Free to throw snowballs...

One of the things I have been working on as a mother is giving my kids a bit more independence. I'm sometimes the type that, if it were more socially acceptable, would wrap my kids in bubble wrap, keep them locked in the basement, and make them wear football helmets even when sleeping. This is a tendency I spend a lot of time fighting back, and because of it, I am occasionally smacked in the face with the realization of what precisely my kids can do, beyond my expectations.

Case in point: with this baby, I have mentioned I was sick. Much of my first trimester was spent losing weight, thanks to my inability to stomach the mere thought of food, much less eat it without it coming up. Most of my mornings were spent laying in bed or on the couch, mustering the courage to face my work day. Other times, I would drag myself around, attempting to play with the kids or get things done. Lucky for me, it turns out that Squirrel is quite the domestic assistant. Thanks to my illness, I learned that she can (and actually loves to!): pour cereal and milk for her and Little Bird; make peanut butter and jelly sandwiches; start a movie; pick out everyone's clothes for the day; empty (some of) the dishwasher; and make the beds.

In most cases, letting her do these things usually left me feeling like a colossal failure (like when, at 22 weeks, I was throwing up again and laid in bed, and she said, "I'm sorry mama. I should have made us breakfast this morning, but I forgot." The kid still says "breffast" and is apologizing that she didn't feed her 4 year old self and 3 year old brother?!? Epic mommy-fail!), but I have also realized that she and Little Bird take a great deal of pride in doing things on their own. He is learning to use the potty and dress himself, and Squirrel is his biggest cheerleader and advisor (going so far as to demonstrate step-by-step in the bathroom how to get it done). When she makes a PB&J, or he puts his shirt on the right way, they positively GLOW with pride, and not even because I celebrate with them; there is a genuine and deep sense of accomplishment at doing something on their own. 

So...I am trying to give them a bit of independence.

We haven't had a whole lot of snow this year, actually a remarkably small amount, as I previously mentioned. But in the last month and a half or so, we've been getting the occasional fluff. And so yesterday, my kids asked if they could go out and play in it. And Squirrel specifically asked if they could go out *alone.* Generally, my immediate response would be to say no and distract them with a fun game where they would be locked up tight in my over-vigilant sight. This time, I reminded myself that I didn't have a good reason for saying no, and that they had been showing me how much they could do. So I set some ground rules and let them loose.

Mostly they stomped around, kicked the snow, and puddle jumped. Then they hung upside down on the banisters over the concrete steps (insert image of me picturing their brains spilled everywhere and literally biting my tongue to keep from hollering at them to stop...they totally survived AND still have all their brains in their heads!).

Then Squirrel got an idea. You can see it forming here...

And the approach here...

She pummeled her little brother with a snowball. 

He, in turn, came running to the door where I had just started taking pictures, near tears, to tattle. 

"Mommy! Sister frowed a snowball at me!"

Ordinarily, I would have probably given him a kiss, reprimanded his sister, 

and said it was time to come in. 

This time, I stopped to think, and then I said:

"Well, I guess you better throw one back at her!"

His expression immediately changed to pure mischief, and he was off to retaliate. 

And then came one of my favorite scenes thus far in the year: 

They had so. much. FUN. They both threw snow until they were out of breath. No tears, just laughter. No fights, just fun. And when they looked exhausted, I invited them in for hot chocolate. 

They were so proud of their outdoor play "alone."

Today Squirrel, wide eyed with excitement, said, "Mom. Remember that time you let me and brother have a snowball fight outside...all by OURSELVES???"

Yep, I remembered.

"That was really fun."

Note to self: a little freedom goes a long way. 

Maybe I'll let Squirrel make me breakfast in bed tomorrow...scrambled eggs, and hold the guilt. ;) 

The Happiest Birthday

I kind of hate birthdays. Every year, I have a tendency to have a melt-down around my birthday. This year was no exception. I feel like I have had some really crummy ones, that sometimes people I love forget about it, or just generally awful events tend to coincide with the weeks/days before I turn a year older. And even when they don't, I still get so ornery and mopey around my birthday. It's been like this for at least the last several years, but I can trace the beginning of feeling this way back to when I was in high school. In the weeks or month before my birthday, I look forward to it. I like cake. I like presents. I like when my friends and family call. Birthdays are great!

Until four or five days before...and then I get gloomy and mean.

This year was no exception.

