Rae of Sunshine

Wee-Wee-Wee All The Way Home

2012-02-09T14:52:00.001-08:00

Ten days in Utah, plus a couple good road trip songs, and eighteen hundred sixty seven split second pictures can only mean one thing:

SLIDE SHOW!

Whew! I haven’t done one for while and it went pretty smoothly until I almost collapsed under the pressure of picking music that people watching could enjoy without resorting to wedding music (or revealing my somewhat juvenile taste in music). At 2am I finally surrendered the idea of ever being cool in the music department, and the result is a little Rob Thomas followed by a little instrumental bluegrass which I am not ashamed to say I LOVE. This is important because while I want you to enjoy it the one time you might watch it, in my remaining years I will probably watch it over and over again. You know, since the truth behind why I make these slideshows lies somewhere between true love for my family, and the ability to use these smiling reels as weapons when my teenagers are acting like turds and I’m too tired to personally escort them on a guilt trip right that minute.

Utah was wonderful. AMAZING. Coming back home was thrilling, too. This trip marked the first time that going to Utah didn’t feel desperate, and returning to California didn’t make us feel like strangers in a strange land. I can’t say thank you enough to all the people who fill our lives with joy (and our belly’s with warm delicious calories of the savory and/or sweet variety!!)

(p.s. even if you don’t want to tuck into this whole slideshow, you should at least start it, those four burst photo’s seriously rock my world :)

The Force is strong with this one…

2012-02-03T00:24:00.001-08:00

Let me start by saying I know it was only, like, two posts ago that I was complaining about that girl who always brags about her “girls weekends”, but then I remember I am only mad at her because I am jealous she has them so often. Then I remember I don’t need to have them as often because my friends are twice as cool as her friends, so I get all the goodness in half the time.

And that concludes my fictional argument with my fictional friend.

(You know who you are.)

Anyway, for now I will skip the gory bragging details about my fabulous weekend with Caroline Carson, especially since I am finally on the verge of completing my Christmas Slideshow sometime this year, and I will just tell you that the whole thing fits into what seems to be the theme of my life these days.

“Many Works In Progress”

I like spending time with the people I love. I enjoy the fun parts, but I cherish the parts where we spill our guts and then buoy each other up through a good snotty cry. Life will throw sand in your eye on one day, then wrap you in a warm blanket on the next, and even though it’s selfish, it’s nice to know I’m not the only one in a dysfunctional relationship with my existence.

Despite the swings, lately I seem more aware that everything around me is a work in progress, and if I don’t stay up too late getting depressed watching the Tudors (seriously, enough with the beheadings!), then all the “works in progress” really satisfy me. There is a little family, yes family, who picks up their daughter/granddaughter from Kindergarten every day and has lunch on the nearby picnic table. Little do they know they have become my daily zen checkpoint! Every time I breath in the smell of their hot lunch, I understand the conscience decision they have made to spend their time this way, and then make a mental note to walk a little slower to the car.

For that minute, as I hold the kids hands while we cross the street, I do it not just to save their squirrely bodies from running into the street, but because their hands fit into mine like puzzle pieces meant for my fingers.

And then we race home to the Work In Progress that has taken over all our art supplies:

Yup, that’s what Star Wars looks like through six year old boy goggles, aka Russell King!

Each of those characters are two 8.5 x 11 pieces of plain printer paper, taped together, and turned into PURE AWESOME. He made them on a whim about two weeks ago, then today we finally got our huge canvas covered with magnetic paint and had the characters laminated. Tomorrow we will glue the magnets on the back of the hero’s, and then he will paint the background… or better since he has requested to take his first stab using spray paint. I admit the idea of teaching my son his first graffiti techniques made me so proud we spent an hour googling street art when I was supposed to be making dinner.

Oh yeah, thanks again for the pizza Papa Johns, do you do laundry, too? If you do, I would say yours is a business model that is not longer a work in progress but PERFECTLY COMPLETED.

<sigh> a mother can dream… and holy cow, 12am, I’m going to attempt that right now, goodnight!

p.s. the Wookie is three pieces. it seems important to note that :)

Caroline Carson

2012-01-27T15:44:00.001-08:00

So did I ever tell you about the time my family hosted the largest three day bluegrass festival in Utah for a few years in a row? And how I never had the common sense to flirt with any of the musicians until I was already engaged to the festivals assistant director, and then I was so busy flirting with (and eventually marrying) him, that I NEVER flirted with any of them, EVER?

Which is why no one ever met me for fifteen minutes one year, then came back the next year with a song they had written about me and AND put on their new ALBUM.

You guys, my besty of 27 years is in my guestroom right now, and the only reason I allow this is because when she wrote down her name and number for the cute mandolin player, he thought her name was Caroline CARSON, and it’s actually Caroline Larson and I was able to forgive her for out-flirting me at my own damn event. Which is good, because after she is done changing we are going OUT. And we are going to gossip, drink virgin pina colada’s, and lament how old we are. And also how our non alcoholic beverages are NOT making us feel better.

I LOVE her. I’m so glad she is here. I needed this, and maybe she can talk some sense into the Rude Voice that follows me around lately telling me I should be better, smarter, faster, more organized, or at least STOP hating myself for getting my son to school 4 minutes late every single day for almost his entire kindergarten career. In fact she has already exclaimed that my house is “filled with heart!” and I’m sure later she will offer to help me figure out where I should start setting out Russell’s clothes the night before.

Because THAT is what girls do for each other who have been friends for THIS long:

I’m the one with the face. She is the cute blond beside me. Watch out weekend, we are going to vanquish rude voices, dream big, and eat an enormous amount of chocolate. YAY!

You know what is hard?

2012-01-25T13:30:00.001-08:00

Taking pictures of WINDOWS.

Seriously! I should have looked up an online tutorial or something, but I was already laying on the floor trying to take 3 story tall pictures when it occurred to me that I am totally not qualified for this kind of insanity.

In other words, look at my cute windows! And don’t look at my terrible photography. My poor wall colors can’t get a fair shake in any of my documentation so far… they are really pretty, I promise! You’re just going to have to come see for yourself :)

Anyway, I have these five strange tall windows that are a particular kind of challenge, they live in two separate to rooms at once, they are too high to put blinds on (you could never close them anyway), and they are the first thing you see when you walk in my house.

So.

I framed them :)

I couple 50 cent samples of bright teal paint, a little gold paint applied with a stencil, some brown metal primer on the aluminum window casing, and gold spray painted trim from the hardware store.

$40 bucks, and four days later (don’t forget to calculate child rearing into your schedule when you have a project that should only take a couple hours!), and I love these windows! I love how the teal invites in all the green and blue from the outside, and how the gold and brown keeps it from looking like a circus. The other thing I didn’t expect is that the bright color in those little rims somehow makes it feel like I painted the whole wall.

LOVE FEELINGS.

Make-over

2012-01-18T12:38:00.001-08:00

Diet edition.

I finally updated my NOT CANDY tab up there. It was long overdue.

Enjoy :)

My New Day Resolutions

2012-01-13T09:49:00.001-08:00

Yup, it’s that time of day again: Time for declaring my New Day Resolutions for Friday January 13, 2012!

Yesterday I began my day the usual way, an ice cold glass of low sodium V8 juice, a small handful of sunflower seeds, and a small delicious bowl of Multigrain Cheerios with organic whole milk.

And yesterday I ended my day in the usual way, standing over the sink eating directly out of the cake pan using the spatula as my fork. I really shouldn’t even own a spatula.

It’s the gateway utensil.

People, I HAVE to eat cake, I’m kind of on the fritz! I’m starting to get a wreckage of bodies piling up around me and they have names like “blog updates”or “make a grocery list for MEALS.”

Despite how yummy the Costco barrels of sourdough pretzels are for a kindergarten lunch, they don’t actually transfer well into a Tuesday night dinner. And don’t forget my other dead friends:

“date night”

“check engine light”

or sadly

“personal hygiene”

For the latter we will be holding a vigil this evening in my shower, and no you’re not invited. Well, maybe Jon, kill two birds with one stone and all that. For goodness sake, I’m a mom! If I can’t turn “shaving my armpits” into “date night” then I should just give back my Multi Tasking tiara and sash now.

Also, I’m still waiting for that tiara and sash because I earned it!

Last year, anyway.

I know we’re only 13 days in, but already it’s clear I might be aiming for the more modest pageant mom titles like “licks her plate clean before placing in the dishwasher” or “cool mom” which I will earn by delivering Russell to school a fashionable 5 minutes late every day this week.

<sigh> and now you are caught up, so let’s get back to it:

My New Day Resolutions!

Brush teeth.

Eat with actual utensils.

Unpack one box under the garage.

And finally, write and publish one itty bitty blog post telling people you’re not dead.

(just too busy eating cake to answer the phone)

Wish me luck and I’ll wish it back! What are your New Day Resolutions for this lil’ ‘ol Friday?

YEAH! Of Sunshine!

2012-01-03T13:08:00.001-08:00

I have a new blog address! Well, it’s not new, as much as improved. Or shorter. You can now get to this site using:

Of Sunshine Dot Com

ofsunshine.com

OF(nospaces)SUNSHINE(dot)COM!!

No, you don’t need to update anything to get here, and you’re welcome to keep using lissaraeofsunshine.com since I own them both and they both point here. I don’t know why I didn’t think of this sooner! And despite my contact cards being adorable, I am so glad I don’t have to explain the mouthful “lissaraeofsunshine.com” anymore.

And that it was available!

Merry Christmas to me from the World Wide Web.

Also, I’ve been meaning to tell you guys (you can read this next part in a spoiled valley girl accent, or a smug slow hippy vibe, it works wither way)

My life is perfect.

I run 6 miles everyday.

I only eat, like, totally organic food.

My children are never rude and only ever use there inside voices.

My sweat doesn’t stink anymore. In fact I’ve had offers to create my own perfume line WITH my actual armpits.

I can type in the air and my new phone can sense my gestures from across the room and, when I nod my head, send emails directly to Oprah.

Jon and I have been taking Samba lessons and are having the BEST TIME EVER. In fact, more fun than you have ever had in your entire life.

Oh, and all my undesirable hair follicles closed up and I don’t have to shave my legs anymore.

(you may now return to whatever my voice usually sounds like in your head)

Because only 25% of that is true, and you have to mix the words around a little to even get that. Instead read:

There are voices inside my head, I can eat more food than you, my children stink, Jon and I have been taking lesson on how to send rude gestures from across the room, and I don’t shave my legs anymore.

I tell you this, because this study conducted by some smarties at Stanford, has declared that facebook is making people UNHAPPY! Apparently, as we cruise the internet in our pajama’s and face creams before we call it a night, that is the moment we decide to look down and compare our entire lives with the perfectly manicured family portraits of someone we sort of know, or used to date, or that one girl who is ALWAYS out on the town, sending a live stream of photos of herself, probably with the celebrity she just met at the airport on the way back from her quick “girls weekend getaway” to Fiji.

Or… or… there are those (never me) who say things they shouldn’t (a little religious banter anyone?), or take pictures of things they shouldn’t (not that this would be worthy of a scandalous case for Judge Judy, but my sister STILL has a picture tagged of me from her college graduation that someone took downhill from us, so we are already getting the Triple Chin Look Down, but then they cropped it so you can’t see my pregnant belly!), and let’s just not mention the “friends” who always write on your wall as if they were in a gas station bathroom instead of in a forum you share with your GRANDMA.

But still, it bummed me out! I sort of like facebook when they aren’t changing it every five minutes, you know, forcing me to take a course down at the community center just to be able to find my own homepage again. And I used to like the facebook stalking! Now I just feel like facebook is that friend who I told I had a little crush on Hugh Jackman, and the next time they came over they brought me naked pictures of him.

(I should clarify that never really happened, but if it did, I would probably be appalled. just leave them on the table and get out. you’re disgusting.)

It’s too much, Facebook! I don’t need to know the moment one my friends “like’s” something one of their friends said. Or that 15 minutes ago Joe was at church, but for some reason now he’s at the bar. I think moving from the Holy Spirit to just plain SPIRITS is a personal choice that should be left in the cab ride home.

All I’m really trying to say here is, if facebook is getting you down, just head over to ofsunshine.com, where the funny lady will tell you all about where the sun shines.

And also,

where it does not.

Can’t type, too tired…

2011-12-25T18:39:00.001-08:00

I am too tired to be funny!

I will have to settle for happy, fat, and tired.

Merry Christmas :)

Also, I got you a present!

No, it's not the promised before and after pics of the tree house... but it IS a video walkthrough!

I’m sorry it's sort of long, you have to forgive us since the tour guides are short and distractible (it’s all the production budget allowed for).

Also, I can't tell you how badly I want to jump through the screen and grab that green mylar balloon on the ground outside the front door at the beginning of the video, or how much wish I had finished the story about Kate Cotter and Facebook updates on potty training. I started it, and then realized it's only funny when she tells it. You're trailing off... (and did I catch a "nine-er" in there? I think I smell a guest
post in the works).

Anyway, let's set the stage, and get this show on the road, shall we?

Remember the hoard?

Would you cook a roast in this kitchen?

Dine in this dining room?

Store your pin ball machines under our garage?

Shower in these bathrooms?!

Slumber party with the babies?!!

And don't forget about that bathtub in the floor...

Wow, I suddenly feel better about that balloon on the front porch.

What are you waiting for? Come on in:

Click Here

(remember, push play, then pause for a minute so the video can load, then play it :)

What do I want to say?

2011-12-22T12:59:00.000-08:00

My brains are a little like jello, and I'm wearing three pairs of pants, indoors, with my coat on (I am snow not kidding).

But, BUT! This momentous occasion MUST be marked by blogging of some kind.

Today I am older than I have ever been before. Today my husband is FORTY. He says he is fine with it, and has therefore given me permission to freak out as much as I feel is necessary.

Which is a lot.

Do you realize how old this makes me?! My only consolation is that no matter how old I get, he will always be older. Which usually helps, but today I can't help but feel like it's somehow inappropriate that I am dating, er, MARRIED, to a forty year old.

...

Shhh...

Don't tell him I said this...

...

He is the nicest man I have ever known. He is my best friend, my home, my greatest challenge and my greatest reward. I am so glad he was BORN today, even though he has to share the season with the baby Jesus, and is old enough to tell you what kind of cake they served at that party.

Happy Birthday, Jon King. You are old.

Love Me.

How do you like them apples?

2011-12-13T20:45:00.001-08:00

I have been using the word “ambivalent” incorrectly for so many years that I’m not sure how to live without it, except now I know it doesn’t mean what I want it to mean.

I’ve even known this for several years, but I cannot find a satisfying replacement word.

I thought it meant indifferent.

It doesn’t. Well, it ALMOST does. It’s complicated. It’s like indifferent with a vengeance.

It’s actually kind of an awesome word when used correctly, it can mean having two opposing opinions about one thing at the same time. Not knowing what to do, but with angst.

But I am very attached to it as a PASSIVE word. Like, a step below indifferent.

“I can’t believe that pageant mom is so devoted to making her 4 year old the Grand Supreme of the Diva Town Hollywood Pageant (this weekend only, down at the Double Tree in the Grand Ballroom, slash dining room, where you can enjoy tomorrows free continental breakfast), but ambivalent about her child's nutrition while she pours pixie sticks and soda down her gullet.”

See, I mean it almost like lazy. But like mean lazy. Eyes shut tight.

Indifferent would be the guy checking into the same hotel who see’s the pint size 40 year olds running by to change for the talent competition, and turns to ask the hotel clerk what the code is for the Wi-Fi.

A more correct use would be to say;

“The mother was clearly ambivalent about whether she should have allowed the camera’s to follow her all day, since what her shining star really needs right now is a spanking if they are going to get that crown, but she can’t because it’s on camera.”

What I’m really saying is, I can’t tell you guys how many times I’ve had to pause the reality tv show we are watching to tell Jon, “I need another word that means ambivalent, dammit!”

I am open to suggestions.

Whatever you do…

2011-12-04T23:19:00.001-08:00

…do not, I repeat, DO NOT, try and console Rainbow Brite.

Otherwise known in our house as Alice Jean King.

If she is mad at you, don’t tell her you’re sorry. If she falls down, do not ask her where it hurts. Most importantly, never try to hug her if there are tears of any kind present. My fat pink baby/lean pink toddler machine/big girl is THREE today! That means, starting about a week ago, she doesn’t need your pity.

I am so not kidding.

“don’t TOUCH me”

“Go. Way.”

“No. WOOK. At! Me!”

So what’s a mom to do when a baby, I mean a big girl, (with delicious ham hock thighs) plays too hard with the cat and gets a little catty whomp?

Something else!

You have to sit about a foot away, and pretend you have a minor injury of some kind like a splinter, or make your fists into mouthy hand puppets and let them begin some unrelated banter about goldfish and the cost of gas these days.

In about thirty seconds, with giant tears still perched for take off down already wet fat cheeks, she will be chatting and climbing into the human chair I used to call my lap.

Because, according to most three year olds, no idea is worth having if it isn’t your idea.

And I don’t care, because I. LOVE. HER. And her reddy brown hair, and her perfect little nose, and her weirdy weird BRAIN.

Happy Birthday to the best Daughter this mother could ever ask for!!

(even if you were mostly your fathers idea…)

(oh! before I forget, it’s not a costume, it’s better! I got this fantastic apron from Flirty and Fun Aprons by Shawna, you should check it out. She made me a custom order for a toddler, saved me a few bucks, and the quality is top notch! I think this apron is going to see some life in the next few years :)

BOO!

2011-12-01T11:42:00.001-08:00

Haha, happy December. Here are my favorite pics from Halloween that I forgot to show you.

(my blog really is like glimpsing into the chaos of my brain, only in my brain they are always serving root beer floats and fried chicken has zero calories and a full serving of fruit and veggies in each drumstick.)

That’s Russell with his class and The Worlds Greatest Kindergarten Teacher. No, that’s not what she was for Halloween, that’s just what she is EVERYDAY. For Halloween she was a hippie :)

He is a piece of paper. It was his idea. I had no idea how I was going to pull it off, but one $8 dollar clearance canvas later, and I think his friends liked it --->

Admittedly, his costume makes more sense when he has his “partner in crayon.” Now where in the world has she gone?

Oh good, I found her. She won’t be 3 for four more days, and she’s already a globe trotter. Where does the time go?!

Sheesh, this post is already awesome and it doesn’t even include the part where the Stewarts were in town with their baby SUSHI

I mean Norah, and how we went to the live concert for So You Think You Can Dance, and Nic fixed our railing so no one would come to our house and DIE. I don’t have pictures of that but you can see some on her much more timely post about the whole affair. I’m not lazy, I’m just… you know. Lazy. :) I have too many darn piece of technology! Phones, cameras and Jon’s new iphone. The pictures of their visit must be on at least 12 different tiny black pocket machines!

I have got to get a better system.

Like my sister who had THESE pictures in my email by November FIRST. Fab costumes and timely picture sharing? Show off.

I forgive her, because she is making small people who are related to me BETTER BY THE DAY. Sheesh, that is a lot of awesomeness for one Halloween!

No go enjoy your Christmas music, WHA-HA-Ha-ha-ha-ha…. (evil laughter?)

Grateful isn’t a big enough word.

2011-11-28T21:41:00.001-08:00

Did you see them? Did you SEE THEM? The comments on the post before this one are proof of how totally awesome I am.

Yup.

I am totally making this about me.

And HOW AWESOME I must be to have to have such grateful articulate friends!

You guys are devoted to your families, your country, your cars, and in Lorraine’s case, her Tivo. Which, you know, rocks.

Honestly, that turned into something I would never have guessed, and I found myself overwhelmed more than once at how beautiful and heartfelt they were. I really loved them all, and in particular, my gratitude for beautiful healthy babies has me a little weepy. And Pat’s 3 years of sobriety! I am SO PROUD of him.

What? You would like me to shut my trap and announce the winner already? Okay, OKAY! Here you go, in traditional Rae of Sunshine style:

(p.s. let’s keep in mind I have a little cold, and now your job is to email me and tell me my voice doesn’t really sound like that…)

Untitled from alissa king on Vimeo.

**if you have problems with the video, pause it, let it load for a minute, and then press play again**

Happy Thanks-give-away!!

2011-11-24T20:12:00.001-08:00

**BONUS**

I just added this book to the giveaway. Because it’s my blog and I can. Two winners will be picked on Monday, and one of those winners will get both books. Because the Monday after a long weekend needs a little sparkle, too :)

*** (I now return you to your regularly scheduled blog) ***

I don’t care if you roll your eyes at me (I’m looking at you, snow dwellers), in my 29 years in Utah, I was never as cold as I am in California!

I blame this on several things:

1. The palm tree’s. The unfulfilled promise of tropical paradise makes the cold and the dark feel extra rude.

2. I moved to California and started doing yoga and shopping at places called “whole foods” and eating bowls of oatmeal that somebody “rolled with a stone”… and lost 70 pounds! Which is, you know, great! except all I have now between me and the cold dark night is some stretch marks and a homemade snuggie…

3. Did I mention it’s a wet cold? Not a dry Utah cold that makes that “best snow on earth” powder, but a wet, seeping into your bones, cold? Again, I think this is the tropical climate playing a rude joke.

4. It is pitch black by 4:45pm. PITCH BLACK. I don’t remember that in Utah! Sure, I may not have been paying attention (this is me we are talking about), but 4:45?!

5. No snow. Snow requires fluffy jackets, scarves, ear muffs, delightfully pink cheeks and noses, and snot icicles. Here, I’m just trying to get along with fashionable little sweaters, knee high boots, and sniffles that would run unchecked without constant blowing and wiping. I wish I was talking about the children.

What I’m trying to say here is I AM COLD!

So why am I bothering you with this? What could inspire my pale blue hands to bang away at my keyboard? Because no matter where I live, cold means one thing: Turkey and Christmas lights!

I don’t even know why I’m so excited. I am SO not decorating this year! Plus any clever crafts are still packed up, we will be using this weekend to work on house stuff, and this is my first year of not getting everyone Christmas presents (you can read about that in this post, where shortly after my computer filed for a restraining order).

I don’t care, lately my cousin Emily seems to have daily facebook updates about gratitude, God’s love, the gift of HUGGING, and I wish I could reach through the monitor and kiss her cheeks I appreciate her way of expressing it so much! I’m too much of a Scrooge McDuck to post such things, plus I spend a lot of my free time in the emotional tug of war between my blessings and my trials, and mostly my ability to be worthy of either of them.

