Pumpkins

This weekend I took the girls to The Pumpkin Patch on Sauvie Island, a place where u-pick meets consumer kitsch, and the parking lots overflow with cars from all over the region. We haven't been there in a while. Duchess brought a new friend she met in French class, an exchange student (somewhat bewilderingly) from Sweden, and Skipper brought a friend whom she first met when they were both toddlers tagging along to their big sisters' kindergarten dropoffs. It was a nice outing, and the kids were all good company. I'm generally opposed to chauffeuring, and I usually stay out of the way of their friends, because I am embarrassing, but I was reminded today that it is often a pleasure to hang out with them and their friends, who are generally interesting and funny and able to keep a conversation rolling merrily along. (And apparently I was able to keep my embarrassingness under the tolerance threshold.)

Things are fine. The weather has been unseasonably warm and sunny. Duchess is in the throes of college applications. Skipper continues to do crosscountry and ultimate frisbee. Cook has been taking time off work to do house work, because that is still how he rolls. I just emptied my entire work email inbox into a new folder labeled "old stuff - unsorted" so that I can PRETEND I don't have 300 un-dealt-with emails looming over my head. I recommend this dumb psychological trick - I feel amazingly relaxed.