The Mitchells

Gaga's Treasure Hunt No. 3

2009-10-21T22:48:00.003-04:00

Find a pretty leaf

See something purple

Find a crooked stick

Feel something soft

Touch a pumpkin

Gaga's Treasure Hunt No. 4

2009-10-20T22:03:00.004-04:00

Collect an acorn

See a dog

Hear an airplane

Find something really big

See a Halloween decoration

Finn turns on his charm for the camera (please pardon his jelly face)

2009-10-20T21:57:00.002-04:00

Aedan shows some initial apprehension towards our setting his cake on fire, but getting to eat it is a whole different story!

2009-10-20T21:47:00.003-04:00

Exploring a country mile of dirt driveway with Uncle Rob

2009-10-20T21:45:00.000-04:00

Dad, diggin' potatos

2009-10-17T21:06:00.000-04:00

How old are you? I'm 2!

2009-10-17T21:01:00.000-04:00

Aedan celebrates his second second birthday

2009-10-17T20:47:00.002-04:00

One compelling reason to have children....

2009-10-17T20:45:00.002-04:00

Minnesota highlight no. 6: Uncle Rob

2009-07-01T23:44:00.003-04:00

Minnesota highlight no. 5: Endless buckets of rain water

2009-07-01T23:38:00.002-04:00

Minnesota highlight no. 4: Donkey rides

2009-07-01T23:36:00.001-04:00

Minnesota highlight no. 3: Fire stations

2009-07-01T23:27:00.001-04:00

Minnesota highlight no. 2: Ice cream cones

2009-07-01T23:24:00.001-04:00

Minnesota highlight no. 1: Easy chairs

2009-07-01T23:16:00.002-04:00

Unveiling no. 2

2009-05-28T16:44:00.002-04:00

Unveiling no. 1

2009-05-28T16:37:00.001-04:00

Pillow time

2009-05-28T15:02:00.001-04:00

Birthday boy!

2009-05-21T20:18:00.001-04:00

Giggle time with Gaga

2009-05-21T20:17:00.000-04:00

Bubbles!

2009-05-21T20:13:00.000-04:00

Barefeet on cobblestone

2009-05-21T20:10:00.000-04:00

Sweet little Aedan

2009-05-21T20:08:00.000-04:00

Celebrating three beautiful years!

2009-05-03T14:39:00.003-04:00

Our growing boys!

2009-04-30T00:29:00.000-04:00

Brother to brother

2009-04-30T00:17:00.001-04:00

At the car wash

2009-04-30T00:05:00.002-04:00

Call to order

2009-04-30T00:02:00.001-04:00

Pimp my ride

2009-04-29T23:53:00.001-04:00

Fun wheels it is!

2009-04-29T23:51:00.000-04:00

Finn on wheels

2009-04-29T23:48:00.000-04:00

Bunk mates

2009-04-29T23:41:00.003-04:00

Adventures in sharing a room

Easter baskets

2009-04-14T00:31:00.003-04:00

Happy Easter!

2009-04-14T00:20:00.000-04:00

Finn colors Easter eggs

2009-04-14T00:10:00.002-04:00

Aedan enjoying the great outdoors!

2009-04-14T00:05:00.003-04:00

Finn enjoys the great outdoors

2009-04-14T00:01:00.002-04:00

January Highlights

2009-02-01T11:19:00.005-05:00

Sorry that our January blog was almost entirely devoid of updates....teaching has been an absolute bear! Here are a few of our highlights from the past month. Enjoy responsibly!

Aedan cozies up to his Gaga

2009-02-01T11:13:00.000-05:00

Finn: Really starting to fill out his big boy bed!

2009-02-01T11:11:00.000-05:00

Aedan turns 16th months

2009-02-01T11:06:00.001-05:00

Latest milestone achieved: Dunking cookies

Bompa gets conned into reading the longest bedtime story ever

2009-02-01T11:02:00.000-05:00

Fates aligned

2009-02-01T10:58:00.001-05:00

Just because I like it when the J meets up with the B...

