In lieu of this blog which is completely non-identifying for myself, I started a new one. Stop by at www.KarrieMcAllister.blogspot.com. I will post columns as usual, but also a bunch of other stuff-- photos, everyday thoughts and stories, recipes, etc.
Whatever comes to mind.
You just never know.
Sunday, November 02, 2008
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Stress-inducing school photos: Just tuck in a t-shirt?
It was pretty fitting that the forms came home from school because I was just noticing how much dust had formed on last year’s school pictures. Now that we’ll be getting new ones, I suppose I can hold off on the Pledge until I replace the toothless, hairless smiles from last year with brand new ones.
School picture day is extremely insignificant in the context of the entire world, but in the tiny world that my children and I live in, it is a huge deal. They are very concerned about what they are going to wear to be preserved in childhood history, and I am very concerned about ordering enough copies for all of the grandparents, not to mention remembering to send the money to school that day.
Of course, there are other things I worry about too, all which stem from the disastrous memories of my very own school picture days. In first grade, the cowlick that still exists on the right side of head was in full force which only complimented the bangs that my mom cut at a too-steep angle. And I can remember standing in line in elementary school forever, waiting for the two seconds you got to sit down and smile. Then you’d wait months to find out if your eyes were open or your smile was cattywhompus in the yearbook. This same kind of humiliation continued on all the way through my school-aged career, with the culmination being my senior pictures when I woke up with those puffy sleepy-eyes and wore a daisy vest I sewed myself and my grandfather’s fedora hat. (Oh, the nineties!)
To this day, I can’t believe my parents spent the money to buy any of those shots in a large print size.
But this year photo day is causing us problems even before the actual day arrives. My son, Captain Camouflage, refuses to wear anything with any class. In his mind there are two types of clothing: comfy clothes and fancy clothes. Fancy clothes consist of the tuxedo he wore at a recent wedding, and his comfy clothes are all grass and mud-stained or ripped (he is a boy, through and through.) I just don’t think the tux would fit in very well with the other preschoolers.
Confiding in some close friends over lunch yesterday, I told them that I was beginning to worry about picture day because my son doesn’t have any decent clothes that I can convince him to wear. And buying something new that he will only wear for two hours doesn’t make all that much sense, so I wasn’t sure what I was going to do.
And bless their hearts, both of them brought me, at separate times, clothes from their own sons to borrow. They are pretty spectacular friends, with very well-dressed sons, and I was pleased as punch until I opened up the bags of clothes.
They didn’t look like anything like my son. If I dressed him in a clean shirt with a collar, I’d probably have to put a nametag on him. He’d be unrecognizable. And why would I want a picture of someone who doesn’t look like my kid at all?
For that reason, we decided to dress him in his nicest of “comfy” clothes, something that will best represent who he is this year at school. And who he is, is a rough and tumble boy who loves camping, skateboarding and building forts. I want a real and truthful memory of him, and if that means he won’t be the nicest dressed, well, it won’t be the first time. Or the last time, either.
Chances are it’ll be a fabulous shot, and I’ll be reordering large sizes to pass out to the family. I know my parents will be happy to hang it on the wall, right next to the captured moment shot of my sleepy eyes and grandpa’s hat.
Karrie and her family live in Orrville. Drop her a line at www.KarrieMcAllister.com.
School picture day is extremely insignificant in the context of the entire world, but in the tiny world that my children and I live in, it is a huge deal. They are very concerned about what they are going to wear to be preserved in childhood history, and I am very concerned about ordering enough copies for all of the grandparents, not to mention remembering to send the money to school that day.
Of course, there are other things I worry about too, all which stem from the disastrous memories of my very own school picture days. In first grade, the cowlick that still exists on the right side of head was in full force which only complimented the bangs that my mom cut at a too-steep angle. And I can remember standing in line in elementary school forever, waiting for the two seconds you got to sit down and smile. Then you’d wait months to find out if your eyes were open or your smile was cattywhompus in the yearbook. This same kind of humiliation continued on all the way through my school-aged career, with the culmination being my senior pictures when I woke up with those puffy sleepy-eyes and wore a daisy vest I sewed myself and my grandfather’s fedora hat. (Oh, the nineties!)
To this day, I can’t believe my parents spent the money to buy any of those shots in a large print size.
But this year photo day is causing us problems even before the actual day arrives. My son, Captain Camouflage, refuses to wear anything with any class. In his mind there are two types of clothing: comfy clothes and fancy clothes. Fancy clothes consist of the tuxedo he wore at a recent wedding, and his comfy clothes are all grass and mud-stained or ripped (he is a boy, through and through.) I just don’t think the tux would fit in very well with the other preschoolers.
Confiding in some close friends over lunch yesterday, I told them that I was beginning to worry about picture day because my son doesn’t have any decent clothes that I can convince him to wear. And buying something new that he will only wear for two hours doesn’t make all that much sense, so I wasn’t sure what I was going to do.
And bless their hearts, both of them brought me, at separate times, clothes from their own sons to borrow. They are pretty spectacular friends, with very well-dressed sons, and I was pleased as punch until I opened up the bags of clothes.
They didn’t look like anything like my son. If I dressed him in a clean shirt with a collar, I’d probably have to put a nametag on him. He’d be unrecognizable. And why would I want a picture of someone who doesn’t look like my kid at all?
For that reason, we decided to dress him in his nicest of “comfy” clothes, something that will best represent who he is this year at school. And who he is, is a rough and tumble boy who loves camping, skateboarding and building forts. I want a real and truthful memory of him, and if that means he won’t be the nicest dressed, well, it won’t be the first time. Or the last time, either.
Chances are it’ll be a fabulous shot, and I’ll be reordering large sizes to pass out to the family. I know my parents will be happy to hang it on the wall, right next to the captured moment shot of my sleepy eyes and grandpa’s hat.
Karrie and her family live in Orrville. Drop her a line at www.KarrieMcAllister.com.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Tuesday, October 07, 2008
Look out, folks—there was a well-timed spark
The little fire-making workshop came just at the right time because lately I’d been really getting bogged down by the daily doldrums of being a mom.Stuff was starting to get to me. I’d practically break into a sweat about the smallest things, like I had totally lost perspective on what really matters in life. Not that fire really matters, but I found myself worrying about what the other moms would say if I fed my kids white bread and at what percentile the baby clocked in.
It was getting out of hand, and I knew it when, driving to my little fire-making workshop, I bombarded my husband with my apparently annoying life. And if I would have been a fly on the wall in my own conversation, I probably would have thrown up. “The weather these days is so annoying. The school rule is that it has to be 60 degrees before you are allowed out without a coat, and I know this because I got scolded for not wearing a coat one morning, and now it’s like 59 degrees when we leave for school and the kid have to carrying a coat around all day. It’s nuts! And by the way, how did you like that new bread I bought? I like that you can actually SEE the whole grains in there…”
Blecccch.
About once a year I venture away from my family for an empowering couple of days in the wilderness, or something like that. An annual program put on by the Department of Natural Resources called “Becoming an Ohio Outdoorswoman” is my latest love away from home—it’s a weekend of getting dirty and having fun. All sorts of adventurous classes are offered, everything from camp cooking to instinctive pistol shooting, and each and every one of them makes you feel, as a woman, just a little bit stronger, more confident, and ready to take on the world and the makers of the 60 degree rule.
This year, because of having a baby at home, I was only able to sneak away for one class and I begged the powers-that-be to just attend the one class that I had been dreaming about since I saw it happening the year before: primitive fire making. In the class, you actually make your own bow drill and through a series of carving and sweating, start a small fire without a match in sight.
It sounds terribly nerdy, but those who personally know me were not surprised to hear me babble about how excited I was about this class. I literally counted down the days. Then when the time finally came for the class to start, I left my family and walked into the room ready to become skilled in the ways of making fire. I had visions of myself screaming like Tom Hanks in Castaway when he finally starts that first spark. I am woman, hear me roar!
So when, not five minutes into carving my bow drill fire-making set I sliced the tip off of my left index finger with the brand new knife, I was pretty upset. Tearful, really. An entire year of waiting went down the drain with the gushing blood, and I spent the first half of the workshop holding my hand up in the air with my finger wrapped in gauze while everyone else sat there carving and all empowered.
Bleccccch again.
I could have easily spent the rest of the time wallowing in my own self-pity and band-aids, but eventually I realized that even though I was getting a late start with a handicap, I could still begin work on my bow drill. So using what fingers I had left, I started carving here and there. When the session ended, I took what I had started home and spent the rest of the weekend, in between motherly duties, carving and actually trying to create the a tiny spark. And let me tell you, it is hard work. Very hard.
But today after another round of attempting fire, I finally saw a tiny hot ember. It was very small and not even big enough to make an actual fire, but it was just the spark I needed to get me going, to empower myself and, should I need to, wave my bandaged finger at anyone scoffing at my kid’s sandwich.
Of bald eagles and cheerleaders
You’re never too old to learn something, right? Playing a child’s board game recently, I have learned two very interesting fact. For one, I never knew that a group of twelve or more cows is called a “flink.” (And I am anxious to add it to my next Scrabble game!) Secondly, I learned that the bald eagle when it is a young bird, looks nothing like a bald eagle.Like most birds, they start off kind of funny looking with grayish down that covers their little bodies. At about three or four weeks, the little birdie begins to grow its secondary coat of gray down, and by the time the little dude (or dudette, as it may be) is around 6 weeks old, it will be nearly as large as its parents—but will just start growing in its black feathers. Not white, black.
In other words, no bald head.
The white feathers that grow on the head and the tail and that are so characteristic of bald eagles don’t grow in until sometime during the bird’s fourth year of life.
In other words, eagle kids don’t look anything like their parents.
This may not seem all that much of an important fact, but it’s something I can really relate to. Of my three children, my youngest two look very much like their father. My oldest daughter, however, looks very much like me. As if someone put me in the dryer too long. A real life Shrinky Dink. She has my same dark eyes and little nose, and she’s got the overly large two front teeth that she’ll eventually grow into, just as I did.
We both love to read and be outside. We both play the piano and love to dance. We both love garlic and can eat popcorn like nothing you’ve ever seen. So for the most part, we are very, very similar…but not completely.
It started with a simple flyer that came home in her first grade folder, advertising a cheerleading camp. Having grown up anti-cheerleader (and not because I didn’t like them, but because I split my time between the marching band and generally being a nerd), I was rather shocked when she showed some interest in attending.
“Mom, you get pom poms!” she said. “And a pizza party!”
And somehow, I felt at that moment that all of the energy I spent on raising my child as an intellectual artist (and, well, a nerd) was beat out by red puffy things and pizza. Like the little person that I always thought looked just like me really wasn’t that much like me after all.
Then came the time to make a good parenting decision, and we all know how hard it is to do the right thing. I swallowed my anti-cheerleader pride and signed the check for her to attend cheer camp.
After picking her up from her first session, her eyes were glowing with excitement and looking at her I had a flash to the future, seeing myself sitting week after week on a set of bleachers. The excitement carried over to the football game where the field was lined with little girls with little pom poms and loud screechy voices. She was hooked.
It’s hard being a parent because you tend to want your children to turn out to be like you…but even better. You instinctively want them to have all of your best traits, and carry on your legacy, whatever that may be. But sometimes you’ve just got to let them be who they really are and let them make their own choices, even if it’s not the choices you would make.
I just think of mama eagle way up in the nest, looking at her little black-headed eaglet. She must wonder if her baby will ever have her same matching white feathered head just as I wonder if my daughter will be a cheerleader or join the marching band. All we can do is let nature take its course and usually that course turns out pretty well which is good because really, there ain’t no stopping it.
Learning things the hard way prove to be real life lessons
This past week I learned, the hard way, that one should not roast hot chili peppers on the same day one goes to the dentist. This is, of course, because of that last minute rush to the bathroom, five minutes before your appointment, where you scrub the garlic bagel out of your breath and hope to trick the dentist into thinking that you floss more frequently than a full moon.
Because when you are rushing to roast hot peppers and then floss your teeth, you tend to be a bit lazy with the whole rubber glove/hand scrubbing thing, and you inevitably end up running around the bathroom, fanning your face, spitting, and yelling “my lips are on fire! My tongue is on fire!”
Eventually the burning subsides and you go to the dentist and while laying there in the chair, mouth pried open with multiple instruments that suck and scrape and grind hanging out, you sit your nine-month old baby on your lap in the hopes to keep her occupied while your mouth is sucked and scraped and ground. And to keep her quiet, you, in your infinite wisdom, grab a container of Cheerios that you’ve got stashed in your purse and slip one in her open mouth.
Her tiny tongue reaches out for the snack. Her tiny lips wrap around your finger to take in the entire oatey deliciousness. And your hot-pepper-laden finger lets go of the O…and some of the hot chili oil…into her most delicate mouth.
Then, with baby screaming, spitting, drooling, crying, etc. (I’m pretty sure there was baby goo coming out from every hole on her cute little head) the dentist happily informs me that I am cavity free! Hooray! Just what I was really worrying about at that point.
Shaking my head on the way home at my poor choice of parenting, I am taken back to when my daughter at a young age learned about creek mud. The hard way. We’ve got the stained shoes to prove it. Avid creek walkers will appreciate the hidden danger of creek mud, the semi-solid black organic muck that seems to come alive as it sucks in your foot and sometimes your entire leg. And even worse, sometimes it goes as far as to eat your shoe. It takes a trained eye to spot the quicksand of the woodlands, and guaranteed, if you step in it one time it will be your last. Your lesson will be learned.
“I learned about creek mud the hard way,” my daughter will tell people, all the much older and wiser. She’s an expert now.
We learn a lot of things the hard way, it seems. Just when we gain enough confidence to try something new and exciting, whether it be roasting chili peppers or creek walking, sometimes life just up and reminds us not to get to comfortable in our own shoes. (heh heh heh…)
But those very lessons that we learn the hard way are the ones that tend to stick with us the longest. Think back to something you did a little bit too carelessly and it backfired on you. Maybe you went too fast and rushed through things. Or maybe you didn’t look closely enough or let your mind wander. In any case, chances are you haven’t done it again.
Learning things the hard way might even be one of life’s reminders to take things slowly and pay attention to the little things. To stop and smell the roses, to look before you leap. And I don’t know about you, but I’d rather look before I leaped in creek mud and not have chili oil up my nose -- I know I’ll never do that again.
Because when you are rushing to roast hot peppers and then floss your teeth, you tend to be a bit lazy with the whole rubber glove/hand scrubbing thing, and you inevitably end up running around the bathroom, fanning your face, spitting, and yelling “my lips are on fire! My tongue is on fire!”
Eventually the burning subsides and you go to the dentist and while laying there in the chair, mouth pried open with multiple instruments that suck and scrape and grind hanging out, you sit your nine-month old baby on your lap in the hopes to keep her occupied while your mouth is sucked and scraped and ground. And to keep her quiet, you, in your infinite wisdom, grab a container of Cheerios that you’ve got stashed in your purse and slip one in her open mouth.
Her tiny tongue reaches out for the snack. Her tiny lips wrap around your finger to take in the entire oatey deliciousness. And your hot-pepper-laden finger lets go of the O…and some of the hot chili oil…into her most delicate mouth.
Then, with baby screaming, spitting, drooling, crying, etc. (I’m pretty sure there was baby goo coming out from every hole on her cute little head) the dentist happily informs me that I am cavity free! Hooray! Just what I was really worrying about at that point.
Shaking my head on the way home at my poor choice of parenting, I am taken back to when my daughter at a young age learned about creek mud. The hard way. We’ve got the stained shoes to prove it. Avid creek walkers will appreciate the hidden danger of creek mud, the semi-solid black organic muck that seems to come alive as it sucks in your foot and sometimes your entire leg. And even worse, sometimes it goes as far as to eat your shoe. It takes a trained eye to spot the quicksand of the woodlands, and guaranteed, if you step in it one time it will be your last. Your lesson will be learned.
“I learned about creek mud the hard way,” my daughter will tell people, all the much older and wiser. She’s an expert now.
We learn a lot of things the hard way, it seems. Just when we gain enough confidence to try something new and exciting, whether it be roasting chili peppers or creek walking, sometimes life just up and reminds us not to get to comfortable in our own shoes. (heh heh heh…)
But those very lessons that we learn the hard way are the ones that tend to stick with us the longest. Think back to something you did a little bit too carelessly and it backfired on you. Maybe you went too fast and rushed through things. Or maybe you didn’t look closely enough or let your mind wander. In any case, chances are you haven’t done it again.
