basically was completely buried by it. it was very traumatic, but she recovered. there is nothing like looking down your 3-year old's legs flailing underneath a suitcase and a large metal cart(e). and i had carter on my back, so bending down without ejecting him was nearly impossible. we finally got checked in, re-entered security, killed 1/2 hour there, got pizza, killed 1/2 hour there, and then faced another 1.5 hours of waiting. which turned into 2.5 hours. by the time our 19-seat plane arrived, carter had fallen asleep, we had purchased Charlotte's Web and were on chapter 10, and I had given up completely on cleanliness. We zoomed home, and the kids finally were tucked in by 10 pm.

Today, we unpacked, cleaned and dealt with the mail. Tomorrow is the grocery store. Peter was supposed to go, but I was so exhausted I could not even come up with a list. I figured we have Cheerios and milk and coffee and cream and grapefruit. Plus toys and a bathtub. We're good. What else could one need?

We fly back to NY tomorrow. Austin has been wonderful and a terrifically fun time for both kids, but I have to say we are ready to resume our normal routine. As is Grandma, I am sure.
I have always loved Austin. I have always wished that we lived here. That is, until the last 48 hours. Because in those 48 hours I witnessed first-hand exactly what the consequences can be when you combine wide vast expanses of flat land and big sky with hot humid weather.
Thunderstorms.
And when there are thunderstorms here, often you are the tallest thing around. And when you are the tallest object, lightning takes on a profoundly terrifying aura. I exaggerate a little, we were not ever the tallest object, but it sure felt like it. On Sunday night, as we relaxed in our hotel room on the 12th floor in San Antonio, we watched a thunderstorm move across the sky as I pondered the fact that there was a tornado warning in effect. Or a tornado watch. Whichever is worse. The 12th floor feels very vulnerable during a tornado watch. Especially one that faces west. I came close to relocating the kids and the bedding and myself to the stairwell, but stuck it out because the 11:00 news weatherman never said the word “tornado” – only flash floods and washouts. Which did not seem to be an issue for us at the moment. The next day was beautiful, bright, and sunny, albeit a bit damp around the edges. We navigated the wild animal park successfully and got home in time to go to Chuy’s for tex-mex and the Children’s Museum.
Then today we made plans to go to the Rodeo when Carter woke up from his nap. The sun was shining when we left, but it had clouded over by the time we arrived at the Rodeo grounds. This was not a bad thing, because the Rodeo can be blistering hot, and a bit of cloud cover is nice. Then the drizzle started. So, we headed to the livestock barn, where there is a kid’s section with pony rides, a petting zoo, and Elsie, the cosmetically enhanced Borden’s cow. Both kids had a great time, and Ava was entranced by the baby goats that sat quietly in her lap, happy to be cuddled and warm. This obviously meant that Ava was sitting in poop-laden shavings, but whatever. That cavalier attitude would haunt me later as I realized that farm animal smell clings to people and clothing relentlessly and that we were getting on a plane in 12 hours, but for the moment I was happy that she was happy. Carter decided he had had enough of goats and tame deer and of all things, a kangaroo, and we left to go ponder the rest of the building. I noticed that the wind was picking up outside the big open doors, and that men seemed to be moving rather rapidly to close them and so I casually inserted myself into one of their conversations. Thanks to good ol’ Texas chivalry I learned that there was a severe thunderstorm coming through the area and that floods and high winds and hail were expected. I looked around at the building and at all of the relaxed happy folk running around and decided that this was the last place on earth I wanted to be. Corrugated steel and I-beams seemed like a poor choice of shelter materials. The man that had informed me about the weather mentioned that he was concerned about the animals, that they might get jittery, and so I went into rapid response mode and pulled Ava and Grandma out of the petting zoo before they were the victims of a miniature goat stampede. I filled Grandma in on the weather situation, and she went in search of more information. At that moment, a man in an official rodeo 4-wheeler rolled in and apparently urged all of the rodeo staff to “take cover, now!” (note: at no point did anyone ever inform rodeo spectators that doing so might be a good idea). Grandma grabbed an employee by the arm and said “where?!”—and thus began our terrifying flight across 50 yards of open space to a concrete-block building chock full of tchotchke for sale. Ava absorbed every last ounce of fear-induced adrenaline and was sufficiently panicked by the time we got there, having screamed “mommy why are you running?!!” about 7 times before I answered her. I had carried her in my arms, and I am fairly certain that I said “shit shit shit shit shit shit shit” the whole way. But it was justified, as the sky was discharging bolts of lightning everywhere. In fact, I might have employed every last curse I have every heard. Once inside, I did damage control with her, and was pleased to learn that Carter found it hysterical. We tooled around in there for a while, listening to public service announcements and warnings, and then accosted a man with a computer and a link to the local radar. He let us know that we were in a lull and that the worst was due to arrive in an hour. So, off we ran to the parking lot. Oddly enough, there were people milling about outside, people who apparently thought that lightning felt nice. Admittedly, at that point the sky was a lot lighter, but we still ran. This time I smartened up and flung Ava onto my back, which made running a lot easier. Everything was fine until we got to the car and just as Grandma unlocked it a HUGE bold of lightning struck somewhere close and then a GIANT crack of thunder opened up above us, and please forgive me everyone, especially you Jesus, but at that point I screamed “JESUS FUCKING CHRIST, GET IN THE CAR NOW!” Ava, true to her nature, snapped to it and jumped in across the back seat and I wrestled Carter out of his (metal) stroller, and we both dove in to the safety of a small container with rubber wheels. Ava was again peppering me with whys and I first apologized to her for cursing and then I simply said “it is dangerous and we needed to get somewhere safe.” Frankly, I do not care how scared she is of storms. I am not sorry that I terrified the living wits out of her. I am sorry in the sense that I do not want her to be distressed, but not that she learned that the weather can be dangerous. So, we drove back to Austin, breathed a collective sigh of relief (hellllooooo cliché), watched the radar on the computer for a while and had an early dinner.
And tomorrow we return to the relative safety of regular ice-storms.