Gaga's influence takes hold

2009-02-01T10:56:00.000-05:00

Aedan puzzles

2009-02-01T10:53:00.001-05:00

Happy boy!

2009-02-01T10:51:00.000-05:00

Sweetest bunk mates

2009-02-01T10:49:00.000-05:00

Aedan colors

2009-02-01T10:47:00.000-05:00

A more charming rendition of Finn

2009-02-01T10:46:00.000-05:00

James Brown impersonation?

2009-02-01T10:44:00.000-05:00

A little something to appease the masses

2009-01-30T22:44:00.003-05:00

Farewell to 2008--a very good year, indeed!

2009-01-01T18:38:00.010-05:00

Please enjoy this little montage of some of our best moments from 2008, set to Eddi Reader's "Peacetime." Simply click on the title above to watch the video. Thanks to Jeremy for a brilliant editing job!

Grumpy Santa

2008-12-17T23:14:00.002-05:00

Santa's little helpers

2008-12-17T23:09:00.001-05:00

Our first Christmas tree

2008-12-17T23:00:00.002-05:00

Aedan ventures after a doughnut

2008-11-22T22:27:00.000-05:00

Aedan and his Gaga

2008-11-22T22:23:00.000-05:00

Finn enjoys the fruits of his labor

2008-11-22T22:18:00.000-05:00

Finn and his Bompa

2008-11-22T22:17:00.000-05:00

Our other little cookie monster

2008-11-22T22:10:00.001-05:00

Finn's facial expression when saying, "Cookie!"

2008-11-22T22:06:00.002-05:00

Baking cookies with Gaga

2008-11-22T21:54:00.001-05:00

Ghoulish Halloween tales (Okay...it's really Thumper)

2008-11-02T00:27:00.002-04:00

Best treat of all: Fire helmets

2008-11-02T00:19:00.003-04:00

"Are you kidding me with this?"

2008-11-02T00:18:00.000-04:00

Baby mine

2008-11-02T00:11:00.001-04:00

Clownin' around

2008-11-02T00:06:00.002-04:00

Since you're used to peeking in on them before going to bed...

2008-10-30T10:37:00.003-04:00

Radiance

2008-10-23T11:28:00.001-04:00

Finn breezes by

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Taking the leap

2008-10-23T11:23:00.002-04:00

Finn experiences a new fall treat

2008-10-23T11:12:00.001-04:00

Aedan's favorite part of the day

2008-10-12T22:08:00.000-04:00

Aedan and I enjoy the tractor ride

2008-10-12T22:02:00.000-04:00

A few stolen moments

2008-10-12T21:56:00.000-04:00

Finn and Aedan drive the tractor

2008-10-12T21:52:00.001-04:00

Jeremy spies the camera

2008-10-12T21:48:00.001-04:00

Aedan admires the pumpkin patch

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Aedan and me

2008-10-03T02:06:00.000-04:00

Silly boy!

2008-10-02T00:24:00.000-04:00

Mugging and hugging for the camera

2008-10-02T00:20:00.001-04:00

The alley to my oop

2008-09-30T01:25:00.003-04:00

Let me preface the following discourse by saying that I love Husband, unconditionally, in spite of his dirty socks.

Our hamper is an emblem of our marriage. Literally. When Husband and I got married, what did my parents get us? A hamper. Okay, not only a hamper…they also gave us a Ford truck, dinner in a fancy restaurant, and a very nice party, but clearly the sentimental gift of the occasion was the hamper. A brown wicker hinge-top hamper.

I can hear the questions already. A hamper? Just what about a hamper is sentimental? Isn’t this rather domestic? Where is the romance in such a gift?

Please! Stop with your inquisition and give me a chance to explain!

See, when Mom and Dad got married, my mom’s parents gave them a hamper. A white wicker hinge-top hamper. I feel relatively sure that the hamper was given simply to help out a young couple trying to scrape together a household on a limited income and not with any sort of hidden agenda on communicating the significance of the marital union. Nevertheless, since my parents are still using the same hamper 46 years later (KUDOS!), and since the grandparents who gifted the hamper have been married 70 years (KUDOS! KUDOS!), one must consider the power of the hamper as wedding blessing.

