Party hardy

We had five social events this weekend -- which is five more than usual for our family. But, as a mark of how my little family is growing up, everyone hung in there, had a great time, partied and, except for one teeny blowout on the way to b-day party #2 on Saturday, there were no tears, fits, or temper tantrums.

A even made it through Mass on Sunday -- a whole month of church for my little guy. It was so nice to be there as a complete family.

We've been media free for over one week now and we've really seen a huge difference in the kids -- even D who had always watched some TV. They are playing with each other more and really using their imaginations. At dinner last night (Taco Night!) I was describing "The Amazing Race" to D and she totally got into it. After dinner both kids spent an hour tearing through the house doing "challenges." At one point, D was dragging him along by the arms and when I stopped to ask what she was doing she said she was helping him out of the icy river that they'd been swimming in for five miles.

On the downside, things aren't quite as clean and tidy as I usually keep them and the laundry room looks like someone's camping in there. I've also been cooking more e-z things like mac n' cheese, spaghetti, quesadillas, basically cheese. A doesn't like sharing me with anyone or anything, so unless he's being distracted I really don't have time to cook like I used to. And there's only so much roast chicken one family can eat. Which leads me to this week's conundrum: anyone know where I can order surf n' turf for two to be delivered on Thursday? It's our Ninth Anniversary and I'd like to do something special but will probably opt for the mail-order kind of special instead of the cook-it-yourself-then-clean-up-until-ten-o'clock kind of special.

My dream menu:
Gazpacho with garlic croutons
Surf n' turf
Buttermilk mashed potatoes
Sauteed green beans with mushrooms
Bananas foster

I didn't. Did you?

I didn't watch the VP debate last night. Instead M & I spent the evening watching the Mel Gibson classic "Tequila Sunrise" and making snarky MST3000-type comments. And folding laundry. And trapping the few remaining cats.

Was it socially irresponsible of me not to watch? I have decided who I'm voting for and I doubt whatever I heard last night was going to change my mind. I think both parties have a share of the blame in the current mess, but I don't think that Obama's plan is going to fix anything, other than the short-term agendas of a few special-interest groups. I think the bailout has to happen, but I don't like it or agree with it. The way I see it, it's kinda like when you're a struggling student and you have to hit mom & dad up for a loan to cover your rent. But guess what? The reason you're short in the first place is because you spent the money on BEER. (True story. Sorry mom & dad.) But you learn from your mistakes, as we are now. I don't care what you want, or what the "American Dream" is, you don't get to own a house, or have a credit card, or buy nice things just because you want them. Those are things you have to earn by working hard and saving your money and not buying stupid stuff you can't afford to pay for all by yourself. (If you want to buy stupid stuff you can afford, check out the dollar bins at Target.) And there are a whole lot of people trying to get into office right now who's policies reek will create an even bigger class of people looking for entitlements and handouts. I grew up in a socialist country (not America). It wasn't pretty.

I'm talking about a government who will happily take MY tax dollars to support programs that shouldn't exist in the first place.

I'm voting for the person that will be in the best interest for MY family. You should vote for yours.

This is my Friday Rant. I'm up to my eyeballs in Daisies, and birthday parties and Jr. League stuff. And we are keeping A "media free" right now so my blog time (and blog-reading time) is minimal. I'm sure I'll post sometime next week, but don't worry if things are a bit quiet 'round these here parts for a bit.

Over the hump

Two days to the weekend.

Not easy keeping up with things these days. A definitely has me on the move -- I think it's a boy thing. And even though M & I have never really enforced any gender-specific things with the kids, they chose their boyness and girlness all on their own. This afternoon D was playing Cheerleader while A played Iron Giant. I sat on the couch and tried to play both. But at least dinner wasn't a total nightmare. A only ate a handful of grapes, but at least he wasn't screaming. I think the trick is to wear him out completely. We were at the zoo for four hours today and he never stopped running. Tomorrow I might take him to the beach and see if that works too.

All this activity is bad for housework (I'm still doing Laundry at 10:00! Yikes.) and bad for any downtime during the day, but if it is good for A and helps him get back on an even keel then we'll work through the rest.

I don't like lizards. At all.

Hey, lizards. If you persist in coming into the house I will persist in killing you. One by one or all at once, it doesn't matter to me. You saw what we did with the cats, right? You know we don't fool around when it comes to getting rid of vermin.

And also? Why do we always, always, always have at least one or two get in on the days when M is out of town?! I think I have a permanent case of the heebie-jeebies. Ugh.

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. A

A has been working himself into the Terrible Twos and although he's shown all the classic symptoms like independence, separation anxiety, clinginess, crying jags, stubbornness and so on, for the most part he's been his usual agreeable self. Except for the last week, when all of us a sudden every meal time has become an all out battle of wills. We've tried serving him whatever we're having, asking him what he'd like (but only giving two healthy-ish choices), and on Sunday M decided to see what would happen if we just let him graze and eat whatever and whenever he wanted. All three options had the same result: the minute he sits down to eat he throws a temper tantrum. We remove him from the table. He cries til he throws up. He calms down. He comes back to the table. He pitches another fit. We remove his food. He goes hungry. Until the next meal and it starts all over again. It's a little bit worse if I'm trying to eat too, but that's not saying much because it's downright horrible. So, in addition to trying to deal with his finicky eating, we're also having to deal with a huge meltdown at every meal.

We've tried talking to him about it in advance, talking to him when he's sitting down, holding him while it happens, getting angry and putting him in another room, but the end result is the same: he doesn't eat. It makes me want to cry, because after it's all over he invariably comes up to me and says "Love, Mommy?" which is his way of requesting a hug. I don't think he wants to act this way, he just can't help it.

We were willing to chalk it up to his cold for a while, but I know he's almost over it now and he doesn't have any problem eating snacks like Cheerios, graham crackers, Goldfish or fruit. It's just mealtime. Do we just give up for now, let him snack and trust that he'll start eating meals again? Do we stick with serving him and try to work through the crying? Do we all eat separately? I'm at my wits end here, so anyone out there dealing with mealtime tantrums, PLEASE let me know what you think!!

Of Saturday, sao bao and scones

Take that, cat people. With the sudden, welcome and blissful arrival of Fall we've been spending a lot of our free time enjoying our beautiful CAT FREE porch and yard. Hooray! No more smell of cat pee! No little "presents" in the yard! It kind of makes all the hassle worth it. Especially since Neighbor Man came over and had a heart-to-heart with M and privately thanked him. (I guess she was spending a pretty penny on cat food.) Then Crazy Cat Neighbor Lady came over to thank us too! And apologize! All's well that end's well and hopefully the joke won't be on us when we're overrun with fruit rats or something.

So Saturday morning I made a batch of spiced apple & cranberry cream scones, heated up some sao bao (Chinese steamed buns) and we turned off the cartoons and forced took the kids outside to play: pirate ship, ahoy!, croquet, buggy races, spot the garden snakes and other assorted porch/yard games. If the humidity stays low we may even head to the beach after Mass tomorrow.

Yummy scones:

Everyone loves sao bao!



Daddy likes the scones




Playing in the yard

Finding my happy place

We decided to take A to the doctor yesterday morning as he's been up 5-8 times per night since June Sunday and then he woke up with a fever. When I went in to get him you could feel the heat pouring out of his crib from the doorway of his room. Turns out poor baby has a raging ear infection, a sinus infection and a sore throat (not strep at least). Yay Zithromax! He's to rest quietly for a day or so -- fat chance-- so we're out for playgroups and stuff this week. He's eating even less than usual, so while normally I wouldn't encourage him to graze, I am OK with it for a few days. Yesterday he ate a bowl of cereal with milk, about half a bowl of cereal with no milk, a cracker or two and water (and Zithromax). He turned down: waffles, watermelon, pb&j, cookies, jell-o and applesauce. He's the pickiest eater ever. Ever. Have I mentioned he's a vegetarian who won't eat vegetables? Not even corn. And it's worse when he's sick. Amazingly, he seems to get all the nutrition he needs from cereal and peanut butter and the occasional bite of fruit.

So, after my mini-rant about needing a break, I am cheerfully! gratefully! bi-polarly! back on the happy trail. Today, I am (tiredly) thinking about being a mom and the constant juggling act that involves. Don't even get me started on what it takes to juggle the house and meals, because these days I'm of the mind that I only need to really, really clean up if someone is coming over. You show up unannounced and you'll be tripping over toys and shoes and homework papers with the rest of us. I supposed I could've spent an hour cleaning this morning, but A wanted to play "throw the balls in the laundry basket" and you know what? So did I.

Mama needs a break, v. 43309

Last night was the first night I've seen/talked to M since Sunday. Have I mentioned that he's been traveling a lot lately? Yeah, well he has. And will continue to for the immediate future as all of his cases are busy right now and they're all out of town. Hooray?! I guess with the economy the way it is, we should be grateful and thankful he has a job. (Which I am.)

