Improvisation

“Nooo. We have to play by the rules…” Daddy gently explains a new board game to his 3-year-old daughter who is recovering from her birthday party sugar crash.
Mom smiles to herself as she sits knitting, waiting for the upcoming meltdown, which to her pleasant surprise, doesn’t happen.
“Tell you what. Let’s just put the monkeys [...]

What You Can Learn from a Toddler’s Vocabulary List

So, my daughter’s preschool had parent-teacher conferences the other night, and the subject of discussion about our daughter with her teachers was her upcoming move to the 3-year-old classroom. In many ways it’s an exciting event that needs to happen; in others I dread it because my daughter has so enjoyed her year in the [...]

Learning to Knit Words

For years I have knitted words to create sentences that roll off the tongue in a comfortable rhythm, words that flow to create meaning. Each sentence is looped together with the next using a limited number of techniques (transitional phrases, repeated words, etc.) to create an unlimited number of patterns and finished pieces.
Now I am [...]

A Wisconsin-Hardy Tinkerbell

When I was a little girl, I loved dressing up for Halloween, but inevitably the weather would turn cold October 31, and my mom would make me wear a coat over my Halloween costume. I hated that.
I couldn’t figure out how anyone was supposed to see my costume if I had to wear a [...]

Open Spaces

I once wrote about my daughter learning to let go in order to experience new things, and I made the statement that when we let go, we are left with open space and that open spaces make us nervous.
My daughter is walking now, and her new challenges involve bending over to pick up an [...]