So today, and for the next 72 hours, I am going to try extra hard to accept my inner cheeseball and be thankful for all the things I like so much! Like Russell’s whole entire face, or the way Alice gets mad and says “don’t WOOK at me!” while stomping an entirely perfect foot in a cowgirl boot.

And since gratitude isn’t just something you get to have when you win the lottery, but something you should learn to practice in your little everyday triumphs, I have a book I would like to share with a couple someone’s who comment on this post. It’s called The Way To Love

It’s a shiny little pocket book filled with the beautiful last thoughts of a Jesuit Priest named Anthony de Mello. I’ve never read it cover to cover, instead I just open it at random for little treasures of hope and courage.

So let’s hear it, friends, what are you grateful for today? I can handle the sap! On Monday the winners will be chosen at random, unless I just decide to give it to the two people whose comments could be used as the inspiration for a fabric softener commercial.

Myself? I am grateful to be married to my best friend, the love of my life, the star in my Skyrim, even when I’m so mad at him I feel like I could suffocate him with just my mind.

And I probably would have loved him forever either way, but I’m also grateful I got one of those guys that LOOKS SO GOOD at (almost) 40.

Which reminds me that I am not entirely grateful that in a month I will be able to say I’m married to a forty year old. He doesn’t seem to understand how old that makes me. <sigh> He’s so selfish sometimes.

Go!

Taking a Paige out of 1994…

2011-11-18T14:54:00.001-08:00

So, you know how teenagers LOVE to be featured on their cousins Mommy Blog? Well, they totally do.

Especially if you threw them a 1994 themed birthday party.

And you have pictures.

First, I have to say it’s both flattering and insulting that my teenage cousins always tell me I don’t “act as old as I am.” Unfortunately, every once in a while my age really, really, shows it’s crows feet. Like when Paige showed up for her party with her boyfriend and sister and had no idea what I was talking about when I tried to explain our costumes.

Alice was Nancy Kerrigan with a bandaged knee, I was Tanya Harding (complete with one untied shoelace), and Russell was my trailer trash husband that smashed Nancy’s knee before the Olympics.

I also didn’t prepare her that we would dressing up like current events of 1994. Note to self: warn teenagers when costumes or wigs are involved or they will pretend they don’t know you, even if you are the only people in the room.

It’s all good, when my dad got here he laughed at tiny Nancy Kerrigan, and when cousins Frank and Jack showed up at least one of them knew why I had written RIP Kurt Cobain on all the tombstone candy bags. Sigh, I don’t just know this stuff happened, I remember it all. I was, like, 15.

Ouch :)

You guys, I LOVE PAIGE. Yes, enough to embarrass her this much. Here are your pictures…

Hey, I wasn’t going to BUY ice skater outfits, but I also don’t have any ruffle swimsuits to wear with tights like Alice! I’m just impressed I own anything with that many sequins. Because my shirt is the thing I should be worried about in that picture…

… if you don’t know what that sign is about, than I am older than you. A lot.

Yes, “Nancy” is wearing blue eye shadow, but she did NOT want me to put those band aids on her knee at first. We made a trade, eye shadow for dignity.

Did I forget to mention some of my signs were totally rude? I was trying to make teenagers laugh! They like things that are inappropriate. This sign is because 1994 was the first deaf Miss America. Hey, I know, I crossed a line, but I think this made them smirk so I’m going to own the victory.

That’s my husband Mr. Harding, with 94 pieces of 90’s candy and our RIP Kurt Cobain bags. I probably crossed line there too, but grunge rockers are probably not reading this blog so I think I’m safe.

That sign is totally nice! Because Russell made it. I continued to make rude ones…

Ronald Regan announces he has Alzheimer's

Cananda makes the obvious official

Russia and America agree to stop pointing nuclear weapons at each other “just because”

Someone BURNED DOWN a high school in BURNSVILLE. I am not making this up.

The cakes represent the first successfully cloned cells! But if you look close, one is, um, a little off. You know, to represent why all the cloned sheep wouldn’t live very long. This was Lorraine’s idea. She gets me.

Oh! And I didn’t get a picture of Jon in his costume, but he was the perfect guy to wear this belt, because in 1994 George Foreman became the OLDEST heavy weight champion in history. So the opposite of this:

Happy Birthday, Paige! WE. LOVE. YOU.

Now, do you forgive me? :)

Show me a kid on medicine…

2011-11-17T00:39:00.001-08:00

…and I will show you a desperate parent.

Actually, I know one! She has long brown hair and a totally hysterical blog where she talks about her “feelings” all day long, and, whenever possible, dessert.

My point is, I dare you to find me a parent on the planet that WANTS to medicate their kid. Wait, never mind, they don’t exist. No one dreams of the day you go to your first parent teacher conference and sit there wondering what parts of this progress report is a reflection of your kindergartener, and what parts are medicine related? Especially when you suspect there are other parents out there who simply get to go admire the coloring and discuss penmanship and fundraisers.

This thing happened in the late 80’s and 90’s where being diagnosed with ADHD came under attack for being overused, a fad, an excuse, and a label for bad parenting. What these kids need is just a little structure, yah know? And the parents and experts allowing these kids to be labeled were vilified, mostly to get ratings on afternoon talk shows.

Well, I am here to tell you that in 2011, even with all the advances of our modern, more enlightened world, there is still no “structure” big enough to contain the shining persona of my eldest son.

<break>

Let’s talk about Russell’s privacy for a minute, shall we? I know by having this whole blog devoted to the way the brains work in our house, it may seem like I have no problem violating, well, everybody’s privacy.

I do care. In fact, in the last 6 months every time I have stressed how hard our move has been, mostly that was code for “people are losing it here!”

Since not the least of the unstable people was me, and sometimes I didn’t feel like I had a clear view of self imposed boundaries, I simply made entire topics off limits.

And By Golly! I can’t stress how nice it is to finally be home. To have my furniture (and brain cells) in semi-permanent arrangement's! Ahhhhh… that’s better.

So now I have to define what “Russell’s privacy” really means. I guess that someday (in a land far far away) potential girlfriends could go through these archives and find something humiliating? That when you turn 18 your criminal record gets erased, and so should your mom’s blog? That as I make friends with other parent’s at the school, if they find this blog, they get to see all our underwear before the first playdate?

Yeah.

Or.

Hey kid, welcome to the age of technology, facebook and text dating. Not only can this site work for Russell as a resource when he has his own kids <cough> in a way that MTV would have no interest in making a documentary about <cough>, but this? I am proud to let my kids see this blog as their mom learning to drive on the information highway. I think the age of information and fast food is going to be more open, and more isolating, than any other time on this planet. I hope my journey can serve my family as a road map, and that on the way, we can learn to grow strong supportive real and/or online communities.

Plus, it’s not like Russell robbed a bank. I guess I’m just feeling a little determined to talk about this thing that isn’t shameful or anybody’s fault, as if it isn’t shameful or anybody’s fault. You know since IT also happens to be the thing that makes my guy exactly the person he is supposed to be, and exactly the best friend I ordered. Shaken, not stirred.

Most important, if I show you mine, will you show me yours? Gosh, medicine does fit that deep dark secret feeling, but honestly, I would love to get some emails about what you or a loved one may be trying. Scientist’s are so, so… scientific, what I might need right now is some good ol’ mothers and fathers wisdom on the topic.

And, of course, those things I would keep private. I will stick to making people in my immediate family uncomfortable, since afterwards I can bake for them, while they glare at me, waiting for warm cookies.

So, yeah, I’m going to start addressing medication here more often. I apologize in advance that during my first few posts about this, I may sound a wee bit defensive. Something to do with a lifetime of misunderstanding and feeling misunderstood on the topic. Mostly that means there will be times when you may find me addressing not you, my awesome friends, but Tom Cruise, current holder on-ers of old misinformation, or over opinionated parents who aren’t here, at my house, raising my best friend, Russell.

And I guess all I really want to tell them is that medicating an otherwise perfectly healthy child so they can sit in a chair ALREADY FEELS AWFUL, thank you very much. We don’t need your help feeling bad about it.

Hopefully it gets better. I have met some wonderful intelligent parents who give me great hope that I can find peace with medication and not buy into all this parent guilt, and all I really have to say to them is “what are you taking, and can I try it?”

Hahahahaha… it’s funny cause it’s true.

Plus, laughing hysterically helps me not run in the backyard and yell the F word over and over and over again, which I’m tempted to do lately only because it burns more calories than eating my entire stash of chocolate in ten minutes followed by the obscene amount of sour patch kids I know Jon stashed under the stairs after Halloween.

…

Yeah, sometimes this whole thing just makes me mad, but then I breath and count my blessings.

And can you help? Sure!

As I told him about my good, but very long day, when I had parent teacher conferences, followed by the child psychologist, then the child psychiatrist, Jon summed it up for me by saying that as we are building our support system “we’re just looking for some compassion.” It’s so true it made me bawl like Alice when we take away the iPad.

ADHD doesn’t often elicit that emotion in people who haven’t dealt with a beautiful child that has it. I don’t know why, adrenalin junkies, trouble makers, maybe because left untreated it so often manifests itself as defiance, you end up with angry kids and adults. So many ADHD people own the title of “Bad Seed” and feel like they deserve it, while on the other side you’ve got some ADHD adults who are successful and ambitious in a way that seems like they don’t need anyone’s compassion, but you probably don’t want to see the wreckage of close important relationships behind the portraits above the fireplace.

Russell’s not bad or scary, he is wonderful and relentless and passionate, so it might not look like he needs compassion like some other kinds of special needs kids, but tonight I filled a prescription for something that was originally designed as a blood pressure medication for the elderly. For my shining six year old best friend. I’ve actually done my research and it is a non stimulant that has years and years of success with ADHD, and we need it to see if it can counter some parts of the amphetamine we give him so he can have a shot learning to, you know, read and write.

People (me) are cautious with immunizations and high fructose syrup, choose organic peaches and regular banana’s because of how different foods absorb pesticides, read the label on the baby Tylenol ten times before you ever administer it, and here I am giving him something an elderly person would take for blood pressure, to try and help the side effects of a medication I could sell by the high school to kids who want to cram for a test. THAT is what I’m giving my son.

But then… something works… getting the right combo and dosage is so hard, but when you have one of those moments where you see him finally breath, or focus, and laugh like normal happy boy, it’s amazing. AMAZING. Like it or not, medicine compliments all the other hard work we do with structure and rewards and consequences, exercise, and nutrition.

And I know I should feel only glad.

But sometimes when medicine does work…

…it just feels…

…very real.

This is not a broken leg that is going away, or an ear infection that was affecting his hearing. For this ADHD mom, the years that stretch out before me, the calling I have for constant vigilance and education are daunting. I know I’ve been talking about this for years, and have the whole blog, but maybe I’m still slow to accept or understand what all of this means.

Mostly, and with medicine in the picture now, I just pray to God every night to protect his growing brain, and fill his body with the golden light from his golden heart, and to give his mother the power to be enough.

…

Did I say desperate? I meant grateful.

I am grateful to have it.

Great, now I have to move to Japan…

2011-11-05T21:41:00.001-07:00

I know, we just moved, but it can’t be helped.

In other news, I predict as Jon reads this he will stab himself with a fork in an attempt to bleed to death from the tiny prong holes. (Jon if you haven’t stabbed yourself yet, use plastic, I don’t think you are up on your tetanus shot…)

It’s all for the love of a biscuit. A koala stamped, strawberry frosting filled biscuit. I have no idea what they are called, but they look like this:

and they TASTE like this:

And it’s all Facebook's fault for keeping people connected who would otherwise wander the planet trying never to think about high school again, because I? Was a nerd. Actually, I was in band AND color guard. I believe the technical term for that is "double nerding".

I’m telling you, it takes a special kind of person to double nerd, so I don’t think she will be insulted that I never thought I would say that being friends with Deanna Obergfell would ever make me cooler.

She played the french horn, I played the bass clarinet, and together our freshman year of high school we were HOOPS in the marching band. Hoops were, well, exactly what it sounds like; we marched around in formation with thousands of pieces of shiny plastic tied to hula hoops.

Let's just say neither of us were going to be dating the quarterback.

(to be fair, we did have our pick of the drum line from time to time, and don’t get me started on those Osmond’s! You think there were a lot of them on Oprah? you should have seen our school assemblies. Toothy grins as far as the eye could see…)

Anyway, Deanna, the last time I saw her was probably about 10 years ago? I ran into her at the water park right after I got married, and holy cow! She looked better than ever, skinny and great big boobs. Or it could have been at the Halloween party we had at our house that same year, I seem to remember her handsome husband being one of the ugliest dead prostitutes I have ever seen… though, now that I think about it (and remembering something about my husband and tights...), that party may never have happened.

Like high school, only we were legal, wearing costumes, and totally sober. So, sadder.

Agh! Hurry! FAST FORWARD! ---> To about a week ago when I find THIS on the front porch of my new house:

YES, I took a picture. I was happy! I’ve been cyber stalking her adventures in Japan, and when she told me she would send me some weird goodies I was excited…

but

not

excited

enough…

At the end of a long day, myself and the tired pink baby with uncombed hair found ourselves tearing through that box with enough glee to power a car. It was the single best assortment of tricks and treats this Halloween lover has ever SEEN!

Which means, of course, that when the kid got home from camping, we opened it AGAIN!

I have pictures, like this one:

and these:

What I don’t have pictures of is some of the expressions on the faces of adult men that I let sample those shrimp chips, or Russell explaining to his friends at school that his ‘package of fries’ are healthy because there are pictures of vegetables on the front.

And the pink frosting koala biscuits… considering relocating my family just to be near them, I think that says it all.

Deanna, not that it would have taken much to make me cooler, but I am officially wearing my sunglasses indoors from now on. When people ask me why, I will pull this out of my pocket:

(I don’t know what it is, but it’s NEW! :)

Son of a… oh wait. That’s me.

2011-11-02T21:42:00.001-07:00

Moving is LAME.

It just is. And no matter how awesome your life is, the total disassembly of all the pieces of it so you can relocate it across town IS. LAME.

That being said, lately I find myself accidently getting a little giggly from the awesomeness of the tree house. Like, I wake up, and the sun is streaming in through the trees, and I giggle myself awake.

Sure, once I’m awake the giggling dives under one of the many rude “to do” lists that seem to menace me from every corner…

…but I know it’s there…

Unfortunately, with regular life returning, the regular problems are right behind. Like the one where your kid makes you question why you wanted to have a BABY SHOWER. A party. To celebrate that you are willingly turning over the success or failure of your life to someone that poops in their pants.

Case in point, Russell has a best friend over here in our new city. A nice wild best friend, and together they literally bring out the BEST and the WORST and the WEIRDEST in each other. And this boys parents? Should be Sainted for continuing to let Russell hang around their shining boy when all they want to do together is make weapons out of anything that remotely resembles a gun or a sword, and then say the word diaper a thousand times.

Oh my gosh, I like that family.

Anyway, so, ugh, how do I tell you this? So, Russell has been having a hard time. Double time. With the move, the schedule of kindergarten, the fact that it’s pitch black by FIVE (don’t get me started on daylight savings time, it hasn’t even happened yet! agh!), and don’t forget that he is trying to keep up with growing into the fantastic brain and body that I adore despite the smell.

So, not knowing which way is up, Russell began coming home with uneaten lunch and dramatic tales of his friend throwing it on the ground. Day after day. If I can nutshell this for you, there was some denial, some confessing, some apologizing, and a lot of parent’s trying to figure how to glue this puzzle together considering it was all covered with kid slime.

Then, tonight, as I was tucking my weirdo into his covers after one of the best days he has had in months, I get inspired to ask him if anyone threw his lunch on the ground. I have no idea why I asked. You see, I was AT school today. ALL DAY. I sat as his miniature table and ate a granola bar while I quietly lamented all the chocolate milk and waffles with big packets of syrup they were serving kindergarteners at noon. Brain food for beautiful little brains that are learning how to read and write their own names in about half an hour. I don’t care what it makes you think of me, it makes me want to cry.

So, you want to know what my protein fed, organic milk drinking child says to me?

“Well, I don’t want my friend to get a bare butt spank, but… yes, he did, and I don’t know why! I thought we were friends!”

Which is when he really looks at my face. Based on the look he see’s there, I see him begin to go back through the day until the knowledge dawns on him that I was THERE. That he is so freaking busted over something SO TOTALLY LAME.

I had his little bum in the car and on the way over for a big fat apology before you could say uh-oh. And the beans, they did SPILL on the way over. Standing on the doorstep, I felt like such a schmuck! And when our friends came outside, it’s like we were just sort of stuck there watching the circus of these two kids who kind of try to explain why they are lying or saying they did something they didn’t, apologizing and forgiving in hot second, then running off to lock me out of my car and laugh like hyena’s.

I guess it’s lucky for them that I really like hyena’s.

I see it!! It’s over there!!

2011-10-24T13:27:00.001-07:00

And by “it” I mean UP!

As in, I think I am about 4 days away from figuring out which way is up!

I am so close I can smell it.

Oh, Italics! How I’ve missed you… iPad, you’re great, but my lack of computer presence lately has much less to do with moving, and a lot more to do with the fact that I can’t figure out how to type anything in italics on the iPad.

Shhh… I might even type the rest of this post in italics so it feels like I’m telling you a secret…

Except I don’t really have any secrets, and until about 4 days ago, we didn’t have any window coverings, so I really, REALLY, didn’t have any secrets.

Wow, all caps, AND italics?! Yup, “up” is getting closer by the minute.

Also, now that I have a computer I can show you PICTURES!

Like this one:

No, it’s not a house picture, it’s better. That’s a picture of my breakfast date the other day. I think she likes me.

Parental Advisory

2011-10-15T10:48:00.000-07:00

hi. Hey. HELLO! Don't ask me about the move. It's a lot. Tomorrow we finally get to unpack a few boxes! Maybe we'll find last weeks kindergarten homework that never got turned in.

You know, from only the forth week of kindergarten. I'm pretty sure if I don't find that yellow folder and turn it in, I have somehow destroyed his entire academic career in the first 21 days.

Which brings me to this thought that I have had to wrestle with for the past few months, and particularly, the past three weeks. It's not even a thought, as much as it is a word.

Parent.

I've gone a few rounds with the definition of that word lately, plus it pokes me when I'm sleeping, and mocks me in public spaces. Like at Target tonight when I was supposed to be looking at a sewing machines and ended up buying toothpaste that comes with stickers you can put on the tube! It makes TOOTHPASTE exciting, you guys!

(what mom doesn't enjoy letting the kids join the no cavity raffle as they leave the dentist office? Especially when the lobby has OTHER moms in it? I'm beginning to think I should have bought two tubes...)

So what does "Good Parent" mean to you?

It didn't seem strange at the time, but when I was growing up, my parents were antique dealers. Before I was 8 that often that meant stocking shelves, greeting customers, setting up rows of baskets every morning and night, and every few weeks, 5-8 days on the road with a truck, a camper, and great big trailer, stopping at every antique mall or big red barn between here and kansas.

And this was decades before GPS was even a thought on Tom Toms mapquest!

I am not going to say that I loved every goll darn minute of it, but I don't remember feeling like it was ACTIVE suffering. Torture. Unbearable! I liked when we got somewhere late enough, that while my dad finished loading the trailer, we could catch lightening bugs in old blue tinted mason jars.

I liked laying on the top bed in the camper, the one that sat above the cab of the truck, we'd press our faces against the glass and pretend we were flying or running really fast.

It's dumb, but it was fun, cause we were SO bored.

And I SURVIVED. I was not, in fact, bored to death! In fact, being raised with those experiences, and by parents who provided for our family in interesting out of the box ways, it's made me seek an interesting life for myself. So why, WHY, do I feel so guilty about what the last few weeks have been like for the kids?

I am tortured right now. This move has wrecked havoc on my boy. I knew it would be hard, but it all just went so much longer then we could have known, and here at the end, it's just gotten so hard.

I am in love with this house! With the price, with the school district, with the forest, with the layout and the closets, and the finally completed mini renovation! But it's just so big, my sleeping people all seem so spread out!

As in, I just ordered walkie talkies to use in the backyard, but I'm pretty sure the most common phrase that will be said into them is "Jon? Can I please have an ice of glass water?"

So tonight I'm wondering what parts of this Russell is going to remember. In the last few weeks I think I've been good parent, but as a mommy I have failed him and Alice more than a few times. Turns out, I can't do it all. I'm not sure I could even do 80 percent of "it all" on a good day, even with the right meds and a bottomless diet coke.

Now I just need someone to tell me that's okay. That being a good Parent doesn't always have to mean sitting in one spot, never reaching for anything, or growing, or stretching your family past what makes them comfortable.

I pray to God, who may or may not be speaking to me right now, that I have what it takes to get my people upright again. And that whether it be with structure, medication, diet and/or all the love in my body, that I can find some relief for my boy from this relentless angst that has jumped under his skin.

I am a good parent for finding this house and pushing for it side by side with my man, now I need to be a mommy again for a while.

...

Whew! You still with me? Well, shucks, then all I have left to say is, I love you, too. And thanks.

Yes, we have a lot going on, but everybody does. Grandparents, parents, future parents, the parent word packs a lot of punch. Maybe parenting just means not quitting.

...

And, alright already! When Jon hooks up my computer, I. HAVE. PICTURES. Sheesh, you'd think the Internet had never seen a before and after picture of a room with a bathtub in the floor...

Consider Me Pumpkin Patched Up

2011-10-05T10:15:00.001-07:00

What follows now is proof that I am a firm believer that if you are going to play hooky? You should PLAY:

<sigh> I may make it to Saturday after all.

This one time…

2011-10-02T13:09:00.001-07:00

(because this is how Russell pretty much starts every sentence lately)

So, this one time, I had all these nice friends and cousins show up at my door to pack almost my entire house into boxes and put it in the garage!

I totally could have done it alone, but instead of four hours and some good times, it would have taken me about 4 weeks and some good hysterics. Or medication.

Thanks friends!! And that includes friends who took the baby for about 4 hours longer than we asked them to, and friends who are bringing me furniture from far off locations (like Glendora? I know, very exotic stuff going on here…)

Suffice it to say, I have excellent taste in friends and family, and blog posts of gratitude are being formed in my head as we speak, but FIRST, I want to tell you about this one time (last night), when I smashed my own self in the face and my husband fell over from the shock of all the blood.