The day before my birthday, I melted down. I cried to Rob about how I hate my birthday, everything and every one that has anything to do with it, and I that I didn't even want people to wish me a happy birthday; I just wanted to crawl in a hole and forget the whole day.

And then I had a realization. It isn't my birthday. It's me.

Every year around my birthday, I get the birthday blues. I always thought I was feeling bad FOR myself, but I realized I feel bad ABOUT myself. Even though I don't struggle the rest of the year with this thought, there is something about being another year older that makes me feel like I have fallen short; I look at myself, at my life, and I basically feel...worthless. I feel like I am another year older and I haven't done anything meaningful or important. It's kind of hard to write it out like that, to realize that deep down, that's why I hate turning another year older, but really, I heard it in my head and I felt it in my heart, and I knew that the anger wasn't about what someone had done or about something that had happened. It was about me, and the fact that I didn't think I was worth celebrating.

That's kind of depressing, right? And maybe not normal (I don't know...do a lot of people feel this way?), but definitely not the type of person I want to be.

So I decided to change my mind. I think this has been a long time coming. The past few months, I have been thinking about doing something meaningful for my birthday, and finally came up with a plan. But I realized I could easily do more, and that when you feel bad for yourself, the best thing you can do is go out and do kind things for others.

So, I did register for that 5K, and even had a little extra to add to the donation.
(Look! Here's me, "running"!)

 But more significantly, I got done crying, wiped off the smeared mascara and walked into the kitchen and started making cookies and brainstorming. And I think I created a new tradition for myself and my family.

That night I made 4 dozen cookies. The next morning, we got up and we went to spread some love.

Our family delivered cookies to the police station, where we were invited to give them to the Chief of Police, who nearly came to tears, telling us that the day before had been one of the worst ever, and that he couldn't express how grateful it was to know that some people were actually appreciative of the work they do. (They gave the kids badge stickers and a ride in the display car.)

We went to fire station, where we handed cookies off to the fire fighters and the kids were given a tour of the station with a look/climb around the ladder truck.

We went to the library and gave them to the librarians.

We took people treats AND animal treats to the local animal shelter where the kids got to happily play with the dogs.

Then we went to Walmart to get a dozen balloons, where we left 3 plastic bags of quarters taped to the soda machines for people to find and enjoy a free soda.

We took the balloons to one of the local nursing homes, where we made some new friends and spread a little cheer. (It was so AMAZING to see my sweet daughter giving hugs, holding hands, and talking to the residents. I was so worried that she would be too shy or would be frightened, but she commented on how much she loved it and all the "nice grandmas and grandpas.")

I had to go to work after that, but after work, we went "camping." The kids have been asking to go camping for ages now, and with all they do to fill me with joy, I figured one awesome birthday present would be to return the favor. It was really cold, so I chickened out and we took the kids home once the fire died and we all got sleepy, but it was once of those moments I want to tuck away in some place for safe keeping and never, ever lose; a moment I wish I could freeze for all time and play back again and again and again.

We roasted hot dogs and marshmallows, and watched the colors of the fire. The kids told us campfire stories: Squirrel's was about a little princess who shared her name who went camping in the woods and was afraid of everything, so her mommy stayed with her. And THEN when a bear jumped out to scare them, they realized it was only DADDY! (Insert shrieks and giggles.)

Little Bird's was about a little monster (who also shared his name) and a little ghost that came to play with him everyday, until a big ghost came and put the little ghost in the garbage can! (Insert raucous laughter.) Luckily, his friend came and got the little ghost back out of the garbage can and they played more.

As I sat there by the fire, with Squirrel snuggled in my lap and Little Bird in Rob's, listening to my children weave tales (complete with conflict and character development), watching the purples, oranges, and yellows of the flames run into each other, I realized that these amazing children were another year older too. That every year, time will move on, and these beautiful little people are my accomplishment. These sweet hands delivering cookies, stroking the veins on the hands of the elderly, their darling mouths telling stories and filling the cold air with laughter, the eyes that shone at me with love and affection and pride for their work that day, those are the things that reflect my worth back to me.

And so, this is how I know that in the past year, I have accomplished something important and that I am not only someone myself, but I am creating beautiful little someones who can someday go on and do the same.

Pretty much the best birthday in the history of the world.

Peace and love,

On Legacy, Part 1

Family, and specifically, mothers, have been on my mind a lot lately.