Learning things the hard way might even be one of life’s reminders to take things slowly and pay attention to the little things. To stop and smell the roses, to look before you leap. And I don’t know about you, but I’d rather look before I leaped in creek mud and not have chili oil up my nose -- I know I’ll never do that again.
Monday, September 29, 2008
Insider tips, straight from the trenches of parenthood
It’s time to break out the itty-bitty socks and diapers again in our family, and in my current state of total and utter chaos, I’m glad it’s not me.
It’s my sister-in-law, which will give me my very first chance to be an aunt, and my children to have their very first cousin. We’re all so excited we can hardly stand it. Not only will we be able to empty out some of the baby clothes we’ve accrued over the years, but it also gives us older, more seasoned moms, an opportunity to relive those glorious newborn days. You know, the ones where the kids are too small to dress themselves in ridiculous clothes, be picky eaters, and roll their eyes at your every word.
Besides, it gives me a chance to reflect on all I’ve learned as a parent deep in the trenches of parenthood. There’s only so much to expect when you’re expecting, but what comes in that fateful fourth trimester—the one that lasts about 18 years – is the hard part.
And even though my parental wisdom only gets me as far as the elementary school years, I thought this would be a good of time as any to start writing down a few of the things I’ve learned before old age sets in and I forget these things as quickly as I had to learn them…
1. Outlet covers and table padding can only help so much. Crawling babies can find danger in just about anything, including leaves and shoelaces. I’ve also learned that children of all ages and sizes are inevitably smarter than the average doorknob protector.
2. Children will eat just about anything that includes dip, sprinkles, or a magical ingredient. Keep in mind that pepper can also be called “fairy dust” and if you eat it without whining, you may gain mystical powers.
3. During the infant and toddler years, you will praise the maker of Cheerios because they occupy your child for more than one minute at a time. You will have various personal shrines to the Cheerio, in the form of little containers of them in every purse you own.
4. All of those so-called child specialists that say TV is terrible for your child doesn’t know how wonderful it can be to their parents.
5. As much as you love your kids, you’ll still squeeze them into shoes and clothes that are too small (or drown them in items too large) because you just bought them and they aren’t even dirty or stained yet.
6. Shopping by yourself, even if it’s the grocery store, is an absolute luxury. And if the kids are with you and misbehaving, you’ll find that you have gotten really good at threatening them through gritted teeth and a phony smile.
7. Toys that are safety-approved and brain-stimulating and made just for your child aren’t interesting at all. Give them a wooden spoon, some measuring cups and an old pot filled with scraps of fabric, and they are happy for minutes.
8. When dealing with small children, minutes are practically hours. Get used to it. The ride to Grandma’s house that normally takes 45 minutes is now officially 18.75 days.
9. It may take a few years, but you will eventually grow to love cartoons and G-rated movies. You’ll find yourself sitting to watch PBS Kids and then realize that there are no children in the room. Don’t panic, this is normal. Some people even find that they turn on Spongebob when they are all alone, but I don’t know any of those people…
10. Sending your kids to school is a blessing and a curse. You’ll appreciate the break but get all worked up the first time the school’s rules trump your own better judgment. Your desires to fight with the powers-that-be will then be trumped by the thought of your kid getting the evil eye every time she passes the front office.
11. You will worry about spoiling your child when you answer to every cry when they are infants, by putting bandages on every scrape as a toddler, or by smothering your school-aged child with enriching experiences and the latest in backpack crazes. Don’t worry all that much—no amount of spoiling you do can compare to what the grandparents are capable of.
12. There will be bad days and you will pray hard that your child grows out of that particular stage. And the moment they do, you’ll long for the way it used to be…and look forward to tomorrow. It is a continuous emotional conundrum that is thankfully soothed by the occasional random hug, kiss, or simple “I love you, mommy.”
Have your own tip? Email Karrie at KarrieMcAllister@aol.com.
It’s my sister-in-law, which will give me my very first chance to be an aunt, and my children to have their very first cousin. We’re all so excited we can hardly stand it. Not only will we be able to empty out some of the baby clothes we’ve accrued over the years, but it also gives us older, more seasoned moms, an opportunity to relive those glorious newborn days. You know, the ones where the kids are too small to dress themselves in ridiculous clothes, be picky eaters, and roll their eyes at your every word.
Besides, it gives me a chance to reflect on all I’ve learned as a parent deep in the trenches of parenthood. There’s only so much to expect when you’re expecting, but what comes in that fateful fourth trimester—the one that lasts about 18 years – is the hard part.
And even though my parental wisdom only gets me as far as the elementary school years, I thought this would be a good of time as any to start writing down a few of the things I’ve learned before old age sets in and I forget these things as quickly as I had to learn them…
1. Outlet covers and table padding can only help so much. Crawling babies can find danger in just about anything, including leaves and shoelaces. I’ve also learned that children of all ages and sizes are inevitably smarter than the average doorknob protector.
2. Children will eat just about anything that includes dip, sprinkles, or a magical ingredient. Keep in mind that pepper can also be called “fairy dust” and if you eat it without whining, you may gain mystical powers.
3. During the infant and toddler years, you will praise the maker of Cheerios because they occupy your child for more than one minute at a time. You will have various personal shrines to the Cheerio, in the form of little containers of them in every purse you own.
4. All of those so-called child specialists that say TV is terrible for your child doesn’t know how wonderful it can be to their parents.
5. As much as you love your kids, you’ll still squeeze them into shoes and clothes that are too small (or drown them in items too large) because you just bought them and they aren’t even dirty or stained yet.
6. Shopping by yourself, even if it’s the grocery store, is an absolute luxury. And if the kids are with you and misbehaving, you’ll find that you have gotten really good at threatening them through gritted teeth and a phony smile.
7. Toys that are safety-approved and brain-stimulating and made just for your child aren’t interesting at all. Give them a wooden spoon, some measuring cups and an old pot filled with scraps of fabric, and they are happy for minutes.
8. When dealing with small children, minutes are practically hours. Get used to it. The ride to Grandma’s house that normally takes 45 minutes is now officially 18.75 days.
9. It may take a few years, but you will eventually grow to love cartoons and G-rated movies. You’ll find yourself sitting to watch PBS Kids and then realize that there are no children in the room. Don’t panic, this is normal. Some people even find that they turn on Spongebob when they are all alone, but I don’t know any of those people…
10. Sending your kids to school is a blessing and a curse. You’ll appreciate the break but get all worked up the first time the school’s rules trump your own better judgment. Your desires to fight with the powers-that-be will then be trumped by the thought of your kid getting the evil eye every time she passes the front office.
11. You will worry about spoiling your child when you answer to every cry when they are infants, by putting bandages on every scrape as a toddler, or by smothering your school-aged child with enriching experiences and the latest in backpack crazes. Don’t worry all that much—no amount of spoiling you do can compare to what the grandparents are capable of.
12. There will be bad days and you will pray hard that your child grows out of that particular stage. And the moment they do, you’ll long for the way it used to be…and look forward to tomorrow. It is a continuous emotional conundrum that is thankfully soothed by the occasional random hug, kiss, or simple “I love you, mommy.”
Have your own tip? Email Karrie at KarrieMcAllister@aol.com.
Trying to decide whether or not to keep the change
by Karrie McAllister
I’ve been thinking a lot about change lately. Maybe it’s because I see and hear the word 5,873 times a day in the political campaigns, or maybe because I’m just finally realizing how much I am surrounded by it in my daily life.
I’ve always considered myself a person who likes change. I was reassured of this when I went in for a haircut last week and told the beautician to “do whatever” and that “it was only hair, it would grow back.” She took a good five inches off of my eight inch hair, leaving me surrounded by a pile of my own clippings.
Looking in the mirror at my new self, I smiled.
“You like change, don’t you,” she said, speaking the truth.
I was reassured of how right she was when I had the sudden urge to rearrange my house. I find I do this frequently, even if it’s just moving my kitchen table (which is pretty much a square) a simple ninety degrees. I also adjust the angle of my couch for no real reason, or maybe I’ll switch the end table from one side of it to the other side. Just to shake things up. Just to keep things moving. Just to satisfy that craving for change that must make me tick.
Another reason I can tell I’m a change-lovin’ kind of girl is that I live for the seasons. I get all giddy when the weather starts to change, like when the first fall crispness hits the air and I am drawn to my kitchen to make a giant pot of soup and then put pumpkins and gourds all around my house and then pull out all of my sweaters and wool socks and grab a rake and sit outside and wait for the leaves to fall – even though it’s only early September. (Can you just hear my excitement?!?!)
But for all of the reasons I seem to welcome change in my life, there is one thing holding me back.
My kids.
They provide me with plenty of change, often more than I want.
I change their diapers when they are young. Then they grow up and change their clothes a dozen times a day. Then they grow up a little more and change their minds about dance class and a remote control dinosaur and I’ve got a drawer full of leotards and a pitiful triceratops that now sits untouched in the basement.
Not only that, but they also mature and hit milestones right before my very eyes. They are constantly changing and growing up no matter what I do. And unlike my furniture, I can’t simply move it back to the way it was.
It’s the little things mostly that really make me realize that my children are changing. My baby just started waving and eating Cheerios this week, and as happy as I am to see her make this tiny accomplishments, I know she’ll never be that babe-in-arms that only reaches out to grab my finger. My son is starting his second year of preschool and is a whiz on his bike, riding one-handed at breakneck speeds and it seems like only yesterday he was crawling onto a baby scooter. And my oldest daughter told me the other day that “actually mom, I’ve discovered in my research that…” when I’m so used to her asking me to please read her a story about fuzzy bunnies or flower fairies.
I don’t know how it all happens, but it happens fast. The change is gonna come, whether I want it or not. There’s no stopping it, although I can’t say I haven’t threatened to put bricks on their heads to keep them from growing up. They aren’t too fond of that idea.
I can hear it now. “Actually mom, I’ve discovered in my research that the placement of a heavy object atop a person’s cranium does not inhibit growth patterns in any way.”
Pbbbbt. At least I know they’ll soon be big enough to help me move the furniture.
I’ve been thinking a lot about change lately. Maybe it’s because I see and hear the word 5,873 times a day in the political campaigns, or maybe because I’m just finally realizing how much I am surrounded by it in my daily life.
I’ve always considered myself a person who likes change. I was reassured of this when I went in for a haircut last week and told the beautician to “do whatever” and that “it was only hair, it would grow back.” She took a good five inches off of my eight inch hair, leaving me surrounded by a pile of my own clippings.
Looking in the mirror at my new self, I smiled.
“You like change, don’t you,” she said, speaking the truth.
I was reassured of how right she was when I had the sudden urge to rearrange my house. I find I do this frequently, even if it’s just moving my kitchen table (which is pretty much a square) a simple ninety degrees. I also adjust the angle of my couch for no real reason, or maybe I’ll switch the end table from one side of it to the other side. Just to shake things up. Just to keep things moving. Just to satisfy that craving for change that must make me tick.
Another reason I can tell I’m a change-lovin’ kind of girl is that I live for the seasons. I get all giddy when the weather starts to change, like when the first fall crispness hits the air and I am drawn to my kitchen to make a giant pot of soup and then put pumpkins and gourds all around my house and then pull out all of my sweaters and wool socks and grab a rake and sit outside and wait for the leaves to fall – even though it’s only early September. (Can you just hear my excitement?!?!)
But for all of the reasons I seem to welcome change in my life, there is one thing holding me back.
My kids.
They provide me with plenty of change, often more than I want.
I change their diapers when they are young. Then they grow up and change their clothes a dozen times a day. Then they grow up a little more and change their minds about dance class and a remote control dinosaur and I’ve got a drawer full of leotards and a pitiful triceratops that now sits untouched in the basement.
Not only that, but they also mature and hit milestones right before my very eyes. They are constantly changing and growing up no matter what I do. And unlike my furniture, I can’t simply move it back to the way it was.
It’s the little things mostly that really make me realize that my children are changing. My baby just started waving and eating Cheerios this week, and as happy as I am to see her make this tiny accomplishments, I know she’ll never be that babe-in-arms that only reaches out to grab my finger. My son is starting his second year of preschool and is a whiz on his bike, riding one-handed at breakneck speeds and it seems like only yesterday he was crawling onto a baby scooter. And my oldest daughter told me the other day that “actually mom, I’ve discovered in my research that…” when I’m so used to her asking me to please read her a story about fuzzy bunnies or flower fairies.
I don’t know how it all happens, but it happens fast. The change is gonna come, whether I want it or not. There’s no stopping it, although I can’t say I haven’t threatened to put bricks on their heads to keep them from growing up. They aren’t too fond of that idea.
I can hear it now. “Actually mom, I’ve discovered in my research that the placement of a heavy object atop a person’s cranium does not inhibit growth patterns in any way.”
Pbbbbt. At least I know they’ll soon be big enough to help me move the furniture.
Make new friends, but keep the old…
by Karrie McAllister
Guaranteed, all of the scout alumni are finishing the title with “one is silver and the other gold.” In fact, some might even be attempting to sing the ever-so-popular round, even as a solo.
I, myself, sang that around many a campfire when I was a kid, with the new friends I made way back in Girl Scouts. Someone would direct us in small groups by waving their arms around in an attempt to appear like a real conductor while looking more like a flying bird, and as sure as the s’more is tasty, we’d sing the round.
And even though it was just a silly song so many years ago, I now know what real truth rings through those few simple lines.
Today I had breakfast with a relatively new friend. We both amazingly ditched our children, leaving them in the fragile care of our husbands, and discussed the big issues in life over coffee over French toast.
It was fabulous. The conversation, that is, as well as the French toast. It’s not often that two people connect on such an everyday level, and after my breakfast I spent the entire day with a smile (and a little syrup) on my face.
New friends are something special for many reasons. We usually get acquainted in the here-and-now, and have something recent in common. We get together and discuss daily changes in our children and our own lives. We talk about current events and something good we made for dinner this week or how we feel about the new changes in the grocery store.
Easy stuff, but stuff that makes a difference in our lives. Important stuff.
Now, contrast that with old friends, the friends that I once sat around the campfire with and sang Girl Scout songs.
The same old friends that I have reconnected with on Facebook.
In a moment of weakness and sulking about the fact that I’m over 30, I went against my better judgment and signed up for Facebook. If you are unfamiliar with this web service, it’s a site where people can connect and re-connect, chat, and share about their lives. You can look up people you know and invite them to be on your “friend list,” and only then can they have access to the photos and life updates that you post.
And of course, she with the biggest friend list wins.
So in my quest to add to my pathetically small friend list, I started searching into my past. I sifted through college friends and high school friends, all the way down to the little boy who lived across the street from me when I was growing up. He’s not so little anymore.
I found old friends that I hadn’t talked to in ten years, and in just the click of a mouse we were reunited. We have since chatted and written and have even talked on the phone to make plans for a lunch date. When we meet, no doubt our conversation will not be about the new grocery store or what’s for dinner, though. It’ll be about major life happenings: careers, marriages, children. Big stuff, but stuff that makes a difference in our lives. Important stuff.
I’m sure we’ll also reminisce about the old times, too, and laugh about all of the songs we used to sing around the campfire.
Make new friends, but keep the old, one is silver and the other gold…but they’re both on Facebook.
Guaranteed, all of the scout alumni are finishing the title with “one is silver and the other gold.” In fact, some might even be attempting to sing the ever-so-popular round, even as a solo.
I, myself, sang that around many a campfire when I was a kid, with the new friends I made way back in Girl Scouts. Someone would direct us in small groups by waving their arms around in an attempt to appear like a real conductor while looking more like a flying bird, and as sure as the s’more is tasty, we’d sing the round.
And even though it was just a silly song so many years ago, I now know what real truth rings through those few simple lines.
Today I had breakfast with a relatively new friend. We both amazingly ditched our children, leaving them in the fragile care of our husbands, and discussed the big issues in life over coffee over French toast.
It was fabulous. The conversation, that is, as well as the French toast. It’s not often that two people connect on such an everyday level, and after my breakfast I spent the entire day with a smile (and a little syrup) on my face.
New friends are something special for many reasons. We usually get acquainted in the here-and-now, and have something recent in common. We get together and discuss daily changes in our children and our own lives. We talk about current events and something good we made for dinner this week or how we feel about the new changes in the grocery store.
Easy stuff, but stuff that makes a difference in our lives. Important stuff.
Now, contrast that with old friends, the friends that I once sat around the campfire with and sang Girl Scout songs.
The same old friends that I have reconnected with on Facebook.
In a moment of weakness and sulking about the fact that I’m over 30, I went against my better judgment and signed up for Facebook. If you are unfamiliar with this web service, it’s a site where people can connect and re-connect, chat, and share about their lives. You can look up people you know and invite them to be on your “friend list,” and only then can they have access to the photos and life updates that you post.
