Here in this week when you could argue I have nothing but time on my hands, I have been neglecting my duties to this blog. It seems that 80 percent of my noteworthy moments are derived from my children, and about 99 percent of my photogenic ones. Left to my own devices, I take photos like this.
And lord knows, that’s not what you came here to see.
Nevertheless, I submit it as a sort of proof that I continue to thrive in spite of spending approximately 23 hours indoors with the shade drawn. This is my opportunity to block out the loathsome sun without feeling bad about denying Robbi her well-deserved dose of vitamin D.
I have been writing with a satisfying fury. I have been taking a daily run. And I have been eating almonds.
Lots and lots of almonds.
As for the little people? Apparently, Alden has become quite the archer. The prospect of firing a bow and arrow has interested her ever since seeing the movie Brave. Apparently, she hit the target 2 out of 30 times, which means she has a ways to go before I’m going to let her play William Tell.
Her burgeoning ferocity extends to the climbing wall, where she climbed to the very top on the first try. I do not know where she gets her courage. It strains comprehension to believe that she is mine.
It is possible that her father was a pirate. Have you ever seen a more jolly buccaneer?
While Alden has been engaged in strength, agility, and ruthlessness, Kato has been lounging in the sand.
And August has been napping on the window seat.
For her part, Robbi has spent her days holed up in the lodge by the lake, enjoying the free WiFi while working on drawings for the book we’re doing with LB Kids.
I owe you all a long post on the process thus far, but Robbi’s current task is creating sketches for each of the spreads in the book. She did most of them last week while I was in Kansas City, but she had a few more to finish when the time came to leave for the lake. So instead of sketching using Photoshop on her beautiful Intuos Wacom tablet, she has been forced to sketch on the iPad, the screen of which was shattered when someone who she’s married to threw a suitcase on top of it.
I’m not sure which of her husbands it was, but I’m sure he feels terribly about it.
If it makes you feel any less bad for her, here’s her view out the window while she works.
Our deadline was today, and Robbi wasn’t quite done, which means she had to take the iPad to the lake and finish up the final spread while the kids made sand castles. Notice the thick bands of packing tape wrapped around the iPad to keep the elaborate matrix of shattered glass from slicing Robbi’s finger into tiny ribbons? I do.
In spite of the certain leaden sadness in each of their hearts at the prospect of being so far from their doting father, everyone seems to be having a fine time.
Summer days at the lake have a way of healing what ails you. One of these years, I’ll go with them.