Anyway, the "funny" part comes when I mentioned to him last night that we have an extraordinarily busy weekend coming up whereby the universe has conspired to line up D's first Daisy event of the year as well as two birthday parties for the children of very good friends. Luckily the universe also saw fit to schedule the events at totally different times so we'll actually be able to attend all three events -- I would simply need M's help to get A to Party #1 while I drive D down from the Daisy event. No biggie, right? I'm talking about a difference of maybe15 minutes. Well, lets just say the reaction was less than positive -- you would have thought I'd asked him to watch the kids for a week while I went to the Ritz. His first reaction to anything, if I ask for help, is to say "why don't you just skip it?" So, I can totally see myself schlepping the kids all alone, all day. The lemonade part to that is that the kids will be totally into the parties and I might actually have some quality girl-talk time.

But, a bit of a break would be nice, even if it is just 15 minutes. Maybe when the kids are older? When they can do their own homework? And don't get sick every other week (I'm looking at you, A!) and aren't up all night? I can wait.

What did she say?

Three of D's first grade "electives" are Spanish, Music and Religion. So it was no surprise when she came home singing the popular Spanish hymn "Envia tu Espiritu". It was a surprise to hear that God has a "frosted tiara." Actual line: "la faz de la tierra."

Thank you, Google, for clearing that up!

However, I think we're stuck with her beauty pageant-esque interpretation for a while.

(This one is almost as good as her line from "Our God is an Awesome God" when "with wisdom, power and love" became "whizz down pal on us.")

First day of Fall

Well I do declare. The first day of real Fall weather fell unusually close to the actual first day of Fall. This morning brought not only much, much lower humidity, but actual cool air. I think it was only 72 when I took D to school. Why, that's practically sweater weather! And chili weather! And stew weather! And baking weather! Yay! Plus you know it must be Fall when Target starts to sneak the Christmas stuff in. There were a whole bunch of cards and wrapping supplies right between the Autumn/Harvest and Halloween displays.

I'll draw the line at Christmas decorations, but I could not resist buying apple cider and caramel apple stuff and even some teeny-tiny hard as rock pears at the grocery.

A friend of a friend of a friend...

Because I read so many blogs and then, on days when I have time, I read the blogs that those bloggers read and sometimes I follow links to other blogs because someone made an interesting comment and, if I end up with more spare time, then I'll comment on those blogs, and so you end up with this funny electronic "paper" trail (I don't know the real blogger term for this phenomenon) and you end up with this six degrees of separation feeling from all the other wonderful bloggers out there. Does this make sense? If not, it's because I've been up since 4:00. Anyway.

Once in a while I'll read something on a blog that is so moving, so incredible that I say to myself, "Self, you lazy thing, you should post this on your blog, and maybe someone reading your blog will go read their blog and be moved by their story too!" And then the baby wakes up or something and I'll forget about it. But not today:




If you want the full story you're going to have to dig a bit after the click, but basically CJane's sister, NieNie, who has a popular "mommyblog" of her own, was in a horrible plane crash a few weeks ago. NieNie and her husband are in critical condition and will be hospitalized for months because of their burns. CJane (and the rest of Nie's family) has taken in 3 of Nie's 4 young children to raise and take care of and be a surrogate mother to them while their parents recover. You may have heard/seen this before in the blogosphere and it's been all over the morning shows, but I still thought it worth posting about. Because, although I don't know them, I wish I did. It is an incredible story of an incredible family. Go read. And get some tissues.

Fry-day

I'm fried. Tired. Frazzled. Both kids up at 5:30 this morning. D wanted to make a card for her teacher! At 5:30! Awww, how sweet! Now go back to sleep. A up multiple times for water. The kid's a camel, I tell ya. I just want everyone, but especially me, to sleep through the night. Please. Pretty please.

But there was a small compensation for the early rising, and not just that I didn't have to nag D constantly to hurry up. It's also because this morning Fall was in the air (shhhh, don't jinx it!) Just enough to lower the humidity, if not the temperature. Just enough to make the walk to school pleasant, not a trip to the steam room. Just enough to make me say ahhhh, not ugggh.

And in an unprecedented move, we're getting a sitter and going out tonight. Usually, we only go out once/month. And usually on a Saturday. We're supposed to be going to a baseball game with M's law firm, but I have a feeling we might show for a bit then ditch out to go eat tapas and enjoy the nice weather. My biggest problem right now is what the heck to wear because I truly hate all my clothes. Except for the cute new tops I got at ATLoft last month, but I've already worn them all over the place so I'm getting that "I can't wear that again feeling.

Okey-dokey. A is incredibly cranky from lack of sleep and I've got housework to do. So I'll leave you with this:




Have a great weekend!

The drama-mamas

By unspoken agreement and mutual consent, most of the parents who handle morning drop-off at D's school are dressed down. Waaaaay down. We're talking one step up from jammies, hair in a ponytail (or hat), make-up totally optional. Those that stay home are dressed to return there. Those that work are dressed tastefully for work. We are, after all, a parochial school and there are men and women of the cloth about.

But, as in all situations, there are a choice few who choose to flaunt the norm. They edge right up to the line of modesty and good taste and stand there, proudly, screaming "LOOK AT ME! ME! MEEEEEE!" to the short-n-tshirt clad masses. They talk loudly about how plastered they got this past weekend. The laugh loudly and inappropriately at nothing. They flirt with each other, your husband and the PE coach. They talk about you while you're talking about them. They are the Drama-mamas.

Up until this year, the main object of my amused fascination in the morning was a woman I'll call Sport. The mother of two girls, she has sported just about every trend or fashion that they'd see on MTV or maybe even E!TV. She is clearly dressing to attract attention, to fuel drama and maybe even controversy, a strategy that is clearly working well for her given the cluster of people around her in the mornings. Thigh-high boots? Check. Orangey over-tanned body with mismatched face? Check. Mini-skirt? Check. Full makeup and hair with work out clothes? Check. To her, tight, revealing, flashy and inappropriate are good things. (Granted, she has both the attitude and bod to carry off these things. Who knows? If I looked like her I'd probably show up wearing a bikini and stilletos, carrying a coffee mug filled with vodka.)

This year Sport has some competition for the main Drama-mama at school. A new Mama is in town. We'll call her the Bond Girl. Tall, starved to willowy perfection, sculpted (think knives, not weights), Botoxed and so shiny she looks like a penny. Her large blonde bouffant doesn't move, her make-up never runs, her teeth are impossibly white and large, her heels are so high she needs supplemental oxygen. I don't know where she was the first few weeks of school -- sunning on some gorgeous South Pacific island? couldn't bear to close up the summer place in Cote d'Azur? -- because I just noticed her this week and there's no way I could have overlooked her up 'til now. Naturally she has drawn some of the minor satellites orbiting Sport, but so far there has been no obvious sign of competition other than an ever-so-slight uprise in bouffant height and a slight increase in volume. So far she's stuck to a uniform of high-heels, unbelievably tight designer jeans and either tank tops or shiny wrap tops. Perhaps she had to assess the competition before breaking out the minis? Perhaps her thigh-high boots are out for re-heeling after a busy summer trampling on others? Perhaps she'll trump Sport's wardrobe of skintight sheath dresses and go straight for evening wear?

Luckily, I shall be able to observe and report all of the Drama for you from my nearly-invisible position amongst the other normally dressed moms and dads. I wonder who will up the ante first?

Gratituesday

In keeping with my theme of Upbeat! Cheery! Laid Back! this week, here are the things that I'm grateful for today:

1) That my reliance on PBS as a babysitter has not seem to affected A's mental health or vocabulary development(yet)
2) That my kids are healthy
3) That only two of the five members of my household coat everything with drool (hint: one is the dog)
4) That we currently have two working a/c systems in these hot, horrible, humid Florida months. Even though the electricity bills make me cry.
5) That my children are curious, happy, intelligent and well-mannered, despite the occasional meltdown, hissyfit or screaming match
5) That we can afford to buy food, whether anyone eats it or not. BTW, I will never, ever make casseroles again. M hates them, the kids hate them. I don't care how quikneasy they are. It doesn't save me any time if I have to go make a whole other meal for everyone not eating the damn casserole. My most recent attempt, a chicken spaghetti casserole, featured chicken, pasta and cheese, three usually tolerated -- if not beloved -- ingredients (and this was a Pioneer Woman recipe. Everyone loves PW! What gives?) It was deemed: yucky, crunchy but gooey, too oniony, not good, tenkyoumommyNONONONO, great! and yummy, thanks I'll have seconds. The eaters were: myself, M, sister Debbie, Debbie's Roommate Kari, and the kids. Guess who said what?

Our Parish's sister church is on the little island of La Gonave, Haiti. They are desperately poor, have no electricity and are almost completely dependent on food and supplies brought over from the mainland. Because of the recent string of hurricanes, Haiti itself is being cut off from the world and food is almost non-existent. On La Gonave, they have lost their entire avocado crop and this means almost certain starvation for many. When they can get food, the staple dish on La Gonave is a concoction of rice, beans and oil. At Mass on Sunday, we were encouraged to partake of a similar meal (or fast) on Fridays for the rest of the year and donate the difference in what we would have paid to eat out or have meat or butter or ice cream or whatever to our church's Partners with Haiti ministry. It may be a bit of a hard sell for my family, but I feel led by Gratitude to at least try it this week.

