1. The Hawaiian Pom-Pom Crab.

2. Huge umbrellas that open with a loud floomf.

3. I like the phrase “gym shoes” but I hate gym shoes.

4. Generic-brand crackers that are like, “Thin Wheats” instead of Wheat Thins.

5. Waffles.

With spring comes the thunderstorms, the peeper frogs, and the habit Chris has of shaving the hair on his head down to (not even) half an inch.

1. Standing on a beautiful, empty beach for maybe 5 minutes, before the cold wind took me away.

2. Antique carousels.

3. Sandwiches with salsa.

4. Strawberry lip gloss.

5. Yesterday, I saw a guy driving a Mustang with the license plate “SPENDIT.” He was eating an ice cream cone (vanilla).

You know how when you have a pen that’s stopped writing, you shake it? (Or lick it, to revive a dried-up tip. Not a felt tip! Just ballpoint.)

Well, I use a Wacom tablet almost every day, to draw and color in illustrations. While it’s not the biggest and newest, I’m really comfortable with it. And sometimes I’ll be in the flow, finishing something up, when all of a sudden my computer will pause to render the latest line or color blob or whatever. In confused frustration, I always shake the Wacom pen as if it were a regular pen with low ink.

I do it all the time; I can’t help it.

1. Watching fat, fluffy clouds with straight-across bottoms float through the sky. They look like cartoons!

2. Making a whistle out of a blade of grass.

3. Lying on a soft blanket, on top of soft sand.

4. Smelling warm, damp pavement.

5. Slurping fruity popsicles.

New, sharpened pencils
Warm, damp pavement
Darkroom chemicals
Newspaper print
Boursin cheese
Chopped wood
Dusky cellars
Sugared fruit
Hair salons
Rye bread
Radishes

1. New desk chairs. Chris and I got matching ones because we’re twinsies.

2. To-do lists. There’s plenty to do and I need to stay occupied.

3. Bird nests. Look at how the hummingbird makes his.

4. The sound of new e-mails. For me, it’s the Submarine sound effect for Macs.

5. The smell of Easter lilies.

I haven’t been feeling too interesting lately, but I want to get a small post in before I update with another Grace in Small Things list on Thursday.

How do the people with popular weblogs do this stuff?

I think winter is trying to go ahead and gift me with a cold while it still can, because I stopped being its friend in March and it’s all mad at me about it. April and May are the months in spring that trigger my seasonal allergies, but since it hasn’t yet stopped snowing my body’s like, “Alright already, let’s just go for the cold! We’ll save the pollen reaction for later, as an encore!” Not like I’ll be buying tickets for this.

I also found out on Monday that I didn’t get the job I’d really wanted, which is of course deflating. I had to wait a really long time for the decision to be made, though, so the disappointment was already halfway realized. (But still…) (No… it’s okay.) I was going to write about my interview experience, which was truly very fun and not unlike Oz, but it doesn’t really matter now because I’m already on a new track and it feels pretty good. I just hope the Vitamin C will kick in soon, and spring weather, too.

1. Little girls who still draw horses and read books by L.M. Montgomery. I thought these were dying hobbies, for sure… but then on Sunday I actually saw two little sisters carrying their Green Gables books and pony-doodled drawing pads.

2. Grandpas. I never knew my own but I love when Chris talks about his. I’m glad I got to meet him.

3. The very nice airport security attendant who once assisted me when my bra set off the metal detector. She had to do her job and pat me down in that area, but she was gentle about it. That’s what I get for going the route of the extreme push-up.

4. My favorite bus driver, who always stops with the door right in front of me—even when other people are waiting. He’s not very talkative but he smiles all the time.

5. Kindergarten teachers who still recognize their students, years and years later.