We had a very busy weekend. A lot of time was spent furniture shopping, which the girls do not love. Much whining, especially today. But it was productive and we hope to have some new living room stuff in place soon. It is badly needed.

Today we had a fun playdate at Sydney's house. We were there for a few hours, played some games, did some puzzles, and ran and hid from Sydney's father, also known as The Monster (as named by A).

Happy Birthday Imogene! Daddy and the girls made her a cake today, which they will present to her tomorrow.

As mentioned earlier, today kicks off the first of a photojournalism series about the girls and their lives.

We start in the bedroom.

 

This is their night table. It has: a monitor (are we the only parents of almost 5 year-olds that still use a monitor?); a very cute lamp that lights up like a house; some Eucerin for A's dry skin; tissues; the baby countdown duck clock we bought when I was pregnant; and a ballerina cake decoration that Buppie put on my birthday cake last year. Sitting under the table are three bears – two that the girls got for Hanukah in Colorado and one from when they were born. In front is my trash can from my den, which the girls have appropriated.

These are all the animals at the end of A's bed. There are quite a few.

 

These are all the animals at the end of M's bed. Again, there are quite a few. You can also see Blankie in the left corner.

 

There is an ancillary wing of animals over the dresser.

 

This is the top of the dresser. Of note: the two treasured Nutcrackers; the pottery work that M&A did at a paint-your-own pottery place last fall (the pink princess with black belt (A) and a flower-shaped box (M)); the girls' piggy banks, which were presents from Mikey and Christina from their honeymoon in Hawaii; and a host of other boxes, souvenirs, necklaces, watches, doll clothes, comb, and miscellany.

 

These are two of the potholders the girls have made so far. There are two more – a yellow/green one they made for Imogene's birthday, and a red/purple/white one that we attached to the purple/pink/white one above to make a purse. I am supposed to be making the straps of the purse tonight, but am instead writing this blog.

 

This is the girls' bathtub. Notice how it is devoid of toys. I remember when there used to be so many toys in the bath that we couldn't even see the girls – Clifford dogs, balls, fish, ducks, boats, crayons, etc. Now they like to play rhyming games in the tub ("Name someone in your class whose name rhymes with 'silly'." "Name a fruit that rhymes with bapple." etc.) and are content not to have anything in there with them.

Here are the toothpastes the girls use. M likes the Oral-B Stages one (preferred flavor/design – princesses), and will wince and moan if I accidentally put one of the others on her toothbrush. A likes the Colgate ones, and seems to have a slight preference for the Spongebob one.

 

These are the girls' towels. In retrospect I should have unfolded them, but they do have each girl's name on them. They are very faded at this point – at one point the trim at the bottom matched the hand towel in the top right of the photo, but they have been washed and bleached so many times that you can barely see a trim on them at all. The theme is surfing, and they were baby gifts when the girls were born.

That's it for the first installment of the photojournalism series. More to come in the weeks ahead…