My mom, who is one of the few who reads my blog, told me this morning that I needed to update it because she was tired of facing my tornado story. This demand for update on a blog is, by the way, from a woman who didn't know what a blog was until about 2 1/2 years ago and who didn't own a computer until about 4 years ago. When she got the computer, she said she was only going to use it to look at the pictures we were posting of her first grandchild. Uh huh. Now she asks for blog updates and whizzes her way around the internet.

So what's been happening? Lots of things in our town, in the aftermath of the storm. I drove out to see what was left of Betsy's and Chris's house a few weeks ago, once the state police took down the roadblocks intended to keep out gawkers like me. I drove to see Betsy's house and then came home, so I don't know that I win a gawker's first prize.

By the time I saw where their home used to be, there was nothing left but the foundation and they were waiting for a report from an engineer to see if they were going to be able to rebuild on it--they are. They still hadn't drained the murky swimming pool in the backyard yet as of last week and because they can't see the bottom, they have no idea what might be in it. For all they know, there could be a car down there. They're not going to be able to safely garden in their yard for years, too, because of all the broken glass in the soil.

The 3-year-old, Erin, talks a lot about the poopy tormado (not tornado) that wrecked her house. Maddie, the 5-year-old, doesn't talk about it at all. She started kindergarten on schedule, though. They're going to be OK.

Allie started kindergarten on September 6 and she loves it. Last night, as she did last Friday night, she almost started to cry because she wasn't going to be able to go to school on Saturday. She's made new friends, including a little girl named Maddy (different girl than above) who sat at Allie's table at lunch every day and cried. Allie's nothing if not a sensitive soul, so I don't think she ate lunch for the first 7-8 days while she too tried not to cry.

Allie's not too crazy about hot lunch--she likes her daddy's sandwiches, made fresh every morning. She got to go on her first field trip yesterday, to a nature center, and she learned all about plants and bugs and saw a real tarantula. Allie did not want to touch any bug, by the way.

She's had gym class 5 times so far and all the games they play sound like they involve extensive running. She's had art a bunch of times and she's working on some project that she hasn't talked too much about. Allie likes music class, and she loves her reading buddy (reading with a 4th grader) which is once per week. She's already brought home three books from the school library (sequentially, they can only take out one at a time).

And she's doing great walking the three blocks from her bus stop to daycare, thank goodness. That was the thing Greg and I were the most stressed over. She's done it completely by herself at least a couple of times and she often walks at least part of the way with other kids. Now we can just start worrying about winter walking.

Meanwhile, Julia is doing just fine at daycare. She's talking in phrases all the time now. When I opened her window shade this morning, she saw a bird and called my attention to it, then spent a good 3-4 minutes telling me the bird was "Up, in da sky. Up, in da sky. Up, in da sky." Yes, I got that, Julia.

She hasn't bitten anyone in ages, knock on wood, but she does hit. I have to confess that I'm not going to worry about that. It's usually Allie and Allie usually deserves it. Now if she would just eat------ Well, I suppose she eats like a normal toddler, but that's not very much. The kid is still skinny and tall.

I got a raise last month, which is awesome, and we're spending a little less on daycare now. Pig, the cat, is still doing OK despite her diabetes, and the grass outside is actually greening up in places now that it's cooler. The newspaper said we should be giving our trees a drink, though, since it hasn't really rained in ages.

That's the update on our family and household. How are you doing?