Wow, didn’t see that coming did ya?

Neither did EYE!!

So, long day, hard work, good times… oh, and Russell living high on the hog by snaking bottled waters from the fridge all day, drinking half and then getting new ones. Don’t ask, I DON’T KNOW WHY. Anyway, midnight rolls around and I’m TOO TIRED to sleep, but TOO TIRED to stay awake. Ugh, my brain was just being so loud, and I just wanted to sleep so bad…

…no, this is not the part where I smash my own self in the face, but in retrospect I really wish I would have at least considered it…

Instead, I decided to take an AMBIEN, climb in my covers, and call it a night. Which is when I started thinking about ALL those half consumed waters. Like, ten or fifteen of them.

<sigh> Alright, one last mommy job and THEN sleep.

So I stumble out of bed to get the kid up to pee. Not because I’m awesome, but lazy! I simply don’t want any chance that 15 bottles of water may require me to change anybody’s sheets at 3AM when I’m getting my beauty (trying not to look as old as I feel) sleep.

Which is when, as I directed the still mostly sleeping child into the bathroom, I (read: ambien) misjudged where I was when I leaned down to pull the toilet seat up and CONKED my eye socket on the corner of the tall granite countertop.

I’m not real clear if I started cursing or bleeding first, all I know for sure is there was a lot of both, and when a still mostly sleeping Jon bounded round the corner and saw me, well… Alice has just learned to say “adios,” and at that moment, Jon simply acted out the word. First he turned as white as the snow from our home state, heroically got me a bag of frozen mixed vegetables and a paper towel, and then bam, we lost him.

I don’t remember much after that, I woke up this morning bandaged and rested with a warm bag of defrosted veggies on my head, and a GLORIOUS shiner to show off all week while we finish the new house and move out of the old one.

I know what you’re thinking by the way, and yes, maybe later I’ll add a picture to this post. I mean, this is WHY I have a blog, right? To amuse you at my own expense?

Gosh, I hope you’re amused…

Less Cursing, More Eyebrows.

2011-09-28T00:50:00.001-07:00

Whoa! Sorry for all the swears in the post below!

(that’s for my grandma)

Well, a little sorry. Things around here are

Insane in a good way, but you know, there may still be a few curse words flying around so watch your head.

Anyway, I don’t have time for a super post, but how would you guys like a little peeky-peek into house land? Like, for starters, I’ve been scouring craigslist for some kitchen appliances when I ran across this listing for a SPACESAVER microwave:

"very nice model, great SPACESAVER, installs under the counter, perfect for your small kitchen"

And ends with

"must sell, it is too big for our house"

I might have startled poor Jon with the sudden choking/guffaw spasm that last line inspired. And is SPACESAVER a brand? Why are they yelling at me? Because they are frustrated they live in house that is too tiny for a SPACESAVER microwave? (If their house is really that small, they should probably whisper.) (I’m just saying.)

Also, we begin PAINTING tomorrow! Every wall, closet, door, ceiling, and cupboard of a 2700 square foot house. With paint I PICKED. No big deal, I only obsessed about it for weeks, including on the phone with my mom while I was trapped in my hospital bed in California, little color booklets in hand, while she was at the Sherwin Williams kiosk in Utah.

(thanks mom)

So… I’m not going to explain them, but these are my colors. Don’t tell me if you don’t like them, cause it’s TOO LATE. Besides, if I never have to talk about painting a wall again, I could live with that.

Yeah… they kind of don’t look anything like that on the walls, (or on the paint chips sitting next to me) so don’t worry, I didn’t ruin the surprise.

That’s all for now, oh, except I think I’m moving in about a week and I have yet to pack one box. What are you doing Saturday? You should come over.

And bring your friends.

Tell them it’s a party and I may be convinced to have junk food available while they bubble wrap my dishes.

Do you bubble wrap dishes for a move 5 miles away? Maybe you could just come over and hold stuff on your lap while I drive back and forth.

Gosh, that just gave me a total college flashback. Goodnight!

Right ureteroscopy, laser lithotripsy, basket stone extraction, cystoscopy with right utereial stent placement.

2011-09-25T00:04:00.001-07:00

At least that is what Dr. Grunenfelder called it.

I just call it “What I did last week.”

“Kidney Stone” just sounds too simple, really. I even had them make me a copy of the order, which was so comically long, the nurse had to take a breath when she was reading it to me.

You know before I signed the paper claiming I understood what the hell they were talking about before they knocked me unconscious.

Hey, it’s cool, I didn’t have anything else going on last week. Nope, my days are SO boring right now I needed a little mind sucking pain to span a week of my life just to liven things up around here.

That’s all.

And maybe to give me a little of that perspective I’ve been craving. I’m sure I could write a long complaining post about how much it sucks to have an obstruction in your body so ridiculous that you’re trapping fluid in your kidney’s, but when I stop and look back on it?

I have the BEST WARD, AND FRIENDS, AND FAMILY ON THE PLANET.

And I live in a day and age when Morphine has been invented.

Plus Denise and Olivia were the two single best nurses I have ever had, and I had them when I REALLY needed my nurses to be kick ass.

Thanks for your prayers and cheerleading folks. This tired momma felt every bit of it, and yes! Finally, tonight, I think I really am feeling better.

(good enough to go take some pictures tomorrow? You betcha, only halfway through the renovation of the new house I have some “before and after” pictures that might give YOU kidney stones they are so Oprah worthy)

Yes, definitely feeling better.

But what if I can’t?

2011-09-15T16:40:00.001-07:00

There are groceries all over the counter in the kitchen behind me, and zombie children watching tv to the right of me, no toilet paper in the kids bathroom, not to mention that pile of wet towels from last night that wants to go to therapy with me so they can tell me that “when” I don’t wash them, they “feel” stinky.

I am going to vent, and you know what? I don’t care who reads it, because I am not even a person right now. I am a caricature of every overwhelmed mom I have ever met, or seen on tv, or watched in a movie, or read about in a book.

When we were growing up, we were told our whole lives that we were special, different, one of a kind! I could be anything I wanted to be… and what I am today? Is EVERY SINGLE OTHER WOMAN IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD that wants her children to pick up their toys, put a dish in the sink, not put their shoes there, leave their sibling alone, stand by the cart in the grocery store, treat me like a person and not just a chair…

Alice makes this sound lately… you guys, it has a direct line to my emergency reactor hormone, or brain section, whatever, but it is this shrill, angry, loud sound that makes me want to dive under the bed and suck my thumb. Don’t worry, she only makes the sound about 30 or 40 times a day. Just enough to have me declared legally insane, but not enough to get me a note from my doctor to take a day off.

I am not a nice person right now. It makes me so sad when everyone in my house is finally asleep, and I spy on their peaceful sleeping faces and think of all the times I could have kissed them instead of shouted. If I was on a reality tv show, I would be the villain. I would be known my whole life for that time when I had two houses to manage, and taught my daughter, who learns to speak once in her life, that the way we speak to Russell is with exasperation and impatience.

Wow, writing that really hurt my feelings.

I know my kids deserve better. I am a good mom. I know there is a finish line for this particular part of the race I am running. I know I will get there, and soon I will be shouting less and laughing more. I know that I am not stressing my family out for something selfish or insignificant. Jon and I have chosen a path that requires a lot from us, because it will give us a lot back.

And I know I’m a good mom, because my life is FILLED with wonderful moms. Moms who have felt exactly like I do right now. Mom’s who work their butts off, who would make pioneer women proud even though we aren’t having babies in the back of wagons, but reading labels, making charts, voting in elections, mastering the internet, joining the PTA, working full time jobs, or working as full time moms, all while keeping relatively high standards for hygiene considering the fact that we aren’t even allowed to PEE without someone standing outside of the door saying “What doing, mommy? WHAT DOING?!”

Have I mentioned on this here blog that we are being sued by a bully? A BIG STUPID BULLY. I am watching the shine of every dime right now as we pinch pennies over this renovation, and this guy who damaged our property before we ever even owned it is trying to bully us into, not only having to pay someone else to fix the whole stupid mess, but still paying him an outrageous amount for the “work” he did messing it up in the first place.

It blows my mind that adults require children to sit in their chairs, say please, thank you, and sorry, to share, wait your turn, and clean up your own messes, and yet somehow our society is still filled with adults who missed any of those lessons.

Or, the school lessons didn’t carry as much weight as the behaviors they learned from watching. That used to mean watching your own parents, family, community. Now it’s that and tv, movies, video games.

If our children are going to learn softness, patience, how to give an apology or accept one, they are going to learn that from us. If they are going to learn how to make technology work for them, instead of becoming slaves to it, we have to teach them that, too.

Maybe I will go and do that right now.

I have problems that are a privilege to have, I have children who give twice as much as they take, and friends who let me pitch a fit once in a while. If someone wants to come over and do my dishes, I think I could probably shut my trap.

Or cookies. In fact I will accept baked goods of any kind.

And thanks. If I had to write these feelings in a journal it would probably have thrown itself off a bridge when I was done.

(I like chocolate chip, but really, I’m not picky…)

Why we never throw stones from our glass house.

2011-09-13T16:05:00.001-07:00

…don’t walk away from me, Jon King, these are YOUR KIDS, TOO.

(more yours than mine probably. they look just like you!)

Best Post of ALL TIME

2011-09-09T22:18:00.001-07:00

I might toss and turn about that title a little, but I’m too busy feeling clever to worry much about it. You guys! There are, ok, (breath, alissa) there are a couple things right now that are BLOWING my mind. The first is the cover of the fall issue of Exponent II --->

Sorry non-mormonites. That probably just made you go “huh?”

Don’t feel left out, all you’re missing is the feeling of trying to decide if that cover makes you uncomfortable or not.

Isn’t she beautiful? I know that woman. I am that woman. I love it so much, for all the things it says that I never seem quite able to articulate. Wearing your religion, hiding it, showing it. It could only be improved for me if the lady were holding a beer in one hand and blogging with the other.

Item Number Two:

My “kindy-gardener”. He is like a tiny human filled with magic and angst, shaken, not stirred, and ALL MINE. I volunteered at his school yesterday. I’m so grateful for the opportunity to make being a mom my job, job. Is it controversial to say that? I feel like if I told everyone “I LOVE WORKING AT LADY FOOT LOCKER!” a person could just smile and keep walking, but somehow saying “I LOVE BEING A STAY AT HOME MOM!” translates into, “Shouldn’t we ALL?!”

I’ve just never really been good at anything before, at least not anything that actually has the potential to contribute back to society. So yeah, I love it :)

(for today, at least)

I’m also grateful for medication, because after spending “day two” there, I see how the rowdy kids are making their first impressions on the teacher, and, well? I’m just glad he has a chance to make a different kind of impression for a minute. I know medicine is a careful dance, but as much as I despise giving him that little pill, today I said grateful prayers about it. Sure his teacher is not getting to meet the full blown persona that is RUSSELL!! but he also doesn’t have to meet the full blown persona of TEACHER who has 33 other kids to teach and will put you in time out repeatedly because, honestly, what choice does she have? He gets a chance to just like her, because he can stay in his chair and color, and she tells him it’s nice.

Item Number Three:

GOLD COINS. gold coins. Gold Coins. GOLD COINS!!!! I will tell you about it in the next post. That’s right, it is so mind blowing it get’s it’s own post. This is not an exaggeration.

Last, but certainly not least:

All Time.

I read something the other day that was smart. SMRT. Like, not usually the kind of thing I dive into since it had scripture references (yeah, more then one), and alluded to other smart things assuming you knew what they were talking about, but the title of this grabbed me, and all of sudden I was at the end if it, and my brain is now different. It should have had a warning at the top.

It’s from the blog associated with the magazine at the top of this post. Yeah, I guess it’s a Mormon thing, but also, it’s totally not. Sometimes I look at all the religions around me and I feel like they are just different outfits for people to wear, or wrap around themselves, so they can express this thing, this connection, this information they hold that has no words in any earthly language.

When I read this post, I had one of those feelings where something besides just the intelligence I carry in my head said “yes. that is the thing you were looking for.”

Here is the link to the post, (if you haven’t already wandered to the fridge and off to find your remote, that is)…

http://www.the-exponent.com/2011/09/06/lesson-41-postmortal-spirit-world/

And here is what I heard:

Eternity isn’t from this point forward. It is ALL TIME. According to the Mormon religion, by getting married in the Temple, and being a child of Temple Parents, I am sealed to my family for all time and eternity, which now I’m understanding would include before I ever met them.

According to how I feel, God or the Universe wants me to keep my family BEFORE, after, and during this moment, simply because we happened. When I die, it’s not that everything goes away, it’s more like everything comes all together. All time.

Even though the blog post up there is supposed to be an intellectual Mormon conversation about what happens after we die, I feel this strange anchoring comfort that what has been done here, my family I have made, they cannot be undone. Even when things do become undone. I like the reference to that scripture about God weeping, because it is sad. The suffering we are capable of withstanding is sad!

And I guess it feeds into this idea I already believe, and have been thrashing out on my own here, which is a determination to find. my. joy. now.

I am already in my All Time and Eternity.

I don’t want to wait until I die and only examine my life from some other side. I want to be grateful NOW. I want be part of something bigger than myself today. I want to pay back into my life all the time, and I want to think that someone like Jesus could watch me flop around on the ground, and be proud of the way I fight for it, right before he scoops me back into the water.

And now brain is tired and wants to go watch Top Chef: Just Desserts.

Gosh I hope this post still makes sense tomorrow. Sorry(ish) for the rant. Good night!

How many days has it been since yesterday?

2011-09-07T22:50:00.001-07:00

Three?

Four?

Definitely four.

We started “kindergarten day” with an announcement from Russell that he might have maybe locked the keys in the car.

That was 7:50am.

8:35am

AAA arrives (woo-hoo!)

8:50am

termite guy who messed up some work on the house before we ever even bought it (and has since been lost in Germany for an unknown number of weeks), calls and starts screaming like a crazy person. (woo-huh?)

9:30am

daddy takes pity on my mental state and joins us to take Russell to Kindergarten (woo-woo! if you know what I mean :)

10:05am

Obligatory 1st Day of School Photo Op!

10:15am

frantically texting friends and neighbors to see if someone can watch Alice as Russell has a total meltdown of epic proportions

10:30am

SO GLAD I sent that email yesterday so I didn’t blurt out something defensive or inarticulate in an attempt to explain the “epic proportions” and, instead, was able to leave Russell with his new teacher who is so awesome I could marry her, if it wasn’t for that afore mentioned woo-woo husband.

11am

writing and sending 1st draft “go away” emails for the nutty termite dude to my attorney/contractor/DAD

11:45am

hanging up with enormous relief that my dad loves me enough to not point out exactly how this is probably my fault, while simultaneously saving my skin with hours of tedious contract reading

12:30pm

called my big sister. we both have brand new Kindy-gardeners at the same time. power in numbers.

1pm

called my little sister, too. because I can.

1:35pm

arrived back in Russell’s classroom to find him tired and full of smiles and stories like a totally normal human being, and then I cried like a totally normal human being, too, because, GOSH! I just like his kindergarten face!

…blah blah blah, more stuff, celebrating shiny kid with a little fast food ice cream, errands, more dissecting of contracts…

Finally, we ended our day at our new “tree house” where we hauled out more flooring, worked in the yard, and went for a walk in the forest which was remarkable mostly because of the man we met walking with his dog. Russell told him we have a new house, and “we can go in the forest whenever we want!” so the man asked him “yes, but do you know the most important thing you have to do before you ever go in the woods?” to which he replied, arms flung open, “YES! You have to put on your CLOTHES!”

Hmmm, with common sense like that, maybe I’ll just let him deal with the pesky termite guy….

“Don’t EAT Me!!”

2011-09-05T10:11:00.001-07:00

Otherwise known as the name of every game Alice plays lately. When that child is awake, the way the earth orbits the sun, I can count on her shrill voice calling it out with such clarity, with such sincerity, that often I can’t stop myself from checking to make sure she is not, in fact, being eaten.

For the most part, her yells are on behalf of some poor lego man who is becoming a plastic lunch for a toothy yet body-less t-rex head that she is obsessed with. It had a body once, but I don’t dare throw it away in favor of toys I actually *paid* for. Toys are no fun if your parents want you to play with them.

So “Nooooo!! Don’t EEEEAT meeeeee!”

and

“Wook, mommy! Wook meeee! …Happy Face.”

Those are the phrases that make up most of my day.

unless she is mad and then she says things like

“STOP. SINGING.”

“Don’t wook at me. DON’T WOOK AT ME!”

and don’t forget how several times a day she will point at Russell with one angry fat finger and count to ten in an attempt to control him.

Are you amused? Good, that means you passed the test. You are now qualified to enjoy this video:

Alice Draws from alissa king on Vimeo.

Happy labor day, people!

Pearly Whites

2011-09-01T23:19:00.001-07:00

I don’t know what the best part is; the fact that the kids had no cavities (yay!), or the fact that they let the nice pink ladies stick sharp metal objects in their mouths without crying, wiggling or blackmail.

And were totally photogenic while doing it.

Just more proof that sunglasses make any moment, a “kodak moment.” Oh, and growing up the child of a blogger is, like, totally uncool, mom.

I don’t feel bad. Look at him! That kid might as well be at the beach.

I also liked the part where, even though it’s a pediatric dental office, all the other pink ladies kept coming in to see Alice getting her teeth cleaned. One of the giggling assistants said she can’t remember the last time they had a two year old they didn’t need to hold down…

The worst part is I think she actually liked it.

I should have suspected when I met her strawberry blond head, but now it’s clear; we might need a DNA test up in this joint.

The Feeling Is Mutual.

2011-08-30T08:44:00.001-07:00

Barbara left us a little parting gift…

But, yes, we are in! We had pizza delivered. We ate it on the porch with our neighbors. Mr. Rogers would be proud.

Stay tuned for more… I don’t just have pictures, I actually built a whole new blog for this insanity, but I need to figure out how to add scent to it. The before pictures just don’t have the same impact without the smell of thirty year old carpet.

That’s why we ate on the porch. I mean our porch. :)

Sidebar updates, people!

2011-08-28T14:22:00.001-07:00

Long overdue, but worth the wait, we've got all sorts of new tunes and reads we are currently obsessed with.

Also (drumroll please), today I am unveiling a new category. A category it would be foolish to underestimate. It's called "Jack Movies" and basically it's a category where I show off how awesome I am because of the people I'm related too. In this case, my cousin Jack, fresh out of film school and already an award winning documentary film maker. He has basically devoted his entire life to watching movies, all so that one day he could help correct oversights in my movie watching history.

Like the fact that I missed Adaptation, or The Insider.

Everything he brings over is, like, super smart, but not too super smart, ya know? I mean, watching movies should be a little fun, and those movies? Smart AND fun. I dated a guy like that once. It didn’t last, it ended in marriage.

Jack also helps us to avoid future brain sucking disasters like the upcoming Captain Planet. I don’t even know when that comes out, but you better be sure I already have a text saved on my phone guiding me to steer clear. I’m sure if he turns out to be wrong, he’ll let me know, but he hasn’t steered us wrong yet.

Well.

Except.

He doesn’t like scary movies.

I will overlook this for now since next weekend he has promised to bring over something called Glengarry Glen Ross. I thought that was a typo when he sent it, but it snot.

Ha. Ha. Ha? Yeah, that was a typo. Or a joke, if you’re my six year old son who can’t get enough of the “I thought it was green, but it snot!” jokes lately.

Yes, I have derailed, go check out the links, they are totally rad.

I talked to BARBARA.

2011-08-26T10:30:00.001-07:00

Last night.

For REALS.

Since no one has heard from or seen her in about three weeks, and we were about to begin the process of declaring the property abandoned so we could take possession on “August 29th at 5pm,” this is quite the turn of events.

It all started when my husband, James Bond, stopped by to “check out the wood on the deck” (cover story) and noticed that backdoor was “open” (concerned citizen) and noticed that

all

the

boxes

were

gone.

Front door, back door, everything unlocked, no cars left in the garage, where is everything? Where is Barbara? So of course, Jon begins to look room to room. You know, to make sure everything is okay (well, now he’s just snooping).

So now we know, except for a box marked “ceramics” in the guest room, and a bed we knew she was leaving behind, there might as well be a neon sign on the front that says “VACANCY”

Jon calls me, “This is going to blow your mind,” he says.

Okay, okay! Now the story takes a turn from heroic adventuring husband to “I know I’m a buzz kill” wife, but I’m like WHAT?! You did what?!

In my defense, this should not surprise you (or him!) since when Erin was in town last month, I made her take this picture a hundred yards away to prove I had taken her to see the house, but wouldn’t let her get close enough to actually see the house if you know what I mean.

Let’s just say I do not believe in poking crazy people with sticks.

So Jon gets home, and between him and our realtor, who is paying the mortgage on the place right now, they begin scheming to change locks.

Man, I am a wet blanket! No way! I can’t tell you how relieved I am that she got everything out, but, guys, she got everything out. She’s following our contract! Why would you try and lock someone out of a house when they are following the contract? And knowing how hoarders think from the extensive research I have been doing (you know, from my couch watching television shows about them of course), I know, I KNOW, she is coming back this weekend to get that box of ceramics.

So, before world war 3 broke out, James Bond made a decidedly un-sneaky move. He called her! We have her number, but we never use it (again with the stick theory), and besides, we knew she’s been changing her numbers and returning mail unopened to our realtor for weeks so it was a long shot.

She didn’t answer.

…

She called back…

Man, was she ever mad! She had been at the house all day! The fact that she was gone for the 5 minutes Jon was there is some kind of miracle, but she did pick up a message from our realtor and knew someone had been there. “Haven’t you ever left your house unlocked during the day?” She asked me.

Totally. Yes.

Then followed a conversation where my side went something like this:

“I can’t believe it, when we heard the door was unlocked I was worried, I’m so glad everything is okay! You’re great Barbara, the BEST, you emptied that house! You might have hidden super powers. Why is everybody pressuring us? I’m not ready, you’re not done, we both know Monday is the day, not tomorrow, not Saturday, Monday the 29th at 5pm, I’m with you Barbara.”

20 minutes later she went from mad as a hornet to inviting us over on Sunday to show us “the lovely home” we bought. She says we’re not going to believe it, she can’t wait to show us, she says she can’t believe it’s the same house we first walked through.

Holy cow you guys. This might actually be happening.

I hope this post doesn’t jinx it, but you guys, this might actually, FINALLY, be happening!