Think about it. What better symbol for the nuptial intersection of intimacy and devotion than the hamper? “And Husband shall hand over his London and France to Wife without fear of judgment and Wife shall wash Husband’s London and France without fear of boy germs.” It’s poetic. Almost Biblical in its sheer duality of good and evil.

And so, taking a not-so-subtle cue from my parents and from my parents’ parents before them, I have whole-heartedly embraced laundry detail. Except for one small issue that I even hesitate to mention.

Sometimes, just sometimes, Husband misses the hamper. And by “miss,” I mean, deliberately neglects the completely insignificant effort that is lifting the hinged lid of the blessed marital hamper and inserting the dirty laundry within. Because, come on, who are we kidding! Husband has the hand-eye coordination of an octopus juggling 32 objects and the self-professed reflexes of a one-eyed cat. So you tell me how the dirty knickers come to sit just inches from the base of the hamper, or how the jeans come to be strewn haphazardly across its cover?

Since it is such a small effort for me to pick up misplaced London and haphazardly-strewn France, I cannot even tell you why Husband’s flirtation with the outer boundaries of the hamper bugs me. Except precisely that. If the effort is so trifle, why doesn’t Husband do it himself? I don’t think I’m annoyed by the infraction, so much as infinitely intrigued at its sheer audacity.

So at this point in my post, I’m sure you’ve become concerned, why is Wife airing her dirty laundry here? Shouldn’t she be talking to Husband about this? Not to worry. We’ve talked through the issue. We’ve even made advances. More or less.

I feel embarrassed to admit that my confrontation of the issue began with a passive-aggressive strategy. And boy, did that backfire. I simply decided to let the laundry pile up in its repository outside and around the hamper. Once the piles of laundry had gotten so deep that Husband started asking questions—albeit the precise question showed itself to be completely oblivious to the war being waged, something to the effect of, “I threw my khakis over here, although I’m not quite sure how you’ve got these piles organized….”—I informed Husband that I would no longer be doing laundry unless if it made it into the hamper. So what did Husband do? Duh. Right then and there he picked up what was a week’s worth of laundry and stuffed it into the hamper. Well played.

Since my first lesson in hamper management didn’t come to bear on anyone but me, I decided that my second approach needed to be more direct. So at the next opportunity—and I use the word opportunity in its loosest sense—I called Husband out on his contempt of the conjugal hamper.

And let the record show that Husband made the following statement in his defense: “Sweetie, we’re a team. By putting my laundry just outside of the hamper, I’m setting you up for the slam dunk. Like an alley-oop.”

Husband is an accomplished poker player, but I have to say that this tour-de-force was one of his strongest hands ever played. Because suddenly picking up dirty laundry brings a smile to my lips. Touché, dear Sir.

Let me conclude this discourse by reiterating that I love Husband, unconditionally, because of his dirty socks.

Having fun at the park

2008-09-29T22:54:00.000-04:00

Aedan and his new haircut

2008-09-29T22:50:00.000-04:00

This is not a still life

2008-09-23T12:21:00.015-04:00

I bought three beautiful miniature caricatures from Australian artist Joe Scoppa back in February. I selected these particular three paintings so that I could fill a particular set of three empty frames that I had bought a couple of years earlier. And when I finally married the three paintings to the three frames, I knew instantly where they should hang.

I have asked Husband to hang my little triptych on several occasions since February, because somewhere in my head, pounding nails into a wall is man’s work. Sorry Gloria. Sorry Hillary. I shamelessly subscribe to traditional gender roles on a daily basis. I happily take care of any tasks that have to do with dishes, laundry, and cooking (unless if an open flame is involved, in which case Husband’s Inner Caveman clubs me over the head and takes over the job), and Husband valiantly takes care of anything having to do with assembling, power tools, and repairs (unless if a needle and button are involved, in which case Wife’s Inner Betsy Ross takes pity on Inner Caveman’s humble grunts).

