Speaking of new verbs,

Sage's favorite thing to do in bed is "cuggle," which offers all the benefits of cuddling and snuggling.

verb: that's what's happening

Evan is famous for back-forming verbs from nouns. He uses his hammer to hamm, his dagger to dagg and his light saber to light sabe. You get the idea. Today he came up with a new verb while playing in the sprinkler: to geyse.

Sage doesn't know what a "fault" is but she'll be damned if she's going to let me take it from her

Tonight as I was hoisting Sage into her car seat, I accidentally bonked her on the head. She complained, and I tried to soothe her: "I'm sorry sweetie. That was Daddy's fault." This only made her angrier: "No! My fault!"

one more name

This evening Evan caught a large roly-poly, built a habitat for it in a plastic bucket, named it "John the Roly-Poly," admired it for 15 minutes or so, and then released it by launching it across the yard in a paper airplane. I said I hoped John had a parachute. "He doesn't," Evan said, "but he has a hard shell."

sheer altruism

Evan: "Do you remember when Granddad asked me if I wanted to be a good person or a bad person when I grew up?"

Eric: "I think he said, 'You get to decide what kind of person you want to be.'"

Evan: "Yeah. Well I want to be a good person, because I want to be an ambulance driver."

Eric: "That's definitely a good person's profession."

Evan: "Because then I could drive over the speed limit and run through red lights."

Busted

Sage: "Where Lily and Sophia?"

Eric (not really listening, obviously): "Mmm-hmm."

Sage: "NO! NO SAY 'MMM-HMM.' WHERE LILY AND SOPHIA?"

a crab named Baseball

Children are much better than adults at coming up with distinctive names. Our friends down the street have had two pet hermit crabs since we've known them — Baseball, and his successor, Batman (who has an actual Batman decal stuck on his shell). When I came back from a recent trip I brought Sage a stuffed frog, which she immediately named Sesame Street. Nothing will ever top the name Evan famously gave his rubber praying mantis: Bill Pierce. No grownup could come up with a name that good for a praying mantis in a million years.

As I type this, Evan is amusing himself by disappearing out the front door and returning through the back door. As he passed by the last time, giggling, he said "I keep producing myself."

Rorschach

Evan has started seeing things in the clouds — very specific things. Yesterday he saw the vacuum cleaner from the Teletubbies show. Tonight at dinner he pointed out the window and said, "Look, a cashew in the sky!"

stone cold rhymin'

Tonight Evan walked into the kitchen and started looking at Sonja from different angles. She asked him what he was doing, and I got to deliver the punchline: I'd told Evan I was checking my email; he'd told me he was going to go check my female.

taking requests

Eric: "Hand me down my walkin' cane, I'm gonna leave on the mornin' train. My sins, they have overtaken me..."

Evan: "Can you stop singing that please? I need to kind of clear my mind out."

Eric: "Okay."

Evan: "My mind-desktop is kind of cluttered."

blessing

Evan: "People and dinosaurs together would have been a terrible mess. I'm glad God understood that."

Call me baby, driver.

This morning in the car:

Eric: "You are a bit of a diva."

Sage: "No, I NOT a diva!"

Eric: "Okay... Are you a prima donna?"

Sage: "No, I NOT a peeva dava!"

Sonja: "Are you a sweetie muffin?"

Sage: "No, I NOT a seetie muffin!"

Sonja: "What are you?"

Sage: "I jus' a baby!"

a couple of words Evan has used, casually and correctly, in conversation recently

"indicated"
"enclosures"

Friday Harbor, with juice boxes

Sage and the president of her fan club.

Cody and the president of his fan club.