Say no to the mope

M is out of town on bidness for two days and so last night I got the kids to bed and was getting set to indulge in a What Not to Wear marathon (from my DVR'd collection that I keep in case of emergency or absent hubby) when I stumbled on a 9/11 documentary on the History Channel. It was a series of "man on the street" videos taken by real people and it was very moving. Afterward I vowed that from hereafter, I was going to say NO to the mope. Life is just too short. And although I'm aware that I'm very blessed in many aspects of my life, I am, by nature, fairly impatient and I know I be abrupt in my dealings with the kids, M, house, etc. I also tend to lose my shit pretty easily when people don't respond with as much alacrity as I'd like or when certain children start pushing my buttons. But I'd like to change all that. So. No more moping, pity parties, rolling of eyes, sighing, muttering under my breath, clenching of teeth, barking of orders (esp. for tasks like teeth brushing, but I'll reserve the right when it comes to homework), cynical epithets, clanging of utensils, and other myriad and sundry overt and subtle expressions of my inherent impatience. Instead, we're going to try for laid-back, sunny, cheerful, easy-going, kind and loving.

I do reserve the right to keep a secret stash of chocolate goodies hidden for my own private consumption during moments such as:

1) having to holler up the stairs for the nineteenth time that we're going to be late for school
2) the repeated punching or kicking of siblings
3) the ongoing battle over dividing the living room couch into "his side/her side" (for the kids, not M & I)
4) tuning out petty bickering
5) children who refuse to eat a meal, beg to be excused from the table and then request a snack five minutes later
6) kicking myself for procrastinating driving to Tampa to get necessary forms for upcoming Daisy registration meeting
7) crying jags that last longer than 5 minutes and that invariably end with someone throwing up
8) waking p at 5:30 after being woken up every half hour from 2:00 until 5:00 to: get water, find blankies, talk about bad dreams or fish fallen stuffed animals out from under beds/cribs

Today is the first day of the rest of my life.

Call to arms

Well, it looks like not everyone used yesterday as a day of peaceful reflection and remembrance.

One of our neighbors told us this morning that yesterday the E.A.A. circulated a nasty, untruthful, catty (haha!) email to the neighborhood association members about us "trapping our neighbor's pet cats!" Totally made us out to be the bad guys. Practically made it sound as if we went onto her property with a net.

Well. You really have to work to get me angry, because it's just not one of my go-to emotions. But, this..person... who accosted my husband, yelled at him, lied to him, gave a false name to the Animal Control Officer (because she herself harbors several feral cats), lied about where she works, and then DARES to accuse us unjustly in a public forum. Well, my first rebuttal email was not worthy of my education or upbringing. Instead M & I will bring our full intellectual powers to bear on the matter and craft an exquisite, pointed rejoiner informing one and all of our stance, reminding everyone of the law in our area (hubby is not an attorney for nothing!) and challenging others who are also disgusted by the cat problem here to rise up and do something about it. I am not afraid to use my real name (except on this blog).

I gather all peaceful solutions to the problem are not going to work. May I remind the EAA, my neighbor and all their feral-cat-loving friends, that we have twice talked the county out of fining her cat-feeding ass and that we have talked and talked and talked about this problem with them and NO ONE has done anything about it. Except us.

God Bless America*

Where were you seven years ago?

M & I were actually flying. To San Francisco. We got stopped in Dallas, TX. We landed just after the second plane hit and I remember no one from the flight crew said a word as we got off the plane. They just asked us to check at the information desks. Not knowing anything had happened, I didn't notice if they looked upset or worried or confused. But the airport was a different story - all the TV monitors were tuned to those horrible images from NY and people everywhere were talking and trying to get the story straight (no one knew about the Pentagon or United 93 yet.) M & I immediately called our parents to let them know we were OK and that we'd call them from San Francisco when we got there (ha!) We watched our world change completely sitting in an airport TGIFridays. When the towers fell I cried and cried as did most of the people around us. Thank God I was there with M and we were not traveling alone, as we so often did back in the those busy, two-career, pre-kid days.

Because the company I worked for had offices in the WTC, I called some of my co-workers to see if they had heard if people had been able to get out and I cried some more when I realized that some hadn't.

We were in Dallas for a week. The sense of community was incredible. Everywhere we went people wanted to talk about what had just happened to us as a country and what was going to happen next and who exactly was this Osama bin Laden guy and what the heck is Al Qaeda?! It was a total crash course - one that was probably overdue - on Middle East affairs, Islam and terrorism. I still remember how eerie is was to not see any planes flying at all that week. On Friday, Delta was finally able to send us back to Florida. The Dallas airport was filled with quietly nervous passengers - everyone eyeing up their fellow travelers - and battalions of heavily armed men. They must have been military, but I just remember the huge guns. The flight was almost completely silent - there was no drink or snack and the flight attendants didn't even walk around. You could feel the tension. A man right across the aisle from us looked ready to spring into action; you could tell he wasn't going anywhere without a fight.

Delta got us into West Palm Beach (I forget why Tampa wasn't an option) and we rented a car to drive back to St. Petersburg. We stopped at my parents' in Naples first and it was such a relief to see my family. I'm so grateful for each day we have together.

This morning at the morning opening at D's school (we call it Flag for short), the administration had a beautiful ceremony - the kids sang God Bless America, we all said the Pledge of Allegiance, we prayed the Hail Mary, and then Taps was played as the Flag was lowered to half-staff. We are blessed to be able to send D to a school where these liberties are not taken for granted and where we are raising a generation of responsible, aware and committed children who will not be afraid to continue to stand up for the principles and beliefs on which this country was founded and who will grow up to lead and protect future generations.

*I originally titled this post "A moment of silence." I like this title better.

Tuesday dilemmas

1) A rejected the Big Boy Bed in no uncertain terms. Even though it's a toddler bed, so we used the same mattress, sheets, blankets, stuffed friends etc. that he had in the crib. Even though he spent the afternoon bouncing on it, crawling on it, showing D how he could climb up. Even though he said he'd sleep there. Even though we did the exact same routine bedtime that we've done since he was born: bath, stories, prayers, lullaby. When we went to tuck him in, he climbed right back out and said "Me no sleep Big Boy Bed. Sleep me crib." And he hasn't tried to climb out at all. Although the Big Boy Bed frame is still in the corner of his room. I'm sure he'll tell us when he's ready.

2) I'm finally on the last of the hundreds of Swiffer WetJet supplies (pads, cleaner) I bought last December when we realized how dirty the previous owners left the house. The problem ended up being so bad that Swiffer couldn't handle it and it was only after months of careful hand cleaning, mopping, etc. with real mops and cleansers that our wonderful house cleaner was able to finally get our 3000 sq ft of beautiful pine floors clean. But now I'm back to cleaning myself, which means that I use a vacuum/Swiffer combo most of the time and save the heavy artillery for once-a-month in depth cleaning. (NOTE TO PREVIOUS OWNERS: That is how you keep your floors clean!) So. My dilemma? I really don't think Swiffers work that well on wood floors, not to mention ancient linoleum kitchen floors. But the real mop/bucket thing is so time consuming and a lot of my time is already consumed. Do I stick with the routine and restock my Swiffer stuff? Does anyone have a better solution? Helloooooo out there....

3) The nightly homework thing is kicking my ass. I didn't realize that in first grade they'd have nightly homework (usually a reading, writing and math sheet). I think it's great from an academic POV, but from a mom POV, it is HARD. Most likely this is a temporary gripe and we'll get used to the routine and I'll think of things for A to do that don't involve watching TV while I'm helping D with her work. And I'm still trying to get in a half-hour of reading with each of them before bedtime. If only they read the same books! But A is into Richard Scarry and Russell the Sheep and D is reading Roald Dahl and Ivy & Bean. I'm thinking of moving D's bedtime from 7:30 to 8, but that means she's getting less than 11 hours of sleep.... and she's a kid who really needs her sleep.

4) If the govt. was really interested in economic stimulus, they'd send another round of checks to all the SAHMs out there. I think we bought a bunch of saws or drills with the last one and the rest got saved. I've got some better ideas...

OK. Time to get to the grocery.

The great cat round-up

Update: After sending the two we trapped yesterday to Animal Control and having to listen to Cat Lady's hysterics (not to mention her friend, the Earnest Animal Activist (EAA)) all day, we finally came to an arrangement: they have 10 days from today to round up the strays and take them to whatever shelter or home they can find. (Most likely they'll end up in EAA's "garage" where there are reportedly at least 12 strays living right now.) Anyway, as long as they are off our property. After 10 days, if we still see signs that cats are using our yard as a litter box and/or hairballs on the furniture, then we will immediately resume trapping. Cat Lady started to complain, "What if you trap some of my cats?" To which I replied, "We won't be trapping the ones you feed if you do as you say and get them to shelters." I could tell she didn't like it, but we can't think of another way to get her to stop feeding the strays. OF COURSE when we suggested not feeding them, or adopting them properly and keeping them inside she had a whole list of reasons why that just wasn't possible. Excuses, excuses. Not once were they even willing to listen to how horrible it was for us to smell cat urine every time we walked outside. Or how the backyard is covered in poop. Or how we can't get furniture for the porch because the cats will destroy it. I can't tell you how utterly disgusted I am with the situation. And, in case you don't know me, I LOVE animals. Our whole family does. And I'm sickened by the irresponsibility of others that has forced us to take such drastic action and alienate our neighbors. I'm even more sickened by Cat Lady & EAA's attitude that, somehow, the cats have more rights than we, the property-tax paying homeowners, do.