i do not understand why, whithout fail, the kids must always rotate themselves 90 degrees in the bed the minute they drift off to sleep. both of them. every night.

both carter and ava have suddenly refined their sense of humor. ava now narrates stories and songs that are usually quite funny, but often that is not discernible because she is giggling so hard that everything is completely incomprehensible (a bit like you and lauret the other day, rox...). unlike rox and lauret though, her stories and songs usually involve potty humor, which is where carter joins in the fray and starts to laugh uncontrollably. because poop and farting and the like is just plain funny. and he loves to say PPPPPOOOOOOPPPP! he likes to contribute to the comedy hour by stuffing his mouth full of food and then opeining it as wide as possible and saying AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!! or, he tries to spit it out as far as it will go. both actions are of course met with stern reprimands delivered with my face turned away because i can't stop laughing.

it is so great to watch them laughing together--really laughing hard--i would much rather that than good manners. clearly manners are important, but not at the expense of so much fun and love! in time they will learn not to catapult food across the table. or not.

ava bought pink cowboy boots today. so, we are all set for the rodeo on friday.

then ava and i headed out for some girl-time, while grandma and carter went to the playground. as ava and i were walking down the street, i heard "erin?" -- i whipped around to find my friend sam from NYC walking towards me. i have not seen him in at least 10 years. first, i was impressed that he figured it out, and second, i was impressed that i figured it out. then of course i became the proud mama, yammering on and on about the kids, and then that led me to have to fill him in on the last 10 years in the space of 2 city blocks, and then poof, he was gone--i went west and he went south. i never got his phone number. it was so weird. so much has happened in 10 years. and the things he remembered were completely lost to me.

when i was in NYC in 2001, visiting after having been gone for 3 years, the same thing happened--i ran into an old aquaintance completely randomly on the street. it just goes to show that there is more connection than you think. even in the big ol' city.

today we played and played and played and played and played and played and played at the playground. there is nothing like 70 degree weather after months of winter. the kids had a great time, and huh, whaddaya know, they fell asleep instantaneously tonight. i checked on them a few minutes ago, and ava was sleeping with her body sideways on the mattress and her head and neck off the mattress and on the freezing cold stone floor. when i moved her, she opened her eyes and looked at me like i had just snatched her out of a nest of feathers.

ava has adapted to urban life--she BEGS to go out and do errands in her stroller. and she adores the fact that going anywhere involves at least 4 different elevator buttons. and my god, the trash chute is the single most entertaining thing the kids have ever seen.

and carter has been taking 1.5 hour naps every morning like it is the most normal thing he has ever done. at home, i am lucky if i get 40 minutes out of him. there is something in the water in texas, because ava did the same thing at his age.

tomorrow i get to go to whole foods. it is the flagship store, and it is an Event. for someone whose only option is price chopper for the vast majority of the year, it is so fun to go to this place and get a glimpse of enlightened groceries.

we are in austin, arrived a few days ago and are just now settling in and recovering from the trip. sort of grueling, but technically ok--no major issues at all. just a sticky, sweaty, smelly (thanks to carter's gas) plane ride. one woman gave me The Look of Death when she bumped her seat, but i just loudly said, well honey, remember we talked about not to kicking the seat, but i know how HARD it is to sit still when you have been up SINCE FOUR IN THE MORNING...(and lady did you notice that i am also holding a toddler and trying to facilitate painting and clay games and dvds and picture books and drinks and cheeze-its and i am really sorry but when this little girl squirms she just might accidentally get your seat because it is about 6 inches away from her face, which is not your fault technically because the airplane seats are made like that but please give us a break here).

when we first got on the plane and they gave the oxygen mask speech, ava was consumed with questions about it, most notably why i got to put the mask on first and not her in the event of a loss of cabin pressure. after explaining it, she seemed to be satisfied, and then about 5 minutes later she sighed (and i swear she put the back of her hand to her forehead) and said "ohhhhhh...i need some oxygen!" -- causing the vast majority of the passengers to crack up.

carter seems to love texas, and is especially enamored with city life and all the motorized vehicles on hand every moment of every day. we went to the zoo and he was more interested in the chickens and roosters and peacocks roaming around than anything else in a cage. actually, his favorite part was playing in a pile of rocks--putting them in his pocket and trying to feed them to the animals in the petting zoo.

today ava and i got to go to The Lion King, which was just unbelievable. i knew about the puppetry, but never fully appreciated it. and we were in the 10th row, on the aisle, and there is a procession of animals down the aisles, right past her. she sat quietly for nearly two and a half hours, mouth agape, completely transfixed. it was definitely a big deal--we both got dressed up, and we had vip tickets and were treated like royalty--she really got a dose of theater magic.

not sure what tomorrow holds. all i know is that it is sunny and 70. that is all i need to know.