This and that

I'm not going to tell you any more about how Mabel's nights are going until they've settled down a bit and formed a - dare I say it? - pattern of some sort. Besides, I don't want to spoil the suspense.

I happened to look up the school website to see which day Dash starts back, and it turns out there's only three weeks of vacation left. How can that be? I almost (almost) feel sad about it, except for all the reasons it's a good thing. But he and his sister have learned to play together again this summer, in recent days she has come out of her hate phase and been heard to say "I love you" to not just me but everyone in the family, and things are delightful - at least around breakfast time when everyone's at their most happy and polite. (I'm pretty catatonic until I've had a bowl of cereal, but the kids are good.)

And I will miss Dash when he's back at school all day. These summers really are (barf, sorry) precious, because every one that goes by sees him demonstrably more grown up, more grown away, doing more and exploring further, and in no time at all we'll be at the summer where he goes off to Europe inter-railing for two months. Or whatever the kids are doing then.

Our guests get here tomorrow, and though they are the most low-key guests imaginable - my good friend and her six-year-old son, just for two nights - it's a good excuse to clean some things that never get cleaned, and throw out some things that have been waiting all summer to be thrown out, and organize just a tiny bit. Of course, it's a constant uphill battle against the children who know hilarity lies in throwing toys around for fun, but just maybe the floor will be vacuumed tomorrow morning.

This weekend, many people are going to BlogHer in New York. I think I might just make a resolution to go next year, assuming it's either there or in DC again - I don't imagine I'd fly further afield for it at this stage. But for the first time, I know some people (okay, one for sure) in real life who are attending, and it makes it feel like not such a ridiculous thing for me to want to do. I do blog, I am a blogger, I qualify, right?

Are you going to BlogHer? Would you go with me next year?