Cheeks is stretched out on the sofa, where I told him to wait while I poured him some milk.  He was asleep within seconds, his little body perched precariously close to the edge.  I didn’t even bother with the milk, I threw a blanket over him instead.  Occasionally he’ll shake with a tight cough, thumb in his mouth.

Last Monday we tiptoed into his bedroom at 3:00 A.M. and snatched him from his bed to catch an early morning flight to Montana.  After 20 hours of travel and greeting family, broken only by a 2 hour airplane nap, he collapsed into the bed that Grandma had ready for him.  He never quite recovered in the few days before waking up on Christmas Eve Day, coughing, nose stuffed up, fevered, and thirsty.  Sick, just in time for the busiest days of our trip.

As we dragged him around to see all the family, he smiled and hugged, played and laughed, he opened presents, he entertained and impressed.  In short, he was in top family-visiting form.  Each time we put him back in the car he’d sigh and fall asleep or stare out the window, his eyes glazed over.  He spent his down time on our laps, looking thoroughly worn-out.  On our last full day at Grandma’s house he looked up at me from his seat on my legs and asked if we could go home.

Our return trip was just as long as the first.  He leaned against the airplane wall and slept until we woke him up to deplane.  We drank beer in an airport restaurant while he ate an entire plate of chips and guacamole by himself.  He made sure to touch the outside of each of the airplanes as he boarded.  In six hours of flight time he complained once, because he was hot.

When we crawled into bed last night at 2 A.M. I thought about how we’d dragged ourselves from the warmth of those sheets exactly one week earlier.  To the minute.  I thought about all the fun we’d had in the intervening days, and how much we’d enjoyed seeing our family.  And I was glad to be home.  Then I slept.  Hard.  Knowing that I’d be able to get up in the morning, rub his little back, fill his belly, and try to begin repaying him for making life better and easier than ever.  As if I ever could.

Merry Christmas!

Having a family picture taken is on my life list.  For my birthday, in the summer, Cody got me a gift certificate to have it done, but I wanted there to be fall foliage in my family photo.  I don’t know why, I just did.  So, we waited until October to do it.  The week before we moved, we got all dressed up and hiked our way up a trail into the foothills, where we smiled for an hour even though we were freezing our noses off.  Our prints arrived in the mail this week, like an early Christmas present.

Aren’t we proper.

When I got out of bed in the morning I looked out the window.  Another gray Virginia day.  I spent five minutes pulling on layers of warm clothes, trying to make my hair lay flat, rubbing the sleep out of my eyes, and by the time I made it down the stairs and pulled the curtains open it was snowing.  Tiny little snowflakes that, if you watched for long enough, you could see were sticking to everything in the twenty-four degree air.  It was quiet and cold.  The snow fell steadily, frosting the world.  The coffee bubbled away and filled the house with it’s strong scent.

Before long I heard his tiny voice loudly reciting parts of The Polar Express, “Well, are you coming?  Where?”  I swing the door open and join in, “Why, to the North Pole, of course.  This is The Polar Express!”

We spent the rest of the day watching the snow fall.  Every time we passed a window one of us would exclaim, “It’s snowing outside!”  We baked brownies, making sure to lick the bowl and spoons clean.

For Rent: Unfurnished studio apartment with separate entrance, no kitchen.

In the late afternoon, before the sun went down but after the snow had stopped falling, we bundled up and went outside to explore.  He shuffled his feet through the snow, afraid he was going to fall.  He asked me for permission to “touch it” before bending down to put the tip of his mitten in the snow.  We walked across the street and down the neighbor’s driveway to look at the freezing river, the geese, the ducks, and to wave to Maryland.

After greeting Maryland we listened to the geese. We were sure they were complaining about the cold.

Back in our own yard, I dragged the sled out of the garage.  “A snow boat!”

Yeah, who needs the word ‘sled’ anyway?

Captain of The Snow Boat, wearing the Pink Mittens of Power, navigated the treacherous, frozen tundra.