Various homeowner tasks were performed: garage cleaning, basement shelf sorting, tree limb tossing, and the finding of misplaced family history papers for the wife. The kids enjoyed the day, splitting it between stomping mud (the melting snow has us totally waterlogged), fishing around in that mud, and trawling the yard, Jawa-style, by dragging a dump truck on a rope and collecting bits of things. No R2 units with bad motivators were stumbled upon, although the dog has left unspeakable gifts.

"All water we find goes in this mudhole, because we love this mudhole."

The Youngest moved to her new two-wheeler today, now that the training wheels are mounted and she couldn't be happier. Although the lack of a basket (with flowers on it) on the handlebars was pointed out to me as an object lesson in my parental failings, I soldier on. She had only one fall into the ditch and plenty of other good fun. It was funny to see her pedaling around in wellies. Did I mention the mud?

The highlight of the day was the hanging of the Helmscene #82 in the basement. The "deer picture" as we call it, hung in my grandparents' and my great-grandparents' homes for years and I was the one lucky enough to score it as my inheritance. I'm sitting under the glow now, its fluorescent buzz soothing my scattered mind.