Today’s To-Do List:

1) Scrape off once-cute fake snow from back window. Not cute anymore. Christmas is over. 2) Take down “Santa Stop Here” sign from front yard. He came. He saw. Christmas is over. 3) Dump dried-up drooping poinsetias from front door pots. Christmas is over.

Small things make me happy. Like books. Children’s books to be exact. And I’m picky. I like the hard back ones with thick pages, the kind that slide smoothly on your finger when you lick it to turn the page. I swear, part of the reason I chose elementary when it came to my teaching education was because I would get to read these hard-backed treasures aloud. I used to dream of how I would hold up the book while I read it, spanning the open pages from left to right for all the kids to see…how I would pronounce the words with perfect diction and creative inflection to make characters come alive…how the little kiddies would all silently award me the “best read aloud” they had ever heard after each of my “performances.” To this day, one of the things I miss most about teaching is reading books aloud.

But now I read to my sweet audience of one, and I take great pleasure in stocking up her library for future performances. Hence our book store trips on rainy, cold days. Today, Brandyn came along and was tickled to be a part of it. “How come you go to Borders every time it’s cold out?” he asked in the car. Because it’s a perfectly good excuse to add another treasure to her bookshelf. Because bookstores on rainy days are like popcorn at the movies or apple pie on Thanksgiving. Because it just goes.

So, we took our time searching for the next treasure that would grace her collection. We paged through the classics and the Caldecotts and, as much as I always lean toward the older, more simply-illustrated books like Beatrix Potter, I let Brandyn pick out her book today and Bad Dog, Marley it was–hard-back, of course. I made sure the pages made the perfect crinkle noise and passed the licked-finger test. It may not be a classic or a Caldecott, but with oodles of funny dialogue, it’s sure to guarantee future note-worthy performances.

Oh…and that picture is her crawling in the “plush pit” in the back corner of Borders where, if there was a contest for fastest tag-finding time, she would surely take first place. She found the tag on every single one of those stinkin’ Elmos within seconds.

So, I was washing dishes this morning while Lainey played happily in her playpen. Brett walks by.
Brett: “She’s got something in her mouth.”
Me: (walking over to perform my signature finger swoop move) I stop. Laugh. “It’s a…. it’s a….” Laugh some more. “It’s a baboon head.”

Where in tarnation she found a baboon head, I’ll never know. All I can figure is somewhere, there is an animal pop-up book with a headless baboon hiding in its pages.