Whoa.

It’s next to the Shire.

2011-08-22T13:02:00.001-07:00

Yesterday I told someone I am from “Middle Utah.”

Granted my brain was a little scrambled because the woman I was talking to was at our house to pick up her GIGANTIC dog from our back yard a few hours after we saved him from running out into oncoming traffic near our house.

But for the LIFE of me I could not think of the words “Central Utah,” or “Fountain Green,” or “Provo.”

So after she got done telling us how it was a rescue dog that was previously owned by a hunter who was going to take it up in the hills and shoot it, I tried to let her know I understood because “I grew up on a farm in Middle Utah.”

What I am saying is, I don’t understand that basics of the English language or geography, but I do know about people who shoot their dogs in the mountains. Awesome.

…

Also, totally unrelated, but if you are having trouble watching any of my slideshows, I just want you to know, I DO care. I can’t post my stuff to YouTube because, in a nutshell, my slideshows are too fabulous. That leaves me with Vimeo, which I love, but you have to know the tricks if you are having problems. First trick? Don’t try to watch them in Internet Explorer. The second trick? When the slideshow starts, push pause and wait about 60 seconds for the video to finish loading and then it should work just fine.

If it still doesn’t work, get in your car and drive to my house and watch them on my computer. I’ll take pictures and make a slideshow of you watching my slideshow! It’s a win/win.

…

and FINALLY, since you probably can’t get me to talk about this if you have been calling me for an update:

No. We do not seem any closer to getting into the house we bought in June, then we were when we put our offer in 7 months ago. Essentially, Barbara has until the 29th of August to get her last things out, but since she is suddenly digging in her heals again, we are faced with the real possibility of having to get an attorney and a Sherriff out there. I guess you always plan for the worst case scenario, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t lame when it happens.

Have I mentioned she doesn’t even live there? That she has two other houses, a barn filled with stuff, 3 storage units, and LIVES in a condo three hours from here? Right now the hang-up is that she drives out here on Saturday, opens up the last 12 boxes she has sitting in the living room, moves stuff around in them (stuff = books, dolls, ancient bottles of lotion, magazine clippings, and zip lock baggies filled with dollar bills), tapes them back up, calls our realtor to inform him the boxes simply aren’t ready to be moved, and then leaves again for a week.

And have I mentioned that she hasn’t paid a dime for this house in over two years? And that our poor realtor has to pay the mortgage for every day she is there, and she knows it?

I am not mad at her. Seriously! Why would I even think about her when she doesn’t think about anyone else? But I am exasperated with the waiting, and I feel bad that when I was ready to walk away from this house, our realtor was so sure he could get her to move along quickly that we have all sorts of contracts that make him responsible for everything that goes on with her, whether that’s the mortgage or any attorney's fee’s.

He probably is mad at her.

And that’s your update, now I’m headed to the grocery store in Lower California.

I have a question about beer.

2011-08-19T09:23:00.001-07:00

Well, after spending twenty nine of my 32 years of life in Utah, I probably have more than one.

Fortunately, I live next to this guy --->

That’s Brad.

He has giant brains and what looks like a mad scientist set-up going on in his garage every other weekend. As it turns out, he is not hatching a plan for world domination, he just cooks beer in there. Or, I mean brews. I know all sorts of things about it now, including how to use words like “hops.”

As in:

“When Brad makes beer it hops down my throat.”

See? Like that.

Oh, calm down everyone, I have not moved to California and become a moonshine loving hippy that lives under a tarp. I actually don’t drink beer. Or, I mean, I only drink happy, free range beer, that never lived in a bottle. And was made in the garage next door. By (get this people) a dude that was, like, third or fourth runner up in the National Samuel Adams Brewing contest.

Yeah.

In. The. NATION.

It would be against my religion to not taste it.

Let’s move on.

THIS is the “recipe” --->

After talking with Brad, I can’t believe how complicated GRAIN is. There are about seven different grains in that bin that will flavor this batch (keg?) of beer. I think there might be different ways to brew the same grains that make it more or less sweet, but as far as ingredients go, what you start with in your “bin” is all the ingredients you use.

I know I’m so Mormon, but this blows my mind! Also, as a person who has spent the last few years researching embroidery, I know there are lace patterns that go back centuries, passed down mother to daughter. Now I know beer recipes have some pretty cool lineage, too.

For instance, I now know there is a beer in Germany that has a specific salty sour taste because of the minerals you can only get from using the water from that region. Um? Rad.

Now, I will get in trouble if I try to explain the process from here, but just trust me when I tell you it involves these three pots --->

…making a mash with the grain, then heating the mixture, draining the liquid, then cooling it using ice and a hose, and finally packing it all into a keg. Please don’t try this at home since I might be making that up. I really should have been taking notes. Either way, the pictures are cool! --->

Oh, and don’t forget to stir it all with something that looks like it belongs above the desk of a cranky head mistress from some turn of the century pioneer school house. So, along with how beer is made, now I know why his children are so well behaved…

That’s right people, I am saying he uses that giant wooden spoon…

…to make his children beer so they will go to sleep.

Or not. It’s just a theory. So, my question:

How did they carbonate beer two hundred years ago? Jon says they didn’t and it was called Mead, and I said, no way! And then he said “yes way,” and then I said, “let’s ask Brad.” and that’s how I got the title of this post.

I will let you guys know what he says if he doesn’t answer in the comments. But I think he will since today is his wife’s BIRTHDAY, and she would want him to… you know since I have a present that I want to give to her…

russell. can. SWIM.

2011-08-18T10:53:00.001-07:00

Which is a good thing or these pictures wouldn't be awesome at all.

Everyone has been telling me this would happen, I've needed to find something he enjoys that requires discipline and listening skills (and where he is not so worried about being a clown for the other kids).

Swim is all those things! Something I don't find a little shocking considering we've spent most of the last two summers heading to the pool, only to have him cling to the edge in water wings, and shriek like he's in a slasher movie when even the idea of moisture approaches his face.

Since he was born, the tantrums he has thrown getting his hair washed have been some of the most epic battles in this household.

And now he does this! --->

Russell Can Swim? from alissa king on Vimeo.

Sure, it’s not the Olympics or anything, but, you guys! He couldn't swim just ten days ago. Like, at all. Then four things happened:

1. We went swimming at Lauren's house, they gave him a life vest, and he floated around and watched her and her friends do little girl cannonballs into the pool. (um, adorable)

2. That night he had a vivid dream that he could swim, and he said it felt like flying.

3. A week later, Papa Russ spent an hour easing him onto a boogie board, and letting him kick his way across the pool.

And finally,

4. We found a swimming school. I requested a male instructor so Russell would want to impress him. I can't explain exactly why I knew this would work, but it has something to do with Russell having a lot of experience with female authority figures.

10 bonus points for the mom lady since it totally worked! Threw off his mental game a little with the young handsome instructor, plus it makes it more fun for me to watch his lesson.

Ahem.

You guys, he listens to instructions! He follows directions! He’s challenged and interested, he's getting exercise while he does it! I take a book when I go, but I never even crack it open. I can't take my eyes off him! Who is that kid? The one who went from incoherently screaming "no FACE!" to doing... what? Is that the breast stroke?!

And finally, FINALLY, he now let's me wash his hair with practically no threats of violence from either of us. I don't have a video of that, but I think we can all agree that is pretty much the best part of all.

Oh, and this.

(in case you didn’t watch the video, and now you’re all, “wait! the video has swimming and stunts! alissa, you should have told us!” and now I have… :)

In for a penny, in for a… pickle?

2011-08-16T21:09:00.001-07:00

That? Is a KING JOHN penny. Like, my husband. Jon King! I’m so punny.

(is pun even the right word for that? it’s my blog so I don’t care.)

We spent a lovey night in San Diego Saturday. We were going to go Friday, but when we were driving down we had to give Russell a bowl because he looked like he was going to barf and, unfortunately, we gave it to him just in time for ALICE to barf all over. A seemingly endless rice and gingersnap vomit waterfall. Needless to say we headed home. On a side note, he never did barf. I have no idea what trick the universe was playing on that one, since she didn’t barf again, either. Mostly it just threw our weekend off a day and we missed church. Barf will do that.

More Pictures:

All taken at Professor Pennypickles in Temecula. You might remember the place from the road trip slideshow last march, but this time Russell and I took Alice and Daddy, too. That place is one of our favorite places on EARTH.

Seriously, skip Disneyland next time, and head to Temecula.

I had a post up this weekend that I took down. I liked the post, something was just bugging me about it. I think I lack some perspective this summer. Or I’m trying to over-perspective everything. Either way, I know things feel harder then they actually are right now, and someday I will look back on this and think it wasn’t bad, it was just long and weird. A limbo summer.

I feel more qualified to write this one, I guess. I’m feeling a little better… I had a great session with my therapist! It was better than a massage AND a pedicure. Seriously, GO GET ONE. Stephanie is the best therapist I’ve ever had. She’s like a kindred spirit, only she’s older than me and has the word DOCTOR attached to her last name so she’s totally allowed to boss me around and tell me when I’m being a jerk to myself or <cough>jon<cough>.

What she and I agreed on, is that I am in the healthiest depression of my life. Woo-hoo (ish)!! She and I have both had depressions where you welcome it in like a friend, wrap yourself up in the blanket of self loathing it brings with it, and eat trashy food together until 2 in the morning.

You know what? I’m doing good. This is the first depression I am asking to stand over there. I have a thing, a wiring, or a chemical predisposition of some kind, whatever it is, I’m not going to invite it in anymore, but I’m also not going to close my eyes, plug my ears and yell “I can’t hear you!” and I’m certainly not going let it stand in my living room making a giant sculpture of all my greatest past failures and future fears so when I finally look up? I will have to drive my car off a bridge.

This time is different. I’m healthier than I’ve ever been in my life, physically my IC and endometriosis are totally in check and I haven’t had a kidney stone in years, which is a victory all by itself! Emotionally I’m in a healthy marriage with two great kids that are as easy and as hard as most other peoples, I have great girlfriends next door or a phone call away coast to coast, and I’ve made a certain peace with the need for medication that anyone in this family seems to have at the moment. This depression is different for me because it was triggered by rage.

I live like most moms, like a racehorse with blinders. Working harder than I’ve ever worked in my life, determined to do this whole charmed life thing right: I’ve got my new and improved california self, a nice man, a golden boy, a pink baby, and a cat. The bulk of the reading I do these days is checking the ingredients on the back of the spaghetti sauce or cheese crackers when I’m in the grocery store, and the most exercise I get is chasing Russell down the street demanding he wear a helmet on his bike.

We’ve found ourselves in a battle for a home that I think is worth every ounce of effort, and as hard as this house thing is, I feel like I am fighting a totally worthy battle. If the house wasn’t a crazy short sale we never could have afforded it. Period. The fact is, we’ve put everything on the line to get this house, and right now, this is the part where I am paying more than money for it. Fortunately, I’ve always had more willpower than money, so in that way I can afford it, where some people may have had the dough-ray-mee, but not the gee-u-tee-ess.

(GUTS :)

The kids and I do art every day, we read together, cook together, and sometimes (often) do nothin’ together. On top of it all, I haven’t abandoned my religion even though I’ve tried to many times. I RECYCLE. What’s worse than a kitchen trash can that needs to be emptied? TWO of them. We use energy efficient light bulbs, I have “sisters” in Afghanistan and Nigeria that I support learning work skills, and I joined a book club. That’s the kind of stuff I mean when I say I was like a racehorse with blinders, determined to BE ALL I CAN BE, and DO ALL I CAN DO.

I was scared and depressed when we moved our family and my pregnant self to California, but I also really, REALLY, wanted to be here. I had that baby, put one foot in front of the other, found doctors for our family’s ADHD epidemic, and after a couple years, lost 70 pounds and found some footing. When cottage preschool closed and I lost the one place I felt like I could take Russell and leave him (and my worries about him) behind, I was sad and thrown off balance, but we got out our picnic basket and climbed that mountain, too. Sure, I’ve never worked so hard, but my family just seems to get better, and better and BETTER.

And then Debi died, and I don’t mean to bring this up again, except I was so angry. I couldn’t stop being angry, and I loved her and I’ll miss her, but there really are a lot of other people whose lives will never recover completely from that loss, and I needed to get a grip. This was no longer about just my friend and her husband. Anger is just not a usual deal for me, and everything about losing those two awesome people was so stupid, and suddenly everything seemed STUPID, and my friends who can’t get pregnant while teenagers pop out babies on tv is STUPID, and the way I never stop spinning my wheels is STUPID, and doing dishes is TOTALLY STUPID.

About 6 weeks ago, Alice and I got smashed by something called a rogue wave so massive it was on the news later that night. We weren’t even in the water, we were standing by a rocky ledge looking for beach crabs about 15 feet away from where the last bit of the waves were crawling up the shore. I was taking a picture and thought, “wow, that huge wave is not slowing down.” When I looked up and saw the wall of water stretching as far down the beach as I could see, all I could do was throw Russell up the rocks, command him to run, then grab Alice and secure ourselves to the nearest boulder. We were engulfed in a violent slam of roaring saltwater. When it receded there was a man running toward us from the nearby Ocean Institute, his face was white and all he said was “I have never seen anything like that. I thought you guys were gone.”

Great.

Alright already. I get it, Universe! I am full of all these complex emotions and dreams and plans and schedules, and as far as you’re concerned I BARELY exist. And the little people you allowed me to make in my body like a freaky science experiment that I can no longer live without? I am all that stands between them, and being swept out to sea.

And that’s how I’ve felt for about 4 weeks. The anger was thick like garlic mashed potatoes, and the blog was more like a blah-g, with half hearted attempts to boost myself out of the dumps. I stopped shaving my legs and cooking dinners from scratch, and opted for pants and the drive thru at Boston Market where the kids and I can split a chicken pot pie for four dollars and fifty nine cents.

But it is all perspective. Sooner than ever before, I can feel myself on the waning side of this particular rogue wave. I’ve never worked through a depression so quick. I’ve written a few posts that will never see the front side of this here blog, and I removed that last one. Not because they said anything wrong, but I knew they were half written by me, and half by the rude voice my depression talks to me with. I don’t mind sharing with whoever has the time or interest to read these long rants, but I would like to feel like it’s actually me talking.

Which, now I’m done doing. Sorry, this post has no real ending. I would say “To Be Continued…” to sound all mysterious, but let’s be real, with an ADD mom that's a pretty open ended promise.

Oh, and right after I took that above picture and almost died, I enrolled Russell in swim classes. That’s my next post, but I must say I think we have found our Russell Whisperer in the waters of the Irvine aquatic center. He’s a FISH.

Butter? CHEESE!

2011-08-11T11:20:00.001-07:00

so, think of the song:

we WILL,

we WILL,

ROCK YOU!

<CLAP>

ROCK YOU!

<CLAP>

but change the words to:

buh-DER,

buh-DER,

BUTTER?

CHEESE!!

BUTTER?

CHEESE!!

and now you know what alice is marching around my house and singing at the top of her lungs at this very moment.

Well, when she’s not belting out “BAY-BEEEEEE! BABY CROCKET!!” to the melody of “Davy Crocket.”

and she’s all mine.

Joanna, you WILL pee your pants.

2011-08-09T16:18:00.001-07:00

For the rest of you this is just a warning, but for Joanna it’s a sure thing.

She can only blame herself. Wyatt’s dinosaur birthday party was on Sunday and she let me take as many pictures as I wanted.

Also, there are a lot of pictures of Russell having several near death experiences, and Alice in a swimsuit wearing cowgirl boots eating CANDY.

Let’s just all take a potty break together so none of us has to pee our pants with the killer cuteness of this party, yeah?

…

Are you back? Alright, let’s do this thing --->

Prozac is a dollar.

2011-08-06T10:09:00.001-07:00

Well, with my insurance and sales tax it actually comes to $1.27

You know what’s cheaper than that? JON IS HOME!!!

We could have had a make-out session on the doorstep for a while, but instead we got distracted by the 20 or so MAGNIFICENT orb weavers decorating the trees in the front yard. It really is a thing to behold!

Wow, I’m an entirely pathetic person about my hubby. I don’t care. My days just start better when I roll over in the morning, reach out a groggy sleepy hand… and find only a warm dent where he was sleeping, so now I know at least one of us cares enough about the kids to get them some breakfast, and I can sleep for 10 more minutes.

How I love that man of mine!

Other things I love in my now ridiculously cheerful mood?

Aunty Beth!

Spooky the Lizard Queen

Alice the Beauty Queen

Yeah, she broke into my make-up. Don't worry, she only only ate a little…

and finally (he made this outfit himself!) --->

I call that one “Russell the EMPLOYED!”

Happy Saturday, peeps!

The Good Fight

2011-08-03T16:05:00.001-07:00

Gah. I’m having a little trouble getting my feet under me. I might have a touch of depression coupled with having a husband out of town for week on our anniversary, buying a house over a month ago that we’re not allowed to step foot in until “August 29th at 5pm”, still trying to make sense of losing a friend in that stupid car accident, oh, and having both of my small intense people climbing up my body like a rope ladder all day, everyday, until school starts September 7th, which is when, no big deal, we will have about 3 weeks to start and finish a renovation of said house AND move into it. On top of that I just feel like I cannot compete with the constant, unrelenting, flow of angst from Russell these days. I sort of feel like ADD is eating my little family for lunch this summer, and every time we almost get our bearings… well, we just don’t.

blah.

I know, it’s all a matter perspective. Another reason why my chemical predisposition for depression is a TOTAL buzz kill. Depression isn’t all that interested in the bright side, and in fact, wants you to know we’re all going to die someday and, as of tomorrow, there will be no more puppies or rainbows. Ever.

And you know what? I don’t accept that. I LIKE rainbows and puppies, and when Jon get’s back into town I will get my butt over to therapy. In the meantime, in between eating my entire months supply of dark chocolate by August 7th and watching reruns of Rosanne after the kids go to bed, I am going to continue making my dopey happy slideshows, set up playdates to get myself out of the house, and continue cruising amazon dot com in search of clearance lego’s and slip’n’slides so I can get more photo’s like these:

and photo’s like this:

(As Russell tells it, this lego man looks “EXACTLY LIKE COUSIN JACK!!” and then set up this photo shoot so we could send him a picture of his lego counterpart, although I do not recall him ever coming to our house without sleeves or with a crayon twice his size.)

I know, poor me with my awesome wild kids and clean running water. If only life always felt like a photo, we wouldn’t need prozac, just Windows Live Movie Maker. Hey, it’s worth a shot! Here’s your slide show:

What do you know? I do feel a little better. Hickman’s will do that to a person :)

Yo.

2011-08-02T12:58:00.001-07:00

That’s how my husband answers the phone when it’s my dad. I don’t know why, but without ever hearing the phone ring, I can be on the other side of the house and know Jon is on the phone with my dad when I hear him yell, “Yo, man! What’s up?”

And yes, I mean yell. My beloved is so very loud I think I would know he was on the phone if I were on another planet. YOU SHOULD HEAR HIM TRY AND WHISPER. IT’S LOUDER THAN MY NATURAL TALKING VOICE. I don’t mind, I knew what I was getting into since we met at a call center in college. He used to get more surveys than anyone you’ll ever meet, and I’ve always had a suspicion it’s because most people didn’t even know they were taking a survey since they were so busy trying to figure out why this nice young man was YELLING at them. After we got engaged they always used to make me sit next to him, because somehow my wanting to marry him gave me a higher tolerance for his volume? Maybe it did. Now I use that tolerance with his very loud children.

I have actually tried to explain the mechanics of whispering to him and Russell before. You know, how to use mostly breath and no vocal chords? All we really got out of that little adventure is that now we know whispering is something you either can do, or you can’t. Like algebra.

In my defense, I don’t know why anyone would want to do algebra.

Oh, and in case you missed it, you are now halfway through my over the top, apparently quite romantic, public love letter to my husband on our 11 year anniversary while he is out of town on business for the week.

Listen, I don’t have time for romance. I mean, we like each other, which I hear is a good thing after eleven years. In fact, since my pregnancies have left me with a semi permanent state of anemia, I seem to have more hickies these days than I ever had in high school.

You know you’ve been married eleven years when bruising easily is the high point of your romantic life.

Happy Anniversary, Jon. I miss your loud face. I’m sorry that it probably seems like this stage of our romance is full sticker charts, health food, time-out battles, tedious chores, and waiting for Barbara to move out of the house we bought a month ago, but I’m glad I am the one sitting with you at this bus stop. I don’t need a life that feels like a chic flick and can be wrapped up in an hour and twenty minutes. For the record, I plan on boring you to death like a foreign film, but I think (especially with our kids) we have at least have a few special effects still to come, not to mention the explosions.

And here is your present! It’s what all men want: a quote from a book! It works as a present because I’m giving it to you here on my public blog so everyone can know how unreasonable I am, and how patient you are. Plus I spent all my money on lego’s and swimming lessons to distract the children while you’re gone.

From Garrison Keillors Book of Guys:

A guy said, “I ain’t no misogynist or chauvinist but I got to say, women are getting awfully impossible to please these days. I’ve been busting my butt for years trying to keep women happy, and they’re madder at me now than they ever were before I started trying so hard. I quit playing softball and took up painting delicate water colors, still lifes mostly, and tossing salads, and learned how to discuss issues and feelings and concerns and not make jokes about them, and they’re still angry with me.”

which he wrote a few pages before this:

A fastball travels ninety miles and hour or so, and if it isn’t thrown by guys, it isn’t gonna be thrown, babes.

Thank you for going out and conquering the world this week. XOXO!! Lissa Rae

Technology Rules?

2011-07-29T11:47:00.001-07:00

With recent events, it’s probably obvious that “no technology week” wasn’t really a priority. Even so, we still managed to keep the electricity bill down, though I haven’t ruled out a total tech break in the near future.

My problem now?

Where on earth does this fit into the rules? --->

Apparently, Russell can build a computer from “scratch”. At age 6! Just don’t try and do your online banking on it…

Oh, and since I’m kind of on a roll now, here’s another song for ya’ll. Both the voices are mine and this is sadly unedited. I have yet to learn how to properly use any of my recording software. It’s okay, just imagine yourself on the porch after a long day of plowing. I like bluegrass best when it’s raw, like you might actually be sitting here with me :)

Someday from alissa king on Vimeo.

AGH! You guys will not believe what Russell made while I was writing this post! Check it out!!