And of course, she with the biggest friend list wins.
So in my quest to add to my pathetically small friend list, I started searching into my past. I sifted through college friends and high school friends, all the way down to the little boy who lived across the street from me when I was growing up. He’s not so little anymore.
I found old friends that I hadn’t talked to in ten years, and in just the click of a mouse we were reunited. We have since chatted and written and have even talked on the phone to make plans for a lunch date. When we meet, no doubt our conversation will not be about the new grocery store or what’s for dinner, though. It’ll be about major life happenings: careers, marriages, children. Big stuff, but stuff that makes a difference in our lives. Important stuff.
I’m sure we’ll also reminisce about the old times, too, and laugh about all of the songs we used to sing around the campfire.
Make new friends, but keep the old, one is silver and the other gold…but they’re both on Facebook.
Wednesday, September 03, 2008
Cardomom, cardomom, I love cardomom
There was a recipe in the newspaper today and to my suprise, it didn't contain dairy! I had to try it. And as usual, half-way into the preparations I realized that I didn't have half of the ingredients.
So i tweaked here and there, and the result was pretty darn good!
Dairy-free spice cabinet applesauce cookies
1/3 cup shortening
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1 egg
1/4 cup cinnamon applesauce
1 heaping cup flour
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
heaping 1/4 tsp of: cinnamon, nutmeg, and cardomom
1/3 cup raisins
1/2 cup chopped pecans
Stir (not with a mixer!) everything together by hand in a giant bowl. Drop by rounded teaspoons on a cookie sheet and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar. Bake at 375 for ~10 minutes.
Makes 2 dozen.
MEANWHILE, make yourself some coffee and after putting the grounds in the filter, sprinkle in a little cinnamon and yes, cardomom for a fabulously simple spiced coffee!
And if you haven't tried cardomom, I recommend it highly. It's insanely expensive as far as spices go, but really out of this world.
So i tweaked here and there, and the result was pretty darn good!
Dairy-free spice cabinet applesauce cookies
1/3 cup shortening
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1 egg
1/4 cup cinnamon applesauce
1 heaping cup flour
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
heaping 1/4 tsp of: cinnamon, nutmeg, and cardomom
1/3 cup raisins
1/2 cup chopped pecans
Stir (not with a mixer!) everything together by hand in a giant bowl. Drop by rounded teaspoons on a cookie sheet and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar. Bake at 375 for ~10 minutes.
Makes 2 dozen.
MEANWHILE, make yourself some coffee and after putting the grounds in the filter, sprinkle in a little cinnamon and yes, cardomom for a fabulously simple spiced coffee!
And if you haven't tried cardomom, I recommend it highly. It's insanely expensive as far as spices go, but really out of this world.
“Squeak, squeak” and before you know it, unit calculations
My husband left for work pretty early that morning, so I didn't get a chance to explain.
But the email came through shortly after he arrived at his desk: "The heating/cooling people are coming out to check the furnace in a couple of weeks. It's making a terrible noise. I don't know why, because it's not even running, but for a few bucks, it's better to have it checked out and tuned up before the weather turns."
And while I'm all for a pristine HVAC system, I had to laugh when I read his email. This was my reply: "Uh, well, that squeaky noise is the rock tumbler we set up in the basement. I heard it this morning too, only I thought it was a cricket."
Besides chuckling at the emergency call to fix the furnace, I giggled a bit at myself for the whole rock tumbler ordeal. When I was a kid, an only child, mind you, my dad constantly shoved science down my throat. Example: for my 8th birthday I got one of those electrode kits where you followed a long, complicated series of connections and something like "HELLO" would appear on the tiny screen. I got my own rock tumbler at an early age and created a ton of smoothed out gravel, which never quite made it to gem quality. And then there was the time while studying for a test on cloud types in the fourth grade that he "helped me" by teaching me unit calculations and drilled me on them so much that I forgot all about clouds and got a D on the test.
Too bad there weren't unit calculations on there for extra credit...
You know how when you're a kid and your parents annoy you and you swear that you'll never ever ever do those same things to your own kids? And then you grow up and have your own kids and you end up breaking your promise and you treat them the same dysfunctional way your parents treated you? Yep, I'm doing it to. On a daily basis.
All of that force-fed gadgetry must have worked because I find myself shoving science into our lives all the time. We've always got some experiment running that is way over my kids' heads, and I wish I was kidding, but when I want them to do something quickly I instruct them to be molecules of hot water.
It's rather sad.
But last year for Christmas something magical happened. My then 6-year-old daughter wrote "rock tumbler" as the number one thing she wanted for Christmas. We scoped the toy catalogues and found some good ones. She tore them out and hung them on a poster. It was rock tumbler mania.
And sure enough, her Papa (my dad) came through with the science, and got her the gift of the world's best rock tumbler. Double-barreled, with extra sets of grit and polish. Plus a heap of rocks sure to tumble into something decent. We could barely contain ourselves.
It took awhile to find the time to get the thing set up, but when our sugar crystal experiments were completely solidified and the chipmunk tightrope had fallen down, it was time to get things churning in the basement. Next to the furnace. Where it turns and turns and inevitably squeaks, like all rock tumblers have been doing since the dawn of rock tumbler time.
It all leaves me wondering, could we use unit calculations to figure out how to pay the furnace man in polished stones? And is my first grade daughter too young to learn?
He's scheduled to come out in 2 weeks, and if there are 7 days in one week, that makes 14 days. And if there are 24 hours in each day, that gives me 336 hours to get it down her throat.
But the email came through shortly after he arrived at his desk: "The heating/cooling people are coming out to check the furnace in a couple of weeks. It's making a terrible noise. I don't know why, because it's not even running, but for a few bucks, it's better to have it checked out and tuned up before the weather turns."
And while I'm all for a pristine HVAC system, I had to laugh when I read his email. This was my reply: "Uh, well, that squeaky noise is the rock tumbler we set up in the basement. I heard it this morning too, only I thought it was a cricket."
Besides chuckling at the emergency call to fix the furnace, I giggled a bit at myself for the whole rock tumbler ordeal. When I was a kid, an only child, mind you, my dad constantly shoved science down my throat. Example: for my 8th birthday I got one of those electrode kits where you followed a long, complicated series of connections and something like "HELLO" would appear on the tiny screen. I got my own rock tumbler at an early age and created a ton of smoothed out gravel, which never quite made it to gem quality. And then there was the time while studying for a test on cloud types in the fourth grade that he "helped me" by teaching me unit calculations and drilled me on them so much that I forgot all about clouds and got a D on the test.
Too bad there weren't unit calculations on there for extra credit...
You know how when you're a kid and your parents annoy you and you swear that you'll never ever ever do those same things to your own kids? And then you grow up and have your own kids and you end up breaking your promise and you treat them the same dysfunctional way your parents treated you? Yep, I'm doing it to. On a daily basis.
All of that force-fed gadgetry must have worked because I find myself shoving science into our lives all the time. We've always got some experiment running that is way over my kids' heads, and I wish I was kidding, but when I want them to do something quickly I instruct them to be molecules of hot water.
It's rather sad.
But last year for Christmas something magical happened. My then 6-year-old daughter wrote "rock tumbler" as the number one thing she wanted for Christmas. We scoped the toy catalogues and found some good ones. She tore them out and hung them on a poster. It was rock tumbler mania.
And sure enough, her Papa (my dad) came through with the science, and got her the gift of the world's best rock tumbler. Double-barreled, with extra sets of grit and polish. Plus a heap of rocks sure to tumble into something decent. We could barely contain ourselves.
It took awhile to find the time to get the thing set up, but when our sugar crystal experiments were completely solidified and the chipmunk tightrope had fallen down, it was time to get things churning in the basement. Next to the furnace. Where it turns and turns and inevitably squeaks, like all rock tumblers have been doing since the dawn of rock tumbler time.
It all leaves me wondering, could we use unit calculations to figure out how to pay the furnace man in polished stones? And is my first grade daughter too young to learn?
He's scheduled to come out in 2 weeks, and if there are 7 days in one week, that makes 14 days. And if there are 24 hours in each day, that gives me 336 hours to get it down her throat.
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
A Mom looks back at a family vacation at the beach
One version of this story appeared in the newspaper. The REAL story will appear in the fall issue of Mom Writer's Literary Magazine. Stay tuned for details, and until then...
Mom’s Un-Official Back-to-School Supply List
It’s mid-August and for the past few months I’ve been carrying around in a secret and secure place in my wallet, a tiny piece of paper labeled “First Grade Supply List.” I was instructed back in May when this paper arrived in my home, to keep it in a safe place and reminded very often throughout the summer to double-check its whereabouts.
I can’t imagine what would happen if I actually misplaced the thing. I’d have a frantic seven-year old running around and crying and screaming “how am I going to know how many number 2 pencils to bring to school!”
Chances are this would be followed by fits of convulsion over types of folders and what brand of scissors she needed to bring.
My daughter, now entering first grade, is a list-maker and a list-checker-offer. She is very concerned that everything that should be done gets done and it needs to be on time and perfect. (Consider this statement just a public warning to any of her future teachers.) She is, unfortunately, just like her mother. So when she recently asked for her supply list, I quickly pulled it from my wallet, where it had been safely stashed over the summer. We then went to the store and purchased everything on the list, all in her favorite colors and in duplicate.
“Just in case” she said.
“Naturally good to be prepared,” I answered.
But while unloading the full cart of pencil sharpeners and hi-liters into my car, I started to think about my own back to school list. They make the actual school supplies easy for the kids—a couple of pencils and folders. But what about the moms?
While driving home I created my very own back to school supply list which readers are more than welcome to clip and save…
__Lunch supplies. Moms, have you purchased an in-style lunch container for your child? Pink camo was soooo last year. And are you well-stocked with juice boxes, fruit snacks, pudding cups and salami? Have you purchased your back-up emergency jar of peanut butter? Get on it! And do not, under any circumstances, forget the special “first day of school note.” It is crucial.
__School supplies for your child. Sure, your home is brimming with giant boxes of tissues and bottles of glue, but do not forget the things the school forgot to put on the list. Have you sufficiently stocked your child’s bookbag with a little bottle of hand sanitizer to remove any perfunctory cooties? Do you have extra folders waiting in the wing just in case Sally Jo has the, heaven forbid, exact same one? Think back-up here, people!
__First day outfits. (This may or may not only apply to the mothers of girls.) Has your child chosen her outfit for the first day of school? Are you prepared? Have you washed and pressed it? Did you lay it out? Don’t forget underwear. I forgot underwear when I was in the first grade because I was so excited. It haunts me to this day.
__Your vehicle. Back-to-school means back-to-the-grindstone. Back to running your kids from school to piano to sports to dance to the library and doing homework and eating mostly en route. Make sure you have sufficiently stocked your vehicle with the necessary pencils and markers, as well as granola bars, peanut-butter crackers and other such non-perishable “health food.”
__Your first day plans. Although the build-up to the first day of school may totally wear you out and exhaust you to the point of well, exhaustion, be prepared for the first day “now whats?” that occur after your kids are safely at school and you sit alone in your quiet house and wonder what in the world you are supposed to do now. Be prepared for this feeling of blankness! Find that book that you’ve been meaning to read for the past three months and set it out by the chair you haven’t sat in for three months. Or get yourself a nice cheese plate and invite the neighbor over.
Me? I’ve got a coffee date already made, which I’ll go to just as soon as I clean the unnecessary lists out of my wallet.
I can’t imagine what would happen if I actually misplaced the thing. I’d have a frantic seven-year old running around and crying and screaming “how am I going to know how many number 2 pencils to bring to school!”
Chances are this would be followed by fits of convulsion over types of folders and what brand of scissors she needed to bring.
My daughter, now entering first grade, is a list-maker and a list-checker-offer. She is very concerned that everything that should be done gets done and it needs to be on time and perfect. (Consider this statement just a public warning to any of her future teachers.) She is, unfortunately, just like her mother. So when she recently asked for her supply list, I quickly pulled it from my wallet, where it had been safely stashed over the summer. We then went to the store and purchased everything on the list, all in her favorite colors and in duplicate.
“Just in case” she said.
“Naturally good to be prepared,” I answered.
But while unloading the full cart of pencil sharpeners and hi-liters into my car, I started to think about my own back to school list. They make the actual school supplies easy for the kids—a couple of pencils and folders. But what about the moms?
While driving home I created my very own back to school supply list which readers are more than welcome to clip and save…
__Lunch supplies. Moms, have you purchased an in-style lunch container for your child? Pink camo was soooo last year. And are you well-stocked with juice boxes, fruit snacks, pudding cups and salami? Have you purchased your back-up emergency jar of peanut butter? Get on it! And do not, under any circumstances, forget the special “first day of school note.” It is crucial.
__School supplies for your child. Sure, your home is brimming with giant boxes of tissues and bottles of glue, but do not forget the things the school forgot to put on the list. Have you sufficiently stocked your child’s bookbag with a little bottle of hand sanitizer to remove any perfunctory cooties? Do you have extra folders waiting in the wing just in case Sally Jo has the, heaven forbid, exact same one? Think back-up here, people!
__First day outfits. (This may or may not only apply to the mothers of girls.) Has your child chosen her outfit for the first day of school? Are you prepared? Have you washed and pressed it? Did you lay it out? Don’t forget underwear. I forgot underwear when I was in the first grade because I was so excited. It haunts me to this day.
__Your vehicle. Back-to-school means back-to-the-grindstone. Back to running your kids from school to piano to sports to dance to the library and doing homework and eating mostly en route. Make sure you have sufficiently stocked your vehicle with the necessary pencils and markers, as well as granola bars, peanut-butter crackers and other such non-perishable “health food.”
__Your first day plans. Although the build-up to the first day of school may totally wear you out and exhaust you to the point of well, exhaustion, be prepared for the first day “now whats?” that occur after your kids are safely at school and you sit alone in your quiet house and wonder what in the world you are supposed to do now. Be prepared for this feeling of blankness! Find that book that you’ve been meaning to read for the past three months and set it out by the chair you haven’t sat in for three months. Or get yourself a nice cheese plate and invite the neighbor over.
Me? I’ve got a coffee date already made, which I’ll go to just as soon as I clean the unnecessary lists out of my wallet.
Wednesday, August 06, 2008
The Perfect Party Disclaimer
When the guests had left and the few remaining pieces of cake put away, I sat down and convinced myself I had thrown my daughter the perfect seventh birthday party, which is really saying something when your evening consisted of 16 kids and a bucket of water balloons…and you live to tell the tale.
Wanting to savor the last breath of childhood before I go from being “fun-mom” to “dork-mom” I decided to go hog wild with an old-fashioned birthday party. We had face painting and beading and lemonade and individual bags of popcorn. We had party games that involved the aforementioned water balloons, not to mention buckets of water, a full-on obstacle course and personalized medals when the games ended. We ate hotdogs and chocolate birthday cake that I made completely from scratch served with ice cream that I had pre-scooped into little muffin cups.
Looking back, it was so perfect it almost makes me sick.
The honest truth is that I don’t like perfect people. I don’t like the mom whose clothes are never wrinkled and stained like mine, and whose kids never leave the house without bed-head, also like mine. I don’t like the dad who never sweats when he’s mowing the lawn and who always has the video camera poised and ready while I fumble with my cell phone in an attempt to capture the Kodak moment in low resolution. I don’t like the parents who tell you, most likely in excess, that their perfect children are intelligent, beautiful, love to eat leafy green vegetables, can write in three languages at age four, never whine, and organize their own sock drawers.
I also don’t like the mom who throws a flawless birthday party, which has the possibility of making me sound like a hypocrite. But I can assure even the greatest of skeptics that when it comes to birthday parties, I am not a hypocrite. No way, no how.
And so it is with great pleasure that I provide for any of those skeptics, my very own Perfect Party Disclaimer:
I hereby declare that while my daughter’s birthday party may have appeared to go off without a hitch, I honestly spent the previous 36 hours in a total mad frenzy of yelling and frosting, all while running around in a haze of my own body odor.
The night before I laid awake in bed making numerous to-do lists, all of which I forgot by morning because I was so tired from laying awake making lists all night long. My tiredness was also compounded by my lack of time management skills, which were also interrupted for a while because my daughter sprayed air freshener in her eye while she no doubt tried to make our home smell nice for her friends.
The baking of the infamous from-scratch cake required not one, but two additional emergency trips to the grocery store for forgotten ingredients. And while filling water balloons, I broke more than I filled and gave my laundry room walls a full and accidental washing.