And no, it isn't really because Mother's Day is around the corner.

I've been thinking a lot about connections and the legacy we leave---the kind of legacy I hope to leave someday. Two things have spurned this on, and I imagine that it will take two posts to adequately express my feelings.

A bit over a month ago, my grandmother passed away. I've wanted to post something about her since it happened, but I have had difficulty coming up with anything meaningful. Not because she wasn't meaningful herself--quite the opposite. She was truly an amazing women. At the ripe old age of 98 and a half, she was survived by 6 children, 34 grandchildren, 95 great-grandchildren, and 24 great-great grandchildren. She lived a quiet life, but she was full of love, and stubbornness, and concern for every one of us in that list. I am grateful to have had her touch my life and grateful that she is relieved of her earthly cares, on to bigger and better things. People remark what a legacy she left in pure posterity, and it is truly beautiful.

But none of these things really means anything. Because statistics and generalizations about my grandma or her posterity do not actually give any idea of who she was. These things do not fill me with the Christmas Eve anticipation of grandma bringing her handmade Christmas bags to every one of those 34 grandchildren, each complete with handmade ornaments, popcorn balls, and two crisp-as-could-be one dollar bills. Or the absolute dependability of a birthday card from one person on the planet. Or her laugh...the way she would almost close her eyes and tilt back her head, and lift up her hand, covered in skin like crepe paper, just a bit as she let it out.

Numbers don't explain her fierce desire for independence--the apologies she would make when I was the one who got to take her on her weekly shopping trip, too worried about inconveniencing me to know how very much I enjoyed spending the time with her, or the insistence that she put those groceries away and the fuss she would make when I would do it anyway. Generalizations don't bring to mind the holographic bandaid she wore on her forehead at my wedding (because in spite of a fall on the way up the temple steps, she was not going to miss it). They don't tell the tale of how, in spite a broken hip, she chastised the paramedics taking her to the hospital for not allowing her to put on a nicer looking dress.

Numbers don't call up the soft voice, the way she watched my children play...the peaceful, contented look she had as she watched all of us--the 34, and the 95, and the 24--play.

Most importantly, it isn't numbers that she left behind. In fact, it isn't just people. It's mannerisms and habits, turns-of-phrase and expressions; it's a legacy not of things, but of spirit. What she left behind is still in us. It's there in the way an uncle and an aunt laugh, the way one talks, and the way another worries. It's there in the way my father walks and the expressions he uses (and the stubbornness I know I will have to contend with as he himself ages). It's in my prematurely graying hair at my temples, and another cousin's nose or eyes. And from there it goes on and out to all of us counted in those numbers. Whether they are physical traits, words she spoke, or the simple mannerisms of a remarkably good woman, they are there.

And ultimately, her legacy is an endless thread of love and goodness woven into each of us. As long as we are still here, spinning and weaving those threads, she is still here.

"Every child begins the world again, to some extent..."

When I was pregnant with Squirrel, I remember my assistant principal at the school I worked said to me, "There are three true emotions you never know the meaning of until you have children: love, guilt, and fear." I am not sure truer words have ever passed my ears, and the expression has stuck with me over these few years of motherhood I have muddled through. The most interesting thing about motherhood though, is not the experience of these emotions; surely, in my own unremarkable existence, I have had the pleasure and pain of feeling all three of these emotions at one time or another. Rather, the fact is that until I became a mother, I did not understand the depth to which these emotions can carry us, or the messy way in which they seem to entangle one another.

Squirrel began her first day of preschool this week. She was positively bursting with excitement, and admittedly, I was as well.

Squirrel is a hard kid to describe. I am told often by my mother and older siblings that she is much like I was as a child. She loves everything and everyone. She is not just a happy kid, but a child filled with wonder at all the things around her. She has a fantastic sense of humor, one that makes me laugh to tears. She thinks deep and plays hard. And above all things, she is nothing but herself. She has no fear about expressing herself, and both literally and figuratively dances to her very own tune. And so, in those respects, the comparisons I get between her and I make sense to me. My perception of her is what I remember of my own childhood. I too was carefree, a little off the wall, and was comfortable with being just the way I was. I love this child deeply and fiercely, and I love her all the more because she has in her what I would consider the best of me. 

As a mother though, this is where things get sticky. 

Love is a beautiful and powerful emotion. It is also an intensifier. Any emotion one feels, good or bad, can be radically magnified by this first emotion. 