But, I want this for our front porch and it's not going to happen as long as the cats are around:

Cat people

After nine months of trying to work it out with the Cat Lady next door, we finally put her on warning last month that we were going to start trapping any cats that came into our yard. We got our first two this morning! Woohah! So, she may finally have got the message that we are going to call her bluff and that she better do something about them. Meanwhile, we have high hopes that our yard will no longer be used as a litter box, that we won't find hairballs all over the porch furniture and that they'll stop spraying our landscaping. But at the very least the litter box and hairball thing. We've been reluctant to invest in porch furniture that is going to be crapped on by 15 feral cats.

The nice animal control officer who came to get the beasts (over her tears and complaints, of course) was extremely upset with her, explained the county ordinance, etc. We talked him out of fining her (not that she thanked us) but hopefully she'll take heed from now on. Or not. She's a nutter for sure.

Read this, not that

With my hectic SAHM schedule packed with kids, playdates, school stuff, Jr. League stuff, Daisies, house stuff, etc. I simply don't have time to be in a formal - or even informal - book club. But I read a lot and all kinds of genres, styles, fiction, non-fiction, etc. Although I don't usually read biographies. But, if you ask me, I'm happy to recommend a book that will suit any occasion, mood, theme, interest. Here are a select few favorites from the last few years, in no particular order:

People of the Book, Geraldine Brooks
Post-Birthday World, Lionel Shriver
In the Woods, Tana French
Invention of Hugo Cabret, Brian Selznick
The Road, Cormac Mccarthy
House of Sand and Fog, Andre Dubus III
Water for Elephants, Sara Gruen
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, Barbara Kingsolver*
Don't Lets Go to the Dogs Tonight, Alexandra Fuller
1000 Splendid Suns, Khaled Hossini
Time Traveler's Wife, Audery Niffeneger
A Fine Balance, Rohinton Mistry
A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
Waiting, Ha Jin
Falling Leaves, Adeline Yen Mah
Memoirs of a Geisha, Arthur Golden

And some of my fave authors:
JRR Tolkien - The Hobbit, Lord of the Rings
CS Lewis - The Narnia Series**
James Herriot - All of his wonderful books***
David Mitchell - Black Swan Green, Ghostwritten, Cloud Atlas
Michael Chabon - Summerland, Final Solution, Yiddish Policeman's Union, et al.
Sandra Gulland - The Josephine series
Ken Follett - Pillars of the Earth, World Without End
Roald Dahl - James & the Giant Peach, Matilda, BFG, Fantastic Mr. Fox
JK Rowling - Harry Potter series

And some kids books that you won't mind reading too:
Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
Nutshell Library - Maurice Sendak
Moomintroll books - Tove Jannson
Ivy & Bean series - Anne Barrows (I think - don't have time to confirm)
Little House on the Prairie series
Cricket in Times Square
Frog & Toad, Mouse Tales - Arnold Lobel
Black Beauty, Anna Sewell****
Nancy Drew series

Next on my reading list:
The Likeness, Tana French
Housekeeping, Gilead & Home - Marilynne Robinson
Savage Detectives & 2666 - Roberto Bolano
Downtown Owl, Chuck Klosterman


*Barbara Kingsolver is an acquired taste for me. I prefer this book to her fiction writing.
** The first series of books I ever read, age about 8
*** The second series of books I ever read, age about 9 or 10
**** The first real book I ever read, age about 7

See a favorite? Have a recommendation? Let me know!

Get that chip off your shoulder

I try to keep it positive here at Three's Company because goodness knows there's enough bad news and negativity in the world without little ol' me going on and on about stuff. Want my opinion? Fine! Just ask and I'll give it to you straight. But, once in a great while I'll stumble onto something that I just have to vent an unsolicited opinion on and today that issue is.....


(drum roll).....


CURTIS SITTENFELD


An author who's first book, Prep, a semi-sorta-autobiographical novel about a misfit trying to fit into an elite prep school, should have been a hands-down no brainer all-time favorite of mine. Instead I hated it and it's whiny navel-gazing protagonist who purposely crapped on every opportunity she had and not for one second tried to get anything out of an educational experience that she pursued all on her own. And worse, the writing was self-important, juvenile and BORING. (Did you read the book? Did you hate it too?)

Well, Ms. Sittenfeld, who I'm sure is a very nice person in her own right, has now decided she's qualified to write this:









Though I have not and will not be reading this, from the reviews I gather it is a thinly-veiled attack on (or parody of) Laura Bush, who I doubt has ever heard of Curtis Sittenfeld before this. I think it is tacky in the extreme and a (very poor) example of the not-so-thinly-veiled agenda of many in the media and the arts who are hell-bent on attacking anyone and anything with values, ethics or principles that don't necessarily match up with theirs.

Ok. So what I'm trying to say is don't buy this book. There are many great, wonderful, thrilling, uplifting, engrossing books out there. I'll post a list of them tomorrow. This will not be one of them.

We do our own stunts

M told me this morning that he could do this so I was waiting with the camera when he woke up from his "nap." We may try moving to the big boy bed this weekend, but A doesn't take to change well, so we might have to move slow. I guess he's growing up.

Labor Day

Yay Labor Day! End of summer! Woohoo! As my northern friends get their sweaters out of storage and put away flip flops and seersucker for another year, we all here in Florida know we've got about another month of shorts and sandals before the first balmy breezes of Fall blow in. (And another three months of potential hurricanes. Gulp.) However, to console us in the meantime, we DO have:

FOOTBALL!!!

I'll be bringing out the orange and blue tomorrow for the UF-Hawaii matchup. College football season starts tomorrow and although I may not follow eachandevery game as faithfully as I did pre-kids, I still manage to watch as many Gator (and other SEC) games as I can. GO GATORS!

Hot, sick

There is a sore throat bug going around D's class. She & I had it over the weekend. A has it now - and in spades. Amazing how a little thing like that can spread so quickly. It's only fifth day of classes! Poor A. Everyone else just had a 24 hour sore throat. He gets a fever, sore throat, nasal congestion and now he's wheezing like an accordian. Or maybe a bagpipe.

It's too hot to do anything or go anywhere anyway. My MIL and I made the rounds of the home stores this a.m. looking for handtowels for the downstairs bathroom and curtain rods for the kids' rooms to go with the curtains I finally got around to ordering. Pottery Barn Kids had the gingham panels I've been wanting on super, duper triple-deep clearance, $12.99/panel! Woohah! I hardly ever get good bargains because I'm too impatient to wait for things to go on sale, but in this case I'm glad I procrastinated.

Gotta go dose the kid with Pediacare. I don't care what they say about kids and cold medicines. I think it makes them feel better.

Do you want to be friends?

I was looking at the list of blogs that I read on a regular basis and it has gotten huuuge. I love the variety of blogs that I read; I love each and every blog and the bravery of the people writing them to put a little bit - or a lot - of themselves out there every day. And it is addicting, this blogging. I don't always feel my "muse" compelling me to write, but I compulsively check in on each and every blog I read. Sometimes daily, sometimes more often. So if you've gotten a lot of hits from "St. Petersburg, Florida," I'll betcha it was me.

The blogs I read are widely varied, but I feel like I have something in common with all of the authors, even if it is just a little thing. SAHM? Preppy? Like to shop, read or cook? Travel (or live) abroad? Are you a little bit - or a lot - snarky? Do you gripe about your kids and husband? Can you be counted on for a dissenting opinion? Me too! There's a big group of blogs I read that I started reading ages ago when a really creative woman named Elizabeth had a wildly, widely popular blog called Preppy Cafe. And I found other blogs through those blogs and so on and so on... you get the picture? The blogs I read are sort of like my group of close friends: from a distance we all seem very similar, but within the group there's a huge variety of opinions, backgrounds, beliefs. I think it makes for a more interesting life, I think it brings more ideas to the table, I think it reminds me that I am part of a big picture and although I may just be one little voice, if my voice weren't out there then there'd be a little blank spot in that picture.

Alright. Enough contemplation. Back to our regularly scheduled program tomorrow.

Ouch

I woke up this a.m. with a horrible sore throat, fever and headache. Ouch. I'm going to put on my comfy pants, softest tee, get a hot cup of tea with honey & lemon and curl up on the couch with a blanket, stack of magazines and some good movies.

I wish.

Still raining

Bleh. I've got to go wake up A from his blissful 2 hour morning nap (yes, I said morning nap) and drag him out into the rain to pick up D at school. Dang.

Rain, rain, go away

Letssee.... a million errands to run, house to clean, in-laws coming in 2 days, grocery store, b-day gift to drop off, D has a half-day (wha? why? the first week of school?!), M out of town and OH YEAH it's RAINING AGAIN. Ugh.

And, by the way, David Lebovitz, I love your ice cream, your recipes are devine, The Perfect Scoop rocks my world, but you have seriously jumped the shark with Candied Bacon Ice Cream. No, no, no. That is wrong. Just wrong.