Ha!! That’s Angry Birds on one very handmade iPad. Are you kidding me with this?! And look at Alice. No wonder they were being so quiet while I was busy neglecting them.

LOVE.

She Moved to Arizona

2011-07-27T10:48:00.001-07:00

Here you go people. Debi always wanted me to sing in church and I usually begged out. I finally sang a few weeks ago. Debi was there, and I wrote about it HERE. I am so glad I have the memory and that I wrote about it when I wasn’t a sad idiot.

Today is the funeral, I wish I had the guts to sing for her there, but I’m a little too sad to pull it off, so when I jumped out of the shower this morning I decided to jump on the computer and record one of my favorites.

Untitled from alissa king on Vimeo.

Tomorrow I will post something cheerful, I promise, because, believe me, I have some.

Unacceptable

2011-07-19T10:02:00.001-07:00

This post wasn't supposed to happen until Saturday, and then it was going to be called "Carnage Hall" wherein I mock myself for the typo in the post below.

There are a lot of deals I would be willing to make with powers that be for that to be the dumb post I am writing today.

My heart is wrenched.

Broken.

Burning.

I hope it's okay if I share this here. I think we have only begun to tap into what this blog universe is supposed to be, but I have always just wanted my blog to be between you and me. It's about me. It’s about how much I like my life, my kids, my family, and you.

And today I feel so pathetically sorry for myself. I know I should probably go find a therapist to talk to instead, but when i woke up this morning, i can't help but feel like you guys will understand.

I lost a friend on Sunday. She was killed with her husband on the 405 in a senseless motorcycle accident involving no other vehicles, but what seems to be a mechanical error in the back wheel.

She was a young grandmother and leaves behind four devastated daughters and the grandchildren she was helping to raise.

I don't know if i can tell you what she has meant to me. I have my feet in all these rich and wonderful worlds, from my Utah life to my California life and everything in between.

Debi wasn't really in any of those. She was the shining light in the complicated little sliver of my "mormon life." That world is so independent from anything else i have, so much so, that when jon got home and told me the news yesterday he didn't even know what he was telling me.

It's not news to anyone that reads this blog that i am a little tortured making heads or tails of my spiritual journey on this planet. This crap is hard for me in my over analytical brain and general stubbornness about organized religion, and yet i seemed to have found a loop hole.

I teach the sunbeams. The four and five year olds, fresh out of nursery. They never give you a canned answer, if you're not looking they will ransack your bag for goldfish crackers while you set up the lesson, and they will tell you, no holds barred, about how their "grandpa got sick and DIED, and then they buried him in the GROUND, but now he lives with JESUS" before they ask if they can please, PLEASE, draw on the chalkboard.

Recently, because i have small weirdo's of my own, my attendance had become a little hit or miss and i found out they had called me a co-teacher. I was totally bummed because i didn't know if i could teach with a co-teacher, if it would bother her that i sit on the ground and eat snacks while recreating bible stories with stick figures, who sometimes have to die gruesome stick figure deaths to reach the moral of the story.

Then they told me it was Debi. Literally the only person whose name I know outside of the primary, and who is the first person i met in the ward when we decided to brave a church BBQ a couple weeks after we moved to California. I have liked her ever since she walked up to us that cheerful sunny day, introduced herself and pointed across the tables to a tall silver-ponytailed biker dude and told us that was her man. She also told us, something i will never forget, as the Activities Director it was her duty to inform us to try the beans. She wasn't in charge of them, but she did just have some, and (leaning in to whisper), "they are totally kick ass."

From then on, though i have a tendency to sneak in and out of the church building since I go alone with two young kids (no pity needed, you should see the way the house sparkles when we get home), well, four out of five times she would catch me and say semi wicked things and then tell me she better see my butt in church again next week.

She was a safe harbor for me in a landscape that is tricky for me. When she became my co-teacher in the last couple months, it's some of the most fun I've ever had at church in my life.

I am not broken hearted.

I am mad.

I resent talking about her in the past tense when i JUST saw her.

She is still so vibrant and authentic in my brain, i keep having this terrible and overwhelming instinct to warn her not to go on that motorcycle ride.

For someone who claims to be so ambivalent about religion or a specific god type person watching over each of us, when I heard this news, in a flash, despite all my intellectual hang ups with the concept, i suddenly became SO MAD AT HIM, and then decided, since I guess we are speaking again, to really let him have it!

Since then I have spent the last 15 hours crying my eyes out and sitting in awe of the intense depth of my belief in Him in that moment.

There is not a power in the world that can make me turn this unique and invincible woman's untimely death into my personal religion story, and don't tell me there is a purpose in this loss, because I'm not interested.

But.

I need it to be true anyway.

And i need it to mean something that the same church she made me feel safe in, will, RIGHT NOW, carry her and her kick ass husband, in their hand basket, STRAIGHT to Heaven.

I love you debi. And I will miss you so much.

Love, alissa

My husband is going to be furious when he reads this…

2011-07-17T19:07:00.001-07:00

So, I had to leave the house a couple times today and every time I came home I gave Jon a serious looking over, even going so far as hugging him just to see if I could SMELL it on him… but he’s been a rock!

IT would be technology. I have these fits every once in a while where we lock up all the gadgets, computers, tv’s, laptops, and other assorted handheld gizmo’s. These fits are usually inspired when I wake up and every piece of technology we own is running at full speed before 8 am and I’m cranky because I stayed up too late watching reruns of So You Think You Can

Dance…

And that is exactly what happened yesterday morning.

YIKES! What was that?

…

I thought I just heard someone in the garage. Thank goodness it was only the change falling out of pockets in the dryer and possibly ruining it! You know, instead of Jon getting back from his bike ride with Russell and finding me on the computer and having it ruin, like, my marriage. Don’t worry, on my way back here I locked all the doors to buy myself time to shut off the computer, spray some air freshener and get a piece of gum if they come back early.

So anyway, NO TECHNOLOGY. One week. And as I lay there yesterday morning and thought of all the reasons that is IMPOSSIBLE, it became clear to me that only means it is mandatory, and actually quite possible.

I know as I sit here typing secret blog posts Jon will probably see at work tomorrow, that I sound like a loon. And one of those moms. I know what you think, I even grew up with a few kids who weren’t allowed to watch tv, and besides being able to skip a rock on a lake for a hundred miles or play the violin at Carnage hall before they were 12, I didn’t really see the benefit to being kept away from the thing.

I guess for me, I just want to know we can do it. We are a technology family. We make our living from computers, Jon’s a software engineer, I have my blog and etsy shop, I do all my photo’s on here, and I stalk all my friends on facebook so I always know what Valeri is having for dinner (and can I please have some?)

When we did this last time our motto became “We don’t work for technology, Technology works for us” and I guess the best way to say it, is that I was starting to feel “employed” again.

Not to mention what I call my “Angry Birds” machine, and Jon calls an iPad? Anyway, Jon and I have spent an embarrassing number of nights sitting side by side, “watching” a show “together” while we surf the web and/or explode green pigs. And we have had the dumbest recurring fight you have ever heard about how Jon can’t even hold the darn thing, even if it’s completely off and closed, without me feeling like he’s not really listening to me.

All I want to do is talk about my feelings endlessly, is that so hard?

And he says he thought that’s why I have a blog.

And I say, don’t worry, I will go and blog about this conversation right now.

And he says no. stop. you can’t…

…but he’s trailing off because he’s already gazing at his closed iPad imagining all the wonderful things that are happening on the internet without him.

Gosh, I’m pretty rude for a girl who’s sneaking a blog post on the computer right now. That’s because:

I’m

The

Worst!

I couldn’t hard boil EGGS this morning! I had to call my dad because I use the internet like it’s actually my brain, and I use tv like xanex because it makes me feel quiet, and between the two, I don’t have to think about all the gigantic looming events like our pending home renovation, and the move, adjusting to the new house and Russell starting school, and all the other good life stressors because “My Strange Addiction” is on and, whoa, IS THAT WOMAN EATING HER SCABS?! I want to turn it off but I CAN’T.

Gross. Sorry. Anyway, Jon has been very good today but tomorrow he gets to go to work, check his email, read the news and do his job, but after I post this, I really will turn of the computer and unplug it for the rest of the week. Before I do, while we are still only about 48 hours in to it, I just wanted to check in and tell you: we don’t know what to do with ourselves!

It’s quite pathetic.

So we’ve sort of, well, we’ve gone on walks, we’ve played some board games, we’ve gone to the beach and the park, we have been reading every kids book we own to Alice, stuff we haven’t opened for years, and just now Jon and Russell left the house on their bikes, and as they drove off, I stood out there waving like a dope who didn’t have anything else to do when I heard Jon say to Russell:

“Listen to me, we are going to the park by riding past the river, but we aren’t going to stop and throw rocks in until we are on our way back, okay?”

I have a notepad by my computer where I am jotting down things I need to address when I turn my computer back on in a week, but I have to say after hearing stuff like that, I am going to be giving that list a long hard look. I want to spend my time like I would my money, and really get what I want the most.

Busted!! They’re back! Shhhh!!

(See you in a week!)

The Magic is in the Details

2011-07-15T12:00:00.001-07:00

Déjà vu? Yeah, I know, the slideshow covered it, but sometimes slide shows move to quick for all the delicious details. Since I only slaved over this shin dig a little bit, please forgive me if I take a minute to break it down.

The CAKE (bday boy did all that fab artwork on the background)

I used a round mixing bowl to make the moon cake, covered in cream cheese frosting and filled with ORANGE cake (from a box! check your local grocery store, it was pretty scrumptious!)

I knew I wanted planet cupcake toppers, and almost went so far as buying a blown sugar kit to make my own planets when I realized, DUH, a small toy solar system kit from amazon would be fine. What? No cupcake for Jupiter? look again, the starry little cake is inside. :)

And, if you haven’t been there yet, I got an enormous amount of affordable, vintage, divine, items from Hey Yo Yo on etsy, including our little space cowboys, the popcorn bags we packed the sack lunches in, and the the “firework” on the cake.

The tin cowboy? I rigged him up to be the moon cake topper and when you wind him up, he spins his lasso! Also, he was kind of the inspiration for the theme of this whole rootin’ tootin’ party.

Mostly, I made a lot of things. Including the holsters for the space guns (which we used to hunt the aliens. Of course.)

And don’t forget The Rocket! (ingredients: 2 pieces of plywood, paint, mirrors, hinges for the wings and one fab handle from the clearance bin at anthropologie. Total? about $40 bucks only because I didn’t wait long enough for the mirror glue to dry and after they EXPLODED all over the backyard I had to buy them again!)

Before blast off, as guests arrived we had “Space Cowboy Training,” which consisted of getting holstered up and putting cowboy stickers on posters of the Universe and watching “The sun is a mass of incandescent gas!” by They Might Be Giants. It was rad.

Don’t forget our saddle photo prop! (this is free if your dad is my dad and happens to have a hundred year authentic cowboy saddle and Indian blanket hanging around. Literally, from the rafters in their house.)

Yeah, he brought the sombrero’s too. That should tell you all you need to know about him :) Oh, and he brought the limes…

Finally, I am a big believer in giving goody bags at the party when the kids are on the last leg of their sugar high, and I am out of idea’s, so I made sure to stock up our little bandana bags with loads of seven cent space cowboy goodies from the local party store.

Now I’m done!! Really.

Note to self:

2011-07-13T16:39:00.001-07:00

I don’t wear bikini’s. Not because I’m ashamed of my awesome mom bod, but because the epidermis on that bod spent the majority of the last 32 years hiding under long winter underwear in Utah. Romance novelist’s would describe it as alabaster, while fellow beach goers would probably call it “a crime” and have to double up on the eyewear to survive the glare from that much exposed “alabaster” skin.

SO… next time we go to the baby beach, let’s make sure there is something a little more substantial than a cheap plastic clasp between

“mom in cute conservative swimsuit”

and

“mom in conservative swim skirt and no top”

shall we?

Fortunately, though I had many adventures that day with hands full of squirming kids when I would have been unable to do anything but stand around doing my best impression of Janet Jackson at the super bowl (minus her six pack and Justin Timberlake attempting to look surprised), at the moment the plastic snapped and my halter top began to unfurl , I was building a sandcastle with Alice and was able to spare pretty much everyone except Russell. Who, bless his soul, had the grace to just look surprised and didn’t point and yell or anything.

Thank you, universe.

I would feel embarrassed except as I was walking back to my car (with my halter suit knotted so tight around my neck that it was cutting off the flow of blood and oxygen to my brain) I saw a small rotund man facing me as he was loading up his beach gear into an old dirty Toyota pickup. He was unremarkable except the woman he was with was Heidi Klum. Or her twin. Or someone Heidi Klum wishes she could look like. They could not have been more mismatched than humpty dumpty and a disney princess. So, I’m kind of watching this out of the corner of my eye while trying to pleasantly threaten my children within an inch of their lives that if they let go of my hand and head toward the street one more time… when he turned around.

I don’t know if I can describe this.

Start with the back of his head, balding and only about five feet away from the ground, below that, a faded blue t-shirt stretched like a canvas and exclaiming down the back in a great white font:

DON’T

DOUBT

and under that, though I was more than 40 feet away and questioning the anatomical possibility of this, what can only be described as 6 inches of hairy exposed butt crack.

Followed (of course) by gym shorts that appeared to be doing a poor job of still covering a fair amount of cheek.

No shoes.

Normally I wouldn’t tell you something like this, but see how you’ve already forgotten the part where one lone mom attempted to turn a baby beach in California into a topless beach in France? I’m not writing this to be rude to that strange man and his rather unbelievable beach date, I’m writing this to thank him. No one that was around long enough to see me scramble from the beach to my car went home and blogged about ME after they saw THEM.

And I appreciate that.

I burned my face with sulfuric acid.

2011-07-07T14:20:00.001-07:00

Last night, just a little. I’m fine!

There isn’t really a story to go along with that except that our shower keeps getting plugged up with my <singing> “long beautiful HAY-er!” and yesterday I took my can-do attitude to Lowes and told the man “I don’t want Drano. I want what the plumber would charge me $100 bucks to come put down my drain.” After which he proceeded to sell me goggles, rubber gloves, diaper cream and a gallon of sulfuric acid. I waited until Jon was home and the kids were asleep, then, with the care of a general surgeon, I wiped diaper cream all around the porcelain by the drain to protect it from the acid, opened the jug, and poured out a pint.

Let’s just say I won’t be asking for the scalpel anytime soon since I wobbled just enough to allow a teeny tiny spec to splash up on my bottom lip and HOLY MOLEY! This is not a joke: that stuff could melt off your face. I think it was worse simply because when it happens you’re not sure how much is on you, but you still have to remain calm and move slowly and ask your husband to “please get it off. Right. Now.” and it certainly doesn’t help if he looks both afraid and amused at your expense while he does it.

Never in my life have I appreciated my pre acid ability to simply snatch myself away from the heat and swear like a sailor!

Calm pain, the slow burn… that’s how we mothers take it.

Anyway, I just thought it would make for a catchy title. I’m actually here to share something else. Something serious and probably not appropriate for a blog.

I’m in love with another man.

Several actually. It’s complicated! For the most part Jon seems to understand, but I know it’s been difficult scheduling our lives around all my new beaus, watching me hug and kiss them on the beach, or snuggle up on the couch to watch a show… it can’t be helped:

My nephews are in town! My sister has to fly home to Baltimore on Friday with only herself to manage three small children on the flight, so I’m not sure I’ll even need to try that hard to get her to leave me one. Or both. BOTH. All I can really say is I’m not sure I’ve ever been so aware of another persons LIPS or TEETH or little boy HAIR as I am with those boys. They are SO. RAD. They certainly don’t want their aunt kissing them all over their smudgy faces, but I don’t care. If I had an ample bosom I would totally put on too much make-up and perfume so I could smother them properly.

I simply don’t know anyone who knows HOW to make an ugly or boring boy child. You think I’m kidding? My college roomie has added a few extra boys to her crew hoping at the end there that a girlie baby would show up, but SHAME! This friend of mine already has 4 boys so beautiful that they could be on the cover of romance novels for the 2 to 8 year old female demographic.

Don’t get me started on my other roommate who is about to have boy number FIVE! Though hers are not romance novel types, but if kids could be in cigarette ads they would all make excellent Marlboro Men. I would not be surprised if she called me tomorrow and told me the older two took up shaving. Who ever met an 8 year old with a 5 o’clock shadow? Handsome little devils with great big brains I tell ya.

And my neighbors all have boys I would snatch away if I didn’t know I could go right outside to see them whenever I really need a fix. My friend Joanna’s two year old son is the single most serious person I have ever met! I kid you not, Jon and I regularly have to restrain ourselves from handing him our wallets because we have no doubt he could handle our money better than we ever could. Plus he does all this on the most spectacularly fat ham hock legs I’ve seen since my own charmer was stomping around on his own toddler tree trunks.

I have to stop! This could easily turn into a bible scale yawn fest if I try to track and record all of the scrumptious boys sprouting at the bottom of my friend and family tree. Which is probably why I’m so obsessed with this right now. I grew up with all sisters and mostly aunts! I never had friends who were boys, and besides a few boyfriends and my hunky husband, well… I’ve been a pretty boyless person who is suddenly surrounded by tons of gloriously stinking weirdo's!

Oh my gosh, (last one!) my nephew Sean? Well, I won’t even get into the time, prayers, money, and more prayers that went into getting that kid to his very steady and somewhat reserved parents, and how he popped out with a banjo and the vocabulary of a thesaurus. I like him (a LOT) but I like him even more because he is SO indifferent to his parents nature, and that makes his mormon mother curse and laugh. He is one of my favorite people on the planet.

Oh boy, I love all these little men! The list of boys I’m leaving out is shameful, I might have to make “In Praise of Stinking Boys” a regular column to keep up with them all. Anyway, I have a long overdue slideshow from a visit we had a while back from my roomie with the beautiful boys. Go ahead, watch it and tell me you feel sorry for her that she didn’t get that girl…

she. SIGNED.

2011-07-05T17:07:00.001-07:00

That’s my facebook status right now. I’ve reread it ten times to be sure, but that’s what it says:

she. SIGNED.

Yeah, I turned to facebook and Jesus in the final hours and I’m glad to report they both came through. Let’s celebrate!

Tomorrow.

Today I’m too freaked out.

Plus she still has 24 hours to totally lose it and call the escrow company to stop this. I don’t think she will, but after the 7 months we’ve had our offer on this house, the last two weeks when she decided to really stick it to us, and the LAST 7 HOURS that she made us sweat as the realtor read her every single word on every single page of the escrow papers, getting her to put her name on that dotted line is great… I’ll just feel better this time tomorrow when this deal is sealed up tight and she can’t undo it. THEN I will celebrate.

Like it’s the forth of July in my backyard!

Yes, that is exactly how I plan on feeling this time tomorrow. Today I will settle for cautiously optimistic. Thanks everybody! For all your nice thoughts, prayers and well wishes! I know I’m just lucky to live in a time and a place where I get to stress over things like buying a house in Orange County California. I’m a humble little girl, and I have a little more waiting and not a little work left before it’s even habitable, but after feeling thwarted and frustrated, I have to say cautiously optimistic is feeling pretty good!

Two things:

2011-06-30T20:05:00.001-07:00

1. I have a virus. It’s not a computer virus but the science experiment that is happening inside my face is so insane you might need to disinfect your computer screen after you read this.

I probably shouldn’t even be telling you this. I think it’s a bad idea to blog while sleep deprived, but I have no choice. I spent the night shooting Afrin and Flonase up my nostrils and STILL couldn’t breath since it seems someone has stuffed gym socks in my nasal cavity at some point. To be fair, at about 5 AM I noted that Afrin works better if you take the cap off first.

and

2. don’t even ask me about the house. We were supposed to close today. Despite the leakage from my face I went to the escrow office yesterday and today we were simply waiting with baited breath for news that Barbara had signed her papers, too.

Instead she went missing this morning. When she finally called she was three hours out of town and was calling to inform us that she went around our agent and called the escrow company and they said she doesn’t have to sign the papers until the 8th, so would it be okay if she signs them on Tuesday? Oh, and can we sign her new contract that will allow her to stay in the house until August 29th?

Yes. I’m having a pity party. For me that means watching entire seasons of Rescue Me because my cousin said it was dark and twisted and hysterical. You’re totally invited but you might want to bring hand sanitizer.

Shakin’ in my my boots…

2011-06-28T14:25:00.001-07:00

Not about the house, this is GOOD shaking :)

So… I like taking pictures with my cell phone, nothing ever comes from them, but my current phone has a funny feature that when I take a picture it doesn’t take one shot, it takes four quick ones in succession. As the mother of weirdo’s, I love that it raises my chances of getting a picture of a groovy dance move or a kid with both eyes open.

I don’t always need it, but changing the settings is a little too much to ask from this ADD mom, so with help from my stellar patience, I simply save them all thinking I will edit them down later.

Yeah, I know, the chances of me getting back to that are about zilch.

GOOD THING!

Sunday I finally downloaded 6 months worth of phone pictures to my desktop. I needed to show Jon a larger picture of tile. YAWN.

Until…

I started to click through the pictures quickly to get to the tile shots. And that’s when it happened. It’s odd, because it sort of starts as nothing, it even takes your brain a minute before it wants to see the pictures played this way, and then all of a sudden, it comes ALIVE.

And these pictures? Pictures I thought only a mother could love? Are suddenly mini stop-action movies! Time capsules of a split second of something that I thought was cool enough to dig my camera out of my purse for.

Inspired, but still not sure what I had, I got a little desperate to shove Jon and the kids out the back door so I could barricade myself at the computer to load 300 random 4-in-a-row shots into my “Slideshow Machine”

10 minutes later I called them in and realized I should just throw a song on the background before I pushed play. It’s cheesy, but since I didn’t want to think too long about it I just put on our very most favorite song around here, The Gambler by Fun.

Then, not having seen it yet myself, I pushed play.

And proceeded to Cry Like A Mother!

I don’t know if you will see what I see when I watch this. What I see? Are simple unedited pictures of nothing fancy that suddenly seem to BREATH for themselves.

I don’t care if I’m a sap, what I feel when I watch this goofy video is simply profound gratitude to have been the mother on the other side of this camera.

Enjoy:

knock on www.ood.ugh

2011-06-27T17:55:00.001-07:00

Do you guys even know how many times since January I almost blogged about the house and then didn’t because I didn’t want to jinx it? Or get too excited too soon?

