1: Breakfast on Snail Mountain with friends.

2: Annalie and I made cinnamon-swirl bread the other day. We had some for a snack this morning.

3: I walked past Annalie’s room and saw her curled up on the chair, looking at a book. I love the look on her face, like she’s just read something particularly interesting.

4: She was in the middle of putting her sandals on when I asked her to go stand on the beach so I could take a picture. She didn’t bother to put the other one on.

5: Stained glass? Or melted gummi bears? My mom sent Annalie a little care package which included a bag of Target-brand gummi bears (With Real Fruit Juice!). Apparently, they couldn’t take the summer heat.

6: My coffee and Annalie’s juice in the train dining car this morning. (Resusable coffee-cup sleeve from Anna’s Etsy shop, Life is Good…At the Beach)

I’m taking photos life’s small moments this month for my photoset 30 tiny moments hath September and for the 30 tiny moments group on Flickr.

Anna, your bowl is waiting in my Etsy shop for you! I would like to assure you that despite the way it looks in the pictures, it’s actually more of an orangey-coral color on the outside. It’s definitely not pink.

Also, the black paint that accidentally got swiped onto the edge? It’s about 99% gone. There is a teeny bit left, just enough so you can look at it and know that Brenda felt compelled to leave her mark on your bowl.

When I went to pick up Anna’s bowl and the other things we painted last weekend, I painted another plate! The Over-Thinker liked Rhi’s plate so much, she requested I paint her a similar one in fall colors. Troy had some errands to run this afternoon on base, so he took Annalie with him. It was my first time painting by myself since we moved here, so I got an iced latte from Starbucks and settled in for a relaxing afternoon.

The only sort-of bad thing about it was that I didn’t have all the colors I wanted. So far I am fairly pleased with Paint & Fire, which is saying something because I really loved Paint ‘N Pottery in Maryland. The major complaint I have so far is that there are only about one-third as many colors of paint here. When I was thinking about what autumn colors to use on this plate, I was picturing about 20 different shades at Paint ‘N Pottery. I know where they would be located on the shelves, I even know some of their names. But at Paint & Fire, my choices were much more limited. So I, uh, mixed up some custom paints. I really really hope they turn out okay!

When I got home from the studio Troy was getting dressed for a Navy function. There was a dining-out, which meant he had to wear one of his formal dinner dress uniforms. That doesn’t happen very often, so of course he had to spend the last couple of days tracking down all the pieces of the uniform (cummerbund, mini-medals, the right shoes, etc.) which were scattered between two closets with the shoes being in a random box. Once he was all put together, he looked quite dashing. But before I could tell him so, Annalie spoke up.

“Daddy!” she said. “You look just like a ship’s first mate!”

After Troy had left, Annalie asked if we could go up to Snail Mountain. I said sure, why not? When we got there, for some reason Annalie made a beeline for the side of the stadium that we never walk on and asked what was back there. I said, “I don’t know. Let’s go find out!”

We found a trail that led around to a bunch of big rocks. It was like a beginning climber’s dream, because the rocks were mostly flat and piled on top of one another in such a way that it was easy to step from rock to rock. I would tell you that I was extremely careful and helped Annalie each step of the way, but I can’t tell you that because I could barely keep up with her! She did have to stop at one point and wait for me to lift her onto the next rock because it was too high for her to climb up. Once we reached the rocks at the top, we were only a few feet away from the low stone wall at the top that encircles the area around the cross.

I wish we could have stayed and climbed around some more, but we had to get home so Annalie could go to bed. She had a full day with no nap, and tomorrow we’re getting up early for a train-riding adventure! When did our lives get so busy?

Good thing we like it this way. Busy days make happy people around here. As long as we get an occasional day to sit around and watch TV and make cookies and read in our pajamas, we’re good.

Rhi, thanks for asking me to paint you a dotty serving plate, thus motivating me to finally get my butt back in a studio. It’s so good to be painting again. The plate’s in my etsy shop waiting for you. I look forward to delivering it!