First taste of fall

I can't wait for cooler weather so that I can wear my new fleece-lined hoodie:






My stylish sisters may laugh at me for wearing something so mom-like -- perhaps even (gulp) frumpy? --but it is the perfect thing to wear to the playground in cooler weather.

I also love these:





But there is absolutely no justification for wearing them in Florida. Even on the wettest, windiest, muddiest, coldest day it is not nearly wet, windy, muddy or cold enough. Not that it stops me from putting them on my wish list. Maybe M will see this and get them for my birthday. Other people may have fancy jewelry or exotic trips on their wish lists. I've got wellies. Whatever.

D had a rough Day 2 yesterday at school. She got put on "red" for the first time ever for talking in class. She was appropriately upset as I explained that no, I wasn't mad, just a little disappointed, and that she needs to make more of an effort to listen, not talk. I felt a little hypocritical as I was/am a chronic chatterer (still am) and can't shut my mouth to save my life. So she comes by it honestly.

A is loving the extra one-on-one time with me. Yesterday we went to the park and played Jack & the Beanstalk all morning and today he went to his first music class. He surprised me by loving it - he had no problem participating, playing along, "singing," marching, etc. The teacher even said she was surprised to see a first-timer so involved. I was pleasantly surprised too since D absolutely hated music class and the crowds of kids and having people watch her do stuff. She would much rather have just watched everyone else and I remember the teacher telling me not to worry about "forcing" her to participate, she'd get to it in her own time. A is the exact opposite and I felt very much like "that mom" as I chased him all over the room, tried to stop him from taking the teacher's props and grinned as he screamed/sang along with every song.

Well hello, there

CAUTION: Griping mom ahead!!

While most of Florida, especially kids & teachers who were supposed to start school today, are rejoicing in an unexpected day off, my heart goes out to parents everywhere who fully expected their little darlings to be off to school and constructively occupied today. Double-sucks because it's NOT EVEN RAINING and the least that could happen if you're going to close school because of a storm is a little rain. Not that I'm wishing a hurricane on anyone, but I think it was pretty obvious by around 9 last night that we were in no danger here. I think they jumped the gun a bit by deciding to close everything down yesterday afternoon.

So, lucky us. No storm damage and another day of "summer vacation." But I'm plumb out of good ideas. My mommy-battery definitely needs a recharge because I can't seem to think of any good activities to entertain them, I'm short-tempered, I'm a bit apathetic about housework, cooking, etc, and I really don't want to play with beads, the pizza game, blocks, Little People(TM), and I really, really, REALLY don't want to haul the paint out. Esp. since A tends to paint about 3 little dabs on the paper, gets the rest all over himself and then declares he's "done."

Here's what I'm going to do: let the kids eat breakfast in their pjs, reassure D that there WILL be school tomorrow and that she is STILL in first grade, let them watch PBS for a while, get them dressed, yell at them for bickering, put someone in time out, be amazed that I still have " storm preparations" that I didn't get to, fold laundry, plunge a toilet, clean up breakfast, turn on the emergency TIVOd episodes of SuperWhy and Hi-5, reluctantly play school, read some stories, yell some more, make endless snacks and meals and refill water cups all day long.

Day off? Not really.

Now, THAT'S tragic

So I am L-O-V-I-N-G that sweet A has decided to start taking a nap again! And right as School starts up! Hooray! You know what that means, right? That if I work real hard, get all my chores done and errands run then I get to plop my sweet patootie down on the couch for at least an hour before I have to pick up D from school. Hot damn. I mean, I guess I could break out my Tae-Bo or pilates tapes (yup, that's how old those suckers are -- I don't even have them on DVD) and do a little work out, but isn't it more fulfilling to read a book intended for grown ups, or munch a bowl of popcorn unmolested or watch a couple TIVO-d episodes of What Not to Wear? Or, as I did today, catch one of my very favorite Guilty Pleasure Movies of all-time, "The Perfect Murder." Now I can only describe the plot in the barest of details because I am so entranced with 1) Gwyneth's clothes. Oh such clothes. and 2) Viggo. But, as I was watching today, a line did jump out at me, even though I was deep in thought pondering if I could pull off the scoopneck-sweater-tucked-scarf look. The scene: After the attempted murder (I'm not too worried about spoiling the movie for anyone since it's been on basic cable for about the last 2000 years), when Gwynnie has left to stay with her "best friend" for a while and pull herself together. The line: The "friend" offering Gwynnie hot tea, clean towels and (here's the line) "your favorite yogurt in the fridge." Huh? What? You startled me out of my cashmere-induced trance. Letsseehere: someone tries to kill you, you decide to leave your husband, and your "best friend" offers you YOGURT? Not chocolate, wine or, as I would want, full-fat, premium-brand mint chocolate chip ice cream, a bottle of Woodford Reserve and some Valium? Some friend.

Well, hello there

Here's my beautiful daughter D this morning on her first day of first grade. I. Am. So. Proud. And she, evidently, is so happy! Happy to be seeing her friends, happy to be at school, and happy to be away from her baby bro for a bit, I suspect. A was not so happy. Today during snack time, he looks up at me and says "I miss D...." Oh my. I didn't think he even understood the concept of "miss." Hm. Absence makes the heart grow fonder. Unfortunately everybody's happiness may be temporary since they might cancel school tomorrow due to the impending arrival (or not?) of Tropical Storm/Hurricane/Whatever Fay.

So. Lots of other stuff going on today as we get ready (maybe) for a tropical storm/hurricane/whatever. Let's check: water? (got it), tuna? (got it), millions of packaged snacks? (got 'em), refried beans and tortillas? (got it), nutella? (got it), pb & j? (natch), UHT milk? (yup). I'm all ready! Unfortunately, because I was too lazy/tired/distracted by the Olympics I had to go yesterday so I battled the crowds of panicked senior citizens in the grocery store and I also missed getting water at the low, low price of 10 bottles for $10, but hey. At least we won't be hungry for a day or two or ten. Then I sent M to Target to get batteries for the flashlights. He came back with a new Coleman camping lantern and a pack of men's undershirts, size L. OK, close enough! I'm sure those are things we can use in an emergency too!

Now I'm busy making a double batch of pancakes to freeze. Because who doesn't like delicious breakfast foods during a tropical storm?! I'm also doing laundry and cleaning the house because I have an odd compulsion to make sure everything is clean in an emergency. So that will keep me busy between compulsively checking The Weather Channel for updates and taking inventory of our household goods.

I'm sure other people's hurricane/tropical storm/whatever preparations are more practical, but then they probably won't be eating buttermilk-banana pancakes while they wait for the power to come back on.

U.S.A.! U.S.A.!

I'm half-dead from six nights in a row staying up to watch the Olympics, but boy was it worth it. Can you imagine if Michael Phelps (in the 100 b'fly) or Jason Lezak (in the relay) pulled up like Usain Bolt did in the 100M dash? Can you imagine if Usain had actually kept running full out until the finish line? Wow. I'm so full of adrenaline I feel like I could run something.

Gotta run now and start thinking about Hurricane preparations. Yeah, and it is supposed to hit on the second day of school. Great timing, eh?

Oh who cares! I want more races!

Dear housemates..

Just a little request here re: microwave use. Whether you are reheating dinner or just nuking a cup of cocoa or whatever, if the food splatters, boils over, or otherwise escapes it's confines the appropriate response, unless you suddenly lose consciousness after cooking, is to clean up your mess. Do not leave it to fester in the microwave. Because I have to clean up the mess after it has been baked on. Also, when I discover evidence of a potential boil over, let's say for example an abnormally sticky and disgusting Pyrex dish, and you hear me make a comment like, for example, "eew gross, what happened to this dish?" do not feign ignorance or innocence. Because I have to clean that up too. I'm just saying.

What's the reverse of Murphy's law?

After a whole morning of M & I arguing with the warranty company and tricking the a/c place into talking to us, they agree to come out. And inexplicably, the dang system starts working perfectly 20 minutes before the guy gets here. So now we (I) get to babble on about how it's an intermittent problem and oh yeah, it's OK now and our bedroom is 75 degrees but I promise you by bedtime there'll be no a/c at all and it will be 87 in there. Somebody help us.

So it's not if anything can go wrong, it will. It's when you want it to be wrong, it's suddenly right. Mostly, I think we just need to stop fixing the dang thing and replace it.

Knowing me, knowing you

Mamma Mia was great fun! We were lucky enough to see it at a small show and the theater was full of ABBA fans who didn't mind singing along to the songs. Christine Baranski was hilarious as usual and Colin Firth showed us a whole new side of his acting range. Meryl Streep was amazing. I had just seen "Devil Wears Prada" a few weeks ago (on cable, natch) and she was great in that as well. Strangely, I came home and found M watching the cinematic exact opposite from Mamma Mia: "The Deer Hunter" (also with Meryl Streep -- I think it was her first big movie.) Anyway, the two movies were totally different in every way, except for reinforcing Meryl as a wonderful actress.

