A Little Gift for the Kids

July 18, 2008

When I was in third grade I went to Catholic school for a year. After school every day I would walk with a bunch of my friends to a nearby child care place where we would run around and make trouble until our parents came to get us. Honestly, I don’t remember what we used to do in those few interim hours. It was a shockingly long walk that included crossing railroad tracks and a busy intersection.

We would walk by a little candy store on the way. My mother used to give me 26 cents. With that I could buy a piece of candy. A huge gobstopper, a large pixie stick, or a ring pop were my typical purchases. But every once in awhile I would pool my money with another friend and we would buy a box of bubble gum cigarettes.

San Francisco

July 17, 2008

I keep wanting to burst into song…

“Rice-a-roni, the San Francisco treat.”

Does anyone else remember those commercials? Of course now I am curious, what does Rice-a-roni have to do with San Francisco? And why is it called a treat?

Coming and Going

July 14, 2008

Our flight home yesterday was cancelled. And then the flight we were put on was delayed, for hours. And those of you in the comments of the last post who asked, “Doesn’t it get easier?” Yes, it does get easier. Physically easier.

While we were waiting for hours in the airport I noticed a mother with a new baby strapped to her chest, two bags over her shoulder, trying to chase down an under two year old toddler. It’s hard to remember those days, but I did remember the look on her face. The one that said she was about to break.

I was sitting on the floor playing cards with two of my kids. The third one was scowling at me from a distance. I was getting annoyed at him and his eye rolling whatever-ing. He was pushing me and pushing me like that toddler was pushing his mother. The difference now though is that I wasn’t going to snap and roughly grab him by the arm or break down into sobs at how overwhelming it all is. The difference now is that I might say something unkind, use my words to cut him down, and then instead of being overwhelmed I’ll feel like a failure for still not getting it right.

I put down my cards and walked over to that other mother. I asked her if I could help her. She said no. But isn’t that what we all say?

I crouched down on the floor next to her and just talked to her. I talked to her son and he showed me one of his books. After awhile I guess she realized I wasn’t insane and we just talked. After a half an hour or so she decided she was done waiting at the airport and gave up on the trip. She thanked me repeatedly for coming over and talking to her. I remember being there. Sometimes just having someone acknowledge that what you do is difficult is enough to make you feel better.

She asked me if it gets easier. I laughed and said, “Yeah just wait soon enough they don’t even want to talk to you.”

I looked over at my kids and thought about it.

Yes, it gets easier. What doesn’t change is the feeling that you are somehow not doing it right.

*****

We finally landed 4 hours later than we were supposed to. It was 1:45am. We found a hotel to stay in at 3:00am.

I got home to do the laundry-a-thon at noon today. To unpack and repack my bag.

I need to leave my house at 3:30am to get to the airport in time for my flight tomorrow to San Francisco. That is in four hours. three hours and fifty-six minutes.

There are 250 more of them just like it

July 12, 2008

You know how when you are traveling with a toddler you do whatever it takes to keep them quiet and tantrum free. Turns out that it never really changes, even when your kids are 11 and 12. Except change “quiet and tantrum free” to “keep them from talking non-stop to me and forcing me to play endless cards games.”

Yup, I have 250 more of these photos. Most prominently featuring the wing of the airplane.

In My Next Life

July 10, 2008

I am going to be the Dad. I have already decided.

Today I packed suitcases for 8 people.

Four of the kids are going to my sister-in-laws house for the weekend. I packed medicines, in case they get sick. Or maybe I should say sicker since two of them now have the throw up bug that began with my 7yr old almost two weeks ago. Luckily for everyone else it has only lasted 24 hours and then they have sprung back good as new. But still, dropping off sick kids, even older ones, is not easy on the mommy guilt.

I packed their bathing suits, sunscreen, beach towels, shovels, pails, and goggles. I am paranoid that one of them is going to drown or be washed out to sea. The fact that it is a lake and not the ocean holds no weight with my over active imagination. Even though I trust my sister-in-law above most people in this world, she still isn’t me. When I told my husband I was worried, would she remember to count to four over and over again? He assured me that she can count to four.

I packed them some of their snacks that they like to eat. Who knows if the sell the “right” kind of granola bars on the other side of the state. Do they have normal food there?

I packed pajamas, made sure eveyone had the correct amount of underwear, tooth brushes, toothpaste, hairbrushes,clothes for every day, such a novel idea to my 7yr old who has two favorite outfits that he rotates through.

Then I packed my stuff and helped my older children pack their things. I handed out tiny ziploc bags for their liquidy things. I suggested items to bring…cameras, ipods, books to read.

I packed it all up into the back of the van. Everyone’s stuff organized into their own little rolling suitcases with their little sleeping bags strapped to the top.

In between all of this I worked. I fed kids. I tended to the sick ones. I had two conference calls. I gave thanks that next week I will be traveling all alone. At this point I may just attend BlogHer naked so I don’t have to pack again.

At 5:00 tonight my husband comes home from work and says that he doesn’t understand why it is such a big deal to pack. It seems positively easy to him.

Then I killed him.

Then I brought him back to life because there is no way I am missing my trip to San Fransisco Tuesday.