I remember myself as a child being, like Squirrel, sometimes shy, but never ashamed. I remember recognizing the fact that I was different than a lot of kids, goofy and carefree, and unfazed by social stigmas. In short, I was kind of weird. But I was smart, and I knew I was loved, I had the greatest best friend a kid could ever ask for. I recognized by second or third grade that I would never be "popular," but the fact suited me just fine: I was far happier simply being me than conforming to the social pressures that begin emerging so early among grade school kids. As a young child, I think there is no greater gift one can be given than to have a sure sense of self...just like I had, and just as I hope Squirrel is developing for herself. 

Unfortunately, the young years never really prepare us for the blows of adolescence, that singular, dubious time. This sense of self, which kept me worry-free, and ignored by childhood bullies, began to make me stand out. I became a target, and though I held out for a long time, the inevitable began to happen. My faith, my intelligence, my peculiar sense of humor--all the things I had found safety in--were suddenly fodder to the adolescent animals around me. In most ways, I was still me, but suddenly everything I did or said filled me with self doubt and loathing, and every word people said to me, kind or not, was laced with double meanings and criticism. I let myself fall into some bad choices and relationships, simply because I started second-guessing that self worth. I built a wall to hide myself and drew inward. 

It is this period of my life that fills me with fear and guilt for my child. Logically, I know those years are far off. I know there are far greater struggles than I endured. I know that preschool a few days a week is hardly akin to sending her off into the lion's den. But there is still the fact that I am steadily marching toward that precise inevitability. I want nothing in the world more that for her to be sure of who she is, but worry that my own endowments are too scant. I feel guilty that I gave up on that sense of self, as though my past will someday say to her, because of our similarities, that she is not enough. And I already anticipate the guilt I will bear, when unlike her current pains, the scrapes and bruises of her spirit will not be fixed with bandaids and pink lemonade.

This wall I hid behind took many messy years to break back down, and still, I find my clumsy feet tripping now and again over the rubble left behind. There is no one and nothing to blame for those laborious years. It was simply life--experience, the nature of teens, and the patterns and tendencies of social constructs. But these experiences fill me with a repressive, heavy fear. And my own love, my positive joy in seeing who she is turning out to be, makes that fear more poignant because the stakes are so much higher for my own children.

The world cannot know how exquisite this child is. It cannot know how perfect and kind, how innocent and brilliant, how joyful and exuberant she is. It will not handle her with the care necessary to preserve her indefinitely. And yet, inevitably, I must send her into this world. I must trust that the gifts she has been given are sufficient and that her meager inheritance is somehow multiplied in the generational gap. And I will watch, as those three old emotions, awakened by my new role as mother, tangle and interweave around me, compounded and intensified by one another, as my child weathers the storms life has laid out for her. 

{Happy Birthday, Squirrel!}

Dear, sweet little Squirrelly Girl,

Today, you turned three years old. I simply cannot understand how so much time has passed since you entered my world and changed it forever. I know it's cliche and every mother will say it, but the joy that burst upon my life the moment you, my first child, entered the world was incomparable. Because of you, I became stronger, more selfless, more joyful, more observant, more patient, and more terrified than I had ever been. Here, in this tiny bundle was my new universe. You melted your father's hard exterior and this macho, tough guy turned into a puddle of pure love for his daughter the minute you came into his life.

He has always been able to produce laughter from you that no one else can replicate. And you in turn hold his heart completely in your hands.

You are three, and in this third year, I am amazed at the person you have become:

Your language has exploded. You are precocious and talkative. In fact, some days I sit, exhausted after a day of listening to all the things you have to say. {Sometimes, at bed time, as I lie with you and try to get you to settle down, you'll sleepily prattle off all the many things that run through your head, with exclamations like, "Mommy! I am thinking of a party, with cake, and candies, and cupcakes, and gumballs, and doggies, and oh, I miss Zucchi and Titan, and brother will ride his bike, and I will ride with him and we can visit the ladies in the 'partments." I love this peek into your mind via stream-of-consciousness...} You like me to make up up stories and you like to make up stories of your own. Since your aunt Katie's wedding, every story ends with the addition from you that "they got married and lived happily ever after."

You love to see the temple. Even though it is down the street, you remind us every time we see it that it is there and it is "BEEEEAUTIFUL." I cannot wait for the day when you can enter it {which I know will come too soon, as some days I am afraid to blink because of how fast you grow}.