It also reinforces how totally different M & I are in our movie tastes (and TV, books, music, art, etc.). Not that the Deer Hunter wasn't an amazingly powerful, deeply upsetting movie packed with great performances, but would I have picked it for my Thursday night entertainment? Nope. And he would have been asleep in the first 15 minutes of Mamma Mia and then would have waked up briefly during "Voulez-Vous?" to comment how much he hates ABBA. Although he loves me, so we'll see how well he tolerates a weekend of me walking around singing "S.O.S."

Send prayers and good wishes -- the piece of crap upstairs A/C is out again and in a new twist to our ongoing saga, the repair people sent by the warranty company aren't returning our calls AND seem not believe us that it's not working. Like we'd lie, when it's 90 degrees out and the bedrooms are uninhabitable. S.O.S.!!!

Independence day?

Tonight I am going to do something that I have never done in my entire six years and twenty-seven days of mommyhood. And maybe only once or twice in my entire almost-nine years of marriage.

I am going to a movie with a friend! Just me and a friend! That's right, although I've seen a couple movies in the theatre with M, it's been a long time since I've gone to one with a friend. At night. During the week. It's like....a small reprieve, with popcorn. I'm sad to say the last movie I went to with a friend was "Traffic" back in 2000? 1999? I don't remember. And before that it was, believe it or not, "Clueless." But tonight I'm seeing "Mama Mia."

A huge step. But M said he had no interest in seeing it. And I do. And he can be home by 7 to watch the kiddos. And although I pushin' the envelope a bit because we're going to the 7:35 show and so I'll be in public right smack in the middle of the time I'm usually falling asleep on the couch, I'm really looking forward to it.

I'll be the one singing along to every song.

Fools like us

Only I would decide that TONIGHT is the night I'm gonna finally learn how to use the chimney starter on the grill. In the pouring rain. While A is nap-less and five seconds from a bona fide blow out. And I've got $16.00 in tri-tip steaks on the line.

Why? Because the women's team gymnastics finals are on tonight, because I made a killer batch of chimichurri, because I've got a whole fresh, crusty loaf of bread and a bunch of organic green beans. And what goes best with all that goodness? Why grilled steaks of course!! (And an ice cold Fosters for after the kiddos are a-bed.)

I've got the charcoal lit, I think. I'm waiting for a "medium ash" to form. Hopefully sometime tonight.

Well hello there

I'm back in blog business. The kids and I took our last vacation of summer vacation last week and spent a fab week at my parents in Naples. We got a little shopping in, had a belated bday party with their Florida cousins and Dad made his awesome homemade egg rolls. I've been craving one of those little babies since we were in NC in July and finally, finally, finally I got one. Mmmm.

We had a nice weekend, took the kids to the pool, had some good family time, and stayed up way too late watching the Olympics. I love them. I love the marquee sports and I love the obscure ones. I love athletes and I love competitions and I love watching huge, awesome spectacles like the opening ceremonies, which was better than any other opening ceremony I can ever remember watching -- and I watch them all. I love that Beijing looks like a real city and that China is presenting itself proudly and positively. And I love all the coverage of Dara Torres and her amazing abs. At first I thought there's no way she could be doing this without 'roids, but after watching endless reports and interviews, maybe just maybe it IS pure and simple hard work -- and God-given genetics, obviously. Because I don't care how many laps I swim, weights I lift or how many people walk all over my legs and back I'll never, ever, ever look like her and it's not just because of my deep-rooted love of ice cream. I just can't believe she's my age.

So. Busy week ahead as D gets ready for first - gulp! - grade which starts next Monday! Zowie. We had planned to do her school supply shopping today but unfortunately the crapping upstairs a/c crapped out again yesterday so after a sweltering sweat box of a night, we'll be spending this morning in the cool downstairs waiting for the a/c guys. Again. It's OK though because I've got 8 hours of TIVO'd Olympics to catch up on.

Uh oh it's magic

Remember that line from the Cars song? Hee. One of my favorite songs waaay back in high school. I still remember toolin' around with my BF Angela and her boyfriend and he would play that song on his rockin' cassette player. In his Datsun. Good times, people.

Anyway. My lil sis (Aunt Debbie) has an interesting post on her blog about magic and a really cool YouTube video of a guy doing an amazing card trick. In other magic-related news, the illusionist Criss Angel was in Clearwater last night where 10,000 people clogged the beach streets to watch him free himself from an old hotel that was being imploded. He did the stunt here because Clearwater was the only town in America that would let him lock himself in a building that was being demolished to perform his stunt. Ummm.. where were the lawyers and insurance people when THAT contract got signed? Does that reflect well on Clearwater? Hmmm. But, anyway, unlike my lil sis, I only watch magic tricks -- and illusionists -- because I like to try to figure out how they do the stuff they do. I don't like to be fooled, and I hate when anyone, even a TV illusionist, messes with my mind. That said, some of s**t David Blaine does is really cool. I've never been able to figure out anything he's done and he really messes with my mind.

D had asked and asked and begged and pleaded for a magic kit for her birthday. We didn't buy her one because 1) all the kits we found were for ages 8+, 2) we thought it would be better to wait until she was reading confidently on her own (it destroys the trick when you have to have the instructions read to you, and 3) she was absolutely convinced that she would be able to "really do magic." We tried so hard to explain the concept of "tricks" to her but she counldn't get past the idea that even though it was a trick, it was still magic. We tried to explain the tricks she'd learn from a magic kit -- milk in a hat and all that -- but she thought it was all real and she wanted to "learn how to make candy appear whenever she wanted." She didn't even want to eat the candy -- not much of a sweet tooth -- she just wanted to make it. We finally convinced her to wait until she can read, and maybe then she'll understand about the trick part of magic tricks. Or maybe, like her Aunt Debbie, she'll hang onto her sense of wonder and delight in watching the impossible happen. Maybe she won't waste her time on the why or how, but just sit back and enjoy the candy.

Question of the day

Is six too young for playdates?

I wonder, because D has them quite frequently but so often the kids end up mooning around saying "what can we do?" and asking for snacks. Which is what I'd expect my kids to do if they were alone, but not if there was a friend over to play. (Case in point: there is a little girl here right now who has actually been watching the clock since she got here because "3:00 is [her] snack time." )

So either six is too young, or I'm too old, because really? I have some interest in playing games and doing art projects with my own kids, but virtually no interest in doing those things with someone else's kid(s). It's also weird because D's been having playdates since she was about two and of course at that age you stick close by and everything is closely supervised so maybe the kids have gotten used to that set up because now if you're not in there setting up games and making suggestions and freakin' playing with play-doh everyone just ends up wandering around the house making a huge mess.

Or maybe I just expect too much and imagine that if someone is over here to play -- an actual real live friend -- everyone should actually PLAY. I know we did when I was young. Of course, we also spent major amounts of time (at least as I remember it -- my mom may disagree) outside either playing in the yards, riding bikes or swimming. So maybe the kids are playing, or doing what passes for playing these days, but I just don't recognize it. Maybe because instead of playing too, I'm in here blogging.

Tomorrow's burning question... how come we have a lot of playdates at our house, but those same people rarely invite D over to play?

Drama-mama

So A's little family birthday was a bit rocky. He had some little presents and homemade cupcakes and a balloon, but the major drama there was D's hysterics because he was getting all the attention. She ended up getting sent to her room during dinner, sobbing and crying and carrying on, and then she didn't want to come down and have cake and ice cream. It was definitely an Oscar-worthy performance. When we finally ordered her to participate, of course she wouldn't sing Happy Birthday and in all the pictures she's pouting. Nice, huh? I would NEVER have expected that kind of behaviour from her. Ah, sibling rivalry.

Look who's two!

Happy Birthday my sweet boy. We love you so much!



More pictures later of present opening, cupcake eating and his birthday dinner request... Jelly. By which I hope he meant a savory guava jelly-red pepper glaze on baked chicken breasts accompanied by buttermilk mashed potatoes and green peas.

Picking my battles

Last night a friend and I were discussing the daily battle to dress our six-year-old daughters. I was amused to hear that she had the same conflict that I do over letting D go out in an obviously clashing or otherwise crazy outfit. These are two little girls that, until they could dress themselves, were dressed consistently in Hanna Andersson, Lands End, LLBean, and other designer-ish kid togs. They always looked cute and as pulled together as pre-schoolers could be. Until they could dress themselves. Some of the ensembles make me dizzy - kilts (in summer!) with tie-dye; floral skirts with striped shirts, pink t-shirt with everything, or her favorite outfit this summer: pink shorts and teal t-shirt which gives me major Miami Vice flashbacks. I keep expecting to see Crockett & Tubbs hiding in her closet. But, we both agreed, it is better to see your child express herself, no matter how bizarrely, than to squash their nascent sense of self with criticism. (And frankly, I'm not one to point fingers as I can be relied upon to wear the same black t-shirt, ratty khaki shorts and flip-flops almost every day. Hey, they're comfortable! Don't judge.) I do draw the line for church - she has to wear a "church dress" -- and since we don't buy logo tees or anything branded with cartoon characters or Hanna Montana or anyone like that, I don't worry about her being inappropriate, just clashy. As for her other funny dressing habit, tucking in her shirts so snugly she looks like she's wearing a onesie, I assume she'll grow out of it.

