• Fun in Chicago

    Introducing Chicago To a Five (Nearly Six!) Year Old

    As if my summer plans couldn’t get any better, what with the Blogher conference in New York City and our trip to Munich, oh, and my evening with Michelle and the B-52s which is coming up soon…Kate and Bean are coming to Chicago for a visit! Spending time in the city with a youngster such as the smart, spunky, and adorable Bean is a much different experience from time in the city with teenagers (though just as fun!), and Kate and I have been e-mailing back and forth, trying to figure out how much we can pack in. Bean has her own idea, though, and you can read about it…elsewhere.…

  • Uncategorized

    Parting Is Such Sweet Sorrow

    Saying goodbye to Kate and her family was super tough, especially since Bean started saying goodbye to me on Monday evening. (I had arrived at their house on Saturday and wasn’t due to leave there until Wednesday evening!) Bean summoned me to her room–though her mom–so I could say goodnight to her up there. I walked into her mostly dark room and knelt down next to her bed. She said, “Melisa, I have something to tell you. I wanted my mom to tell you, but I am going to tell you myself, okay?” Wow, that sounded important. I said, “Sure! Go ahead; I’m listening.” She pulled the sheet up over…

  • Bean,  Too Funny To Ignore

    Dinner With A Five Year Old

    I took Bean to dinner at Red Robin last night, and although I had an extremely awesome list of interview questions for her to answer while we ate, the freestyle conversation was, as you might expect, way better. First of all, I have to tell you that Bean brought a weighted clip to Red Robin, so that when she got balloons from the hostess they wouldn’t make their way up to the ceiling, out of our reach. Is that preparation, or what??? We asked for her balloons on the way to the table (she wanted one for herself and one for her baby brother), promptly ordered our hamburgers and fries,…

  • Too Funny To Ignore

    Life With A Five-Year-Old

    It’s been a while since I’ve enjoyed the extended company of a five-year-old; to be exact, it’s been just about ten years (the younger boy turns fifteen next month!). I always enjoyed my kids at five, because they were such little people by that point. They were smart, they were talkative, and they were funny. I only arrived at Kate and Scott’s yesterday, but Bean has had me LOLing and ROFLing and LMAOing many times already. I asked Kate what time they are up in the morning usually, with Bean and the new baby, who has yet to get a nickname in real life (as far as I know) and…

  • Food,  Friends,  Too Funny To Ignore,  Travels

    Who Knew An Empty Bag Could Contain So Much Bad Ju-Ju??

    When my parents came up from Tennessee for Thanksgiving, they brought a big bag to me from Kate, which contained a few Yankee Candles I purchased from Bean during a preschool fundraiser (they’re getting those kids out earlier and earlier!). As I was taking the candles out of the bag, I noticed something in there that I didn’t expect: it was a quilted bag/purse that I had given to Kate two years ago. This bag is awesome. My aunt, who is a phenomenal quilter, gave me a couple of them and when I saw this particular one I knew I would have to give it to Kate because of the…