Well… I should give credit for my impulse control where credit is due. And I probably should have told you a little more about Barbara. Barbara owns the house right now. Also, Barbara is making me want to take razor blades to my eyeballs to distract myself from the pain of dealing with her. She’s also the reason for my self control over blogging about the house since we just never knew what she was gonna do, and it wasn’t until the DAY BEFORE we were closing that I took to my blog.

Of course that would be the moment she finally cracks.

I swear, I’m a nice person.

Really!

When I see Barbara, I sympathize with the position she is in, she obviously suffers from some kind of mental illness that led to the hoarding, and she also used to be a young (er?) probably interesting person who sold pinball machines and now her health is failing her and she’s losing one of her homes. Yes, one of them. Blah, but of course I am nice to her and I’m no dummy, I understand that her being so difficult is why we are able to have a shot at this house. Anyone with even one dollar more than we have in the bank would have let this go, well? Probably about four months ago…

I think it’s my old fashioned nature that keeps me hanging on:

“Rome wasn’t built in a day,”

“Anything worth having is worth waiting for,”

(I know that! I married my husband in a Mormon Temple for heaven’s sake.) (Look it up.)

And don’t forget that it wasn’t uncommon for young men to leave their fiancé's for years before returning with enough money to start a proper family.

I can be patient. I can even practice happy patience.

Which is also how I know when I am TOTALLY FREAKING OUT OF IT.

I know that she is thrashing around like a fish taking it’s last breath as the noose tightens, but I did not know her thrashing would be able to mess with us SO BADLY. Since we had to fix our underwriting she can suddenly call this whole thing off. In fact she is threatening us daily to call it all off unless we sign contracts that she suddenly feels are VITAL, even though they don’t really pertain to anything! I feel like I have no choice and I don’t do well with being held hostage to a crazy person. (other than my own self of course, but I’m fun crazy, and she is just CRAZY, crazy…)

How do I explain to her that I have BLOGGED about it? Shouldn’t that be even more binding than a legal contract?! All my friends know about it now! I’ve shown them pictures!

It’s the same reason I always feel bad for the first person kicked off a reality show. You know, like the Bachelor or American idol? You get all the way there, maybe you even keep it to yourself all the way to premier, but now you are ON the show and every single person you’ve ever met in your entire life is suddenly tuning in to watch you be that guy. The one so bland you end up getting less than 120 seconds worth of face time before you have to pack the only outfit you actually got to wear, next to all the other ones your mother or friends painstakingly helped you pick for your big tv appearance, and the only tv they will ever be seen on is the airport x-ray on your way HOME.

Ugh. Fortunately (probably) Barbara has not given out the final rose yet. This has become the make-it or break-it week in a way I never could have imagined after our months and months of patience and cooperation. I took her Junior Mints this morning and even though she answered the door with a stream of F words, she hugged me when I left and told me I’m the daughter she never had.

No, really, someone please get the waiter, my patience needs a refill. It’s gonna be a long week…

P.S.

2011-06-22T11:37:00.001-07:00

Not that I think my post below came off as a rant about being a Stay At Home Mom, but I have wanted to add something ever since I wrote it.

I don’t believe in “Stay At Home Moms” and “Working Moms.”

I believe in MOMS.

My post below was about how I needed to give myself permission to blow off some of the responsibilities I’ve been piling on myself that, while I have small children, just aren’t a priority. If you work, you ARE taking care of your children. If you stay at home, you are there for a reason.

If you work from home? Call me so I can send you some love, because I don’t know if anybody can appreciate how insanely tricky that is.

What I’m saying is that you are awesome. That’s all.

Now here are some pictures for my Grandma :)

Long Overdue

2011-06-20T12:06:00.001-07:00

Updates of all kinds:

Didn’t close the house! Lame. Jon caught a mistake in the underwriting at the last minute and is MY HERO for getting it straightened out. We will close before the end of the week. For sure. Probably. Definitely.

We have to! Since January we’ve been told that Barbara, the current owner, would be staying until August 8th, but suddenly began cooperating (or surrendering?) at breakneck speeds and will be out by June 27th… which means while we thought we had the summer to line up contractors and mull over paint samples, we actually have to be MOVED IN by August 1st to avoid paying a mortgage and rent for August.

At her house my friend Stephanie has dubbed the next few months “The Summer of Fun” with horse camp, beach dates and good times galore… she doesn’t know that I have stolen her cheerful phrase and twisted it to my own purposes. Because you better believe we will REALLY be the ones having “The Summer of FUN!”

We just say it with a smile a little too bright and eyes a little too wide, that’s all.

On other fronts, we have opted to take Russell out of preschool for the summer and have hired my teenage cousin Paige to take care of both kids 4 hours a day, 4 days a week, while we get this house madness under control. She will be here when Alice has her long nap, and we have purchased a few kindergarten preparedness kits for her to do with Russell.

I have been torn over this. I want to set both Russell and Paige up for success this summer. I’m worried because Russell was thriving so entirely at Cottage Preschool and when he transferred to Learning Tree it presented a much greater bump in the road than I anticipated. We suddenly had old behaviors surfacing, difficulty scheduling private communication with his teacher, having the beloved teacher we followed from Cottage mysteriously fired after only a week with no explanation. Even when I asked, the owner would literally zip her lips and throw away the key! Who does that? I came to your school for that teacher and you owe me any kind of response. Oh, and one other small issue…

…involving the word bully.

I haven’t talked about this for a few reasons, the main one being I am not entirely sure who knows about this here blog. Sure, I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings, but when you are in the business of owning a preschool and you find yourself in the mommy blogging era, you better be crossing your t’s and controlling your daughter, or eventually you are going to find yourself reading something you’d rather not. And since I am in the business of being a parent, while I was navigating the politics of our situation, I wasn’t taking the chance of anyone involved finding this.

I will revisit that later, school is a trick huh? And Russell hasn’t even hit the mainstream yet. Whew!

As for this summer, we have some challenges ahead of us and I have had a stupid epiphany:

I am not going to die tomorrow!

Barring anything bizarre or tragic, I have to stop spreading myself so thin trying to “Be All I Can Be.” I put my Etsy shop on vacation, I put away the recording equipment and list’s of café’s I’ve been compiling for some little gigs. I’ve finally (and painfully) cancelled any idea of making it to Utah this summer, and I’m only going to blog when the kids are really, for sure, being taken care of. You know, in bed for the night, with Paige, or reading Tolstoy.

You guys! I’m. A. Mom.

That’s what I am right now! I’m a homemaker! I’m not a feminist, and I’m also not June Cleaver. I shave my armpits too often to be the former, and not nearly enough to be the latter.

I have a lot of work to do this summer, but, gosh darn it, I’m going to enjoy it! I’m going to work hard and play hard.

I’m going to enjoy my children.

I’m going to focus on getting Russell back in Cottage Preschool shape before Kindergarten in September.

I’m going to dance with Alice whenever she asks me too.

I’m going to paint my new house crazy bold colors and hope it turns out like I see it in my head.

I’m only going to take medicine on days where not having ADD is essential, and on the other days I’m going to like who I am while I wander around the planet with good intentions, and maybe less than stellar follow through. My ADD self is just so much more cheerful than my medicated goal oriented super efficient self! I think there is room for both in a home where

being

mom

JOB.

I just needed a little reminder. Contemplating putting Alice with her brother into a preschool situation this summer so I could manage all the things I’m juggling just felt so icky! Having Paige come help out in my home keeps me THE MOM. And making that decision opened my eyes to the limited time I have to do this job right, and how distracted I have been from it. Or at least spread thin.

So now you are about 7% updated on our lives. Stay tuned for the other 93%. I’ll get around to it eventually :)

I’ve been holding out.

2011-06-16T10:03:00.001-07:00

So, you know how I pretty much share every thought that comes into my head on this here blog? Well, even though I may have let a few clues drop that we might be buying a house this summer, I may have forgotten to mention that we will actually be buying that house rather soon.

As in tomorrow.

Sorry.

Hey, I’ve had some pretty good reasons to hold back the details! Like the fact that it’s a short sale and we’ve had our offer in since January. Putting these things in the back of your mind is the only way to survive the suspense!

Also, in the master bedroom there is a bathtub in the floor. And it’s filled with “antique” soda cans and polyester clothing. Actually, the whole house is. You know when you see someone so beautiful they should be a movie star? Well, when we walked in this house we knew it should be on tv.

On one of those documentary series about hoarders.

That’s right, this house could be FAMOUS. And that’s not even why we like it! Once we found our way around the racks of clothing and through the maze created by more than 30 pinball machines and 15 juke boxes, what we found are bones even a pirate could admire!

I should back up. If you don’t happen to be one of the people whose ear I have chewed off about our funny hoarded house, than I will try and give you a quick nutshell version:

February 2009

While at the pediatricians office for a check up on my newborn (wasn’t that just yesterday?) I met a wonderful couple, and like a single girl at a bar instead of a married woman with a baby, I asked them for their number. Then lost it! For six months.

Then found it! They didn’t even mock me a little when I called them after all that time, and promptly invited us over, which is how we found great friends AND the 2 square miles of “forest” area in Orange County.

December 2011

We’ve been watching the listings for two years, and we’ve been in every house remotely interesting with no temptation to bite. Then we noticed this listing which we had somehow been missing. It had one lonely picture of the garage and had been on the market for almost a year! We tried to get a showing.

And tried.

And TRIED.

Finally, I went around my agent and put a note in the mailbox with a picture of our family begging for a showing. And it worked! We were the first ones in.

Maybe even the first people to enter in years.

I’m not sure if you could call it love at first sight since I actually couldn’t get out of there fast enough, so I was pretty confused when Jon and I got back in the car and both exclaimed “Can you believe that?!” but meaning two totally different things. With his perspective I returned to the pictures I had taken, and when I couldn’t smell the place, I began to see what he was talking about.

January 2011

So we put in our offer.

drama

blah blah blah

February 2011

After firing realtors and almost committing murder we found ourselves in 2nd position behind “The Junipers”

(I can not repeat the terrible things we said about people we’ve never even met. This is a family show.)

and then we waited.

and waited.

walked through about 30 more houses.

waited some more.

April 2011

Finally! “The Junipers” were in a horrible accident involving sharks, electrical tape, and fire ants. And no one survived!

That is to say they weren’t honest on their application and were trying to buy this as a rental home, with primary residence funding, and got booted out of the top spot. I like my version better.

Oh, and now we are in the front seat of this bus! Which isn’t as fun as it sounds since this house is not getting any cleaner from this angle.

May 2011

Rhymes with Inspector.

repeat three times

June 2011

Wow, slow down there! We’ve only had 6 months to think this over!

June 2011

Yeah, there’s no more months, this is the big one!

June 2011

What? We have to pay for some termite work before they approve the loan? Give us a minute... because the minute you write that first check… well, it’s been almost like a dream (if dreams smell like old newspapers and need a new porch). Actually involving our real live money seems so strange.

June 2011

We wrote the check.

The repairs were done.

And most significantly, after months of zero progress, home owner Barbara has suddenly allowed our realtors to hire movers and they removed about 75% of her items yesterday, and will be finished by the end of next week!

(I have no idea how they managed it, but I suspect Oprah had to be involved, or at least a part of the National Guard)

TOMORROW 2011

In the morning, I am driving over to the DMV to take the written test and finally get my California Drivers License (don’t yell at me, it’s been a busy couple of years), and then I’m using it to drive over to the realtors office. And then I’m going to buy the house you are about to see.

TONIGHT 2011

Pray for us. And send us money. We will need lots of both.

(click the picture to be directed to the online album. if you’re afraid, just think what I think: “wow! these are going to make excellent ‘before’ pictures someday!”)

Gold Star Moment

2011-06-14T08:34:00.001-07:00

My friend related this story on facebook the other day about parking too far from the gas pump and only realizing it after she had swiped her card, pulled out the nozzle, and heard the truck full of construction workers next to her laughing and pointing.

I would have laughed at her clever telling of it, but suddenly my brain zapped me with my own “hysterical” gas station mishap memory. Ouch.

(I can’t believe I’m going to share this story, but here you go):

It was probably 8 or 9 months ago, I was running late for something so important I can’t even remember what it was now, and I had Jon bring Russell to me at the gas station so I wouldn't have to go home to pick him up. Russell got out of his dad's car and came and held my hand (bad move #1). Jon and I talked for a minute and then he left.

So now (brain damage #2), I'm standing there filling my tank with my kid out of the car, and even though we were still holding hands, (in moment of total brilliance #3) I bent into the car to pick up something for Alice at the same time as Russell decided to "help" me with the gas.

And pulled the nozzle out of the tank.

While it was still pumping.

You should see me melting into my chair just remembering it! Thankfully a woman in another car pulled over and screamed at me for a solid 30 seconds like I care what she thinks of my bad parenting. In fact, Lady, I'm hard enough on myself without strangers berating me in public while I try and wipe gas off of me, my car, and my startled kid, thank you very much.

So, now I’m late, there is gas everywhere, and I’m taking off my kids clothing in a parking lot so I can strap him in the damn car already. Which is when the gas station attendant finally moseys out (again thanks to the helpful Lady standing inside at the desk glaring at me between the neon beer sign and cigarette ads) and the attendant informs me that “children should really stay in the car at a gas station,” then hands me a small wad of paper towels to clean up the three or four gallons of gas on the ground.

Needless to say, this is a lesson you only have to learn once… seeing as how it’s a lesson most people don’t actually need to learn at all. And I hope this story makes my friend feel better about the car full of construction workers who just thought it was cute because she is totally a hot mom, instead of a car full of mean Lady.

The Slideshow Has Landed

2011-06-09T00:24:00.001-07:00

But first let me say:

Never underestimate the power of masking tape.

Especially when preschoolers are involved and birthday anarchy is taking place. Although it should be noted that little sisters are immune to masking tape guidelines when presents are involved.

Just FYI.

And, yes! It’s done! The slideshow of the half decade is complete and I’m glad (and a little sad) to say that this post will conclude my work on the Space Cowboy birthday party! Also, for about 48 hours after the party, we kept remembering highlights… so I started writing them down. In no particular order they are:

Doug’s Shirt

Russell’s art on the cake backdrop

The Lone Ranger

2 year olds fighting over who had control of the rocket ship door (it got ugly, folks)

(well, as ugly as two tiny angry people can get)

(which was still pretty darn cute)

Lime Chicken Drumsticks

Doug’s sleeveless shirt

Sack Lunches served in Giant Cowboy Popcorn Bags

Awkward adult photo ops involving sombrero’s

Party goers old enough to scratch their names and smiling faces into a starry “guest book”

Gramma Sharri’s jewel encrusted, donkey wrangling, cowgirl shirt!!

Gramma joining Russell in time-out so he “wouldn’t be lonely on his birthday”

Alice singing Happy Birthday to “Alice.”

One Seriously Toothless Birthday Boy

Three year old Owen’s first birthday party!

Owen’s chaperone/big brother trying not to look like he was having as much fun as he was

Doug’s sleeveless hillbilly shirt

The look on my dad’s face when I told him the man who had asked to see the real civil war gun he was wearing around at a children's party was actually an off duty police officer.

Little Cowgirls

Even Littler Cowgirls!

Cowboys!!

Doug’s sleeveless hillbilly shirt that his in-laws gave him for Christmas and meant it!

Cleaning up with Aunt Beth

At the end of the day, when the last person departed, Jon and I looked at each other and, without saying a word, realized we had not stopped talking the entire day, but hadn’t really said two words to each other. Then for some reason we burst into laughter.

and last but not least?

Papa Russ

yes, his mere existence counts as a highlight

plus he brought the saddle, cooked the food, and made sure the rocket was secure enough to keep me from getting sued

…

Whew! And that doesn’t nearly cover it!

What I’m trying to say is that, as far as parties go, it was okay.

Enjoy your slideshow :)

An Honest Mormon.

2011-06-06T00:53:00.001-07:00

That is what my Aunty Beth called me.

BRILLIANT!

Can I just? Wow… I have to say, the ups and downs and all arounds of figuring out what the “heck” I am even doing on this planet in the first place can be so exhausting. Add to that a move from Utah to California where I am asked by anyone who hears the area code of my cell phone, if I’m one of those “new fangled Mormons.”

As if that is just a simple question for me to answer.

On the other hand, and since we’re all friends here, I will give you some examples of what my answer to that question have been over the last two and half years:

“No.”

“Today I am.”

“Not in the conventional sense.”

“I don’t know, are you?”

“I claim them. They don’t always claim me.”

“Sure, why not?”

or lately my personal favorite

“I’m more of what you’d call a Hippie Mormon.”

I seem to have hit a snag where I am simply too Mormon for some people, but not nearly Mormon enough for others.

Learning to live in the grey. That’s me. That actually sums up my philosophy about almost everything in life, from this religious stuff, to what I eat, to how I feel about medication for ADHD.

Here is one of my problems, I could stand in a room with 10 million people, with each one telling me they know, FOR SURE, for a fact, WITHOUT A DOUBT, that God exists, and there is no final death, and someday we are all going to wander around the universe in white sheets with harps. And they all know it FOR SURE. And I would TOTALLY want to believe them! But someone else's knowledge can only lead me to the important questions I have to ask myself.

They are as likely to convince me that someday I will walk around on clouds, as I would be able to convince them that I know that when I lose things and I pray to my dead cats to help me find them? They totally do. You may think I am misguided about who it is that is helping me find my keys, but you would be wrong. It’s my cats.

See how this works? Some knowledge is supposed to be personal. If I am going to get a little Mormon for a minute, then when I’m feeling at all religious, the idea that I was already a spirit who chose to come here makes as good as sense to me as anything else.

I’m not a religious studies expert or anything so I don’t know if this is an exclusive idea to Mormons ( I believe this idea has a common thread throughout many religions), but the way I understand it, is that we were fully formed spirits hanging around a heavenly place when a very real war broke out. The gist of the war being that God wanted us to be removed from his knowledge and light, to go to Earth and have, you know, a whole earth experience, and then hopefully return to him at the end. Once we’ve had this experience, we would better know the “metal” of ourselves and have a better idea what we should do with ourselves for… well, forever. There isn’t a Heaven and a Hell in my religion, there is essentially four places you can end up: 3 kingdoms of heaven and something called “outer darkness” which is essentially like hell where you gnash your teeth and suffer for the want of the light of God.

The war was about the fact that Lucifer did not like this idea, Earth involved a lot of suffering and humility and general discomfort when he already felt just fine chillen’ out, and no sir, he was not going to go. From what I hear, a lot of spirits joined him, and those of us who decided to come to earth understood the reward, the purpose, the meaning of leaving everything and planting ourselves in the soil of the Earth to see what would become of us.

Again, I’m not telling you this for any particular reason except this is my blog and I’m confused about what in tarnation I am doing on this planet, so sometimes I might need to give a little back story to the idea’s I was raised with that play into my general mind wanderings.

And ever since I was small, my mind has wandered in these mine fields. If I ever forget that, I only have to listen to Russell talk about God for 5 seconds to recognize myself in his determination to work this stuff out, not just be told something and go with it. He wants to know “why, when, where and how?” He has an assuredness in his own worth, and his own spirit, that is ASTOUNDING! With that knowledge as his guide, I encourage his questions, as well as ask him hard questions and expect him to think of his own answers.

The thing I understand the most about religion? The more you think you have it totally figured out, and the more you pick one thing in a way that closes you off to others ways that God may be trying to get in touch with you? Well, the more rigid you become, the more likely a pebble can be thrown at you with just the right force, from just the right angle, and crack you into a thousand tiny pieces. I saw it a thousand times before I understood what I was seeing, and finally, it happened to me.

And I survived!

And I like this side of the mental and spiritual explosion!

I still don’t have a clue exactly what to call myself, or where I could lay down the lines of where I fit in the universe, but I know I am blessed. That there are parts of my life that are simply survival, hard work, and good luck, but that there are also things in my life that are literal gifts. Gifts you could not buy for me and get free ground shipping on from Amazon dot com.

Although that would be nice since (presumably) I could just skip to the gift note and finally stop trying to figure out where it is exactly I’m supposed to be directing my thanks.

I’ve also noticed, since I came to this side of the explosion, that most religions aren’t as rigid as I used to think they were. Though of course there are certain theologies (or even members of a congregation) that are non negotiable, there is also a lot more room for growth and opportunities for enlightenment than I used to give them credit for. And not just religious houses, but vegans, and yoga houses or biker bars, too. I wish you could have heard my ultra-Mormon-mommy-friend at Disneyland describing the color of the other people’s chakra’s. If your chakra turns colors when you’re surprised, that’s what color mine would have been right then!

That’s all. Honest Mormon. I like it.

(sorry if you came here for pictures of the party. I’m a lucky girl and had a few people help me with pictures and now I have about 400 to sort through! I should have a slideshow by Wednesday.)

(Tuesday if my dead cats are hanging around to help keep me on task…)

between parties…

2011-06-04T14:15:00.001-07:00

you want a peek? just a little taste of the pictures coming your way?

no?

okay.

I just thought you might want to see this --->

…or this small fraction of the birthday cake display --->

Don’t worry, I understand if you don’t want to see. It does make all other Saturday’s kinda pale in comparison… and I won’t show you how alice felt when she found out the cupcakes are for later --->

See, she knows how you feel. Don’t worry, you can come next year!! In fact, I’m already waiting for your RSVP’s.

Now onto phase two, which is good cause this cowgirl is starving! Slide show to follow, see you Monday!

Happy Birthday Russell!

2011-06-02T09:45:00.001-07:00

The real party is Saturday, but since I hope you’re all having a Happy Russell’s Birthday, too, I have something seriously fantastic to share with you.

No, really, this has the potential to change your life in an awesome way.

Enjoy!

DN

2011-06-01T13:39:00.001-07:00

Lauren’s mom texted me last night. Yes. That Lauren.

(see here and here)

So, the text:

“Lauren just said ‘I need to dance with a prince. I know who is a prince… Russell.’ She is in her princess dress up clothes. See you tomorrow!”

I feel like I should be mad that there is another “woman” out there who thinks of Russell has her prince charming, but if I asked Russell right which princess he wants to dance with he would also say Lauren.

Or Alice, he really likes Alice, too.

Russell and Lauren are simply the nicest friends! They are spunky and funny, they fight and make up quickly, and they are both hopelessly romantic for 5 year olds. Honestly they are just too cute for me to get too mad about it.