You love your baby brother. There are days when you don't like to share or he picks on you terribly, but for the most part, you love to help him, to reassure him, to play with him, to make him laugh. I know you will be partners in crime, as you have already begun to teach him many of your Squirrelly ways.

At three, you are shy at times and exuberantly friendly at other times. You invite yourself in to the apartments of the girls here at the dorms, and ask to follow them on their dates or to the library. We have to put you in timeout rather often lately for sneaking off to visit the "ladies," as you call them.

You love to be outside, no matter the weather. You request picnics almost every day. You like to lie on your back and look at the clouds.

You love to sing songs and make requests for us to sing together. "Tomorrow" and "My Favorite Things" have been at the top of the request list for several months now. You are finally learning to carry a tune.

You love to dance--you, poor thing, seem to have your mother's grace and sense of rhythm, but music and movement delight you, just as they always have me. I love to watch you dance with your eyes closed, moving to the beat that only you are privy to.

Just as you have been since birth, you are BUSY. You never quit moving or thinking or doing. We are practicing being "still", but it is difficult for you, who even wiggles yourself to sleep.

{Even standing still for the camera often proves to be too much...}

You are growing independent. You like to dress yourself, put on your own shoes, brush your teeth and say prayers on your own. Sometimes I stop and look at you and wonder when you started being able to do all these things alone. I feel such a sense of pride at your endless small accomplishments, so big to little old you;  at the same time, I feel such deep loss for the dependence on me that steadily vanishes.

You are empathetic. You feel sadness for sick birds and squashed bugs. You worry about us when we are sick, or upset. You comfort me when I am sad or exhausted from a long day. You try to make peace wherever you can. You tell me often that you miss Titan and Zucchini, our pugs. {This breaks my heart because they were there to welcome you home and have given you so many gifts...this empathy being one of them.}

You listen. You watch. You process more than I think you will. I am frequently astounded by the things you know and realize it is your own desire to know them, and not my ability to teach them, that has brought you that knowledge.

Your eyes are precisely the same shade of blue as mine, and I love, LOVE, when we are brushing our teeth at night, how you will always ask to squish our faces together and pronounce them to be "same-same."

You recently started telling me that we are best friends. Please know that I always wish this to be the case. That whatever, and whenever, I will listen and I will love and I will guide and protect you. Never stop being my friend, sweet thing.

You are full of mischief. While some say you have my sunny attitude and silly disposition, I know there is a naughty streak in there that can only come from your father. I have seen this look in his face in many instances and many pictures from his childhood, and I catch it on yours regularly. It is a glint in the eye that tells of cleverly devised plans just below the surface.

You are every bit as cute as you think you are, and I have to turn my face or leave the room to hide my laughter at least once a day because of the things you do.

You are uncontainable. You are full of light and laughter and so much love. When you were born, you changed my world, and yet, every day since then, it has continued to change: My capacity for love has grown with every minute of your life. My appreciation for life and joyful moments gains momentum. My desire to be the best example I can be gets stronger. And my gratitude to my Heavenly Father for sending me the WONDER that is you is unstoppable.

I love you, forever and ever and always, my sweet precious darling.
Happy Birthday!
Love,
Mom

{Perfect Day}

"If the day and the night are such that you greet them with joy, and life emits a fragrance like flowers and sweet-scented herbs, is more elastic, more starry, more immortal,--that is your success."

Today was remarkable. Perhaps it is the weather. Perhaps it is the fact that for the last 6 days The Mister has been away and I am getting giddy at the thought he comes home tomorrow (and that I have survived!). Perhaps it was simply my singular children. But today I realized that the fog is lifted and I am here.

After Little Bird was born, I was so incredibly happy and serene. I had this tremendous sense of my womanhood and power and femininity. Life seemed miraculous. And then as the weeks ticked on, and going back to work drew near, even if it was "just for four weeks" as I kept reminding myself, a heavy emptiness started to move in. I told myself it would pass soon. Once the school year was over, I would be a stay at home mom and I would return to the miraculous life I had lived a few weeks before. Instead, through summer this hollow inside of me seemed slowly to expand. I told myself it was simply the oppressive Phoenix summers; soon the weather would turn and so would my mood. In heat like that, no one wants to get out of bed, or do their hair, or play with their children, or cook, or...or... Of course, things would get better when the school year started...or when the autumn breezes finally hit...or near the holidays. I would be happy, I would feel, I would stop snapping at my children whom I love so dearly.

