I can see Venus through my kitchen window

This month seems to be wiiiiinding down (ah, there's still a full week left, I see). A looming dilemma at the moment is: should I set my alarm for six and treat tomorrow like a regular day, or sleep in? Either way, I will make a salad and we'll take it to Mitchell's house, where we'll all participate in the festive holiday tradition of drug store quick Covid tests before (with any luck) tucking into a small Thanksgiving feast.

There will be nearly as many dogs as humans there (three!). And in other dog news, an Irish wolfhound is coming over to watch basketball tonight. 

I'm at the stage of Christmas shopping where I'm prematurely smug about all I've accomplished, when in reality I've bought three things for one person and contemplated about five other purchases. I think I need to make some more lists.

Uncut Gems

Adam Sandler — wow!
And Mom was so thrilled during
the basketball scenes!

Rabbit rabbit

Happy o happy June, my dears. This rabbit's especially for my beloved sports ball fans.

(And having nothing whatsoever to do with sportsball, but everything to do with June first, happy birthday to my sister-in-law Jeannette!!)

Twenty-third

We started the day off right at Tandem with the boy. Otherwise it was largely a cleaning/scraping paint off things/sanding bathroom walls/vacuuming/school project type of day. I did visit the library and pick up three books, despite the fact that I'm only halfway through the New Yorker pile I swore to vanquish first. And Christian, Isaac, and Gus played some basketball.

Second

Mark's mom and his sister Linda came to visit us for a few days. Here is Isaac with his Grandma Nancy, both outfitted nicely for Halloween. We handed out candy on a rainy night, and then we subjected the relatives to The Birds, which neither of them had seen before.

Today was Christian's eighteenth birthday, celebrated with this photo frame, below, from Grandma Nancy, crêpes from Portland's new food truck, lattes from Tandem, and a little pick up basketball. It was fun to watch the seamless teamwork between Isaac, Mark, and Mark's sister.

This guy. Oh, hey, I got three cute little chairs from a thrift shop for seventeen dollars! This one's weirdly painted yellow (even the cane is painted), but I kind of like it.

On our way to the airport, we stopped at Two Fat Cats to get Mark's mom a whoopie pie (all the times she's visited, we've never managed this). The pumpkin whoopie pies there? So. Good.