During the day I kind of forgot to feed my family breakfast until 10:30 and then realized at 4:00 that I never fed them lunch. And I also was known to scream things such as, “I’ve never seen such lazy children!” and “am I going to have to cancel this party?” and “that’s it, no one is ever having another birthday party ever ever again or you will do it all yourself!”
All in all, there wasn’t much of anything that was flawless except maybe the look on my daughter’s face when the party ended.
“Did you like your party?” I asked.
“I didn’t like it. I looovvved it!” she replied.
Score one for the fun-mom.
Wanting to savor the last breath of childhood before I go from being “fun-mom” to “dork-mom” I decided to go hog wild with an old-fashioned birthday party. We had face painting and beading and lemonade and individual bags of popcorn. We had party games that involved the aforementioned water balloons, not to mention buckets of water, a full-on obstacle course and personalized medals when the games ended. We ate hotdogs and chocolate birthday cake that I made completely from scratch served with ice cream that I had pre-scooped into little muffin cups.
Looking back, it was so perfect it almost makes me sick.
The honest truth is that I don’t like perfect people. I don’t like the mom whose clothes are never wrinkled and stained like mine, and whose kids never leave the house without bed-head, also like mine. I don’t like the dad who never sweats when he’s mowing the lawn and who always has the video camera poised and ready while I fumble with my cell phone in an attempt to capture the Kodak moment in low resolution. I don’t like the parents who tell you, most likely in excess, that their perfect children are intelligent, beautiful, love to eat leafy green vegetables, can write in three languages at age four, never whine, and organize their own sock drawers.
I also don’t like the mom who throws a flawless birthday party, which has the possibility of making me sound like a hypocrite. But I can assure even the greatest of skeptics that when it comes to birthday parties, I am not a hypocrite. No way, no how.
And so it is with great pleasure that I provide for any of those skeptics, my very own Perfect Party Disclaimer:
I hereby declare that while my daughter’s birthday party may have appeared to go off without a hitch, I honestly spent the previous 36 hours in a total mad frenzy of yelling and frosting, all while running around in a haze of my own body odor.
The night before I laid awake in bed making numerous to-do lists, all of which I forgot by morning because I was so tired from laying awake making lists all night long. My tiredness was also compounded by my lack of time management skills, which were also interrupted for a while because my daughter sprayed air freshener in her eye while she no doubt tried to make our home smell nice for her friends.
The baking of the infamous from-scratch cake required not one, but two additional emergency trips to the grocery store for forgotten ingredients. And while filling water balloons, I broke more than I filled and gave my laundry room walls a full and accidental washing.
During the day I kind of forgot to feed my family breakfast until 10:30 and then realized at 4:00 that I never fed them lunch. And I also was known to scream things such as, “I’ve never seen such lazy children!” and “am I going to have to cancel this party?” and “that’s it, no one is ever having another birthday party ever ever again or you will do it all yourself!”
All in all, there wasn’t much of anything that was flawless except maybe the look on my daughter’s face when the party ended.
“Did you like your party?” I asked.
“I didn’t like it. I looovvved it!” she replied.
Score one for the fun-mom.
You CAN write a column with a kid on your back
As a kid, I spent a lot of time driving to and from a family cottage sitting between my parents in the front seat of our wood-sided station wagon. The trip was two hours each way, which made for countless games of I Spy and the ABC game, as well as more than my fair share of country music.Roger Miller must have been one of our favorites, because even now I can flip on a song I haven’t heard in over 20 years and still know every word. We must have worn that cassette tape out completely over the years, and if it still exists and runs, it would be a miracle.
One of Roger Miller’s most famous songs was a goofy little song that told about things that you couldn’t do, such as roller-skate in a buffalo herd, drive around with a tiger in your car, go fishing in a watermelon patch. Stuff like that that makes the average seven year old crack up and lose some orange punch out the nose.
There is one verse, however, that has become part of my parenting motto. “You can’t change film with a kid on your back.” Back when I was a kid, I never thought that one was very funny, like it was a joke I just didn’t get. I specifically remember telling my mom in a squeaky voice through buck teeth that that one just didn’t make any sense because surely she could change film while giving me a piggy back ride.
Her answer was simply the chorus of the song. “All you gotta do, is put your mind to it. Knuckle down, buckle down, do it do it do it.”
And that right there is the second part of my parenting motto.
With three kids, I always have at least one of them on my back. Sometimes it’s my oldest daughter asking me to color or play dolls with her (or earn her some Webkinz cash), sometimes it’s my son asking me to go out back into the woods and dig out a stump with him (he recently got a new shovel and an affinity for digging out stumps), but mostly it’s my baby girl just wanting her mommy’s undivided attention and to be held, tying up both of my arms so that ol’ Roger would be right, and I could never change film.
So in order to appease my baby, I totally ignore Roger and actually put my kid ON MY BACK. These fancy backpack contraptions nowadays have been a blessing for me, so much that I don’t know what I would do without it. With baby right in close to me, she’s completely happy and quiet and able to pull my hair whenever she pleases, which must be often because I think I’m starting to go bald in the back of my head. Not to mention that my back and arm muscles are starting to pop out in places where I forgot they ever existed.
But it’s all worth it for a contented baby and two free arms. There is not much I can’t do with my baby on board. I vacuum, cook, do laundry, shop, do yardwork, etc. I have even dubbed myself the modern day Sacajawea, who as we all know helped lead Lewis and Clark on their expedition with her baby strapped to her back.
Sometimes when I meet people who recognize me from this column the first thing they ask me is how I have time to sit and write with three kids. The truthful answer is that I don’t. But what I can do is put the baby in the backpack, park the laptop on the kitchen counter, and bounce around and type between coloring and stump-work and everything else.
Basically, Roger, I put the kid on my back and knuckle down, buckle down, do it, do it, do it. Just like you taught me so many years ago.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
I’m gonna have to face it, I’m addicted to…Webkinz
I happened to be brushing my teeth when my daughter slapped me with this dandy of a question.
“What’s an addiction?” she asked.
My first response was of course, “murph uff baa arw urg” which is dentist for “hang on a minute, I’m brushing my teeth.”
Extended rinsing gave me sufficient time to think just how to answer that question to my seven year old. When one normally thinks about the term “additction,” mostly non-childproof thoughts come to mind. We teach our children about negative addictions, such as drugs, smoking, and alcohol. We children of the 80’s know that Robert Palmer was addicted to love, and likewise Weird Al was addicted to spuds.
Trying my best to not tarnish her innocence, I simply asked her what she thought it meant. Her innocent answer was something like “when you like something,” which is pretty close.
To finish the definition I added on an explanation of how when you have an addiction, you like something a whole bunch, so much that you think about it a lot and it would be hard to stop doing whatever it is.
“Oh, like how you are addicted to coffee and the tile game on Webkinz, right?”
Er, yes.
It’s a well known fact that I’m a coffee lover. My children haven even proclaimed in their wisdom that “moms drink coffee, otherwise they might die.” But this Webkinz addiction is something new.
Haven’t heard of these fuzzy narcotics yet? Webkinz are cute little stuffed animals that come with a specific code. After buying the animal, you log onto their Web site and register your pet, which then becomes your real, live, virtual pet.
And because your pet is alive (in a virtual sort of way) you need to feed it, clothe it, give it a room, and provide it with love. All of these are available to purchase in the W Shop, but like real life, these things cost money. Well, Kinzcash, that is.
Thankfully, the wise marketing geniuses at Webkinz have devised a number of different ways to earn Kinzcash. These include a variety of online activities such as answering trivia questions, being employed, and playing a plethora of games in the arcade.
The more you play, the more you earn. The more you earn, the more you can trick out your virtual pet’s room by buying them stylish furniture, toys, decorations, and I’m not making this up, furniture to store your purchases in.
And just like in real life, I want my daughter to have it all. She is certainly the one sweet enough to not fully understand an addiction, so I naturally want her to want for nothing in her Webkinz world. And being an adult, I tend to be a little more skilled at solitaire games and trivia questions, therefore having the ability to earn money at a faster rate.
So instead of doing the laundry or reading a book or making lunch, I play Webkinz games. Mostly, as she has noticed, the Webkinz tile game. In fact, just now while writing this week’s column, my husband accused me of playing games instead of working, and my daughter in the background asked when I was going to be done so that she could have a turn…with her own toy.
It’s sad and pathetic but just as addictions go, it is nearly impossible to control. I’d like to say that it’s all for the good of my daughter that I am losing my eyesite for squinting at the screen, but while that’s partly true, I cannot tell a lie. It’s become my new addiction.
In fact, just give me my cup of coffee and my laptop, and I’m one happy junkie, with the best dressed stuffed animal on the block.
“What’s an addiction?” she asked.
My first response was of course, “murph uff baa arw urg” which is dentist for “hang on a minute, I’m brushing my teeth.”
Extended rinsing gave me sufficient time to think just how to answer that question to my seven year old. When one normally thinks about the term “additction,” mostly non-childproof thoughts come to mind. We teach our children about negative addictions, such as drugs, smoking, and alcohol. We children of the 80’s know that Robert Palmer was addicted to love, and likewise Weird Al was addicted to spuds.
Trying my best to not tarnish her innocence, I simply asked her what she thought it meant. Her innocent answer was something like “when you like something,” which is pretty close.
To finish the definition I added on an explanation of how when you have an addiction, you like something a whole bunch, so much that you think about it a lot and it would be hard to stop doing whatever it is.
“Oh, like how you are addicted to coffee and the tile game on Webkinz, right?”
Er, yes.
It’s a well known fact that I’m a coffee lover. My children haven even proclaimed in their wisdom that “moms drink coffee, otherwise they might die.” But this Webkinz addiction is something new.
Haven’t heard of these fuzzy narcotics yet? Webkinz are cute little stuffed animals that come with a specific code. After buying the animal, you log onto their Web site and register your pet, which then becomes your real, live, virtual pet.
And because your pet is alive (in a virtual sort of way) you need to feed it, clothe it, give it a room, and provide it with love. All of these are available to purchase in the W Shop, but like real life, these things cost money. Well, Kinzcash, that is.
Thankfully, the wise marketing geniuses at Webkinz have devised a number of different ways to earn Kinzcash. These include a variety of online activities such as answering trivia questions, being employed, and playing a plethora of games in the arcade.
The more you play, the more you earn. The more you earn, the more you can trick out your virtual pet’s room by buying them stylish furniture, toys, decorations, and I’m not making this up, furniture to store your purchases in.
And just like in real life, I want my daughter to have it all. She is certainly the one sweet enough to not fully understand an addiction, so I naturally want her to want for nothing in her Webkinz world. And being an adult, I tend to be a little more skilled at solitaire games and trivia questions, therefore having the ability to earn money at a faster rate.
So instead of doing the laundry or reading a book or making lunch, I play Webkinz games. Mostly, as she has noticed, the Webkinz tile game. In fact, just now while writing this week’s column, my husband accused me of playing games instead of working, and my daughter in the background asked when I was going to be done so that she could have a turn…with her own toy.
It’s sad and pathetic but just as addictions go, it is nearly impossible to control. I’d like to say that it’s all for the good of my daughter that I am losing my eyesite for squinting at the screen, but while that’s partly true, I cannot tell a lie. It’s become my new addiction.
In fact, just give me my cup of coffee and my laptop, and I’m one happy junkie, with the best dressed stuffed animal on the block.
While visions of mozzarella danced in her head
This is what the universe does to you when you make fun of tofu.
I’m a firm believer in eating REAL food. To me, there is no such thing as a substitute. If I want protein, it’s time for a big steak. Ice cream should be ice cream, not frozen this or that. Eggs should be made of real crack-the -shell eggs, and as far as I’m concerned, I’d rather not waste my time drinking skim milk when I could be enjoying the fatty goodness of the cream-top variety.
I’ve gone as far as standing in the grocery store, giving the evil eye to the tofu “ice cream” and saying aloud, “who buys this stuff? If you’re gonna have ice cream, have ice cream. Who are these people trying to kid?”
And now, I’m afraid it’s me. They’re trying to kid me.
Lately I have been totally consumed by my longing for dairy products, so much that I sat down to write this week’s column and instead of seeing a blank paper I saw a piece of Swiss cheese. I very nearly nibbled on the corner of my computer screen. And when I went to the bathroom to wash the drool off of my face, I came pretty close to tasting my milk and honey soap.
The reason for this dairy desire, this craving for cream, this yearning for yogurt is that my baby girl has broken out with a bad case of eczema. Her precious baby skin that was smooth and silky suddenly turned red and bumpy. So like any good parent, I panicked.
Multiple trips to the doctor and dermatologist only seemed to increase the mystery of the rash and it wasn’t until I snuck her a tiny bite of ice cream that things started adding up. Just the tiniest dab of vanilla soft serve and her face looked like she went hog wild with a tube of red lipstick.
After visiting the allergist it was confirmed. My baby is allergic to milk.
This doesn’t seem like anything too major, especially to someone with a baby who doesn’t really eat much food. Controlling her intake of cow’s milk is really not the problem. The problem is that I choose to nurse my baby instead of bottle feeding, and it follows that I can honestly look at her and say “you are what I eat.”
This choice of mine is something that I feel very strongly about, so when the allergist sat me down and told me that while I am breastfeeding I should cut dairy out of my diet, I considered it my only option. He asked me if I was willing to do it, to which I answered “of course.”
These are the things we do for our children. In fact, having kids often feels like one giant sacrifice after another. First it’s small-sized clothing, then sleep, then a tidy home, and the next thing you know you’re in the supermarket, staring at the sour cream and salivating.
But no matter what it is, you do it. You do it because you love your kids and you want the best for them. It is those same parental emotions and hormones that make moms lift cars off of their kids and dads coach years of little league.
And now those emotions have made me spend hours in the grocery store, reading labels on things that are supposed to taste like butter and buy slices of cheese that aren’t even cheese. I left the checkout lane with soy yogurt, non-dairy creamer, milk-free bread, soy milk, and yes, even a small tub of the ice cream made from tofu.
I might say the universe owes me one, but I know I’ve already been paid back and then some with a chubby little baby girl.
I’m a firm believer in eating REAL food. To me, there is no such thing as a substitute. If I want protein, it’s time for a big steak. Ice cream should be ice cream, not frozen this or that. Eggs should be made of real crack-the -shell eggs, and as far as I’m concerned, I’d rather not waste my time drinking skim milk when I could be enjoying the fatty goodness of the cream-top variety.
I’ve gone as far as standing in the grocery store, giving the evil eye to the tofu “ice cream” and saying aloud, “who buys this stuff? If you’re gonna have ice cream, have ice cream. Who are these people trying to kid?”
And now, I’m afraid it’s me. They’re trying to kid me.
Lately I have been totally consumed by my longing for dairy products, so much that I sat down to write this week’s column and instead of seeing a blank paper I saw a piece of Swiss cheese. I very nearly nibbled on the corner of my computer screen. And when I went to the bathroom to wash the drool off of my face, I came pretty close to tasting my milk and honey soap.
The reason for this dairy desire, this craving for cream, this yearning for yogurt is that my baby girl has broken out with a bad case of eczema. Her precious baby skin that was smooth and silky suddenly turned red and bumpy. So like any good parent, I panicked.
Multiple trips to the doctor and dermatologist only seemed to increase the mystery of the rash and it wasn’t until I snuck her a tiny bite of ice cream that things started adding up. Just the tiniest dab of vanilla soft serve and her face looked like she went hog wild with a tube of red lipstick.
After visiting the allergist it was confirmed. My baby is allergic to milk.
This doesn’t seem like anything too major, especially to someone with a baby who doesn’t really eat much food. Controlling her intake of cow’s milk is really not the problem. The problem is that I choose to nurse my baby instead of bottle feeding, and it follows that I can honestly look at her and say “you are what I eat.”
This choice of mine is something that I feel very strongly about, so when the allergist sat me down and told me that while I am breastfeeding I should cut dairy out of my diet, I considered it my only option. He asked me if I was willing to do it, to which I answered “of course.”
These are the things we do for our children. In fact, having kids often feels like one giant sacrifice after another. First it’s small-sized clothing, then sleep, then a tidy home, and the next thing you know you’re in the supermarket, staring at the sour cream and salivating.
But no matter what it is, you do it. You do it because you love your kids and you want the best for them. It is those same parental emotions and hormones that make moms lift cars off of their kids and dads coach years of little league.
And now those emotions have made me spend hours in the grocery store, reading labels on things that are supposed to taste like butter and buy slices of cheese that aren’t even cheese. I left the checkout lane with soy yogurt, non-dairy creamer, milk-free bread, soy milk, and yes, even a small tub of the ice cream made from tofu.
