Links and more links

January 31, 2008

This shit is GOOOOOOOD.

My post is also up over at Parenting.

This year at my son’s gymnastics lessons there are four of us who sit and talk every week. Sometimes it will be a funny story about one of our kids. Sometimes a story about our husbands. We discuss our various jobs. I know their ages, their children’s ages, where they themselves fall in the birth order of their families, what they hate most about their houses, even their stances on immunizations and medications. I know who had natural childbirth and who begged for the epidural in their last trimester. I know who has lost family members to cancer.

My husband always laughs when I come home with stories about women that I hardly know and talk to only one hour once a week. He jokes that I know more about my new “friend” than he knows about his best friend, whom he has known since elementary school. And that was a long LONG time ago, for those of you who are counting.

Now I am trying to convince my children that granola IS a dinner food. And convince myself that driving to gymnastics for 7:30 pm lessons, that I affectionately call middle of the night gymnastics, is what I feel like doing after a long day. I am failing on both accounts.

Leaving the Library

with a book tucked under his arm. The fact that we already own this book would not deter Miles from checking it out.

Bacon, It’s What’s For Dinner

January 30, 2008

Hunka hunka crispy love.

C’mon over at read at Ordering Disorder. Bring your Lipitor. And your thigh master.

Making a Photobook

January 29, 2008

I have been wanting to print the photos I take in book form for years. Ever since I was first introduced to the digital camera I have printed virtually nothing. This year I decided that I was going to take some action and get things printed. In case I die. And Rob dies. And my children are left with my non-computer using sister-in-law, who in all likelihood would throw away the external hard drives that hold all the photos. Yes, I am morbid.

Right after the holidays I started working on a book at Blurb. It was easy.

I just made a hardcover book containing our photos from our Nantucket vacation. I didn’t want to make an extensive book without first seeing what it was like.

It came in the mail today.

The front cover:

Some pages from the inside:

The back cover flap:

The back cover:

I am really happy with it. And at least now if I drop dead suddenly they will remember one vacation.

I am working on making another book, maybe 3 months worth of photos per book? My favorite photos from 2007? I don’t know.

Tasty, Tasty Murder

January 28, 2008

Vegans shield your eyes. This is our half of a cow.

Destined to live in our freezer, not a little house in our yard like my daughter thought.

And because my husband is anal retentive we had to itemize and count all the meat so that he could make a speadsheet. And while I agree that this was a great idea so that I can know what is the freezer to plan meals around, I just would never do it. Because I am lazy and possibly have no idea how to work that there spreadsheet program on my computer.

In other completely unrelated news.

I am no longer working over at Babble. It was time to move on. Especially when they fired me. Which occurred moments after they fired Mir. Really I am fine with it, the job was weighing me down like a lead weight tied to my ankles. But I learned some important lessons. The most important of which is not to work somewhere that you are not valued or appreciated.

The firing wasn’t a surprise. In fact when Mir told me that she had just been fired at 11pm I think I said something supportive like, “Ha Ha, you suck. Wonder where my email is?” Then at 11:05 pm I got my Dear Blogger letter also.

Last week when I deleted all the baby product related bookmarks saved on my computer I felt lighter. And when I realized I would never again HAVE to search for overpriced baby crap, I may have gotten up and danced a jig. And not just because it was 58 degrees in my house and I was trying to warm up.

There are better things lurking on the horizon, I am certain of it. It is just a matter of clearing the path for them to find me. And maybe leaving a breadcrumb trail, gluten free of course.

Frozen

January 25, 2008

A frozen lake. It is so cold that the lake has 12 inches of solid ice. In the spring and summer we swim and kayak here.

How about we strap some snow shoes onto our boots and walk across it?

How about we don’t and pretend we did? Isn’t that a great idea? Kids? Kids?

And even though I know that 12 inches of ice is very thick and strong, it didn’t stop me from being completely riddled with anxiety that one of my children would fall through the ice. And equally as paranoid about the fact that I would then have to jump in after them. I hate being cold.

It is so strange to be standing in the middle of the lake and thinking about the fact that you are STANDING IN THE MIDDLE OF A LAKE. ON TOP OF WATER.

We know how to bundle up here. We take our winter sports very seriously. I think we could safely scale Mt Everest with our abundant layering. I don’t even want to tell you how long it takes me help get everyone bundled up.

Really the preparation to go outside could be considered an Olympic event by itself. I would kick ass in this event.

Making some minor adjustments to his snow shoes, just because.

What better way to finish up a long trek on snow shoes than to dive headfirst down an ice covered hill. Clearly something only the young, the flexible, and those not worried about breaking a hip or knocking out a tooth are interested in doing.

Pull Me

January 24, 2008

His goal this winter is to never have his boots touch the ground.

Baby, It’s Cold Inside the House

When I was purging the homeschool supply closet this past weekend, I came across some old oil bills from 2005. In January of 2005 oil was selling for $1.57 a gallon. I remember we were shocked and outraged at that price. It was double what we had been paying the winter of 2003. DOUBLE.

Here is our most recent oil bill.

Yes. It is $3.40 a gallon now.

I really have nothing else to say about it, because I am struck speechless. Much the same way when I go to the gas station and put $20 in the car only to realize when I get in and look at the gauge that it HASN’T EVEN MOVED. or maybe my lips are just frozen together.

But should decide to come over for a visit, make sure you are dressed warmly. Because at these prices we keep the heat set very low. Seeing your breathe inside the house is the new normal.

(In the interest of full disclosure I should say that we also have a wood burning pellet stove that heats the back part of the house. It is much warmer in the family room. Also, when I get really cold I can go and drape my body across it. Also, I use the oven as often as possible, to make things like this
How is that for slipping a link all sly like.)

Mmmmmm. And thus concludes the most heavily edited post I have ever written.

A Crown For A Princess

January 22, 2008

My daughter had her tooth “made ready for the tooth fairy” today. Which is just a much nicer way of saying that it was torn out of her mouth before its time.

She is sad here. I told her this is called a hangover. The bubble gum drugs will do that to you. That is what she told the dentist the nitrous smells like.

She perked right back up though when she remembered that the dentist told her to eat ice cream. I am sure he didn’t mean to only eat ice cream today, but she can not be convinced otherwise. To her it was not a suggestion, but rather an edict, the same as a prescription. And one that she intends to follow.

I reminded her that he also said she could eat soft things like mashed potatoes, but she rolled her eyes at me and said, “He didn’t mean that.”

And maybe he was joking. I mean who would ever suggest such a thing as eating mashed potatoes.

Not when there is ice cream to eat.

Today at Parenting:

Off to the pediatric specialist we went.

He tells us about all of the work that will need to be done. He tells the baby girl that she will be getting a crown on her tooth. The girl claps, finally someone is recognizing her royal status in a way that she deserves.

Read more about my poor daughter and her dental woes, though she loves going. He is so great I wish he could be my dentist. And not just because he has the nitrous flowing freely.

Dream

In the spirit of Martin Luther King Jr’s day we went to the appliance store, where all brands of appliances live together in peace.

I have a dream… that one day I will have a kitchen that doesn’t make me cry.