To Husband’s credit, he has come close to taking care of the job. I recall a day when he was even preparing to head upstairs with a hammer, but because I wasn’t ready to relinquish control over the paintings’ precise placement on the wall—did I mention that there are three of them whose spacing must achieve a perfect balance?—I told him to wait. My bad.

But then this past week, something happened to shatter that glass ceiling for even this diehard traditionalist. And it had naught to do with Hillary’s recent bid for the White House and even less (yes, less than naught) to do with a related endeavor by an alarmingly presumptuous governor from Alaska who for the sake of utmost discretion shall remain nameless. Nope. Naught. Instead it had everything to do with my sister expertly holding a nail between her lips and my mom brandishing a level with ease and, dare I say, finesse. Contrary to what you may have been raised to believe all your life, that age-old adage is no longer true: Hanging artwork is not the exclusive domain of cavemen.

Feeling empowered, I took on the job last night. When I first started noisily rummaging around the junk drawer for nails and such, I was slightly concerned that Husband would hear my clatter and say, “You know, I would have done that for you.” At which point, you can bet your favorite miracle bra, I would have stopped straight away, willing to wait another seven months just to avoid the sheer torture that is leveling three paintings across two walls. But then, silly me, I realized that Monday night football was on, and I could have been doing the dance of the seven veils on top of the TV armoire without danger of breaking Husband’s trance.

The closer that I came to gathering the necessary tools of the job, I actually started to think that Husband might be proud of Wife’s newfound initiative. And I was definitely off to a good start. Hammer? Check. Sawtooth hangers? Check. Nails? Check. Pencil? Check. Tape measure? Hmmmm…. Tape measure? Husband’s manly Stanley had apparently decided to evade this latest sexual revolution by hiding under a pile of snips and snails somewhere. Yet we are undeterred in our progress. Girlie-girl sewing tape? Check.

At this point in the journey, there stood just one last hurdle between me and my winning over of Husband’s boundless pride and admiration: Mustering up the hutzbah to make that trek upstairs to the job site….preferably in one trip. What would Inner Caveman do? Of course this is why the tool belt was invented, probably by a woman come to think of it, because everyone with any sense knows that if you come down from the ladder mid-job to fetch that forgotten tool, the job will invariably be waylaid by the current season’s sporting event calling from the TV in the next room like an irresistible siren...but I digress. The point is Husband’s Inner Cavemen has not yet evolved to the Toolbelt Age. So what do I do instead? I go and irrevocably girl the whole thing up by placing Husband’s hardware on a floral gilt tray.

Despite my unforgivable transgression against these great symbols of Husband's manhood, I am nevertheless happy to report that the job went off with only sixteen hitches and seven nail holes. And when Inner Caveman passed through the room later that night, he issued a resounding grunt of approval. Gloria would be so proud.

The boys love the tilt-a-whirl

2008-09-22T13:37:00.002-04:00

All aboard the ferris wheel

2008-09-22T13:27:00.000-04:00

Finn rides the whale

2008-09-22T13:22:00.001-04:00

Finn walks Gaga and Bompa

2008-09-22T13:08:00.001-04:00

Finn at the petting zoo

2008-09-22T12:55:00.003-04:00

At the Lenoir County Fair

2008-09-22T12:48:00.002-04:00

Afternoon snack

2008-09-22T12:42:00.000-04:00

Finn swings on the rings

2008-09-22T12:38:00.002-04:00

Bouncing baby Finn

2008-09-22T12:34:00.000-04:00

Bouncing baby David

2008-09-22T12:30:00.000-04:00

Ike blows through Ohio

2008-09-22T12:11:00.001-04:00

Cute kid alert

2008-09-22T12:03:00.000-04:00

Finn and his Gaga

2008-09-22T11:59:00.001-04:00

Baby in a box

2008-09-22T11:38:00.001-04:00

Big appetite

2008-09-22T11:30:00.002-04:00

Finn attacks his fourth (yes, fourth) big pancake with the same gusto as he did the first!