I might say the universe owes me one, but I know I’ve already been paid back and then some with a chubby little baby girl.
LOL: Laughing Out Loud or Learning from Our Little ones?
Here’s a question I guarantee you won’t have an answer for.
When’s the last time you stuck a popsicle stick into a banana and pretended it was a phone while walking down a main street and laughed so hard that you caught the attention of many passers-by and thereby publically humiliated yourself?
For me, eleven years.
It was 1997. My college roommate and must have consumed dozens of cups of cafeteria coffee over an extended lunch, and the over-caffeinated result was…wait for it…the Cellana. The cellular banana: an awesome idea spawned from the fact that every time my mother packed me a banana in my school lunch, she drew little number buttons on it with a blue pen so that I could make phone calls on my elementary lunch hour.
Regardless of what the Cellana means to anyone else, the image of a banana with an antenna is a sad reminder to me that I just don’t laugh that hard anymore. I’m talking full-out, doubling-over, eyes tearing up, “stop it stop it stop it” kind of laughing.
It’s the kind of laughing I see coming out of my kids all the time, especially when whatever they are laughing at isn’t all that funny to me.
For my older kids, 4 ½ and almost 7, their laughter seems to build off of each other. If one finds something funny, the other will start laughing and like the snowball effect, it doesn’t take long until they are on the floor rolling around giggling. Speaking of rolling, they also find it quite comical to roll down the hill in our front yard, seeing if anyone hits the sidewalk. And other times their laughter all stems from a killer knock-knock joke such as the one I actually heard today, “Knock knock.” “Who’s there?” “Pete.” “Pete who?” “Pete-y seed-y eat-ys his eyeballs!”
Cue laugh track.
My baby, on the other hand, is very particular about what she finds funny. At seven months, tickles don’t work. Toys don’t work. Peek-a-boo only works for a very short period of time. But if I pretend to take a big bite out of her chubby baby leg? Hilarious. In fact, it’s so funny that I have to watch where I’m biting because sometimes she laughs so hard we get giggles out one end and something else out the other.
So surrounded by all of this laughter, it makes me wonder why we adults don’t laugh a little more. Some studies show it’s healthy for us, improving blood flow, energy levels, and immune systems, while also reducing stress. Not only that, but one study done at Vanderbilt University showed that 10 minutes of laughter burned 50 calories! All of those benefits and smiling at the same time. Sounds better than health food and the gym to me.
What else about adulthood is keeping us from laughing? Is it the daily stresses or the tiredness that could be alleviated by a few good jokes? Or maybe is it just that our standards of what is really funny have dulled down to the point of being, well, dull?
Maybe we all need to take a few lessons from our kids the next time we see them snorting their drinks out their noses over a good knock-knock joke, or rolling down the hill and crashing into the sidewalk. Or maybe the next time I take a bite out of my baby’s leg and she laughs out loud, maybe I should just laugh back. Not only will these things boost my health, but they’ll also boost my relationship with my children.
It’s a win-win situation, one so spectacular that it is worth more than a million brand-spanking new Cellanas.
When’s the last time you stuck a popsicle stick into a banana and pretended it was a phone while walking down a main street and laughed so hard that you caught the attention of many passers-by and thereby publically humiliated yourself?
For me, eleven years.
It was 1997. My college roommate and must have consumed dozens of cups of cafeteria coffee over an extended lunch, and the over-caffeinated result was…wait for it…the Cellana. The cellular banana: an awesome idea spawned from the fact that every time my mother packed me a banana in my school lunch, she drew little number buttons on it with a blue pen so that I could make phone calls on my elementary lunch hour.
Regardless of what the Cellana means to anyone else, the image of a banana with an antenna is a sad reminder to me that I just don’t laugh that hard anymore. I’m talking full-out, doubling-over, eyes tearing up, “stop it stop it stop it” kind of laughing.
It’s the kind of laughing I see coming out of my kids all the time, especially when whatever they are laughing at isn’t all that funny to me.
For my older kids, 4 ½ and almost 7, their laughter seems to build off of each other. If one finds something funny, the other will start laughing and like the snowball effect, it doesn’t take long until they are on the floor rolling around giggling. Speaking of rolling, they also find it quite comical to roll down the hill in our front yard, seeing if anyone hits the sidewalk. And other times their laughter all stems from a killer knock-knock joke such as the one I actually heard today, “Knock knock.” “Who’s there?” “Pete.” “Pete who?” “Pete-y seed-y eat-ys his eyeballs!”
Cue laugh track.
My baby, on the other hand, is very particular about what she finds funny. At seven months, tickles don’t work. Toys don’t work. Peek-a-boo only works for a very short period of time. But if I pretend to take a big bite out of her chubby baby leg? Hilarious. In fact, it’s so funny that I have to watch where I’m biting because sometimes she laughs so hard we get giggles out one end and something else out the other.
So surrounded by all of this laughter, it makes me wonder why we adults don’t laugh a little more. Some studies show it’s healthy for us, improving blood flow, energy levels, and immune systems, while also reducing stress. Not only that, but one study done at Vanderbilt University showed that 10 minutes of laughter burned 50 calories! All of those benefits and smiling at the same time. Sounds better than health food and the gym to me.
What else about adulthood is keeping us from laughing? Is it the daily stresses or the tiredness that could be alleviated by a few good jokes? Or maybe is it just that our standards of what is really funny have dulled down to the point of being, well, dull?
Maybe we all need to take a few lessons from our kids the next time we see them snorting their drinks out their noses over a good knock-knock joke, or rolling down the hill and crashing into the sidewalk. Or maybe the next time I take a bite out of my baby’s leg and she laughs out loud, maybe I should just laugh back. Not only will these things boost my health, but they’ll also boost my relationship with my children.
It’s a win-win situation, one so spectacular that it is worth more than a million brand-spanking new Cellanas.
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Tuesday, July 08, 2008
The zoo is good to the last drop [of sweat]
For a child, there are few places more exciting than a zoo. Perhaps it’s the idea that an animal that you’ve only seen in books is right there, behind the glass. Or maybe it’s the enchantment of seeing these animals up close, to see the texture in their fur, to hear their sounds in first person, or to look one square in the eye and have it look back.
Or maybe it’s just the anticipation of waiting to see if one will actually go to the bathroom while you’re there watching it.
Whatever it is, the zoo is pure magic for children.
And unfortunately, it’s pure sweat for parents.
When my children first caught wind of our potential zoo trip, I was constantly barraged with questions. “How many more days to the zoo?” “When are we going to the zoo?” “Is the zoo today?” And, as usual, when dealing with small people with no concept of time, every answer you give is a real waste of breath.
But finally, after a few agonizing days, it was time to go to the zoo. I knew it was the perfect day because the temperature was going to top 85 and the air was so humid, just looking out the window made you start to perspire. I could almost smell monkey exhibit…
After a lengthy “arewethereyet” car ride that might as well been to Africa itself, we arrived. While still in the parking lot, over the screams of enthusiasm, I did my best to hurry through the preparatory procedures. Because as all parents know, going to the zoo isn’t as easy as say, going to the store (even though that’s not all that simple either.) You have to pack and prepare like you’re going on an actual safari.
So while herding my children away from moving vehicles, I managed to slather sun block over three children and outfit them in hats and sunglasses. Then in between my yelling and herding, I packed the backpack full of the necessary items for the day. These items include: more sun block, baby food and toys, water bottles because surely the sun would dehydrate us all in a matter of minutes, and fruit snacks for bribing the children to keep walking. Oh yes, and the camera just in case something exciting happens. (I learned my lesson a few years ago when we saw an otter eat a duck. Sadly, I have no photographic evidence.)
At this point I’ve already started sweating through my clothes and have used my loud-angry-voice quota for the day. The sweat has deactivated all of the product in my hair and as I hoist the baby in the backpack and the backpack on my back, I am really starting to resemble the mule that I feel like.
And if you’re keeping track, we haven’t even entered the zoo yet.
Eventually, after a bathroom break and me shelling out the big bucks for our tickets to this arena of animal wonderment, we were off and running.
Well, walking. Actually, more like dragging, as in the kids dragging their mother from penguin to fish to crane to lion. Not wanting to miss one attraction, we hiked the entire zoo. By the time we reached the bears, I was glad to be carrying the baby on my back – the backpack did a fabulous job covering up the fact that I could now seriously wring out my shirt.
But through my sweat-stinging eyes, I watched my daughter, a kindergarten graduate, read the signs to my preschool-aged son for the first time. I saw them learn and laugh, and not once did I have to bribe them with fruit snacks to keep walking, which was a good thing because I ended up eating them all myself, just to make it back to the car.
Or maybe it’s just the anticipation of waiting to see if one will actually go to the bathroom while you’re there watching it.
Whatever it is, the zoo is pure magic for children.
And unfortunately, it’s pure sweat for parents.
When my children first caught wind of our potential zoo trip, I was constantly barraged with questions. “How many more days to the zoo?” “When are we going to the zoo?” “Is the zoo today?” And, as usual, when dealing with small people with no concept of time, every answer you give is a real waste of breath.
But finally, after a few agonizing days, it was time to go to the zoo. I knew it was the perfect day because the temperature was going to top 85 and the air was so humid, just looking out the window made you start to perspire. I could almost smell monkey exhibit…
After a lengthy “arewethereyet” car ride that might as well been to Africa itself, we arrived. While still in the parking lot, over the screams of enthusiasm, I did my best to hurry through the preparatory procedures. Because as all parents know, going to the zoo isn’t as easy as say, going to the store (even though that’s not all that simple either.) You have to pack and prepare like you’re going on an actual safari.
So while herding my children away from moving vehicles, I managed to slather sun block over three children and outfit them in hats and sunglasses. Then in between my yelling and herding, I packed the backpack full of the necessary items for the day. These items include: more sun block, baby food and toys, water bottles because surely the sun would dehydrate us all in a matter of minutes, and fruit snacks for bribing the children to keep walking. Oh yes, and the camera just in case something exciting happens. (I learned my lesson a few years ago when we saw an otter eat a duck. Sadly, I have no photographic evidence.)
At this point I’ve already started sweating through my clothes and have used my loud-angry-voice quota for the day. The sweat has deactivated all of the product in my hair and as I hoist the baby in the backpack and the backpack on my back, I am really starting to resemble the mule that I feel like.
And if you’re keeping track, we haven’t even entered the zoo yet.
Eventually, after a bathroom break and me shelling out the big bucks for our tickets to this arena of animal wonderment, we were off and running.
Well, walking. Actually, more like dragging, as in the kids dragging their mother from penguin to fish to crane to lion. Not wanting to miss one attraction, we hiked the entire zoo. By the time we reached the bears, I was glad to be carrying the baby on my back – the backpack did a fabulous job covering up the fact that I could now seriously wring out my shirt.
But through my sweat-stinging eyes, I watched my daughter, a kindergarten graduate, read the signs to my preschool-aged son for the first time. I saw them learn and laugh, and not once did I have to bribe them with fruit snacks to keep walking, which was a good thing because I ended up eating them all myself, just to make it back to the car.
Monday, June 30, 2008
Mom Writer's Literary Magazine!!!
Summer issue has been launched!!! This is a great one, too. The cover feature is about Lori McKenna, a beautiful and talented mom singer-songwriter. Great reviews, profiles, poetry, essays, etc. And such fabulous web design, too. :)
www.momwriterslitmag.com
www.momwriterslitmag.com
Watch out boys, she’s a [blinking] man-eater!
There are many reasons besides the calendar telling me that it is officially Summer. For one, fireworks are on sale at the grocery store. I’ve also been consuming a lot of macaroni salad. We’ve all got mosquito bites and sun tan lines. And, my favorite indicator of our warmest season, the lightning bugs are back.
Whether you call them lightning bugs or fireflies, these little critters with their flashing hind ends never cease to amaze me. They have been entertaining people young and old, since that very first day when someone saw a flash of light in the woods and wondered just what it could possibly be.
Since then, we’ve been chasing them and collecting them in jars to make our own nightlights. My grandmother, who is a very sweet lady, admits that she used to smash the glowing ends onto her nails as glow in the dark nail polish when she was younger. And while I never had the “guts” to do that, I’ve caught my fair share of the illuminating fliers over the years.
No matter whether you are a lightning bug watcher, catcher, collector, or manicurist, you would probably agree that those flying beetles are some of the sweetest, most innocent that you know. But just read on…
Scientifically speaking, each species of firefly has their own blinking pattern. The males are the only ones that actually fly and blink, while the females sit on the ground and respond accordingly. Or as I explain to my kids, “it’s like the boys are driving around in big fancy cars honking the horns, and if the girls want to go out on a date, they honk back.” Biology, I find, is fairly difficult to explain to young children, and I usually end up sounding like a deranged teenager caught in a tornado of gossip.
There is, however, one fantastic biological story about my flying friend that is worth the time and effort to explain.
As I said before, each species has its own pattern so that males and females know who is who because there are a lot of different species out there. But one species, or rather the almighty female of one species, is smarter than the average bug. She is an evil genius. I think she is the kind that, if she was a human, would end up being the character on the soap operas that everyone loves to hate.
She is a man-eater.
This hungry lady hangs out in the grass where the girls who are waiting for the boys with the fancy cars would be. Only she’s really a biker chick and isn’t really into cars, so when the boys drive by and honk, she has to fake an “ooh, handsome wheels” flash right back at the male, luring him into her trap.
He blinks (honks,) then she blinks (fakes,) and before you know it, the poor sucker has honed in on her location and is pulling his Mustang convertible right up to her door.
I’m certain that the faking female then throws back her little beetle head and laughs a teeny evil genius laugh before devouring the less-than-intelligent male, who really thought he was going to go on a date.
As I see it, this tale of trickery provides a few very important life lessons. For one, it’s a nice lesson in “everything isn’t always what it seems.” Secondly, it’s a great story that might get my kids interested in science. It also gives me a good defense when arguing with my husband. (As is, “do you want me to go all lightning bug on you?”) And lastly, it gives me a nice platform for explaining the perils of dating to my kids at a young age, and teaching them that boys in shiny cars should look out for girls who honk back.
Whether you call them lightning bugs or fireflies, these little critters with their flashing hind ends never cease to amaze me. They have been entertaining people young and old, since that very first day when someone saw a flash of light in the woods and wondered just what it could possibly be.
Since then, we’ve been chasing them and collecting them in jars to make our own nightlights. My grandmother, who is a very sweet lady, admits that she used to smash the glowing ends onto her nails as glow in the dark nail polish when she was younger. And while I never had the “guts” to do that, I’ve caught my fair share of the illuminating fliers over the years.
No matter whether you are a lightning bug watcher, catcher, collector, or manicurist, you would probably agree that those flying beetles are some of the sweetest, most innocent that you know. But just read on…
Scientifically speaking, each species of firefly has their own blinking pattern. The males are the only ones that actually fly and blink, while the females sit on the ground and respond accordingly. Or as I explain to my kids, “it’s like the boys are driving around in big fancy cars honking the horns, and if the girls want to go out on a date, they honk back.” Biology, I find, is fairly difficult to explain to young children, and I usually end up sounding like a deranged teenager caught in a tornado of gossip.
There is, however, one fantastic biological story about my flying friend that is worth the time and effort to explain.
As I said before, each species has its own pattern so that males and females know who is who because there are a lot of different species out there. But one species, or rather the almighty female of one species, is smarter than the average bug. She is an evil genius. I think she is the kind that, if she was a human, would end up being the character on the soap operas that everyone loves to hate.
She is a man-eater.
This hungry lady hangs out in the grass where the girls who are waiting for the boys with the fancy cars would be. Only she’s really a biker chick and isn’t really into cars, so when the boys drive by and honk, she has to fake an “ooh, handsome wheels” flash right back at the male, luring him into her trap.
He blinks (honks,) then she blinks (fakes,) and before you know it, the poor sucker has honed in on her location and is pulling his Mustang convertible right up to her door.
I’m certain that the faking female then throws back her little beetle head and laughs a teeny evil genius laugh before devouring the less-than-intelligent male, who really thought he was going to go on a date.
As I see it, this tale of trickery provides a few very important life lessons. For one, it’s a nice lesson in “everything isn’t always what it seems.” Secondly, it’s a great story that might get my kids interested in science. It also gives me a good defense when arguing with my husband. (As is, “do you want me to go all lightning bug on you?”) And lastly, it gives me a nice platform for explaining the perils of dating to my kids at a young age, and teaching them that boys in shiny cars should look out for girls who honk back.
