a fine monday

Today Kari and I picked up this kid at lunchtime after she was done with her first day of preschool.

She wanted Wendy's, so we looked up the location of the closest one and bought some lunch.

Then we went to the nursery up by their house and bought two dogwoods, a burning bush, and an arborvitae, and also a little mum she wanted to give to her own mum.  Kari picked a dark pink one for her to give to Heidi. 

Jay planted those purchases later, but before she went home we walked to the park and played for a while.

After this, Kari went back to her dorm, had a class this evening, and I drove the little one home again.

Julia had volleyball tonight and Kirsten joined us in the bleachers.  This morning as I watched the queen's funeral procession winding through Edinburgh, it brought back lovely memories of the semester Kirsten spent in Scotland, the green, green hills, the winding little roads and historic buildings, the Loch Ness monster, the dorm room in a castle, her taking dizzy video of the ceiling in the Sistine Chapel a few weeks later. 

It is fun to be in the old gyms, be part of the crowd on a Monday night, cheering them on.

That's such a Julia expression, biting the inside of her lip under stress:

They did not win, but it was a close game, fun to watch.

And then we drove home in the early darkness of September, quiet car gliding down quiet streets, lights shining in all the windows along the way, glad for a perfect weekend and all the things that make a random Monday special.

Love, MOM aka GRANDMA