Anyway! I sat down to show you something that made me swoon and laugh my butt off. Russell has been making the most spectacular art lately! I say art, and I don’t care if I’m his mom, it really is! He made these for no reason almost a year ago --->

And his used chalk and cut up a photo copy of one of my mom’s paintings to make this --->

Oh, that isn’t even the tip of the iceberg, but I have to move on because yesterday he came home with his first book. I can’t do the story justice, but it opens from the back, the title is “Russell” and it’s about “a boy and a princess and an evil witch, and the black widows come down and there is a big fight and the evil witch turns good, because she wasn’t bad, she was just sad, and then the prince and princess get married. D. N.”

What? DN?

no…

“THE END!!!”

Hahaha!! Oh my gosh, his brain is the coolest brain ever in the history of brains!!!

I know. Awesome.

And if you’re wondering what Alice is doing these days, I can tell you what she is not doing, and that would be helping me paint a rocket ship in the back yard.

You get the glue…

2011-05-30T11:50:00.001-07:00

I’ll get the scissors!

It’s party time!

So I got an email from my neighbor a couple days ago that said:

“I bought a Sarah Lee Cheesecake for dessert tomorrow night... random, I know, but I had a coupon. BTW... I think one of our neighbors is building some sort of spacecraft in their backyard!!!”

What?!

Oh, wait, she means us :)

(and the cheesecake was delicious, thanks for sharing!)

Russell is turning 6!!!! And we are gonna PAR-TAY!!!!

Before we get into that, let’s talk about birthday politics, shall we? I don’t know what you guys are doing around your kids birthdays, but I’m torn over how to conduct these shin-digs. It doesn’t help that I tend to go a little crazy around certain events, in fact the “Space Cowboy” theme is so ridiculously fun that I’m not entirely sure it’s not my own birthday party I’m planning. Evidence of that would be the other day when Russell asked Jon and I to “please stop talking about my party for a minute!”

(It’s okay, I’ll get him therapy vouchers and stuff them in a spaceship for future use)

So far, Russell has been young enough that I haven’t really had to give the guest list a second thought, but… what’s this?! Who is this big kid? With big kid friends? Friends that have nothing to do with me?! Oh the agony! And since we are talking about this, at some point do I have to stop kissing my wild boy right on his sticky dirt flavored lips?! I can’t bear it!!

Anyway, I have birthday rules. Because I’m a jerk. And I’m trying to suck all the fun out of the word “party”.

1. Invite as many kids as “years old” the kid is turning. I’ve more or less been able to stick with this, and gosh darn it if it doesn’t make total sense. Especially with someone as high strung as Russell, I don’t want him to feel like “Jam” at his own party!

2. Have the party in the morning or at night. You don’t think about it until Saturday shows up and you suddenly realize the party you’ve been invited to is smack in the middle of the day and you can’t really do anything else. And you certainly don’t want people to miss your party because of that!

3. Get the most BANG for your bucks!! I spend my dollars where they will be the most awesome, by making stuff myself, looking in unusual places for idea’s or decorations, and by inventing my own games that use cheap props or things I already own. Like Alice’s Tea Party, I already had the tea cups and costume jewelry, or at Russell’s Mario Party, the whole thing only cost me a piñata, and a few rolls of paper (and one cramped hand from using the scissors too long!)

4. Invest in future parties! Instead of spending a lot on presents or décor, every party I throw usually ends up getting one “fancy” thing that will roll forward into other parties. The soft serve ice cream maker I got for my own backyard party last year will live on at Russell’s party this year, and it didn’t cost me a dime!

And I am totally following those rules this year. Mostly. Except.

I have two guest lists.

And, you know what? I went around and around with this, but since we’ll already have the SPACESHIP, we are just gonna go ahead and have two parties! On the same day! I would be insane if I didn’t have the coolest friends on the planet. The problem is, our friends are so cool and we want to share our Space Cowboy Birthday Adventure with them! But Russell is turning six and wants to have a big boy party with his school chums. So the plan is one party at 10am to “high noon” which will get over in time for us to clean up, give certain people naps, and still get ready for our nighttime BBQ bash with the rest of our nutritious delicious friends and family! I think it’s gonna work out great because we will have big kid games and cupcakes at the morning party, but will send them off before lunch, then we’ll eat drink and be merry space cowboys and cowgirls with everyone else in the evening.

Whew, this birthday stuff is complicated.

so.

you want a little preview?

just a tiny taste?

a glimpse into why we are already having such a ridiculously fun time and the party isn’t for 5 more days? Okay, first let’s set the stage:

Yup, that’s Russell and a rocket picture I pirated off the internet, then I squished them together and ran them through photo shop. We have decided the way to do this party is to ONLY decorate like we’re in outer space, but DRESS like we headed to the Wild West.

And what if I told you I made holsters with $.29 cent pieces of felt and a package of shiny brads I got on clearance for $1.42 with an extra 25% off?

Jon picked the ribbon for the belt and it’s “muy perfecto”.

(And, Aimee? Before you email me, in this case, yes, I do think I will try an sell these on etsy. Maybe Adobe House would be interested in picking up this particular party favor?)

So what about this holster makes it appropriate for a Space Cowboy party? One word:

LASERS.

YEE-HAW!!

Besides being total fab for photo ops, we will use these in our alien hunt as well. Think Easter, only I have 150 one inch tall alien toys that I will be hiding in the backyard which you have to “stun” before you put them in your bandana bag :)

Also, since I will probably be too busy taking pictures of ferocious space rangers, here is probably the only glimpse you will get of my totally stellar outfit. Don’t email me, I know it’s not my birthday. On the other hand, I did make the birthday boy and I think I deserve the appropriate accessories.

Hair:

Ears:

and Body:

I know, the shirt is a little much, but I kind of think it was always meant to be mine.

That’s it, now you just have to wait for the party pictures. I have to go, there is a pile of wood in the backyard that just looks like a goofy safety hazard and needs to be painted into it’s rocket ship self so I can put in the windows Russell made that look out to “space”:

I think if there was a portal window on his head so I could look into his brains, it wouldn’t look a whole lot different than those pictures. Which is why we are gonna celebrate so hard! He really is out of this world!!

I’m The Jam

2011-05-24T13:59:00.001-07:00

The way Russell makes a sandwich should be illegal. The peanut butter to bread and jam ratio is way off. In fact it should probably just be called peanut butter with sandwich flavoring. We’ve been letting him make his own sandwiches since he was three, and I keep waiting for his peanut buttering skills to improve, but instead he has just become an expert at taking a forth a teaspoon of jam and spreading it across across an entire piece of bread because I won’t let him have just plain peanut butter. For some reason, I think it’s important that he get’s a little fruit in his diet.

“Little” is the key word there, because every day, every time, he asks to skip the jam, but at least I’m holding the bottom line, right?

So now imagine my life is the bread and I am that jam. I’m spread thin because of the hundreds of moments like that I encounter everyday. I can’t turn around without meeting a test, a challenge, or just a constant need for my patience bucket to be full, and my brain to be sharp and alert. And this isn’t a post about parenting, it’s just about friggin’ life.

My awesome friggin’ life, but also the one that is stretching me like Wiley Coyote being smashed on the hot desert asphalt by an ACME steam roller in a failed attempt to catch the Road Runner. MEEP MEEP! I feel like I have about 20 very real things on my plate that need to be eaten RIGHT NOW, or they will become freaky science experiments before my eyes! “Okay!” I say, “I can do this!” But every time I turn my attention to one, the others start to scream like they’ve been set on fire, and I haven’t even taken a bite yet!

Some of these things are good things. Okay, most of them! Being present for my family and not allowing my angst keep me from enjoying the people I see everyday, and the excitement of the house hunt, and the love I have for being a person separate from “a mom” that sews, and sings, and writes, and dances in my underwear with Alice cause she’s a baby and doesn’t care as long as I dance with her… oh, I guess that does fall under “mothering”, but it sure doesn’t feel like a job to shake my booty in the mirror with my pink diapered counterpart to our own rap version of the alphabet.

Jon, Alice, Russell, The House Inspection, The House Appraisal, The House Contractor, The Crazy Lady That Lives In The House And Won’t Let Those Other Three In The House, Sewing, Singing, Blogging, Traveling To Utah, Hosting Visitors, School, School, School Issues, Birthdays, Coordinating Babysitters So We Can Go To The American Idol Finale, Space Cowboy Parties and The Damn Sexy Spreadsheet…

And that’s just the part of the iceberg you can see.

Oh and it didn’t include the no end in sight items like Sweeping, The Never Ending Line of Dishes that March Toward The Sink all Day, Sorting Clothes, Making The Bed Over and Over and Over?! (who keeps messing with my bed?!) Dishes Again, Counter Tops, Sweeping Again, Toys Away, then Repeat All That Ten Times, and don’t forget Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner, all of which hopefully involve food items that are actually food and not just processed and chemically enhanced food shaped items.

There’s that, too.

I know, I know!! Nothing about that list conveys how very difficult my life is for me sometimes. In the scheme of the universe, having a beautiful kitchen to keep clean and going to American Idol is not a bad gig! I’m a brat, but it doesn’t change the fact that at any given moment ten million things need my attention or I am going to screw something up very badly.

Which is why I’m here today. I’m having one of those days where I think it’s hard for me to enjoy what other people might see when they look at my life, because I feel like I’m the one who has to keep it all balanced and spinning on my finger or it will fall off and bounce down the driveway while I watch helplessly. Like this crazy house we are getting seriously close to buying. I wouldn’t have batted an eye at it’s problems a few years ago, in all it’s craziness it’s seriously amazing… but now I’m afraid of everything. Never in my life have I had so much to lose. So much riding on my whims and passions and medications working together.

I should have called this post Team Work.

…

Which reminds me, my husband is a stud. He does all the things on his lists, and always finds time to help me with the things on mine. The man deserves a shout out because while I’m trying to control all the moving pieces of our lives, sometimes I am just plain not nice to him. And he is building me a ROCKET SHIP in the back yard for Heavens Sake! Jon, you are the reason I want our lives to be above average, and I’m sorry if this embarrasses you, but I have a great big crush on you.

Yay, Team Work!

I’ve Got This

2011-05-21T12:46:00.001-07:00

Today I am thirty-two. I’m not going to lie about my age because

Love

Thirties

LOVE!! Oh my gosh, what a relief to be leaving my twenties behind. I’m grateful for them, and they were full of ups and downs and whatever, but what thirty means? It means I’m no longer in the same decade as 20, 23, 26, 29… And that girl didn’t have my lean pink toddler machine or shining golden trouble maker! No wonder she thought she knew everything… my thirty year old self accepts that I actually know NOTHING. And I have to say, that knowledge is everything.

Plus, I have never felt better, or looked better! Don’t believe me? Just look at this picture --->

Don’t be jealous, I had a very biased artist make me that portrait. Plus, I think I’ve come a long way since the first time he drew me a couple years ago! --->

I don’t know what it means that the only one smiling is “Alice.” I’m just glad I’m now a shiny lady under a rainbow instead an angry humpty dumpty head.

And even though it’s my birthday, I have a present for you! Now that I am full of life experience, I feel qualified to tell you all that I have figured out the meaning of life.

And I made a video about it.

I hope you all have a good my birthday, too!

This Computer Thing Is Giving Me Brain Damage

2011-05-18T16:29:00.001-07:00

So, Kate told me about it first, and then my new friend Andy Richards from the flea market confirmed it’s awesome-ness. Of course I mean Andy Richards the totally adorable Asian girl, as opposed to Andy Richards the balding fat white man, which is what she says she imagines most people think she is if they see her name before they meet her. We met in the linen tent where she was scooping up lace hankies and doilies she is using to make hand screen printed wedding invitations. Seriously.

Andy? Let’s be friends forever!

So, anyway, what’s the big deal? It’s called Pinterest. You can see it here:

http://pinterest.com/

Oh, no, wait!!

Shoot.

You clicked that didn’t you?

Man, I should have saved that link until after you had finished reading this, you may never come back!

But if you do…

Well, then I have to tell you that website should have a warning message before you are allowed to enter that says “This Website Will Change The Wiring In Your Brain. Just FYI”

Why you ask? You looked at it without exploding? You’ve may even have known about it for months, and you don’t FEEL different?

Maybe. But I haven’t really been out and about since my new found love affair with pinterest, so it took me about half the day at Disneyland today before I realized what I was doing.

I was “pinning”.

In real life.

I met up with a friend who was there with a lot of her family, after we were done with general introductions I said “I could have guessed you were Carly’s family because look at this group! You, cute shirt! You, great earrings! And you! Great belt!” Spattering of polite laughter, pulling out some snacks, people breaking off into groups to go on adventures.

Fine, I mean, that’s fine! But in retrospect? It’s so obvious what I was doing! I only wish I could tell them what a sincere compliment it is that I was pinning them onto my internal corkboard! But how could I? I still didn’t get it myself. I spent the rest of our visit chatting and scanning and chasing kids and pinning strangers into my brain. It wasn’t until I was leaving and a girl walked by me who was wearing something I would never consider wearing; skinny jeans with an ankle high sort of cowboy boot… and it worked! Pretty darn cute… which is when I actually lifted my hand to click her shoes with my mouse hand.

That’s when the day flashed before my eyes and I realized the sad truth! I am getting brain damage from my computer.

Will someone please tell me? Is this good or bad?!

I really can’t tell.

It’s never too late for Easter Feasting!

2011-05-15T16:29:00.001-07:00

Especially if it involves calorie free feasting on delicious pictures of lean pink toddler machines and tall dark stinky 5 year olds.

I suppose if you’re watching your figure (or the amount of time spent on the internet watching my home movies), I’ve got a few shots I can share as a little appetizer to the slideshow!

Yep, I said SLIDESHOW!!

WOO-HOO!! <applause><applause>

Right?! Well, it’s my blog and I’ll be excited if I want too.

YAY!!!!!!

Before we begin, I must tell you a few things about this feast: this Easter was done in two parts, one was clean and crowded, while the other was dirty and awesome. If you put them together you end up with my grandma’s mac’n’cheese and my mothers pie crust cookies for dessert, so you better get a fork!

First, we went to a local park for a giant Easter egg hunt… it was so crowded that after the kids filled their baskets we actually walked away from the crowds and used all their goodies to set up a second hunt.

So I could take pictures.

It was a win/win! And when the boys were doing their hunt, the girls wandered off, so I got some good pictures of the big boy bringing in the pink adventurer’s (let’s not pass out any awards just yet, I’m pretty sure it only worked because we held the candy ransom.)

Then We Went Camping.

We wore the same clothes for three days, threatened small boys within in a inch of their lives if they giggled one more time at 5 am, cooked marshmallows and pieces of pepperoni on sticks over the fire until my pants didn’t fit anymore, chased the Easter bunny on a mile long scavenger hunt that led back to the campground which was now filled with camouflaged eggs, and all that was followed by an impromptu dance party and bubble snatching…

I think…

Gosh, I feel like I’m forgetting something…

OH! And I made a wedding cake!

Well, anniversary cake anyway, for Doug and Stacy! With whoopee pies, Easter candy, and (of course!) Polly Pockets on top.

It might have been the highlight of my culinary career so far.

Enough. Enjoy the feast! (click on any picture to go to the slideshow :)

Oh, and instead of taking away the roly poly bug from the fat baby fingers below, I decided to take a picture instead. Her parent’s don’t know about this.

Well, at least they didn’t.

Ha! Now go watch the slideshow!

Let it be known:

2011-05-10T11:39:00.001-07:00

I need another dish in my house like I need a hole in the head. Or, in this case, more vintage stemware. Just FYI.

This is a problem because Sunday we went to the sprawling Rose Bowl flea market. With no children. Also known as my idea of the perfect Mother’s Day :)

And it was perfect. Perfecto. Supreme!

Of course upon arrival (and after receiving our free “beauty soap for beauties”!) I made a bee line to my favorite tent which is literally just stuffed with thousands of pieces of random linen, handkerchiefs, vintage baby camisoles, and raggedy old quilts. One of my favorite parts of the whole day was when I found myself sitting like a queen, in the shade, balancing on a three legged stool as my handsome well dressed hubby was willingly, (as in: of his own volition) on his knees digging through piles of pretty little things and holding them up for me to look at, as well as bringing me piles of linen treasures to sort through. You should have seen the looks the other women at the flea market were giving him; like he was coolest dude since sliced bread.

I don’t think that’s how that saying works, but he really, really was!

So, no, on Mother’s Day I didn’t get any fancy jewelry, but I did walk away from that booth with about two hundred dollars worth of other people’s used, unwanted or discarded handkerchiefs, tablecloths, baby clothes and pillow covers…

..and bartered them down to just under a hundred.

SWEET! See what I mean? PERFECT day. We can go home now…

…but then…

I saw them.

And I wanted them.

Now I am just being spoiled! I mean, as I am ogling these heavy white milky goblets, Jon is hauling a huge basket of linens back to the car. Because we’re done, right?

Well $35 bucks later (bartered down from $60! Woo-hoo!) I was the proud new owner of 8 goblets and 6, um, smaller goblets? Dessert dishes? I don’t know what they are called, but I am going to put pudding in them. With fruit. And chocolate chips.

Which is when I stumbled into heaven. Or “The Heavens.”

Honestly! It was a little space devoted to thousands of hundred year old bookplates. Otherwise known as illustrated pages out of hundred year old books. I have been inspired and sewn some things from bookplates I have found before, and I love the smell of the old paper and the collections of horses and botany and… no… NO! I don’t have any more money! I can not discover this right now…

It was too late! In my hands I was holding a fragile yellowing bookplate of our solar system that stopped at Saturn. And behind that, the mathematical calculations and illustrations of a solar eclipse…

Well, I’m screwed.

So I’m striking up a conversation with the shop owner, all the while in my head trying to figure out if the kids really need bread and milk the rest of the month, when the woman next to me asks what I would like to do with these pages.

I look up, “I’m going to try and sew… …. them….”

brain stops

wheels turning

I know this person.

No I don’t.

…Yes.

Yes!

I really do…

I’m about to have a conversation with Linda Hamilton. (this lady)

Now, I have to stop here and say this might not mean that much to you, but in our horror/sci-fi movie loving house, The Terminator is a honored classic. Even better than that, we are cult followers of the TV show, Chuck, which is a series about what it would be like if, instead of designing software for the healthcare industry, my husband had worked at Best Buy and been recruited by the CIA for his nerdy charm and giant brain.

So in addition to being the kick-ass mom in the Terminator, Linda Hamilton plays Chuck’s kick-ass mom, too.

Which means, now its Mother’s Day, I’m standing in the hot sun holding spectacular solar system bookplates in my hands, and am now required to behave like an interesting adult while I talk to Chuck’s mom, Sarah Conner.

For someone who has ADD, I am used to saying one thing, thinking another, fiddling with whatever I have in my hands, and kicking things with my feet all at the same time.

Because, you know, I can.

But even 31 years of practice didn’t prepare for me for this. It was like my brain was saying “be cool. Be Cool. BE COOL!!” And I’m all “Why are you yelling at me?!” and my mouth is saying, “I just spent an hour at a booth sorting through pillow cases and handkerchiefs, and now I’m hoping to sew this solar system on one…” and my brain is all “Gross! Why did you say pillow cases? That doesn’t sound cool! Say vintage embroidered children's clothing..” and I’m all “It’s too late. IT’S TOO LATE!! <hysteria building>” and my mouth is all “Yeah, I just do these at home, I have a shop on Etsy.com, it keeps me busy between diaper changes, HAHAHAHA!”

Crap. I laughed too hard at my own, well? That’s not really even a joke, is it?

So we talked for a few minutes, and that thing about celebrities being even more beautiful close up? That’s true, but in this case it was for all the best reasons. She had a GREAT face, filled with lines and creases in all the right places, not a face lift in sight, and brilliant sharp eyes. I knew I was standing there with someone who asked me about my plans for the bookplates because she really wanted to know. And gosh darn it, if she didn’t like me back a little, too.

Since “be cool” had to be written all over my face she must have known that I recognized her, so I found it awfully nice that right before she left she put her arm around my shoulder, gave me the briefest squeeze and said “Thanks for sharing your stories with me,” then turned to walk away, and NOW! Right there! While her back was turned I had a split second to get Jon’s attention since I wanted to share our “rose bowl celebrity sighting” with him! It was clear he hadn’t paid her any attention, so I quick grabbed his wrist and made my best “LOOK! OVER! THERE!” expression, during which I’m pretty sure my eyebrows may have detached themselves from my face, then just as quickly dropped it all and threw back on my (probably bizarre) “be cool” face, in case she turned around again.

He didn’t get it, but he did ask me if I needed to sit down or something.

No! YOU sit down! Once she was out of earshot I quickly filled him in and he went bounding out of the stall in search of her while I negotiated a fine little purchase price on my charmed bookplate pages.

Spoiled.

That’s me.

And that was my awesome Mothers Day. Before heading over for a quick fun visit to my Grandma Maxine in her new digs, we finished the market walking hand in hand… except for the twenty minutes my fingers were digging around in the fifty cent costume jewelry… or when Jon stopped a guy loading up his truck to leave, and negotiated him down $15 bucks on a divine and large standing sewing box for a grand total of twenty dollars… or when I bartered three bucks off for some lovely yellow African Trade beads.

I don’t know why I’m telling you all that, I can just show you! --->

If I had planned this day, it never could have gone that well. It’s always the little unexpected adventures that make this mother happy and grateful! No sarcasm in sight. Sorry :)

Did I say bad mom?

2011-05-08T01:17:00.001-07:00

I meant bad granddaughter.

In the last post I may have mentioned that I am going to be writing a wicked post for Mothers Day because I’m a bad mom… but this post isn’t about being a mom.

This post is about my Grandma Sylvia.

She won’t mind that it’s a little wicked because being “a little wicked” is genetic, and I think that I may have gotten my “little wicked” from her. In fact, I always knew something particularly delicious was happening when I heard my pretty and proper grandma engage in what my family calls “evil laughter.” It’s probably more like an evil chuckle, which honestly? While it doesn’t have the “wow” factor of Maleficent like cackling, the right kind of evil chuckle is so much worse.

Alice has it, too. In fact, they both have the ability to be very amused by themselves without ever even saying a word… you can simply see it in the glint of their eyes.