For the love of the treasure chest of a potato plant
You would never think potatoes could be so much fun. But here I am, singing the praises of the spud and dirty fingernails.
Ask my kids their favorite way to eat potatoes, and shockingly enough they won’t say French fries. They won’t say mashed potatoes, baked potatoes or even potato soup.
They’ll tell you that they like the “outside kind.”
I should provide some background and say that my thumbs are only partially green. Growing up, we always had a plentiful garden and I can remember canning beans and peppers with my family. I loved working in the garden and did it quite a bit, so my vegetable thumb is pretty green. But my pretty flower landscaping thumb really could use some help; I would say it is half green and half brown, which is coincidentally the color of the half dead trees in my front yard.
But veggies I can grow.
Because of how our home is situated with lots of surrounding trees, we don’t have a good place for a traditional garden. It was definitely a downside when we moved in. But as I always say, where there’s a will, there’s a way, and if there’s a way, it just might mean growing potatoes in your flowerbed.
Or at least they grow in mine. For the last three years, we’ve grown just a few potato plants right in the flowerbed next to the black-eyed susans and the lilac bush. Aesthetically speaking, they provide great green foliage in cute little bush shapes all summer long. Tastefully speaking, there’s nothing like a homegrown redskin.
This year, keeping up with our tradition, we planted six potato plants and for some reason decided to name them. Salty, Fattie, French Fry, Tater, Spuds and Willie (as in “One-Eyed Willie” for all those Goonie fans out there) were all planted with care and blessings for a bountiful harvest. We check them regularly and keep a close eye out for the blight—with a good Irish name like McAllister we think we’re suckers for a potato famine.
And hopefully if all goes well, we’ll have a hearty crop when it comes time to treasure hunt.
It always surprises me how many people I meet that don’t know the sheer and utter joy in digging potatoes. For those who don’t know how potatoes work, they grow underground like roots, hidden by the soil. So when you come across a potato plant at picking time, you never know how many you’re going to find and each potato is like a little valuable pot of gold.
In late summer, we head out the door carrying our shovels and buckets and tear up the flowerbed with all of our might. We dig and dig and then gently excavate each potato with care and precision. And we can’t help ourselves, cheering and throwing up our dirt-covered hands in excitement every time we find another one, amazed at the size of something that was hiding just a few inches below our feet all summer long.
Never really sure of the fate of the new found potatoes, I can guarantee that if my kids have their druthers, we’ll be frying them up in a cast iron skillet over a campfire, the “outside kind” as they say.
Astonishing, at such a young age they already have a refined palate for truly good food, seasoned perfectly with butter, salt, and perhaps even a little dirt.
Ask my kids their favorite way to eat potatoes, and shockingly enough they won’t say French fries. They won’t say mashed potatoes, baked potatoes or even potato soup.
They’ll tell you that they like the “outside kind.”
I should provide some background and say that my thumbs are only partially green. Growing up, we always had a plentiful garden and I can remember canning beans and peppers with my family. I loved working in the garden and did it quite a bit, so my vegetable thumb is pretty green. But my pretty flower landscaping thumb really could use some help; I would say it is half green and half brown, which is coincidentally the color of the half dead trees in my front yard.
But veggies I can grow.
Because of how our home is situated with lots of surrounding trees, we don’t have a good place for a traditional garden. It was definitely a downside when we moved in. But as I always say, where there’s a will, there’s a way, and if there’s a way, it just might mean growing potatoes in your flowerbed.
Or at least they grow in mine. For the last three years, we’ve grown just a few potato plants right in the flowerbed next to the black-eyed susans and the lilac bush. Aesthetically speaking, they provide great green foliage in cute little bush shapes all summer long. Tastefully speaking, there’s nothing like a homegrown redskin.
This year, keeping up with our tradition, we planted six potato plants and for some reason decided to name them. Salty, Fattie, French Fry, Tater, Spuds and Willie (as in “One-Eyed Willie” for all those Goonie fans out there) were all planted with care and blessings for a bountiful harvest. We check them regularly and keep a close eye out for the blight—with a good Irish name like McAllister we think we’re suckers for a potato famine.
And hopefully if all goes well, we’ll have a hearty crop when it comes time to treasure hunt.
It always surprises me how many people I meet that don’t know the sheer and utter joy in digging potatoes. For those who don’t know how potatoes work, they grow underground like roots, hidden by the soil. So when you come across a potato plant at picking time, you never know how many you’re going to find and each potato is like a little valuable pot of gold.
In late summer, we head out the door carrying our shovels and buckets and tear up the flowerbed with all of our might. We dig and dig and then gently excavate each potato with care and precision. And we can’t help ourselves, cheering and throwing up our dirt-covered hands in excitement every time we find another one, amazed at the size of something that was hiding just a few inches below our feet all summer long.
Never really sure of the fate of the new found potatoes, I can guarantee that if my kids have their druthers, we’ll be frying them up in a cast iron skillet over a campfire, the “outside kind” as they say.
Astonishing, at such a young age they already have a refined palate for truly good food, seasoned perfectly with butter, salt, and perhaps even a little dirt.
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Deep fried hamburgers: When two worlds collide
Among the battles we experience here in our home, there is one constant fight that I am most positive will never be resolved. I am speaking, of course, of the battle of the television.
Naturally my children fight over which cartoon to watch or on special occasions, which movie to occupy their brains for the following hour and a half. This is no surprise. But it is the fight between my husband I and that has come to a nasty, greasy head.
He is a hunter. And every fall and spring when the game go in season, he will grab the remote and flip directly to some outdoor channel to watch yet another hunting show. In case you are not familiar with these hunting shows, let me tell you exactly what happens in every episode.
No matter the game or the season, in each show there will be a man with a goatee or at the very least, a mustache, sitting in full camouflage, whispering into a camera for a full half an hour. At the end of the show, guess what! He successfully gets the deer/turkey/whatever. Every time! I tell you, it’s downright amazing.
Meanwhile, he will tell you that I am a foodie. No matter if I’m hungry or not, I will turn on the food channel and watch yet another cooking show. He will tell you, if you don’t know how these shows work, that in every episode of every show, someone prepares a bunch of different foods. Surprisingly enough, they get it all done in a half an hour. And guess what! It’s delicious. Every time! I tell you, it’s downright amazing.
So here we are, two very different people living with one very singular television. Each of us has our own path to entertainment bliss, and it is when those paths cross that our world as we know it goes off-kilter, gets thrown out of balance, and frankly, affects our very well-being.
One day I left the food channel on while I was busy putzing around the house and my husband walked in to a show that tours the country looking for good food in small diners. This particular episode was displaying a cheeseburger that someone had battered and deep-fried. (I know somewhere a reader’s mouth just started to water…)
I don’t know if it was the juicy hamburger or the lure of the hot oil, but my husband sat glued to the television without changing the channel. One look at that fried hunk of meat and when the show was over, he ran to the pantry to dig through the top shelves to find the rarely-used Fry Daddy Jr. that we acquired at least seven years ago and has only been used once in the “let’s try to fry a Twinkie fiasco of 2001.”
And like the skilled hunter he is (who has watched many a hunting show), he carefully planned his meal. With the grace of a goateed man in a tree stand, he silently went to finding the ingredients, preparing the burger and the batter, heating the oil, and yes, he actually deep-fried a fully-made cheeseburger.
He will tell you it was delicious. I will tell you that two worlds had collided and provided us with a meal that probably included enough fat to last us through the next few winters.
Not only that, but the emerging of the Fry Daddy even inspired him to make homemade doughnuts for breakfast the next morning, in case we didn’t clog up our arteries enough the night before. I don’t know which was sweeter—the doughnuts sitting rock hard in our bellies or my husband. But I do know that as we sat there and ate them, I grabbed the remote control and turned on the news.
Naturally my children fight over which cartoon to watch or on special occasions, which movie to occupy their brains for the following hour and a half. This is no surprise. But it is the fight between my husband I and that has come to a nasty, greasy head.
He is a hunter. And every fall and spring when the game go in season, he will grab the remote and flip directly to some outdoor channel to watch yet another hunting show. In case you are not familiar with these hunting shows, let me tell you exactly what happens in every episode.
No matter the game or the season, in each show there will be a man with a goatee or at the very least, a mustache, sitting in full camouflage, whispering into a camera for a full half an hour. At the end of the show, guess what! He successfully gets the deer/turkey/whatever. Every time! I tell you, it’s downright amazing.
Meanwhile, he will tell you that I am a foodie. No matter if I’m hungry or not, I will turn on the food channel and watch yet another cooking show. He will tell you, if you don’t know how these shows work, that in every episode of every show, someone prepares a bunch of different foods. Surprisingly enough, they get it all done in a half an hour. And guess what! It’s delicious. Every time! I tell you, it’s downright amazing.
So here we are, two very different people living with one very singular television. Each of us has our own path to entertainment bliss, and it is when those paths cross that our world as we know it goes off-kilter, gets thrown out of balance, and frankly, affects our very well-being.
One day I left the food channel on while I was busy putzing around the house and my husband walked in to a show that tours the country looking for good food in small diners. This particular episode was displaying a cheeseburger that someone had battered and deep-fried. (I know somewhere a reader’s mouth just started to water…)
I don’t know if it was the juicy hamburger or the lure of the hot oil, but my husband sat glued to the television without changing the channel. One look at that fried hunk of meat and when the show was over, he ran to the pantry to dig through the top shelves to find the rarely-used Fry Daddy Jr. that we acquired at least seven years ago and has only been used once in the “let’s try to fry a Twinkie fiasco of 2001.”
And like the skilled hunter he is (who has watched many a hunting show), he carefully planned his meal. With the grace of a goateed man in a tree stand, he silently went to finding the ingredients, preparing the burger and the batter, heating the oil, and yes, he actually deep-fried a fully-made cheeseburger.
He will tell you it was delicious. I will tell you that two worlds had collided and provided us with a meal that probably included enough fat to last us through the next few winters.
Not only that, but the emerging of the Fry Daddy even inspired him to make homemade doughnuts for breakfast the next morning, in case we didn’t clog up our arteries enough the night before. I don’t know which was sweeter—the doughnuts sitting rock hard in our bellies or my husband. But I do know that as we sat there and ate them, I grabbed the remote control and turned on the news.
The Popcorn Incident (or “Why we moms stick together”)
A writer friend of mine recently asked me to write the forward to her latest book. This friend lives in San Francisco, where things are very, very different than they are here in small town Ohio. But even as different as these places are, being a mom is the same no matter where you live, which is the point I was trying to get across.
So in writing the forward, I offered up this little anecdote which I think best summarizes my philosophy on motherhood...
It all started on a fall afternoon, when I was grossly pregnant with my third child. And because the veins in my legs had had just about enough of this pregnancy stuff, they gave out and I was required by my doctor to wear full length compression hose which I mention only because they made me flammable from head to toe. I was attempting to race (read: waddle) around the house, trying to achieve some order and neatness so that the playgroup friends who would be over in a short while to celebrate my son’s birthday wouldn’t think I had totally given up on cleanliness. But I also had to pick up my oldest daughter from school. All at the same time.
At this point you may ask yourself, “why would she plan things so close together? Why wouldn’t she give herself some more time?” Let me tell you, the thought crossed my mind. But in order for everyone to be happy (read: except me), this is what had to be done.
And I also had to make “sweetie popcorn,” my son’s favorite snack, for the gathering. So there, belly bulging, I poured the oil, sugar, salt, and popcorn kernels into the pot. I cranked up the stove and began the popping process. When it came time to start shaking the pot so that the bottom kernels didn’t turn into a black burnt mess, I grabbed some potholders to protect my hands.
To make a short story long, I caught one of the potholders on fire so I had to run it to the sink which meant that I was creating that black burnt mess in the pot. So I ran back to the stove, turned it off, and whipped the lid off the pot to cool down the contents and stop the cooking process.
And then a sticky kernel shot right out and burnt a big red dot into my forehead, just above my right eyebrow.
Somehow I managed to find a moment to be thankful that I hadn’t caught my entire body on fire before I raced out the door to pick up my eldest child and back home just in time greet our playdate friends. While the kids played, I had to explain to the other moms why I looked the way I did and why I was telling them to eat the darn popcorn because I lost valuable skin (and a potholder) for my son’s special snack.
And they ate it, and they laughed, because they understood.
They understood why I did the things I did, because they do them too. We’re all just a bunch of nuts, but nuts that go together, bound by our maternal job description.
We’re women, we’re mothers. We stick together like caramelized popcorn to forehead skin because in understanding each other’s stories, we become better mothers. That’s why we need to hear the tales of other mommies’ mishaps and story-time struggles. We need to hear that we’re not the first to watch a baby fall off the bed, and we need to hear that if it happens, baby will be OK. We need to see that we’re not the only one in the world going gray over where to send our kids to preschool. We need to know, even in our weakest moments, that we do what we do because we love our kids and that most importantly, we are not alone in this, the second hardest job in the world.
The first hardest, if you didn’t know, is making “sweetie popcorn.”
So in writing the forward, I offered up this little anecdote which I think best summarizes my philosophy on motherhood...
It all started on a fall afternoon, when I was grossly pregnant with my third child. And because the veins in my legs had had just about enough of this pregnancy stuff, they gave out and I was required by my doctor to wear full length compression hose which I mention only because they made me flammable from head to toe. I was attempting to race (read: waddle) around the house, trying to achieve some order and neatness so that the playgroup friends who would be over in a short while to celebrate my son’s birthday wouldn’t think I had totally given up on cleanliness. But I also had to pick up my oldest daughter from school. All at the same time.
At this point you may ask yourself, “why would she plan things so close together? Why wouldn’t she give herself some more time?” Let me tell you, the thought crossed my mind. But in order for everyone to be happy (read: except me), this is what had to be done.
And I also had to make “sweetie popcorn,” my son’s favorite snack, for the gathering. So there, belly bulging, I poured the oil, sugar, salt, and popcorn kernels into the pot. I cranked up the stove and began the popping process. When it came time to start shaking the pot so that the bottom kernels didn’t turn into a black burnt mess, I grabbed some potholders to protect my hands.
To make a short story long, I caught one of the potholders on fire so I had to run it to the sink which meant that I was creating that black burnt mess in the pot. So I ran back to the stove, turned it off, and whipped the lid off the pot to cool down the contents and stop the cooking process.
And then a sticky kernel shot right out and burnt a big red dot into my forehead, just above my right eyebrow.
Somehow I managed to find a moment to be thankful that I hadn’t caught my entire body on fire before I raced out the door to pick up my eldest child and back home just in time greet our playdate friends. While the kids played, I had to explain to the other moms why I looked the way I did and why I was telling them to eat the darn popcorn because I lost valuable skin (and a potholder) for my son’s special snack.
And they ate it, and they laughed, because they understood.
They understood why I did the things I did, because they do them too. We’re all just a bunch of nuts, but nuts that go together, bound by our maternal job description.
We’re women, we’re mothers. We stick together like caramelized popcorn to forehead skin because in understanding each other’s stories, we become better mothers. That’s why we need to hear the tales of other mommies’ mishaps and story-time struggles. We need to hear that we’re not the first to watch a baby fall off the bed, and we need to hear that if it happens, baby will be OK. We need to see that we’re not the only one in the world going gray over where to send our kids to preschool. We need to know, even in our weakest moments, that we do what we do because we love our kids and that most importantly, we are not alone in this, the second hardest job in the world.
The first hardest, if you didn’t know, is making “sweetie popcorn.”
Putting on an addition in our side yard
Not many will deny that one of the best parts about being a parent is the privilege and the right to slip back into the magic of childhood now and then. Even in my ripe old age I find myself indulging in youth on a daily basis. I play hopscotch. I build forts. I watch cartoons. And I even eat raw cookie dough without worrying about the eggs.
But without a doubt, my favorite part about slipping back into childhood is rediscovering the magic of nature with my kids. And in between writing these columns and being CMO (Chief Mommy Officer) of our household, I do all I can to close the door to my disastrous kitchen and over-flowing laundry room and head into the backyard because simply put, there ain’t nothin’ better than playing outside. The look of my son’s face when he catches a toad or my daughter checking on her fairy house every day? Just priceless.
We don’t have a huge yard, but we’re lucky enough to have our own little chunk of new-growth woods in the back. There are just enough maples to tap in the spring and even a few old gnarly apple trees to produce wormy fruits in the fall. Between those is a killer stand of wild cherry trees and enough poison ivy to make me itch just thinking about it. So it’s not much, but we love our woods.
However, it’s not the wooded area that is making me so excited this summer. It’s the yard, and the side yard that is mostly a dirt pile, to be exact. It’s there in that weedy pile of dirt that I am fulfilling one of my own childhood dreams and, as usual, dragging my kids along the way.
