August 1

I must confess that I am totally inadequate when it comes to playdoh animal making. It is one of the long list of parental failures I am racking up ... I can just barely make a reasonable pig - at least my two year old son Sebastian recognizes it as a pig - so I suppose I'm not a total failure. We spend most of our playdoh time opening and closing the individual playdoh containers ... taking the dough out putting it back in - and so it goes.

It was rainy this morning and Sebastian and I spent the first part of the day shopping, in and out of farmer's markets, and a mattress shop and I even found a small Italian bakery in this backwoods hamlet that makes pretty good biscotti. I ended up eating the biscotti - Sebastian spit his out - he didn't really care for the anisette but he enjoys going out and behaved himself like a proper little gentleman.

The skies cleared this afternoon and we took the kayak out and paddled to the small beach on the lake and spent a hour or so playing in the shallow water and talking with the older women who inhabit the beach here in Smallwood ... women who have been coming here for decades and who cluster in the shade under the leafy sugar maples. Sebastian has a ready-made group of Grandmothers who fuss over him and bring him cookies ... he has a wonderful time there but my plan to keep him cookie-free is totally shot! So be it ...

We took a bath together tonight - what fun that was - and now he's sleeping soundly and the crickets outside are making their nighttime noise...