My grandmother was voted The Best Dressed Woman of Glendale, California in the 1960’s. My mother tells me stories of how she used to hope her mother would stop by her school because all the other little girls would crowd around and tell her how beautiful her mom was after she left. She also tells a great story about driving around town, while in the back of their double wide Buick, imagining that the people they drove by were looking at them, thinking there must be very important people in that car.

I don’t know what that has to do with my grandma, but maybe it helps you continue to trace the line of genetics that allows me to have an over abundance of a self amusement.

My Grandmother is THE youngest surviving daughter of a Utah Pioneer. There are still quite a few daughters of a daughter… but her father came across the plains with his lean, two year old legs dangling off the back of one of the last wagons heading west before the trains came in. Then he went on to grow up and have TWENTY children! I have to say, I’m so glad he stuck with it since my Grandma showed up toward the end there.

She has many wonderful and harrowing stories of her days in Washington DC as a young married woman, and later traveling the world with my Grandpa Phil, who had a wicked glint of his own along with a penchant for eating any disgusting thing he could get his hands on to freak out his daughters, and telling bad jokes. And, I may be remembering this wrong, but he used to give my grandma boots (or shoes?) full of cash around Christmas for her weekly trips to the salon. That’s why she always looked so good! If I’m a good mom, maybe I’ll get some “shoes” tomorrow!

I’m looking at you, Jon.

She had a black eye last week! My 80 something year old grandma had a SHINER! That’s a little startling, but I was even more shocked to find out it was her first one. Ever! How do you survive 19 siblings with no black eyes? I have a black eye right now and my siblings aren’t even in the same state.

Fortunately I was able to look it up on the news and after a few emails, and a dozen phone calls, they were able to forward me the top secret footage of how my grandmother got that black eye:

Personalize funny videos and birthday eCards at JibJab!

Also, my grandma is in love with American Idol’s Scott McCreary and his sideways cowboy crooning. I tell you what, Scott McCreary, I wasn’t a big fan before, but if you keep making my grandma happy on Wednesday and Thursday nights, you can have my vote!

Happy Mother’s Day, Grandma!! This post wasn’t that bad after all. I guess I had to keep some of the extra wicked stuff to myself since you have surpassed all your friends in the technology age and find your way to my blog on a regular basis…

Oh, wait, except that time when you took your Mormon self and my Mormon sister to England when she was 14 and drank WINE.

That was wicked awesome.

And Happy Mothers Day to Jon’s awesome mom, Carolyn, my Grandma Maxine, Susan Love-King and ALL the amazing women who nurture, support and tease me into being a better mom myself, many while feeding, clothing, disciplining and loving rug rats of their own.

Also, if you’re still reading this (thank you for your patience) The Great Grand Babies want to thank Grandma Sylvia for always teaching that if you really put you’re heart into something, then you Can-Can do it!!

Personalize funny videos and birthday eCards at JibJab!

HA! The kids are gonna watch that a bazillion times… well, when they aren’t watching this Mothers Day grand finale that Alice picked for Gramma Sharri…

Personalize funny videos and birthday eCards at JibJab!

Now that! is wicked. That is almost “Happy Easter, Aimee!” wicked.

My work here is done. HAPPY DAY PEOPLE!

To Do List

2011-05-06T12:04:00.001-07:00

1. I need to write a Russell update. Though the fact that I haven’t flown to my computer with grievances lately can be taken as good sign.

2. I have the most SPECTACULAR pictures of our Easter adventures. They must be slide-showed immediately!

3. Except, when I’m done with this, I am going to get started on my wicked Mothers Day post. Yes. Wicked. It’s practically going to write itself I’m such a bad mom.

4. I’ve been recording! I need to visit the wizard to get some courage and share some of my songs with you. I’m afraid what I feel good about in front of a live audience might make me cringe coming out of your computer speakers… yet somehow I’m still considering it.

5. We are trying to buy a house. In California. For, like, a half a million dollars or something. Which makes our options in Orange County either a duplex, a dilapidated fixer upper, an 800 square foot condo, or a boat. Did I ever tell you that people LIVE on boats here? That’s because you can’t buy an 800 square foot condo for less than about half a million dollars.

I know I’m not supposed to talk about money. I’m not supposed to talk about a lot of things. My ability to censor myself was never in any poetry that Jon has written me.

6. I need to write a post about how my husband never writes me poetry.

To be fair, I’m actually okay with this since it would come out like a haiku in zero’s and one’s. Better than that, he is trying to write me a blogging program for the iPad with his giant brains. And he DID get both the kids ready this morning so I would have time to brush my teeth and my hair on the same day! Possibly helping me feel a little cute when I took the kids to the Moms and Muffins breakfast…

Unfortunately, he strapped them both in the car and it wasn’t until I got there that I realized he didn’t put any pants on Alice. Yeah, no one was looking at my hair or my teeth at that point… just my partially clothed child. Maybe during all that teeth and hair brushing I could have spared a glance down at the pants-less child, huh?

Oh! And speaking of mothers day! I have the PERFECT gift for you last minute shoppers! Something that I can’t get for my own mother for reasons that will be clear to you in a second. I just finished designing a gift certificate for Vintage Aimee’s Haunted Glassworks on Etsy, check out these magical “Baby’s First Haircut” Sun Catchers!! --->

Now head over there and buy a gift certificate for YOUR mom!! (Or yourself!)

Now you see my problem? If I gave this to my mom? Since Vintage Aimee happens to be my sister?

“Here, mom, I paid my sister to make you something. Happy Mothers Day.”

It would be like high school all over again, except I was usually paying my little sister to do my laundry (when she was done with my English homework, of course.) Not that I ever paid her anything, you know, since I never had a job and being a band geek only pays in lameness.

What should you get if you already have one of Vintage Aimee’s Baby Hair Suncatchers? Well, if you happen to have any spare baby teeth hanging around, may I suggest “Window In My Mouth” ? --->

Hand painted and embroidered onto repurposed fabric in a vintage metal frame from Pointed.

That’s me :)

7. Which leads me to the last “Blogging To Do” post I’ve been thinking about writing… it’s about how I will never try and make money off this blog from ads. Not ever. I have a philosophy that applies to me specifically, not all blogs. Mostly I want you to know that I gain nothing from you buying something I suggest here (except from Pointed, and you should buy three of those hoops TODAY. What if someone punches you in the face and you need a place to put all your teeth? You’ll be glad you got extra, that’s for sure). No, I suggest stuff here, music, books, Etsy stuff, so you will buy it and and wake up tomorrow just a little cooler…

It’s “cool” karma. Remember the thing about being a band geek? That level of nerd doesn’t go away on it’s own, I need you to be cooler, so I can be cooler by association...

Holy cow, I just realized I could have spent the time I used telling you what blogs I need to write, to actually write one. Oops.

8. Too bad, what I actually sat down to tell you, is that I have figured out the meaning of life! Serious! I even made a 30 second youtube video about it. I was going to show you, but this post is already too long. I guess you’ll just have to wait and hope nothing happens to my fingers before tomorrow. I’ll never be able to publish it if I have to type with my elbows.

It should be noted.

2011-05-04T11:45:00.001-07:00

Alice says “Go. Way.”

Which usually means, “I’m having fun, don’t ruin it.”

And usually involves wearing my yellow dishwashing gloves on her feet and chasing spooky, or putting Russell’s toys in the toilet when he’s at school.

Yes, school! So far so good. More on that later. Like another post later! :)

Any. Way.

She also has been greeting her father when he gets home from work with HORRENDUS stories of injustice that have usually gone down HOURS before. She generally does this by being completely cheerful until she hears the front door open and then runs to him and has a breakdown while saying things like “Dad? Daddy? Jon? JON! Wook! Wook me! Mommy say no, NO! and Awice! No bite! No, no! ooky MY bites! No, no, ooky! Ruzzo go way, no happy, no, NO! happy… MY fwenz!”

I would like to say I have no idea what she is saying, but I’m practically fluent in this weird gibberish: after making absolutely sure she has his undivided attention, I believe I’m in trouble for putting her in time-out for biting, Spooky is in trouble for stealing food off her plate, she feels abandoned by Russell going to school, and she wants a cell phone so she can text all her friends.

Well, that last part may not be true, but it’s coming, and I know that last word is “friends.”

It’s not like she’s an unhappy dictator! In fact, I would say she is 80% pure awesome weirdo, and only 20% sociopath 2 year old, so why she feels the need to unburden herself at the end of each day is beyond me. I would videotape it except she a has a sixth sense for being filmed, or being asked to perform anything if someone besides us might possibly see her.

Also, and most importantly, whenever we tell her we love her, before bed, randomly in the car, at the grocery store, wherever, well she can barely wait for us to finish before she exclaims “you’re welcome!!”

And that’s, of course, in crystal clear English so if anyone is around to witness it, they usually laugh at me because apparently she is doing me a favor by allowing me to adore her.

This is not going to end well.

Also “Watch!” means: playing with toys is not fun if you’re not watching me, so “watch!”

“Pah Pick It” is Polly Pocket

“Choo-choo rain” is for Train

and “Mere!” is for Come Here. Now. Or it will followed by incessant nasal hollering of “MAHM!”

Meaning Mom. But she says it like a jersey newsie selling papers on the corner. Over and over.

And over.

In fact, she makes me answer her three times before she’ll continue.

“Mommy”

“Yes?”

“Mahm!”

“What?”

“MAHM!”

“WHAT?! I’m looking right at you!”

“No. I no wike it!”

You can probably figure that one out yourself.

“Chi-chen” is Kitchen. Also known as “Uhngee, Tubby, and Bites” (hungry, tummy and bites.)

“Shit” is Shirt. Clear as a bell. She likes to tell people we meet about her pretty shirts. They look at me like I’m a terrible person. Which I sort of am, so that’s okay.

Last but not least, she prefers to wish people a “Happy Bird Day Syl-phee!” because her cousin Sylvie turned 2 about the same time as Alice learned to say Happy Birthday, so now no one gets their own birthday greeting. I’m sure the actual Sylvie would be okay with this.

And, not to be left in the dust by his sisters weirdness, it should also be noted that her five (almost SIX!) year old brother likes to use the phrase “I’ll see you The Next Day!” as his parting shot to family and friends alike, be it bedtime or leaving a playdate. Somehow he seems to capitalize the words “The Next Day” with his cheerful voice. Imagine the way you or I would say “See you tomorrow!”

It’s like that, only weirder.

And what’s even weirder than that, on Sunday night, after we had gone over the whole Easter thing again (he’s recently gotten wrapped up in the idea of Jon and I dying, and since I grow tired of discussing my own eventual demise at length, we’ve tried to steer his focus on the “coming back to life” part) , as I was tucking him in, turning off the lights and closing the door he said in his most charming cheerful voice:

“Mom? MOM! I’ll see you The Next Day!”

“Okay, Russell, I’ll see you the next day, too. Goodnight…”

“MOM? Mom!! I’ll see you the next time, when I die and I am dead, and I Come Back To Life… I’ll See You Then, Too!”

And then blew me a kiss.

Oy vey.

I’m Good!

2011-04-30T11:52:00.001-07:00

No.

Better than that…

WE are great!

It was crappy, there was ugly crying and a moment where I didn’t think I could step off the doorstep. But then I did. And every step has been… free.

I’m free from the idea of the moment! The moment of “final severing” has passed! I’ve been in a state of suspended dread, and doubting my ability to grow and change again. After all, our big change to move here in the first place was just so traumatic. When you’re eight months pregnant? Everything is larger than life, not just your stomach!

I was expecting to feel better after Russell’s first day of his new school on Tuesday, but I guess I don’t have to wait. I feel better right this second! It was nice to cry my eyes out in fine company yesterday. I know we loved, and were loved in return, and I know I have come out of Cottage with everything we ever went there for, and MORE.

So we got in the car… and Jon suggested we drive through the woods area of Lake Forest. It was inspired! He gets one of those a year, saying the exact right thing at the exact right time, like when I was still hanging on to the baby weight after having Alice, and I was considering flinging myself into the ocean because I would never, ever, ever, not be fat, ever, ever again… and he told me with total sincerity that “the muffin top is the best part of the muffin!”… or when we were in the hospital with our 3 month old pink baby, when I hadn’t left the room for days, and we were both exhausted and hungry and sharing a plate of hospital food when I turned around and he was offering me the last bite of dry mystery meat on the plate, and it was SO GOOD it made me cry and he said “Baby, I will always save you the last bite of hospital meatloaf.”

This drive was that kind of “Jon inspired.” We have an offer accepted on a short sale over in the woods, and while there are things about buying that house that are still in the air, I’ve been a little paralyzed imagining myself moving on lately. When he suggested we drive around over there? It really was perfect timing. I’m so ready to grow again! And we drove by Russell’s potential kindergarten… you guys, it is the prettiest little public school you’ve ever seen! I have no idea if the teachers are any good, but it’s several little grey stone buildings with bright blue wooden doors and grounds filled with eucalyptus trees. In the words of Tina Fey’s two year old daughter:

“I want to go to there!”

After that we didn’t have to go home and dive into a gallon ice cream. No way! We went to Dairy Queen and got chocolate, cherry, or butterscotch dipped ice cream cones and went to a new park we’ve been wanting to try by our house. And it was good!

And I am good.

And I just wanted to let you know you don’t have to be afraid of my blog anymore.

The next post will be about Easter camping, and I’m going to see if I can find a piece of software to balance the cuteness of the pictures by letting you smell HOW BAD WE STUNK when we got home! Camping laundry is the worst, because after you shower and go out to throw it in the wash you can’t BELIEVE you smelled like this. And didn’t notice!

And tonight I’m going with my cousin Jack to the E Street Café to see Blue Mountain Mule for the first time!

Onward and upward my friends! Have a good weekend!

And the winner is?!

2011-04-29T14:28:00.001-07:00

No one!

Mainly because I’m writing this when I am sleep deprived and my grammar is going to be awful!

And, well, I mean, Lorraine DID win because she commented, AND sent a picture of herself with her midnight snack, AND we talked on the phone for two hours while we watched…

But it’s FRIDAY.

The minutes are inching toward 3:30pm. In an hour I will drive away from Russell’s wonderful school, and we can never go back. And by Monday it won’t even be a school anymore. I imagine today as we pull away from the safe haven for our wonderful spirited boy, and watch it grow smaller in the rearview mirror, my panic will grow a little larger in exchange.

So no one is a winner today! No one can ever win. Ever again. In the history of the world! All winning is over and there’s no more rainbows, no one will ever write a great novel again, or paint a beautiful painting, and the tooth fairy is a lie, and…

what? too much?

A little doom and gloom never hurt anybody. Except me. It’s hurting me all over. And I’ve been trying so hard to distract myself with blogging everyday this week!

Snap out of it! my common sense says.

No way! says the fourteen year old girl writing bad poetry in a dark corner of my brain surrounded by posters of Edward Cullen and Bella Swan.

Fine, I say. One more hour.

Four!

Three?

two.

…

ok. two. but no blogging.

As if a teenager ever listened.

I’ll be okay. And when I pick Russell up from his new school on Tuesday and no one had to call the fire station I will be even better. And the thing about this feeling I have? I think it’s all I know how to feel because the last two times Russell ‘left’ a school it was really a living nightmare. What if I just don’t know what it feels like to have a smooth transition? Maybe this whole thing is what needed to happen so I will know that we can do this school thing at all. That he can move through grades like other kids seem too. And maybe I will look back on this moment and know this was when I learned that not every change has to feel like walking to the guillotine. It doesn’t have to be comfortable, but change never is, and I like things to change.

I just prefer it when it’s my choice. Or involves me getting large sums of cash.

Thanks, my friends, for listening to this last rant. Thank you Cottage Preschool, for taking my wild boy and turning him into a boy who can wiggle and jiggle but sit through a class, a boy whose first real memories of teachers will be of great women who made him feel loved a reined in at the same time.

And thank you Lorraine, for talking to your sister in the wee hours of the morning, because you wanted free scones that badly :)

Yeah, and the crown really does make me feel a little better.

A Royal Giveaway!

2011-04-28T10:57:00.001-07:00

Hey, you know how the world stage always seems full of war and mayhem and tragedy? Well, for about 2 hours at 3AM tomorrow morning, a couple billion people are going to be thinking about the same thing, and it won’t be sad. It will be JUICY! With gossip and tradition and <sigh> true love! Probably. At least they have stuck with each other for this long so, at the very least, they really like each other, right? Anyway, I would like to participate with that :)

I sent out an invite to email addresses that I have, but if I don’t have yours, here is one we can share: (click on it)

So, what’s the giveaway? Well, either send me a picture of your midnight snack in the next 24 hours, or leave me a comment on this post between 2 and 4 AM on Friday the 29th and you will be entered to win…

are you ready for this?

…

SCONES!

Not any old scones, how does Orange Chocolate Chip scones from Liddy’s Delight sound? Fresh from your own oven! Or, maybe I should ask, how do they look?

I have had these.

I think I shared a piece with Jon. He was probably standing there drooling and it would have been rude if I hadn’t. Next time I make them I’m going break into a friends house when they are out of town, so I can be alone, and only leave behind the aroma of something so delicious it could make you cry.

Darn it, now I’m hungry!

Happy Royal Watching and Good Luck!

Stop! Don’t turn on the whites!

2011-04-27T16:01:00.001-07:00

I’m not ready!

What is happening today?!

My funny, fantastic, five year old has a front chomper dangling from a thread in his mouth as he heads off to his preschool graduation, while my tiny, terrific two year old wanders around the house saying things like,

“Go way. Not right now.”

“Ruzzo go pee-pee in the baffroom.”

and “Wook! I turn on the whites!”

Which is bizarre because a week ago all she wanted to say was “Mine” and “Choc-whit.”

Meaning chocolate.

Because she takes after her muther.

Oh! And don’t forget the other day when she ‘spanked’ Jon because he said “no” when it was time for bed and she wanted to sit on his lap instead. She womped his leg with a tiny pink fist then flew into a centuries perfected two year old rage… which landed her in the time-out tent, where, after screaming for about thirty seconds, she launched into this:

“Daddy, wap! No, no, no! No goodnight! I wap, and no hit daddy, and my bwanket, and my tent, and no, NO, hit daddy, and sorry. So Sorry. Pwease wap, pwease mommy. I be nice, so nice!”

I’m not kidding.

It kind of totally freaked me out. In a good way, I guess.

ANYWAY, I have a point, and my point is:

Russell Graduated Preschool Today!!

And today? We celebrate! And I wonder where my babies went… and then we celebrate some more! Because Friday? Friday is gonna be rough. I’m not going to go into it again, I think I’ve bent your ears enough over how sad we are to see Cottage Preschool close it’s doors forever. I can just say that however much I try to prepare, the actual Friday is going to be a tear jerker.

But that’s Friday.

Today? IS WEDNESDAY! Graduation Day! And I just got home from the ceremony! And I have pictures :)

Those are the flowers and vases Russell and I made for his teachers, and also the ribbon I made for Russell to wear today. Before you ask, no I didn’t make it from scratch, but I did “design” it at the little kiosk in Michaels, and put it together at home. Can I just say? Check it out! I had a 20% off coupon so it probably cost 8 bucks, but I got to pick all the layers, the message, the ribbon, and the streamers, so I still felt like I was giving him something that was ‘just’ for him. I like that handmade touch, but sometimes I don’t have ‘handmade’ time!

I also put a little note with the teachers flowers, it’s SO cheesy I should probably spare you, but I actually worked harder on getting what I wanted to say on the little note just right, more than I did on everything else. And cheesy or not, I really meant it:

“May your flowers always bloom in the sunshine the way my sweet boy bloomed at Cottage Preschool.”

I know. I’m a sap. More Pictures!!

Happy Wednesday, people.

Edge-uh-ma-Kated

2011-04-26T12:17:00.001-07:00

Did I ever tell you about the time I was standing in my cap and gown at the independent study center, anxiously watching the on duty ‘teacher’ grading my last English assignment? It was the same assignment my 10 year old little sister had just helped me finish in the car and I needed to get at least a C on it in order to continue on my way to graduation. From highschool.

No? Really? Gosh, I just can’t imagine why I wouldn’t have wanted to share that on this totally public forum sooner.

Anyway, I bring it up because after last night, I suddenly can’t decide if that is more or less embarrassing than the fact that I just found out that “they’re” is a word.

Duh.

I have no idea how this has escaped me, but I think it could have something to do with the stellar education I got from independent study. Or maybe I should say the stellar education my little sister got from my independent study.

‘There’ is a word.

“There’s a snake in my boot!”

‘Their’ is also a word!

“Their toys were all made in China.”

Ah! Now I understand why I’m always getting hung up on “there'” and “their” when it doesn’t feel right. There is totally another “they’re”!

I just finished compiling my favorite posts for my Last Blog and Testament (YAY!), also known as my new “favorite/popular posts” tab called “In Case I Die” (yes, I am amused by myself). While doing this I ran across a comment from kateastrophe, under which she left another comment bemoaning her total humiliation at having used the wrong “their/they’re” in her previous comment. And I was all, “what? Is that true?”

“Hey, Jon? Is ‘they’re’ a word?”

“A word for what?”

“For, you know, for THEM. For their. For THEY? They ARE?!”

“Um, yes? I don’t understand what you are asking me.”

No kidding. To his credit, when he finally figured out my malfunction he didn’t mock me too badly.

Also, I might need Lorraine to get on a flight STAT and tell me how many of my English assignments she actually did and anything else I may have missed. And I’m sorry if reading my blog has ever made your eyes bleed. I am the first to admit that punctuation is the bane of my blogging existence, and the more I write the more I learn what I never really learned! Which is a lot!

(hey, at least I didn’t type “alot”)

(I’m looking at you, dad.)

UPDATE: before Lorraine even knew I was writing this, she sent me this message about yesterdays post

……………………………

12:35 PM Lorraine: morn= mourn. i ALWAYS mispell this one too, but I thought I'd tell you, because I would want YOU to tell ME if I spelled something wrong on my blog. otherwise, awesome post. I also cried when I heard about the restrepo director.

12:40 PM me: did I only type it the once?

12:41 PM Lorraine: twice :D

12:44 PM me: where is the second one?

Lorraine: both in the same paragraph, "I morn with the families" etc

I also "mourn" with humanity

12:45 PM me: gah. i think i got them all

12:46 PM Lorraine: haha sorry. I feel like a jerk now

…………………….

Yeah, well, you are a jerk, you stole my high school education. And I think you might be part owner of my diploma. Oh, and you misspelled “misspell.”

I only know that because spell check told me so.