It’s called a sunflower house, and the easiest way to explain it is to tell you how to make your own. In a circle of about six or eight feet in diameter, you plant a ring of mammoth sunflowers. As the sunflowers grow, they create the walls of the “house.” When they are fully grown, you can sort of guide them to grow together at the top, creating the roof of your sunflower house. And then you go inside your digs, completely constructed of what is possibly the happiest flower known to man.
Tell me that doesn’t sound super cool…
I’ve been dreaming of doing this for a few years now, every year missing the chance to plant the seeds or waiting too long to decide where to put my sunflower house. But this year I decided to do it, and arming my older children with trowels and myself with a shovel in one hand and a baby in the other, we set out to plant our ring of seeds.
I soon found out that it’s not very practical to think that young children have the patience, the strength, or the tools to dig twelve little holes in our clay and rock filled Ohio soil. So they drifted away and found colorful rocks in the gravel and squirted each other with the hose while I, donating one arm to the baby, dug the holes with the other hand (which in case you were wondering, is not very easy to do.)
But if this thing grows and I can actually sit inside a room made entirely of flowers with my children and look at those pretty rocks, it will be worth every drop of sweat.
Now as the days warm and the rains fall, I find myself taking precious care of a new total of fifteen children – twelve little seedlings and three little kiddos to watch in amazement as they grow.
But without a doubt, my favorite part about slipping back into childhood is rediscovering the magic of nature with my kids. And in between writing these columns and being CMO (Chief Mommy Officer) of our household, I do all I can to close the door to my disastrous kitchen and over-flowing laundry room and head into the backyard because simply put, there ain’t nothin’ better than playing outside. The look of my son’s face when he catches a toad or my daughter checking on her fairy house every day? Just priceless.
We don’t have a huge yard, but we’re lucky enough to have our own little chunk of new-growth woods in the back. There are just enough maples to tap in the spring and even a few old gnarly apple trees to produce wormy fruits in the fall. Between those is a killer stand of wild cherry trees and enough poison ivy to make me itch just thinking about it. So it’s not much, but we love our woods.
However, it’s not the wooded area that is making me so excited this summer. It’s the yard, and the side yard that is mostly a dirt pile, to be exact. It’s there in that weedy pile of dirt that I am fulfilling one of my own childhood dreams and, as usual, dragging my kids along the way.
It’s called a sunflower house, and the easiest way to explain it is to tell you how to make your own. In a circle of about six or eight feet in diameter, you plant a ring of mammoth sunflowers. As the sunflowers grow, they create the walls of the “house.” When they are fully grown, you can sort of guide them to grow together at the top, creating the roof of your sunflower house. And then you go inside your digs, completely constructed of what is possibly the happiest flower known to man.
Tell me that doesn’t sound super cool…
I’ve been dreaming of doing this for a few years now, every year missing the chance to plant the seeds or waiting too long to decide where to put my sunflower house. But this year I decided to do it, and arming my older children with trowels and myself with a shovel in one hand and a baby in the other, we set out to plant our ring of seeds.
I soon found out that it’s not very practical to think that young children have the patience, the strength, or the tools to dig twelve little holes in our clay and rock filled Ohio soil. So they drifted away and found colorful rocks in the gravel and squirted each other with the hose while I, donating one arm to the baby, dug the holes with the other hand (which in case you were wondering, is not very easy to do.)
But if this thing grows and I can actually sit inside a room made entirely of flowers with my children and look at those pretty rocks, it will be worth every drop of sweat.
Now as the days warm and the rains fall, I find myself taking precious care of a new total of fifteen children – twelve little seedlings and three little kiddos to watch in amazement as they grow.
Update: I also started some in pots. The toad have been killing them, one by one...
A few words on the invention of Mother’s Day
Note: Apparently some people found this offensive. If you are offended reading this, I'm truly sorry. And I'm also jealous that you don't have to endure what some of us do on Mother's Day. -klkmc
As far as holidays go, I’d venture to say that most were created by a man. On Christmas we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, a man. Easter commemorates the rising of Jesus, again, a man. The Fourth of July is an observation of a new government that was mostly, you guessed it, men. And even Father’s Day, the day when we all treat dad like royalty? Yep, pretty sure that some guy made up that one, too.
But if there were ever a holiday that was most certainly created by a man, it’d be Mother’s Day.
Now, if you are a man and you are reading this, you are probably thinking to yourself, “oh yes, we men love our mothers and our wives, and we certainly want to celebrate the wonderful things they do for us and all that they mean to us, and of course we created the holiday as a day of honor.”
And if you’re a woman reading this, you’re probably thinking, “gee, she’s on to something! No woman in her right mind would create a holiday that would require so much work, stress, sweat, and overcooked scrambled eggs.”
Let me explain this to all of the men out there. As far as mothers go, most of us have mothers of our own. Not only our own mothers, but some of us even have mother-in-laws. And grandmothers. And for us lucky ones, multiple grandmothers. And somewhere in our wedding vows when we were all too emotional to pay attention, we somehow promised that we would bear children, love our husbands, and take care of all holiday celebrations until death do us part.
So come the second Sunday in May, we are required by that vow to manage celebrating and honoring all of our mothers, on a day when most of us could use a break and a little honoring ourselves.
Still confused as to why most mothers think Mother’s Day should be wiped off our calendars and out of our card shop shelves? Still don’t understand how no woman in her right mind would create such a complicated and distressing holiday? I may best be able to convey it in anecdote. Here is a characteristic Mother’s Day for a mother such as myself…
6:30 AM. Get woken up by the baby.
7:30 AM. Told to go back to sleep because the kids (ages 4 and 6 with mediocre culinary skills matched only by their father) are going to make breakfast in bed (ie. Scrambled eggs with bits of shell and toast with two pounds of butter.) Open homemade cards.
8:00 AM. Start the day by wrapping the gifts for all of the mothers in my life, bribing the kids with gum so that they’ll sign the card nicely (instead of writing POOP), and start preparing the Mother’s Day dinner that somehow I got conned into hosting at my house.
9:00 AM. Bribe the kids with more gum to help me clean the house. Have to wash the dishes from my breakfast in bed. Call all of the grandmothers, give holiday wishes, and hope that I put their cards in the mail early enough.
1:00 PM. Host a dinner party for one set of parents to celebrate that mother and the wonderful things she does and is.
3:30 PM. Drive an hour to visit my other mother, and celebrate her.
7:30 PM. Arrive home, feed kids bed-time snacks, give baths, read books, sing lullabies, put to bed.
8:30 PM. Clean kitchen from 1:00 PM dinner party.
10:00 PM. Lay on the couch, re-read precious homemade cards, begin to dread Father’s Day, and fall fast asleep.
Happy Mother’s Day, girls!
Visit and contact Karrie at www.KarrieMcAllister.com.
Monday, June 02, 2008
Quote of the CENTURY
Says Ellen at dinner, "Moms drink a lot of coffee because, you know, they need it to stay alive."
No doubt!!!!!!!!!!
No doubt!!!!!!!!!!
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Not even a little tickle
When we put our oldest daughter Ellen into the grass for the first time, she was about seven months old. The instant her bird legs hit the ground, she started crying and was only consoled by picking her up. Put her in the grass = cry. Pick her up = stop. It was an amusing on/off game we played at her expense.
Just yesterday I put Annie, nearly six months, in the grass for the first time. It was a warm enough day and there was plenty of uplifting sunshine, so I gave it a shot.
Not even a whimper. She played with curiosity and wonder, feeling the blades between her fingers. If this is any indication of days to come, I predict she'll be the kind of girl who doesn't mind a little mud on her shoes. Just like her mom.
Thursday, May 15, 2008
The Piggy Bank Blues
I know, I should record this and put a nifty little link so you can all hear it, but frankly, it ain't gonna happen.
This is the song I wrote to sing to Ellen's class while teaching Junior Achievement.
Look out Laurie Berkner...
The Piggy Bank Blues
I woke up this morning
Turned on the TV.
There on a commercial
What did I see?
I saw a toy
That I just had to have.
I ran to show my mama
And I ran to show my dad.
They said to me,
And this ain’t funny.
“That toy that you want
Costs a whole lotta money!
Check your bank
And see what is inside.”
I shook my little piggy bank
But it was empty and I cried.
Chorus:
I’ve got those blues,
Those empty piggy bank blues.
Those lowdown got no money
Piggy bank blues.
I asked my mama
I asked my pop.
What can I do to fill
My bank up to the top?
They said to work,
And they gave me lots of chores.
I cleaned my bedroom, washed the dishes
Even vacuumed up the floors.
Chorus
When I was done,
They said, “now kid,
It’s time to pay you for all
The work that you did”
They gave me money!
Yippee, hooray, oh boy!
I went right to the store
And I bought myself that toy.
When I got home
I had some change.
A couple of bucks
It was kinda strange.
I took that money,
And you this ain’t no prank.
I ran upstairs and put it
Right into my piggy bank.
Now I don’t have those blues
No more piggy bank blues.
I’m savin’ money, and my
Piggy bank is full.(repeat)
k. mcallister5/1/08
This is the song I wrote to sing to Ellen's class while teaching Junior Achievement.
Look out Laurie Berkner...
The Piggy Bank Blues
I woke up this morning
Turned on the TV.
There on a commercial
What did I see?
I saw a toy
That I just had to have.
I ran to show my mama
And I ran to show my dad.
They said to me,
And this ain’t funny.
“That toy that you want
Costs a whole lotta money!
Check your bank
And see what is inside.”
I shook my little piggy bank
But it was empty and I cried.
Chorus:
I’ve got those blues,
Those empty piggy bank blues.
Those lowdown got no money
Piggy bank blues.
I asked my mama
I asked my pop.
What can I do to fill
My bank up to the top?
They said to work,
And they gave me lots of chores.
I cleaned my bedroom, washed the dishes
Even vacuumed up the floors.
Chorus
When I was done,
They said, “now kid,
It’s time to pay you for all
The work that you did”
They gave me money!
Yippee, hooray, oh boy!
I went right to the store
And I bought myself that toy.
When I got home
I had some change.
A couple of bucks
It was kinda strange.
I took that money,
And you this ain’t no prank.
I ran upstairs and put it
Right into my piggy bank.
Now I don’t have those blues
No more piggy bank blues.
I’m savin’ money, and my
Piggy bank is full.(repeat)
k. mcallister5/1/08
Beauty is in the eye of the Ba-by-holder
Brace yourself. I’m about to go where no decent woman and mother has gone before. I’m about to enter uncharted waters and put right out there in words what so many of us have thought in the past but never, ever quite had the guts to say.
Some babies are…ugly.
I make this bold statement because recently I’ve had to work extra hard to keep my personal resolution which is to never tell mothers how cute their babies are. Last week, I spent a morning with some friends and their babies, who are actually very cute, and I couldn’t help myself but to let a couple of “now that’s a cute kid” fly. But not all babies are so good looking, and I made a promise to myself years ago to never tell a mother just how adorable that bundle of joy was because, by chance the baby wasn’t so adorable, I would feel awful telling a lie.
It all started when I had my first child and, being desperate for adult conversation, immersed myself in a world of babies and their mother. Baby music, baby tumbling, baby playgroup (which was just an excuse to clean our houses and eat cookies.) And we would all dress our little ones to the nines in their corduroy jumpers and those strange little girly headbands that we put on our daughters so that they appear feminine even when bald, and ooh and ahh over how cute everyone else’s baby looked.
At first I did my best, despite the fact that some of those babes looked like their nose had come straight from Jimmy Durante or had ears that made you think the kid was going to take flight. But after a while, all of the lying was getting the best of me. My parents taught me to always tell the truth.
They also taught me that “if you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.” So, since that fateful day when I smiled and awwwed at the flat-headed wrinkly baby with crossed eyes and nine chins, I put my foot down on all the going gaga over infants. Since then I have been known to make such comments as, “what a cute little outfit,” or “aren’t those stunning eyes!” But that’s been pretty much the extent of it until I broke down last week.
But I now know that whether I say anything or not, and whether I think a baby is unsightly (or if he or she really is) really doesn’t make a lick of difference in this world. For one, the ugly baby might one day grow into that nose and lose those chins and mature into a handsome person. Remember the fine story of the ugly duckling? Perfect example. Or it could just be that I have really bad taste in infant appearance, and wouldn’t know a good looking baby if it spit up on my shoulder.
Either way, it doesn’t matter what I think because it all comes back to a mama’s love. We love our own babies regardless what they look like because we love them for who they are – our children. We love their funny noses and lumpy heads. We love their thunder thighs and chicken legs. We love them no matter what. I can say this undeniably, because I have firsthand experience. Looking back on my own children (although I never put one of those girly headbands on them), all three were scrawny little things with round Polish heads. Little lollipops, they were, but I still thought they were absolutely beautiful. The way it should be.
Some babies are…ugly.
I make this bold statement because recently I’ve had to work extra hard to keep my personal resolution which is to never tell mothers how cute their babies are. Last week, I spent a morning with some friends and their babies, who are actually very cute, and I couldn’t help myself but to let a couple of “now that’s a cute kid” fly. But not all babies are so good looking, and I made a promise to myself years ago to never tell a mother just how adorable that bundle of joy was because, by chance the baby wasn’t so adorable, I would feel awful telling a lie.
It all started when I had my first child and, being desperate for adult conversation, immersed myself in a world of babies and their mother. Baby music, baby tumbling, baby playgroup (which was just an excuse to clean our houses and eat cookies.) And we would all dress our little ones to the nines in their corduroy jumpers and those strange little girly headbands that we put on our daughters so that they appear feminine even when bald, and ooh and ahh over how cute everyone else’s baby looked.
At first I did my best, despite the fact that some of those babes looked like their nose had come straight from Jimmy Durante or had ears that made you think the kid was going to take flight. But after a while, all of the lying was getting the best of me. My parents taught me to always tell the truth.
They also taught me that “if you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.” So, since that fateful day when I smiled and awwwed at the flat-headed wrinkly baby with crossed eyes and nine chins, I put my foot down on all the going gaga over infants. Since then I have been known to make such comments as, “what a cute little outfit,” or “aren’t those stunning eyes!” But that’s been pretty much the extent of it until I broke down last week.
But I now know that whether I say anything or not, and whether I think a baby is unsightly (or if he or she really is) really doesn’t make a lick of difference in this world. For one, the ugly baby might one day grow into that nose and lose those chins and mature into a handsome person. Remember the fine story of the ugly duckling? Perfect example. Or it could just be that I have really bad taste in infant appearance, and wouldn’t know a good looking baby if it spit up on my shoulder.
Either way, it doesn’t matter what I think because it all comes back to a mama’s love. We love our own babies regardless what they look like because we love them for who they are – our children. We love their funny noses and lumpy heads. We love their thunder thighs and chicken legs. We love them no matter what. I can say this undeniably, because I have firsthand experience. Looking back on my own children (although I never put one of those girly headbands on them), all three were scrawny little things with round Polish heads. Little lollipops, they were, but I still thought they were absolutely beautiful. The way it should be.
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Who knew God drank Bud Light?
A bit of a religious epiphany over ham sandwiches:
Sitting at lunch yesterday, Toby says, "remember that guy we saw at mr. zoltan's house and how he did that magic trick where he picked up his beer bottle without holding on to it? How did he do that?"
"Must be magic," I replied, knowing full well he inverted the label and stuck it to the palm of his hand.
"Yeah, magic. Maybe he's God or something, you know, all magical."
Sitting at lunch yesterday, Toby says, "remember that guy we saw at mr. zoltan's house and how he did that magic trick where he picked up his beer bottle without holding on to it? How did he do that?"
"Must be magic," I replied, knowing full well he inverted the label and stuck it to the palm of his hand.
"Yeah, magic. Maybe he's God or something, you know, all magical."
Monday, May 12, 2008
How I REALLY spent my Mother's Day
Just a couple of weeks ago I wrote about the ups and downs of Mom's Day. I whined about all of the extra work moms have to endure over this exhausting holiday, and even dissed my family's cooking skills.
But for those who really care, I actually had a decent Mother's Day this year.
After waking up with a sore throat and feeling generally ill, my morning (post precious cards and post breakfast, of course) was spent in the tub and the bed, trying to relax and sleep the bug out of me. And it must have worked because by the afternoon I was feeling better. We went out to eat and I pretty much scarfed down everything in sight. The kids were so well behaved, another patron actually stopped us on the way out to tell me that they were the best kids she's ever seen in a restaurant! Whoo hoo! Score one for me!
