house and home

Charlie recently pulled out our 4-sided measuring stick to record the children's heights. We've been charting this information since they were newborns and it's incredible to see how much they've grown...

This is the current tally:

• William = 4'1"

• Elizabeth = 3'11"

• Carolyn = 4'5"

• Henry = 3'6"

Charlie's is the shortest of his three brothers at 6'1".

I'm the second shortest of my five sisters at 5'7".

While Charlie and I aren't exceptionally tall, there are some very tall genes in the mix as represented by our niece, Alice, who is 6'2". When we recently saw Emily - who is an even six feet - we learned that when she was our children's ages, she was the same size as Elizabeth. What this means is that Carolyn, who is currently six inches taller than her sister, very well might surpass me in height by the time she's 10, and Charlie by the time she's 12.

Seeing how much they've grown certainly helps me to understand why we're spending an obscene amount of money on food (and shoes and clothes) these days. And I know that their food consumption is only going to go UP. Already, on any given day, they'll consume an average of one gallon of milk, a half gallon of orange juice, one loaf of bread, eight cups of cereal, 64 ounces of yogurt and five pounds of fresh fruit. As for me, I'm the scavenger that lives off their uneaten scraps and has been wearing the same pair of running shoes for two years.

Motherhood: It's a glamorous life.