Like All Good Things

July 8, 2008

Over at Parenting.

Titles Are Over Rated

July 7, 2008

I may keep my house relatively clean, but my vehicles are another story. I am not sure why it doesn’t bother me to drive around in filth. Maybe because I can’t actually see most of it? I don’t know.

But today I cleaned out the mini van. I filled an entire garbage bag full of well, garbage.

My four younger kids are spending the weekend at their aunt’s house while Rob and I head out of town with our three oldest. This means that I am leaving my sister-in-law the mini van to use. She who is very anally retentive neat and clean. As in she would make Felix Unger look like a slob.

As in she cleans her windows routinely with things like a Q-tip. Unlike me who cleans the windows only when you can no longer see out of them, and even then a cursory pass with a paper towel and some Windex does it for me.

I went to the store today to buy some special car interior cleaning stuff. And I contemplated renting a steam cleaner for the rug and upholstery, because looking that interior objectively has revealed that we are a family of pigs. Pigs who apparently roll in the mud before getting into the van, then hastily shed random bits of their clothing, and have silent food fights.

Next up I have to wash the carseats. She-who-does-not-allow-food-in-her-car-EVER would be horrified at the amount of crumbs lurking inside.

As a funny aside, while I was vacuuming out the car my two youngest buckled themselves into their carseats on the driveway. They thought it was the best thing ever.

It reminded me of something that I had blocked out completely forgotten about. When my oldest two sons were 1 and 2 yrs old, I used to bring their carseats in the house from the car every day. Then I would buckle them into the seats in front of Sesame Street so that I could get a quick shower without them killing their infant brother, running away, or doing whatever else two unattended toddlers could do in five minutes. They never complained about it either, that I can remember. Or maybe I just couldn’t hear the complaints from underneath the water.

Don’t judge me. If it weren’t for those car seats there would have been a good five year period where I never shaved my legs. Really, I was only thinking of everyone else.

It is strange how something you do every single day, that seems like an eternity when you are going through it (hello, diaper changing I am talking to you.) Then it ends one day and gradually fades from your memory until it almost feels as if it didn’t happen. I can remember clearly coming down the stairs that were open to our family room and seeing their tiny bodies sitting in their seats, but I can’t remember what I felt. Were they as cute to me then as the memory of their small selves is to me now? Was I hoping I could sneak past them and grab something to eat in the kitchen before they noticed? Was I wishing that Sesame Street was on all day long?

A Long Weekend

July 6, 2008

“You have to love a nation that celebrates its independence every July 4, not with a parade of guns, tanks, and soldiers who file by the White House in a show of strength and muscle, but with family picnics where kids throw Frisbees, the potato salad gets iffy, and the flies die from happiness. You may think you have overeaten, but it is patriotism.” -Erma Bombeck

Also I think Erma Bombeck forgot to mention the sparklers and the inevitable burns. Because some people insist that they don’t need to wear shoes. Even though it is dark out. And the burned up sparklers are not visible against the blacktop driveway.

In case you are wondering how to make that potato salad, hop on over to Work It! Mom for our family favorite. I also have an old stand-by pasta salad recipe and spicy grilled corn on the cob that is so tasty, well you will have to restrain yourself from eating it all. Unless you like talking to your guests with teeth filled with corn kernels.

Mmmmm, yummy. I have a lot of other recipes up over there that I have not had time to link to individually lately. For the next few weeks they will all be recipes that you can cook on your grill or single burner. This is because I have no working kitchen.

We are in the middle of Renovation-palooza. In six weeks our house will be finished. Or we will die trying. Possibly from exhaustion, though more likely a murder-suicide scenario. Because OMG did my husband just really suggest something so incredibly stupid, or OMG why does my wife buy the most expensive faucet known to mankind that only has directions in French. For the record, it is not the most expensive faucet, my husband just thinks all things should be able to be purchased with the spare change found in the couch cushions.

And On The Seventh Day

July 2, 2008

He smiled.

Propelled by his steady diet of narcotics mixed with gingerale, coke, popsicles, and ice cream.

A friend called me earlier to ask how he was doing. I told her he was on the upswing, literally.

He was being a rather demanding pain in the butt. You know how kids behave when they are in that period between being sick and well. And you wonder if you should give them the tylenol to make them feel well enough to whine at you or hold off so they will lay silently on the couch for a little while longer. Don’t deny it, you think the same thing.

This time it was a relief that he was well enough to complain about things like the color of the popsicles available, how close someone is sitting next to him on the couch, or THINKING of sitting next to him on the couch, and the fact that he hasn’t been to play miniature golf in like TEN YEARS and that is SO UNFAIR. Especially since he is only seven years old. And THAT is no fair either. Why didn’t I borned him sooner?

But you know what? After the past week, I’ll take it.

On Sunday night when we got home from the ER, I brought him up to bed. I tucked him in and his big brown eyes welled up with tears. He didn’t want to sleep alone. He also didn’t want to sleep in my bed. And that was why at 1am I lifted his mattress up over my head, carried it down the hall and into my room. I made him a little bed right next to me.

He just told me he wants to stay in there forever. Awwwwww, that is so sweet. But so not going to happen.

He also says he is never taking his hospital bracelet off.