Simply Spring

By Megan

The weather caught up with the calendar this past week, and finally the kids and I could enjoy the yellow-blue prairie afternoon sun. For three days running, I opened my doors and stretched and blinked and climbed into the outdoors with my babies, their cheeks still creased from their warm flannel beds.

Peabody banged and squealed and bounced in his saucer as I helped Bean put on and take off and put on and take off her pink skates, her bright rainbow of elbow and knee pads, her bike helmet, her soft white cable-knit sweater. She held my hands tightly as I walked her up and down the rough driveway on those skates. She swung a red plastic bat at the light ball I pitched to her and kicked off her sparkly flip-flops to stitch out a crooked diamond home run on the lawn with her bare feet. She traced my bigger foot on the driveway in purple chalk – a meandering oval of a foot with five little stick toes, like a giant purple bear claw.

We laughed together, really laughed, and I saw in her eyes the exact feeling I felt in my heart.

Peabody bored of the saucer and I spread a striped towel on the grass – grass that was brown on Wednesday but by Friday glowed a brilliant green – and plopped him down on it, his legs splayed wide to form the sturdy base he needed for his pivoting investigation of everything around him. The neighbor-children came to sit by him. He smiled sheepishly at the attention. His sister hovered protectively, proud and only just barely willing to share him.

I sat and watched quietly as my son’s tiny winter world of Mama, Daddy and big sister began its own spring growth spurt.

The wind blew. The sun faded orange. The neighbor children vanished one by one, lifted away by the voices of those who love them best. Bean and I put away her bike, her skates, her brother’s toys. We gathered up shoes and jackets and the striped towel and disappeared again behind the blue door, those four precious cheeks uncreased and now bearing the freshest pink of a soft spring afternoon.

Megan also blogs at FriedOkra.

8 Responses to Simply Spring
  1. Courtney
    April 20, 2009 | 7:57 am

    I know how ya feel! It was beautiful for about 2 days straight here in good ole WV. 75* with a slight breeze and we made the most of it before the rain came back yesterday. The kids helped me weed the gardens and we played all day outside. It was a great few days!

  2. megryansmom
    April 20, 2009 | 1:49 pm

    Ahh yes and tomorrow there is SNOW in the forecast. Gotta love Chicago.

  3. Carrie of Ceaseless Praises
    April 20, 2009 | 3:15 pm

    So nice – this totally describes our joy in spring coming! This is the first season I’ve really been able to enjoy outdoors with my little one- he’s 16 months old, so last summer, he didn’t really care where he was. 🙂

  4. Becca
    April 20, 2009 | 3:23 pm

    This is beautiful Megan! 🙂 I love spring!

  5. Cheryl
    April 21, 2009 | 10:43 am

    AAAAhh!

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