I've learned to relax a lot with two kids. D had such a rigid early childhood, but I have to say things have loosened up a bit and everyone seems to be surviving. We'll eat McDonald's for dinner or buy sugary breakfast cereals or let the kids have some candy while they're with the babysitter. As long as they understand such things are treats and not the norm, I'm fine with it. And so far, so good. The one strange thing is the gradual extension of D's bedtime. (A still goes to bed at 6:30 and is happy to do it. I'm not rocking that boat!) But D's bedtime has gradually crept up to 8:00 - and we let her read for an additional 30 minutes in bed if she wants to. That's a huge change from the strict 7:00 I managed to keep all last year - more for M & I than her I think. Sometimes we'll let her stay up with us and watch Animal Planet or the Discovery Channel, sometimes we'll watch a family movie, sometimes we play games. But sometimes it feels odd suddenly having a talkative little person still hanging around, chatting our ears off, during the time that up until now was still all ours. I'm still trying to get used to it and wondering what will happen when she discovers what a sitcom is, or American Idol, or that there are shows on TV all night long! Will she stay up and watch? What will we do? What did my parents think when they looked around the living room at 8:00 and there were still five kids draped over the furniture watching "their" shows? I guess we'll deal with it when it happens.

Look what the cat dragged in

(The metaphorical cat, that is. Not one of the pack of nasty, yowling, homeless, flea-bitten feline scroungers that hang around our corner, puke on our porch and use our yard for a litter box because those are unwelcome to drag anything into our house. Vermin. We talked to our Cat Lady neighbor (an otherwise nice person with a huge blind spot for homeless cats) and she claims that they "don't leave her yard." Um whatever. We've got pictures. And "evidence" all over the yard. Anyway, lady, you're on fair notice now, so we're going to start capturing and waterboarding them.

This is a more than welcome sight/site on a quiet Saturday morning! Too bad I won't have time to get reacquainted with my obsessions before the kiddos wake up, but now that I know you're back.... I'll see you tonight!

Rain, rain

It has rained every day this week, last week, the whole of time as I can remember it. Not that I'm complaining what with all the talk of droughts and wildfires and dead landscaping and golf courses and whatnot, but whatever, those things don't affect me (yet) and not being able to get the kids outside to run around everyday DOES affect me, most often if the form of massive meltdowns right as I start to saute the veggies or cut up the chicken or whatever. The kind of meltdown that makes one think of volcanos and TNT and loss of life. Shooting flames, piercing shrieks, choking sobs, the whole bit, you'd think they were being tortured. But they're just torturing each other because I refuse to get involved unless it involves protracted violence or bloodshed. Anyway, it's all easier to deal with when they've had some time outside to play, but the rainy season is here which means it's either raining or about to rain, too bloody hot and humid to be outdoors (for me anyway) or too wet on the playgrounds. Fun times.

Have a great weekend. I've got to run and explain to A why he can have pretzels OR chocolate milk, but not both, this close to dinner time. Or should I just cave, let him have both, ruin his appetite and so what who cares, he can eat a good dinner tomorrow? Do I stick to my guns and suffer through a tantrum? Either way, it's not going to be good and it is pouring outside so there's not much else to do.

Life is filled with tiny dilemmas.

Home ech!

Oh if only I had paid attention in Home Ec all those years ago I might know how to make this. Sigh. Instead, I was too busy flirting with boys, passing notes (quite often to this person) and writing stories to pay attention. Still, it's never too late to learn. My SIL, an excellent sewer, has given it the project the "not too hard" seal of approval. We'll see if I get around to it or no.

Meanwhile, the nice insulation people were here this morning, spent an hour blowing recycled newspaper insulation (we're so green!) into our attic, collected their money and left with the dire warning that we "should have had a duct check first." In other words, we'll probably see them again in a few months. The upside is that the whole house smells like one of my favorite smells - newsprint. Mmmmmm. Better than - ok, ok, as good as - brownies.

This and that

I've only got about 2.5 seconds before all hell breaks loose in the living room but I just had to drop a line about my most relaxing day. A good friend and I have arranged a kid swap this week - today she got my buggers for a few hours and on Friday I'll have her kiddos. So, my morning was spent doing what any sensible mommy with a few hours of free time will -- Solo Grocery Shopping! Wheee! Oddly, my cart ended up with more BOGO bags of chips and crackers and cookies than it would have had the kids been with me. I guess it's easier to say NO! to them than to myself.

The kids were mysteriously well behaved, didn't fight or pick on each other, and (reportedly) ate all their lunch. I got big doting cow eyes from A when I arrived to resume my role as mother/slave pick them up. I never notice how cute and charming they are unless I've been away for a few hours.

Soooo -- tomato sauce is bubbling away, ravioli for dinner tonight and then I'm off for a few hours this evening for a Junior League meeting. I love adult time almost as much as alone time.

Last night D wanted to say grace all by herself because, you know, she's a big six year old now and everything. Here's her take:

Bless us O Lord
And these thy gifts
Which we are about to receive
By your BROWNIE
Through Christ our Lord, Amen.

Apparently she's got her mama's sweet tooth.

We had a wonderful weekend staying indoors avoiding heatstroke. M did make a break for it early Saturday morning to mow the yard, and D and I made it to church yesterday morning, but other than that we stayed inside to play. Heck, if you're spending $500 a month to cool your house you might as well enjoy it, right?

We have to have a new roof put on this week (yay crappy leaking roof!) and we're going to get the attic insulated too so maybe our electric bills will come down into the low 300s or -- dare to dream -- maybe high 200s. We were pleasantly surprised that the insulation is going to be under $1000. We were steeling ourselves for another money-pit expense in the thousands, but apparently blowing a bunch of recycled paper and stuff into your attic is relatively cheap. Compared to say, fixing the roof and repairing the ancient a/c. Even so, in the seven months we've been here, we've yet to have a month go by without an unexpected outlay of $2-3,000. Thank goodness we've been blessed with our Lord's "brownies."

TGIF

Wheeee - weekend is (almost) here! I might get to sleep in until 7:00 tomorrow - at least, I hope so. I'm seriously tired from trying to restore order here. I can't believe how quickly the laundry has piled up on us, especially since we washed everything before we left NC. But all the hampers are full and there are towels everywhere, mocking me. At least the spiders webs are gone.

No matter. It's the weekend!

Tonight (or tomorrow if it's too crazy here this afternoon) I'm grilling chicken, making creamy corn-off-the-cob and roasted peach ice cream. Speaking of corn, waaayyy back in time when I was pregnant with D, almost 7 years ago actually, I lost my taste for a few things: red wine, garlic, onions and, oddly, corn. The garlic and onion love came back mid-way through my pregnancy with A, but the red wine and corn aversion has held up. Until this spring, when the early Florida corn was sooo good that even I had to like it. It seems that was all I needed to get me over my hate because now I'm fine with it again -- at least when it comes to fresh corn. Frozen corn still tastes funny to me (waxy? too sweet? can't put my finger on it. ) and I only like the canned stuff when it's cooked into something else like spoonbread or corn pudding. But sweet, freshly grilled corn? Mmmmmgood.

Red wine though? Bleh*.


*My sister Jenn, who is quite the oenophile, has enticed me to sip various Super Tuscans, GSMs, Barolos over the years. While the initial taste is yummy, the aftertaste still leaves me feeling hot & queasy. Like I said, bleh. Give me a cold Sam Adams anyday.

The high price of cockiness

FAIR WARNING: This is a bathroom-related story. If you are squeamish, go read someone else's blog.

Last night during dinner, A suddenly announces "Poopy. Potty." "Really?" I asked. He repeated it so I took him to the bathroom, stripped him down and lo and behold! A big poopy. In the potty. At only 23 months. What a prodigy, right? I was so happy. He was so proud. We wiped, we flushed, we waved bye-bye to the poopy. We washed our hands thoroughly. He was smiling like a crazy-man and even D got into the celebration. Could it be the end of diapers? In my enthusiasm, I bunged a diaper on him, not really being careful about where the leg holes were or if the velcro was secure. We returned to the kitchen, I helped him back into his booster seat and we started to finish dinner.

Fifteen minutes later he made this weird little face, grunted once and then had the biggest diapee blowout of his life. I haven't seen this much crap all in one place since the last time Paris Hilton was on the news. There was poop everywhere - all over him, his outfit, his booster, the chair. Apparently my cocky failure to properly secure his diaper resulted in even more leakage than if I hadn't put one on at all. The elastics and velcros and whatnot acted as a geyser or funnel mechanism. Anyway, I had to haul him back to the bathroom -- no more happy, no more proud, no more smiling -- chuck him in the tub for a quick scrub, take off the disgusting outfit (thank goodness it was a really old onesie and yes, I simply wrapped it up and threw it away.) and then, since no one wanted to finish dinner in the Poop Kitchen, I let them watch a bonus TV show while I dealt with the booster seat -- outside. No mere paper towel and lysol job - I needed the heavy duty scrubber, half-a-bottle of Dawn and an equal amount of Clorox. You know how the straps on boosters and high chairs are sortof ribbed? Imagine all those little ribs filled with.... well, get the picture?

I asked him later, before bed, if he wanted to try to use the potty. He just looked at me sorrowfully and said, "No. Poopy chair. Sad." My sentiments exactly.

