my girls night and my grandma.

earlier tonight evie and i sat under the dim lighting of the dodo with 3 of my favorite girls in the world and had ourselves a little girls night. there were babies involved (3 of them!) so the mayhem was thick and the conversations were stalled, but still-a girls night was had!

i love me a good girls night (lets have one, yes?). girls nights are good for the soul. its nice to slap on some lipstick, spritz on some perfume (because friends appreciate that kind of stuff) and get away for an hour or two to discuss life and all its weirdness.

these friends of mine, the ones we dined with, have been my friends since back before the maturation program in elementary changed our lives forever. can you believe this!? pre-maturation program friends!!! in fact, i think i can remember talking to these exact friends (horrified, of course) in the bathroom after that dreaded program took place, and now here we are, all grown up, leading our own grown up lives. some of us have babies, some of us are married, some of us have rad careers and impressive college degrees and independence to boot. and we aren't kids anymore and we don't see each other nearly enough, but still, when i'm with them, it always feels like nothing has changed.

***

so tonight, after the dessert was devoured and the bill was paid, i strapped my baby in the car and turned on some music and drove us home from girls night under the warmth of the sunset. and as i drove, for whatever reason, i got to thinking about all the people in my life, and what they might be up to tonight.

i thought a lot about my friends, about my gjo studying his brains out at home, about my crazy siblings off making plans and families and lives for themselves, and then because i couldn't help it, i started to think about my pansy.

pansy is my grandma, but pansy isn't really her name. i mean, if you meet her in person, you should call her val or grandma moffitt, but as for me, i will call her pansy. pansy wears lipstick every day and she kisses me right on the lips every time she sees me, even if the lipstick is the brightest shade of pink. pansy writes me love letters and mails them to me in hand-painted envelopes covered in shaky, beautiful cursive. pansy reads my blog when she can remember how to find it and pansy drove 45 minutes in a snowstorm one afternoon to visit me in the hospital and rub my back with her arthritic fingers as i cried.

she is the person i call when i am hurting. she is the person who taught me to paint and and make pie crust and appreciate an afternoon at the opera club. there is no one in the world i love more than my grandma pansy.

lately my pansy has been sick. and the fact that she isn't doing well has made me think a lot about how much i love her and whether i am savoring these moments that surround me just the way that she would want me to. i think if pansy were feeling up for it, she would have loved a girls night tonight. she would have left 30 minutes early and been waiting sweetly to be seated when everyone else arrived. she would have worn great turquoise jewelry and pink lipstick and ordered something special off the menu.

i think she would have enjoyed every minute of her evening. she would have laughed and cried and told her friends she loved them and said a prayer of thanks as she raced the night sky home.

i think she would tell me to slow down a bit. to enjoy the sunset as it fades. to have myself a girls night and order more than one dessert at the end of the night, if i can't make up my mind.

that's what pansy would do.

sundee best.

somehow i found myself ready for church 30 minutes early yesterday!! i am being completely serious when i say that this has never, ever happened in the 5 years we have been married. g almost dropped over dead he was so shocked (and he didn't stop talking about it all day long). it's no secret that punctuality is not my thing, and 90% of the time i am late to everything i attend, so BIG DEAL.

since we were ready and i was bored (i mean, where is the drama when you are early/on-time?!) we decided to take a few pictures of the little family in our sundee best. mckenzie came up and had the idea of getting some of the ivy from our house in the pic. our yard isn't exactly gorgeous, but it's fun to have a picture of us with the little house we are living in (memories! you know?).

 oh, and don't worry, we ended up being 5 minutes late after taking these. business as usual

ps. evie's hair is IDENTICAL to kate gosselin's old haircut these days & there seems to be nothing i can do about it! ;)

teeth.

teeth!

teeth have been the theme of this week so far, and let me just say, teeth have been seriously stressing the girls in this household out. 

first, little evs decided it was time to cut a tooth. we were excited when we saw it peeking it's way through the other day, but sad when girlfriend woke up shrieking a few times that night as a result. we administered the tylenol and sang a few lullabies and let her comfort-nurse her little heart out and then BAM!!! a tooth appeared right before our very eyes!

after the little sucker emerged, we figured the worst of it was over, but found out we were wrong when we had to ditch bachelor pad/bbq time with the fam the next night in order to flee for home as tooth numero 2 set it's sights on the big, bad world. i could practically hear that tooth making it's way through her gums as we drove home in the darkness and listened to our little lady shriek.

teeth!!

if you think that's where it ends, you are wrong, because GUESS WHO GOT A ROOT CANAL, LIKE, 8 HOURS AGO! here's a hint, it wasn't evie and it wasn't g.

that's right, i went in to have a tooth that's been hurting me looked at this morning with the knowledge that maybe, possibly, perhaps i might need an itty bitty little root canal, and then, BAM! before i even knew what was happening-ROOT CANAL HAPPENING RIGHT THIS VERY INSTANT OPEN YOUR MOUTH WIIIDDDEEE!

i mean, really, one minute the endodontist was introducing himself and mentioning that we would "just take a little look" and the next he is squirting ice cold water in the teeth crevices of my problem area (WORSE THAN AN EPIDURAL!!) and hooking me up to laughing gas and shoving needles into the ROOF OF MY MOUTH and drilling giant holes into the center of my brain while i slowly shriveled up and died an agonizing death.

sort of.

i seriously want to tell you, in detail, what it feels like to have a hole the size of the grand canyon drilled in your tooth and the nerves ripped out one by one, but i tried to tell g over the phone this afternoon and he told me he was starting to feel nauseous and promptly hung up.

you guys, we are in serious PAIN over here! evs and i already decided to spend the entire day tomorrow administering tylenol to one another, taking warm baths, watching girl movies and eating the cookies you will surely drop off on our doorstep after reading this post.

teeth!

*on a side note, i know i had a root canal and everything, but can we still be friends?! i swear i've only had a few cavities in my lifetime and am very diligent about my dental care (anyone who knows me knows i am slightly obsessed and in love with my dentist...do you want his number?!?) and apparently this shiz just happens sometimes. apparently? whatever. it didn't make me feel any better.

so long, sweet summer.

summer is over.

i can feel it in the sudden change in the air, in the breeze quietly moving the trees and coaxing the rain from the sky. there is a certain feeling that fall brings with her when she comes, and this morning, when i woke up, i felt it. the sky smells like fall. it smells like wet pavement and possibility. it smells like apple cider and a full moon to lie under. it smells like pumpkin spice and evening lamplight. it smells delicious.


we had a good summer. we swam in cool water and sat on the hot pavement to warm ourselves from the inside out. we ate creamies on the lawn and got shakes from neilsens. we went to the cabin and roasted marshmallows over the fire. we watched the storm clouds roll in over the valley and fell asleep to thunder overhead. we went for walks under the hot summer sun, our bodies damp and tired. we got tan-lines and sunburns and fries from the burger place down the street. we watched fireworks from the patio and spilled snow-cones down our arms. we grilled burgers and tossed salads and sat our tiny baby on the prickly lawn to feel the grass in her chubby fingers and against her naked thighs. we washed the sunscreen off of her at night and tossed her into the sky in the afternoon.

we fell in love with her. and with each other.
and mostly with this little life we are leading above the city, but under the trees.
we fell in love with that, too.

*pictures from our last summer getaway-a weekend at the cabin with family.