Upon returning home, the kids and I all cuddled on the floor for an hour of Spongebob, and by the time we got up, Ryan and I must have had some strange renewed energy. We spent the evening doing the strangest things -- he making homemade potato chips, and I sewing a colorful skirt for Ellen.
Not our typical Sunday evening...but I wish it was.
For sure, it was a mother's day I won't forget -- and I've got the skirt to prove it.
But for those who really care, I actually had a decent Mother's Day this year.
After waking up with a sore throat and feeling generally ill, my morning (post precious cards and post breakfast, of course) was spent in the tub and the bed, trying to relax and sleep the bug out of me. And it must have worked because by the afternoon I was feeling better. We went out to eat and I pretty much scarfed down everything in sight. The kids were so well behaved, another patron actually stopped us on the way out to tell me that they were the best kids she's ever seen in a restaurant! Whoo hoo! Score one for me!
Upon returning home, the kids and I all cuddled on the floor for an hour of Spongebob, and by the time we got up, Ryan and I must have had some strange renewed energy. We spent the evening doing the strangest things -- he making homemade potato chips, and I sewing a colorful skirt for Ellen.
Not our typical Sunday evening...but I wish it was.
For sure, it was a mother's day I won't forget -- and I've got the skirt to prove it.
PER REQUEST.... THE SKIRT!
Wednesday, May 07, 2008
A few words on the invention of Mother’s Day
As far as holidays go, I’d venture to say that most were created by a man. On Christmas we celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, a man. Easter commemorates the rising of Jesus, again, a man. The Fourth of July is an observation of a new government that was mostly, you guessed it, men. And even Father’s Day, the day when we all treat dad like royalty? Yep, pretty sure that some guy made up that one, too.
But if there were ever a holiday that was most certainly created by a man, it’d be Mother’s Day.
Now, if you are a man and you are reading this, you are probably thinking to yourself, “oh yes, we men love our mothers and our wives, and we certainly want to celebrate the wonderful things they do for us and all that they mean to us, and of course we created the holiday as a day of honor.”
And if you’re a woman reading this, you’re probably thinking, “gee, she’s on to something! No woman in her right mind would create a holiday that would require so much work, stress, sweat, and overcooked scrambled eggs.”
Let me explain this to all of the men out there. As far as mothers go, most of us have mothers of our own. Not only our own mothers, but some of us even have mother-in-laws. And grandmothers. And for us lucky ones, multiple grandmothers. And somewhere in our wedding vows when we were all too emotional to pay attention, we somehow promised that we would bear children, love our husbands, and take care of all holiday celebrations until death do us part.
So come the second Sunday in May, we are required by that vow to manage celebrating and honoring all of our mothers, on a day when most of us could use a break and a little honoring ourselves.
Still confused as to why most mothers think Mother’s Day should be wiped off our calendars and out of our card shop shelves? Still don’t understand how no woman in her right mind would create such a complicated and distressing holiday? I may best be able to convey it in anecdote. Here is a characteristic Mother’s Day for a mother such as myself…
6:30 AM. Get woken up by the baby.
7:30 AM. Told to go back to sleep because the kids (ages 4 and 6 with mediocre culinary skills matched only by their father) are going to make breakfast in bed (ie. Scrambled eggs with bits of shell and toast with two pounds of butter.) Open homemade cards.
8:00 AM. Start the day by wrapping the gifts for all of the mothers in my life, bribing the kids with gum so that they’ll sign the card nicely (instead of writing POOP), and start preparing the Mother’s Day dinner that somehow I got conned into hosting at my house.
9:00 AM. Bribe the kids with more gum to help me clean the house. Have to wash the dishes from my breakfast in bed. Call all of the grandmothers, give holiday wishes, and hope that I put their cards in the mail early enough.
1:00 PM. Host a dinner party for one set of parents to celebrate that mother and the wonderful things she does and is.
3:30 PM. Drive an hour to visit my other mother, and celebrate her.
7:30 PM. Arrive home, feed kids bed-time snacks, give baths, read books, sing lullabies, put to bed.
8:30 PM. Clean kitchen from 1:00 PM dinner party.
10:00 PM. Lay on the couch, re-read precious homemade cards, begin to dread Father’s Day, and fall fast asleep.
Happy Mother’s Day, girls!
But if there were ever a holiday that was most certainly created by a man, it’d be Mother’s Day.
Now, if you are a man and you are reading this, you are probably thinking to yourself, “oh yes, we men love our mothers and our wives, and we certainly want to celebrate the wonderful things they do for us and all that they mean to us, and of course we created the holiday as a day of honor.”
And if you’re a woman reading this, you’re probably thinking, “gee, she’s on to something! No woman in her right mind would create a holiday that would require so much work, stress, sweat, and overcooked scrambled eggs.”
Let me explain this to all of the men out there. As far as mothers go, most of us have mothers of our own. Not only our own mothers, but some of us even have mother-in-laws. And grandmothers. And for us lucky ones, multiple grandmothers. And somewhere in our wedding vows when we were all too emotional to pay attention, we somehow promised that we would bear children, love our husbands, and take care of all holiday celebrations until death do us part.
So come the second Sunday in May, we are required by that vow to manage celebrating and honoring all of our mothers, on a day when most of us could use a break and a little honoring ourselves.
Still confused as to why most mothers think Mother’s Day should be wiped off our calendars and out of our card shop shelves? Still don’t understand how no woman in her right mind would create such a complicated and distressing holiday? I may best be able to convey it in anecdote. Here is a characteristic Mother’s Day for a mother such as myself…
6:30 AM. Get woken up by the baby.
7:30 AM. Told to go back to sleep because the kids (ages 4 and 6 with mediocre culinary skills matched only by their father) are going to make breakfast in bed (ie. Scrambled eggs with bits of shell and toast with two pounds of butter.) Open homemade cards.
8:00 AM. Start the day by wrapping the gifts for all of the mothers in my life, bribing the kids with gum so that they’ll sign the card nicely (instead of writing POOP), and start preparing the Mother’s Day dinner that somehow I got conned into hosting at my house.
9:00 AM. Bribe the kids with more gum to help me clean the house. Have to wash the dishes from my breakfast in bed. Call all of the grandmothers, give holiday wishes, and hope that I put their cards in the mail early enough.
1:00 PM. Host a dinner party for one set of parents to celebrate that mother and the wonderful things she does and is.
3:30 PM. Drive an hour to visit my other mother, and celebrate her.
7:30 PM. Arrive home, feed kids bed-time snacks, give baths, read books, sing lullabies, put to bed.
8:30 PM. Clean kitchen from 1:00 PM dinner party.
10:00 PM. Lay on the couch, re-read precious homemade cards, begin to dread Father’s Day, and fall fast asleep.
Happy Mother’s Day, girls!
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Monday, April 28, 2008
Who knew that ducks could read?
Last summer, during my rampage of trying to instill my children with a love of the outdoors and nature, I decided to make a pledge to bring wildlife to my backyard.
You have to understand that for me to actually INVITE wildlife to my personal space was a big step, since I’ve had such outstanding luck with animals even when they were not invited. (Think: snapping turtles under the porch, squirrels in my garage, birds in my house, rabbits in my dogs’ mouths, etc.) But the things we do for the love of our children, right?
So with my husband laughing at me all the way, I went to the National Wildlife Federation Web site and registered my little backyard as a certified wildlife habitat. To qualify for this prestigious status, you must provide the four basics needs for animals: water, food, shelter, and a place to raise their young.
And a small donation, of course. But that goes without saying.
For an extra fee, you can purchase your very own aluminum sign to proudly display. Besides being a great teaching tool for children, this sign serves many other purposes. It is a nice reminder to do your part for wildlife and keep those feeders full. It is also fantastic for explaining to your neighbors why your backyard is “au natural” and doesn’t look as nice as theirs.
But maybe it also serves as an invitation for wildlife, as in “hey! Check out the sign! This looks like a good place to move in – we’ve got everything we need right here!”
It happened just in time for Earth Day, when everywhere you turn and everything you hear is telling you to go green. Live green. Do green. Eat green. Be green. Put Kermit to shame.
In the midst of the greenness, while so many of us are grumbling about gas prices, a little something waddled into my yard, past my sign, and gave me another reason to be kind to the environment. There is a mama mallard (aka Millie) nesting in my flower bed, behind the lilac bush and directly against the side of my house.
She lays one egg each morning and then walks away, leaving her nest unattended except for the fact that we all find ourselves peeking out the front door dozens of times each day, completely amazed by this act of nature happening so close to us. Once she finishes laying all of her eggs (which can be anywhere from seven to twelve) she’ll come back for good and sit day and night, leaving only for a quick bite to eat, until her babies hatch.
The eggs will all hatch at roughly the same time and within a matter of minutes, Millie and her brood will waddle off to their watery home, which I’m hoping is the retention pond across the street. How neat it would be to see the babies swimming around that came from that hole in our mulch!
So even though Earth Day has come and gone, I’m glad I’m still doing my part to keep my own little part of the world clean and wildlife friendly. I’ve got a good quacking reason to do so, especially if it means an open invitation for critters just out my back door.
For more information on how to certify your own backyard, please visit www.nwf.org/backyard.
You have to understand that for me to actually INVITE wildlife to my personal space was a big step, since I’ve had such outstanding luck with animals even when they were not invited. (Think: snapping turtles under the porch, squirrels in my garage, birds in my house, rabbits in my dogs’ mouths, etc.) But the things we do for the love of our children, right?
So with my husband laughing at me all the way, I went to the National Wildlife Federation Web site and registered my little backyard as a certified wildlife habitat. To qualify for this prestigious status, you must provide the four basics needs for animals: water, food, shelter, and a place to raise their young.
And a small donation, of course. But that goes without saying.
For an extra fee, you can purchase your very own aluminum sign to proudly display. Besides being a great teaching tool for children, this sign serves many other purposes. It is a nice reminder to do your part for wildlife and keep those feeders full. It is also fantastic for explaining to your neighbors why your backyard is “au natural” and doesn’t look as nice as theirs.
But maybe it also serves as an invitation for wildlife, as in “hey! Check out the sign! This looks like a good place to move in – we’ve got everything we need right here!”
It happened just in time for Earth Day, when everywhere you turn and everything you hear is telling you to go green. Live green. Do green. Eat green. Be green. Put Kermit to shame.
In the midst of the greenness, while so many of us are grumbling about gas prices, a little something waddled into my yard, past my sign, and gave me another reason to be kind to the environment. There is a mama mallard (aka Millie) nesting in my flower bed, behind the lilac bush and directly against the side of my house.
She lays one egg each morning and then walks away, leaving her nest unattended except for the fact that we all find ourselves peeking out the front door dozens of times each day, completely amazed by this act of nature happening so close to us. Once she finishes laying all of her eggs (which can be anywhere from seven to twelve) she’ll come back for good and sit day and night, leaving only for a quick bite to eat, until her babies hatch.
The eggs will all hatch at roughly the same time and within a matter of minutes, Millie and her brood will waddle off to their watery home, which I’m hoping is the retention pond across the street. How neat it would be to see the babies swimming around that came from that hole in our mulch!
So even though Earth Day has come and gone, I’m glad I’m still doing my part to keep my own little part of the world clean and wildlife friendly. I’ve got a good quacking reason to do so, especially if it means an open invitation for critters just out my back door.
For more information on how to certify your own backyard, please visit www.nwf.org/backyard.
The attack of the milestones
It seems like only yesterday I was hovering over my oldest daughter, thinking to myself, “c’mon, roll over already! What are you, four and a half months old? Do it! Make this milestone happen! Don’t you want to be exceptionally advanced?!?”
And today I’m looking at my new baby, now four and a half months old, enjoying every second that she can’t roll over. I’m loving the fact that she can’t sit up yet and that she’s still not eating real food. I’m savoring each toothless smile and drop of drool, and yes, even each dirty diaper.
Why? Because I am learning more and more each day that they grow up so fast. Too fast.
I realized the speed of growth the other day at the dinner table when my oldest daughter told me about her day in kindergarten.
“I learned a new game at recess,” she said.
I’m expecting Red Rover or TV Tag. Maybe Keep-Away or Chase-the-Boys. Instead I heard, “it’s called Truth or Dare.”
Still keeping my cool and hoping for a preschool-type version of the game where truths range from “what’s your favorite color” to “do you ever pick your nose” and dares involved spinning or jumping, I asked her, in my innocence, to explain how you play this new game.
“Well, someone asks you if you want a truth or a dare. If you pick dare, you have to run the end of the playground or something like that.”
OK, sounds decent enough.
“And if you pick truth, they ask you a question like, ‘do you like a boy’ or ‘have you ever kissed a boy,’ stuff like that,” she told me so matter-of-factly, it caught me off guard.
You know in the old cartoons when a character is shocked so much that his jaw literally falls to the floor and his eyes bulge out like bugles? I think that actually happened to me. A little bit, at least.
My little girl is playing Truth or Dare and worrying about liking boys in kindergarten? In the blink of my eye, she went from being a non-rolling drooler just laying on the floor, to having to fess up by the swings whether or not, at the age of six, she’s been in lip-lock with a boy other than her daddy.
And while sitting there with my bottom jaw in my bowl of spaghetti I started to comprehend that this news, as shocking as it is, is really just another milestone. Another milestone in a long line of milestones that seem to be coming at me faster than I can handle these days.
Maybe it’s the finality in knowing that we won’t be having any more babies in our house, or maybe it’s knowing that once our children go out on their own into school, they are no longer in our safe-haven and protected from these playground games. Or maybe it’s just hard to swallow that our little girls and little boys grow up, no matter how we may try to stop them.
So now I think the only thing I can do to survive these milestones is to enjoy my kids every step of the way, from that first time they roll over, to their first round of Truth or Dare, to that fateful day they get behind the wheel and drive away.
“Hey Mom,” my son, age four, says yesterday, “when I’m old enough to drive, I’m going to get one of those cars with no roofs. A convertible. And then, when you need to go somewhere, you can sit in the backseat and relax and I’ll just drive you there.”
When that time comes, I’m pretty sure I won’t be relaxed, but I do hope I can enjoy the ride.
And today I’m looking at my new baby, now four and a half months old, enjoying every second that she can’t roll over. I’m loving the fact that she can’t sit up yet and that she’s still not eating real food. I’m savoring each toothless smile and drop of drool, and yes, even each dirty diaper.
Why? Because I am learning more and more each day that they grow up so fast. Too fast.
I realized the speed of growth the other day at the dinner table when my oldest daughter told me about her day in kindergarten.
“I learned a new game at recess,” she said.
I’m expecting Red Rover or TV Tag. Maybe Keep-Away or Chase-the-Boys. Instead I heard, “it’s called Truth or Dare.”
Still keeping my cool and hoping for a preschool-type version of the game where truths range from “what’s your favorite color” to “do you ever pick your nose” and dares involved spinning or jumping, I asked her, in my innocence, to explain how you play this new game.
“Well, someone asks you if you want a truth or a dare. If you pick dare, you have to run the end of the playground or something like that.”
OK, sounds decent enough.
“And if you pick truth, they ask you a question like, ‘do you like a boy’ or ‘have you ever kissed a boy,’ stuff like that,” she told me so matter-of-factly, it caught me off guard.
You know in the old cartoons when a character is shocked so much that his jaw literally falls to the floor and his eyes bulge out like bugles? I think that actually happened to me. A little bit, at least.
My little girl is playing Truth or Dare and worrying about liking boys in kindergarten? In the blink of my eye, she went from being a non-rolling drooler just laying on the floor, to having to fess up by the swings whether or not, at the age of six, she’s been in lip-lock with a boy other than her daddy.
And while sitting there with my bottom jaw in my bowl of spaghetti I started to comprehend that this news, as shocking as it is, is really just another milestone. Another milestone in a long line of milestones that seem to be coming at me faster than I can handle these days.
Maybe it’s the finality in knowing that we won’t be having any more babies in our house, or maybe it’s knowing that once our children go out on their own into school, they are no longer in our safe-haven and protected from these playground games. Or maybe it’s just hard to swallow that our little girls and little boys grow up, no matter how we may try to stop them.
So now I think the only thing I can do to survive these milestones is to enjoy my kids every step of the way, from that first time they roll over, to their first round of Truth or Dare, to that fateful day they get behind the wheel and drive away.
“Hey Mom,” my son, age four, says yesterday, “when I’m old enough to drive, I’m going to get one of those cars with no roofs. A convertible. And then, when you need to go somewhere, you can sit in the backseat and relax and I’ll just drive you there.”
When that time comes, I’m pretty sure I won’t be relaxed, but I do hope I can enjoy the ride.
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