presents

For her birthday, Leah's Aunt Juju, Uncle Will, and cousins Caroline and Jamesy sent her two wonderful books: The 101 Dalmations, and The Cricket in Times Square. To continue the weekend-long celebration, on Saturday we went with Nannah to a shop that sells toys, furnishings, and art, all handcrafted by senior citizens. Leah carefully chose two dogs -- Missy and Lucky -- and a wooden nightlight. Nannah also gave her a vintage autograph book and a musical card.

Now it's Sunday, and we're all feeling a tad lazy. The heat has returned, but earlier this morning, Neal and I managed to fill a wire egg basket with maypops and marigolds before heading back inside.

As I write, I'm watching the underbelly of a small lizard twist and turn on the windowscreen outside. In our old house, we once found a lizard in the bathroom windowsill, so we set up a habitat of sorts. We never captured it, but we placed some shallow dishes of water, a few sticks and shoots, some smooth stones, and small bits of fruit and insects in the windowsill. It seemed to enjoy sunning itself on the stones and disappearing into the bamboo.