One more thing

So while the kids were otherwise occupied, I updated my blog template and added this cool (well, cool to me) playlist thingy over on the sidebar. I've forgotten how to code or I'd fix it. I hope it works.

Same old

Yesterday was D's sixth birthday and, per our family's tradition, she got to pick the dinner menu and the dessert of her choice. We all enjoyed the macaroni and cheese, although I just couldn't pull it together to make homemade as she initially requested. For dessert, she picked out a chocolate cake w/ chocolate fudge frosting. And Birthday Cake ice cream. I was a little leery at first but I'm happy to report that both were surprisingly delicious and not too noxiously sweet at all! I also discovered that the appliance bay in the kitchen makes a very excellent place to stash a small piece of cake to nibble on surreptitiously. What's that? Why am I hiding food? If you have to ask, you probably don't have kids. Don't judge.

Other than that, after being home for one day, we're slowly getting back in our groove. The kids alternate between crying because they love each other so very much that they can't stand to be apart for one second, or screaming and slapping each other because someone just stepped into someone's space. I've been mediating the usual arguments about who gets to play with the balloon, penguins, beads, or ________ (fill-in the toy of your choice) next. A has learned to say "sorry" very well, although maybe not so sincerely.

We've also started discovering all the little ways the house fell apart in our absence. There's the roof leak (which we knew about), the odd musty odor, the mysterious gaps in the floorboard, the clanking a/c which runs constantly but never cools anything, and worst, the gajillion spiders which took up residence and built webs between every solid surface. It's very strange. The staircase looks like an Indiana Jones set. I can't imagine how it stayed web-free in the year it sat empty before some sucker we bought it. I have this mental image of the realtor -- a very dignified older gentleman -- frantically running around with a Swiffer before every showing. D takes a little whisk broom everywhere, and every hour there's at least one urgent call of "Mommy!! I found a bug!" Such is life in Florida in the summer in our beautiful old house.

We're baaaack

A day later than planned, but still, here. With the attendant bajillion errands to attend to, the 2 weeks of cleaning and unpacking and sorting to take care of, the mountain of mail - bills, thank yous from the umpteen parties D attended at the end of school, the catalogues reminding us ever so un-subtly that summer will end sooner or later (but back-to-school catalogues in early July? Really?)

We had a fabulously awesome time in NC. All of us. On the way home, in between DVDs, I asked everyone what they learned during the last two weeks:

Me: That you can go on vacation with two kids and no other first-aid supplies except a Benadryl stick and a half-empty bottle of infant Tylenol and no one will die.

M: To love big family gatherings.

D: All about kiwis (thanks cousin Jacob!)

A: How to play like a big boy and that I shouldn't run around too much right after I eat. Also, that I can eat almost a whole box of Ritz crackers all by myself over two weeks.

Mostly now we're trying to reacclimate to 90-degree temperatures and triple-digit humidity. A hard row to hoe indeed considering last Tuesday morning we woke up to a bracing 49 degrees. Heaven.

I made it through almost a whole morning of preliminary mail sorting before I turned on the TV for the kids though.

Pre-vacation countdown

Two days to go until the kids & I leave for a few weeks in NC - hurrah!!!

Three's Company will be on hiatus until July as it's hard to post with company here, and cleaning and packing to do, and kids to play with (or turn TV on for.)

So stay tuned for pictures and more.....

Happy Summer Days!

What did he say?!

When D was learning to talk, her word for elephant sounded a bit like she was saying "f**kint" and going to the zoo was an exercise in avoiding other people around the Wild Africa display for fear that the general public would hear her exclaiming in delight "f**kint!!" when she saw the majestic beasts. After a few months of extreme embarrassment, including one incident in the Library's kids' section, she grew out of it and it's become an amusing family (adults only!) anecdote and we're all over our elephant-avoidance phobias. Until this weekend. When we found out that A's words for both Fruit and Fork sound exactly like "f**k." How exciting! I can't wait until the next time we're in the produce aisle. It was easier to avoid elephants.

*sob*

Look I what I found this morning when I sat down with my coffee, clicked onto tastespotting.com as I do every morning and got ready to peruse yummy treats from fellow foodies all over the world:








Why? WHY? WHY????? Lawyer M says it was probably a piracy thing, internet sharing of copyrighted materials, blah blah blah. Whatever. I can think of two cookbooks that I would never have bought - or even heard of - if it weren't for the delicious reviews I found on tastespotting. Doesn't that make up for the occasional posting of a photo? And sure, I can understand if people were posting tons of recipes right out of a book, but the vast majority of posts were either home cooks dabbling with their OWN recipes or people who made tweaks to book recipes and then posted the results.

Now I have to go and try to find all my favorite food bloggers on my own.

I am so sad.

Summer school

This week we started our REAL summertime routine - swim lessons, camp, vacation and SCHOOL! Lucky kid to have a mom soooo concerned that she will lose all the skills she learned in Kindergarten that I am making her practice them over the summer. Lucky kid? Or crazy-ass, uptight mom? Hmmm. We read a lot anyway, so I'm not including that in the routine, but I've decided that for one hour every day we're going to practice the other two Rs. Even A is getting in on the action by learning colors, shapes and numbers. He astonished my mom over the weekend by counting to 5, but I think that's just because it's my "mom count" as in "you have FIVE SECONDS, mister, to get over here." They hear that a lot too.

What else do we do for an hour each day? Play at the park (PE), make/eat lunch, do a craft or art project, sit in the car while Mommy goes to Starbucks, and they get to watch one hour of commercial-free TV or a video each afternoon, preferably while I make dinner. What I wouldn't give for an older, teenage-style child that could reliably watch the kids while I make dinner. I'd invite one of the neighbor girls to come over, but I really don't want to pay a babysitter, I just want someone to pry the kid off my leg so I can saute some chicken. I realize that was sortof the role I played in my family growing up and I sincerely hope ('cause I don't remember the details) that I was a help to my mom and that when she asked me to watch the kids I didn't gripe too much.

To all my East Coast friends -- stay cool!!

Am I a bummer?

We've almost completed summer vacation week 1. So far so good, and this was technically our week "off" when we had nothing scheduled or planned -- for the kids at least. I'm still waiting on the results of all the testing I had done earlier this week.

Next week we start swim lessons, then we have a week of Vacation Bible School and then the kids & I will head to NC for a couple of weeks in the mountains with my in-laws. Ahhhh..... two weeks off enjoying the beautiful Smoky Mtns. and the cool nights and cool mornings and Uno on the porch and it's just my favorite thing to do in the summer. And it will be even better this year because my brother in law (Colonel Mike) and his family are going to be coming out for the July 4th weekend too. Hurray! If there is one thing I love it's big crazy family gatherings. It will be the first time that we're all together at my MIL & FIL's house since they moved there and I'm really looking forward to it. I'm sure the kids will explore every inch of the mountain -- I'll just have to convince D that she can't do it in a skirt.

Have a great summery weekend!

Summer vacation - day 4

So today is our first real day of summer vacation not consumed with heat, a/c repairmen, appointments, meetings or radioactive isotope thyroid scans. Wheee!

Of course, M is out of town. He had to drive to the Other Coast of Florida for a deposition (taking one, not giving) and he has to go back again of Friday. Which means two days this week of essentially being alone with the kids. Which means... BAKING! I'm making Fruited No-Knead Bread by combining two or three recipes I found on the internet. Yum. Of course the long rise means that I probably won't be baking it off until Friday, but no matter we'll have it for the weekend.

I'll use the next few days to recognize opportunities to be a patient mom and try to stay engaged with the kids. This is the hardest part of parenting for me. I can always think up other stuff I should or could be doing. I've been toying with the idea of turning the computer off during the day to reduce the temptation to send some "quick" emails, or surf my fave bloggers for just a "few minutes" or play a "quick" game of Scrabulous. But the notion leaves me feeling seriously disconnected and then I'd be wanting to do all the above in the evening when I should be spending time with M. And it's not like I have an internet addiction (OK, maybe a wee bit with Scrabulous - but I know that's a passing fancy and I'll get bored trying to break 700 every game.) but it is a convenient way to grab some quick quiet time.

Oh well. Time to go play!

Oh summer

Nothing like a little hardship to put life in perspective.

Our a/c (upstairs this time) quit on us yesterday. Nothing like no a/c on a hot summer Florida day. It was about 90 in the bedrooms last night - there was no breeze so I didn't see the point in opening windows. The fans were going full blast, I had about an inch of baby powder on me trying to keep cool and dry. M wimped out needed a good night sleep, so he went downstairs to sleep on the couch.

Stupid summer.

Of course, the warranty company, ever helpful, said they'd have someone out on Monday. So we're looking forward to one more night in the sweatbox. We're hoping -- in vain? -- that if we wait them out eventually they'll figure out that they have to replace the a/c units and we won't have to shell out the $15-20K it will probably cost to replace them and fix the ductwork, etc. But in the meantime, the units appear to break down at least once a month. Not a big deal when it cools off at night, but I don't think it got much below 80 last night.

AND, of course, tonight we won't be suffering alone since my parents are coming up tonight to help watch the kids while I have the testing done on the growths they found on my thyroid. The good times never stop.