THANK YOU!

Thank you three dearies for signing up, sight unseen, for whatever dreams may come. I did not mean to post much here, as I was just reserving the name---those four words burst out of my mouth one day in reference to my own Southern upbringing---a play on Dyed in the Wool, of course. Then I realized what I'd said, and signed up to Klep the blog title for myself. But your faith in my scribblings and your bright enthusiasm are precious gifts, and I'll not let them go unanswered.

I keep such lively young company several days a week, she who has embellished my world with Fifi the Flowertot and her milieu, as well as Bert and Ernie and Elmo the Red, and an entire new little being whose vocabulary grows by the leap. Sentences today, an entire Sportscast for my merely asking "What did YOU do this weekend?" at the breakfast table.

From her barely-two mouth, full of biscuit, came, "Soccer game. Em'ly run. Kick it, Em'ly, Kick it!"

The Monday night jock-touts would be PRAOUD. The estimable Em'ly is her cousin, whose five-year-old exploits will soon become the things of legend, methinks, as this little one adores and admires and emulates.

The days are full and rich and hold not nearly enough time, and on the spare days, I've been so wrapped up in populating that hazy place called Paxton, for what my Sis calls "Our Book" that nothing seems to come from my brain but the next weird or familiar (or both) person to live in the pages.

The folks jump around in my mind, one with money, one with faith, one with a gift for creating such beauty as to make your heart burst---they have quirks and errors and foibles all mingled with the hope of them, the possibilities. They're slowly coming to life, stumbling blinking into the dim light, and though I meant them for HERE, they spring up on daily posts in Lawn Tea, full-blown and with lives and minds of their own.

I thank you for your patience, and for checking in on my meanderings through Paxton and other foreign places so familiar and so real they want the telling and goad the words. As the dust piles grow, the laundry sends out an SOS, and the sinkful of last night's dishes languishes tepid and wet. And the noises through the monitor grow softer, as the Little One is lulled to sleep in her room with the open windows---I can hear the Autumn breeze and windchimes outside.

Moire non,

rachel