But all these things came and went, and the hole kept getting bigger, until finally I started to believe that this was simply who I had become--tired (so tired), short-tempered, lonely in the midst of love, empty...sad.

Thankfully, there was little part of me that fought to get through the cracks in the wall of this Kierra 2.0. That little part always sparked and sometimes ignited with joy, even if the flame was short lived. The little part ate away at the back of my brain and finally sent me to my doctor.

For many months, I was ashamed to talk to anyone about the fact that I thought I had post-partum depression. I worried it meant I loved my son less than I had loved my daughter. I worried it meant I wasn't praying hard enough, or I didn't have enough faith. I worried I was "broken."

Now I am ashamed I didn't do something about it sooner. For months, it cost me the joy I feel every day. There are memories I know I lost in that fog, moments I can't get back.

Today I realized that I had been silently worried about something else the last few months. I had been worried that the happiness I had again, this return to the old me, was not me, but the medicine. Even though it felt like me, even though logically, I understood the brain function and chemistry behind this, even though I didn't feel embarrassed about my diagnosis, I had been worried I was somehow "faking." But lying there in the park with my children, in the midst of so much (so much!) inexplicable joy made me realize that I am here, wholly present and fully myself. I am a woman who, though imperfect in infinite ways, finds happiness daily. I have made it through a whirlwind of change--in place, in lifestyle, in habits--over these several months. I have worked to find balance, to simplify, to pay more attention to what matters and less attention to what doesn't. I am a woman who has survived 6 days of single mom-hood without blowing a fuse, bursting into tears, or locking myself in my closet to sleep (things that occurred regularly in just a half-day a few months ago). I am daily a better mother, wife, woman. There are many more steps to take before I am all I want to be and all the Lord would have me be, but I am the one walking that path. Medication or no, it is me in here.

So, my brain is a little out of whack...anyone who knows me could have told you this years ago! So, I take a little pill at night before I go to bed. I'm not an asthmatic, I'm not a diabetic, or arthritic, I have a heart and a liver, and marrow that fill their God-given purposes without incident.  This is simply the card I was dealt, and today I let it go. Inside this imperfect flesh, which carries this particular weakness, is an eternal, sunny spirit. A spirit existing in fullness, and I am not afraid to admit that life smells like flowers and looks like starry nights and beauty is immortal...

{Ok...a positively terrible picture, technically speaking...but THIS, this exuberant expression, this explosive joy, was our day today, from start to finish. And besides, I am completely and utterly and madly in love with those little vampire teeth! Aren't you?}

{Mischief}

"Some are 'industrious' and appear to love labour for its own sake, or perhaps because it keeps them out of worse mischief."

I really love being a mom. I never thought, in my younger years, that I would, but it's the best job I've ever had. People who know Squirrel know that she is exceptionally busy. Almost from the time she was born, she has been getting into things, and "busy" is indeed the number one adjective that people use to describe her when they watch her. (By the way, I know "busy" is just a euphemism for "insane" because I live with her.) Because of her need to constantly be doing anything, I try to plan activities with her, primarily to keep her out of "worse mischief." I've had a few friends comment to me about how we do so much fun stuff, but believe me, it is entirely self-preservation, and even now there are days I am doubtful I will survive this child with my own sanity in tact.

Thankfully, Little Bird seemed to be born with quite the opposite demeanor: calm, observant, compliant. Until he started learning to follow in his big sister's footsteps...

This past week or two has been chaotic. The Mister was faced with finals at the same time I was handling checkouts and inspections in the dormitories. What this has meant is that my perpetually tutu-ed Squirrel and her pants-less brother have been finding more opportunity for "worse mischief;" here's a sampling from a day this week:

First, Little Bird practiced his new Squirrel-taught trick of moving the chairs to gain access to the counter tops:

And then we found Squirrel behind the fridge devouring a bell pepper she found in the veggie drawer. (Honestly, do normal kids even EAT bell peppers? Much less, do normal kids find and scarf whole bell peppers in dark corners? All while wearing a tutu?)

And in the two minutes we were away cleaning up a separate mess made by Squirrel (of which I did not get a picture), Little Bird managed this:

Seems I need to dig a little deeper for some "industrious" ideas for these two, as they are obviously so good at finding worse mischief...