Hibernation

I've been hibernating from the world for the past couple of weeks--hoping, I suppose, that when I poke my head out, both the world and I will be full of springtime warmth and goodness. Well, no luck on the first count, though the weak winter sun is enough to warm our kitchen a bit, even if it can't melt the snow outside. As for the second count, I have learned plenty of times before now that the advent of some anticipated date or event doesn't flip some internal switch that activates the good habits and noble character that are slow to accrue in me. I did not become perfect when I started college. I did not live the flawless life on my mission. I certainly didn't become the ideal student when I started graduate school. And somehow I don't even approximate the discipline and hard work of my mother, now that I am a mother myself. But, in the words of Theodore Roethke, "I learn by going where I need to go." So I can't hibernate forever and hope that I'll wake up as the exemplary person. I'll blunder into a serviceable life if I keep at it. It won't come any other way, at least. All of which reminds me of something that my sister Rachel told me. She learned it from her mission president. "If something is worth doing, it's worth doing badly." The inverse is also true, of course--if something is worth doing, it's certainly worth doing well. But if it's worth doing at all, it's also worth doing badly, partially, start-and-stoppedly until you can do it better. You can't simply not do it until you can do it well, otherwise we wouldn't be able to do anything that doesn't come to us naturally. So I'll do the things that are worth doing in any manner I can, and I'll try to do them frequently enough to get the practice that I need to do them better.

Well, I didn't intend for this to become a cliche-ridden pep talk. What I really wanted was to give some snippets of Sloan life from the past couple of weeks:

Polly has discovered our treasury of "Harold and the Purple Crayon," and she's enjoyed re-enacting some of the stories on our picture wall.

A trip to Olive Garden--it's always important to document the fun things we do, lest our children doubt that we actually did them, don't you agree?

We've had some little babies in our house recently, and Joshey has been very drawn to them. If I could handle it, would 12 months be the perfect sibling interval? (TOTALLY facetious question, since the first condition in that question would never be met)

A couple of weeks ago, we spent a VERY long afternoon traipsing from car dealership to car dealership trying to resolve some minor issues with our minivan. The kids were truly phenomenal over the course of the 6-hour adventure. As were the other customers who didn't mind the occasional preschooler sprawled out over the floor.