I’ve referenced here many times how much Avery cracks us up: It’s not like she’s constantly telling jokes, but she’s a real ham (at home, at least) and constantly saying funny/witty things that leave me and Q shaking our head and laughing.

For example, I recently discovered a huge pile of the girls’ clothes sitting on their closet floor. Upon my discovery, even before I could ask them to hang everything up, Avery sighed and said, “I knew this day would come.”

Another time, not long after she was sick for a few days, I told her, “Now that you’re feeling better you have to clean up this room.” Avery’s reply? “Cough, cough.”

On a playground not long ago I saw her mumbling (I thought to herself). She saw me looking at her, walked over and casually said, “Yeh, I might have just been talking to that bird.”

She’s also very dramatic: “You don’t understand how hard it is to be a child with someone always telling you want to do,” she told me one night last week. “I just want freedom!” (This is in reaction to me asking her to empty the dishwasher.)

And, she has her own (modern) way of expressing herself. “That picture of Maddie is so cute!” Zoe commented about a photo on my phone one day. “Hashtag I know, right,” Avery chimed in.

-M

For her big birthday Avery had a small party. The party had a hotel theme, and at this resort the guests made slime (the girls are obsessed!), played Roblox (another one of Avery’s favorite things), enjoyed a donut “cake” and gorged on pancakes the next morning. Not a bad way to usher in the tween years, huh?

-M

As a start-of-summer-vacation treat recently, we got Icees for the girls. Avery was particularly excited; “This is the best gas station I’ve ever been to!” she said after her first sip.

-M

“You know how you always say I’m a handful?” Avery said to me during bedtime last night. “Well, after tomorrow I’ll be two handfuls!” (ha ha)

Happy Birthday to my sweet, sassy (and, yes, funny) baby. Welcome to the double digits.

-M

Avery, to her sister last night: “I just had a really long day, and I thought it would be fun to play with you. But this is very stressful.” (They were playing with slime, and I’m not sure how that could be stressful; alas…)

-M

Just like that, we have two middle schoolers. Yesterday was the last day of school, and the girls will soon be heading to fifth and seventh grades.

To celebrate the last day I took the girls and a friend to tea at Lovejoy’s Tea Room, a classic San Francisco spot. “I’m in heaven,” Avery commented when she bit into a petit four; I personally loved the scone and lemon curd!

-M

Zoe has babysat before but Avery recently got her first paying job: Our neighbors asked the girls to watch their house and check on/feed their cats and fish while they were in Tahoe. The girls had a blast doing it, and they wound up spending quite a bit of time over there last weekend playing with the cats. Below, Avery is reading – and enjoying some goldfish crackers – with the one they nicknamed “Buddy.”

-M

I’ve always been very sentimental (I get it from my dad) and, as a kid, I usually got sad when each school year closed. (I wish my mom was here to confirm it; she has stories!) Turns out Zoe is pretty similar to me in that regard: She’s said more than once how sad she is about sixth grade coming to a close. Despite a few bumps, she loved the year – her classes, her advisory group, the stuff she did with friends – and she said it will be tough to go a whole summer without being at school.

“It just went so fast – it seems like just yesterday that sixth grade was starting,” she said the other night. “Doesn’t it seem like the more you like something the faster it goes?” Indeed…

-M

Something sad recently happened in the family: Coco, Sandy’s dog, died. Coco was a big part of our family: My parents loved him, so much so that we included a mention of their “granddogs” in the obituary, and the girls spent time with him every time we visited Madison. (If you search “Coco” on this blog you’ll see lots of photos – including one of my all-time faves below.) I also have tons of happy, pre-kids memories of Coco; the first time I met him was the summer before Q and I got married, when I flew home for my wedding shower.

After losing our parents, most other sad events/losses will pale in comparison. But anyone who has had a dog (especially one that lived as long as Coco did) knows what an integral part of the family they are and can imagine how hard this loss is for Sandy. I know she’s comforted, though, by the thought of him being with our parents; I like to think of him happily bouncing around on our dad’s freshly cut grass up there.

-M

Remember those end-of-year activities that I mentioned? Also on the schedule was the school’s spring concert – and we snapped this shot as the kids all marched in.

-M