Category Archives: kids

Think outside the box, inside the bathroom

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The other morning, I was braiding Jenna’s hair before school.

We’re facing the mirror together, and talking about lots of important things.

She starts: “Mom…… why does daddy always get to sleep in YOUR bed?”

Good question.

And I love that she just knows it’s MY bed, and her father is obviously  bordering on  rude for still occupying that space at night…..just ASSUMING he has the right….geez……

Also, she is looking to get him out so she can take that spot, but she’s subtle enough to not bring that up just yet.

So I say “Hmmmmmm, well I don’t know Jenna, where else would he sleep??”

She’s clearly thought this out, because she answers immediately, no hesitation.

“Well, why don’t we just get some blankets, and pillows, and make him a bed somewhere else? Like maybe in his bathroom?

Another great idea…. and it would make things a lot more convenient for him as well.

She did eventually offer to let him make a bed for himself in our room…and even said she’d help him build it.

Good compromise.

 

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Caskets of gems….

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Moenich World Coin Grab Bag - 50 Coin Assortment

So last night, it was a stay up late night for me and the husband with the two little ones. Sammy had been playing his kindle, and I let him….. and then I checked my email before heading to bed around midnight.

I find 29. TWENTY-NINE amazon digital receipts… for things like “pile of gems”, “bag of gems”, “casket of gems”, and coins, all sorts of coins and containers of coins. “Unlimited energy”….. how much were these things? I opened the first email. $20.00!!!!!!   second email. Another $20.00!!!!!  Oh, wait!!  $53.99!!!   Gems are expensive!!!  Lots and lots of expensive gems, and coins, to the tune of over SIX HUNDRED DOLLARS. REAL dollars…. charged to my Amazon account.

Needless to say, bad words were said. Hands went flying…. Daddy intervened, saving a life I’m sure. My hands shook as I called Amazon digital customer service, who thank GOD are open 24 hours a day it seems. And miraculously, the guy on the phone, Luke, fixed it for me.

First he laughed. And laughed pretty much throughout the call. I told him I didn’t realize the kid could purchase anything because I had parental controls set, no purchases without a password!

Apparently, since I gave him access to the games he was allowed to play, he can STILL purchase apps within the game. And extra lives, coins, gems, all that good stuff. In one hour, he spent a total of $691 and change. Why? Because he wants to be better than his friends at this game.

The game by the way, which doesn’t exist in our home anymore. Kindle is on lockdown forever. FOREVER.

I would like to say that he learned his lesson…

I KNOW that I learned mine.

 

 

What I don’t want for Christmas

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It’s been a while since I’ve been able to post on here, partly due to lack of time because of work, and kids, and stressful life happenings in general. Also partly because we just took a week off to spend in Vegas with the little ones and I had such a GREAT time that I actually forgot my best friend even existed until we got back. I felt a little guilty about that, but I was able to overcome it once I found that she is still alive and well.

So, on to very important things.

My oldest is asking me what I want for Christmas. She won’t leave it alone, so in an effort to help her out (a mothers job is never done….), I’ve given it some serious thought. I’ve come up with a list of what I don’t want. At least this will help her narrow things down.

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  1. Stuffed animals that fart. I actually don’t want any stuffed animals, but especially not ones that mimic bodily functions. Resist the urge, even for $12.95.

 

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2. Underpants for my hands. I’m good with the ones I’ve got, not on my hands.

 

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3. This monstrosity. I don’t want the sweater, or the baby that possibly comes with it. I know I’ve got lots of kids….but really, I’m good.

 

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4. Ok, actually might be funny if you could get it personalized with the ex’s face… all in good fun of course….

 

 

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5. Might be a cheaper option for me than laser lipo…but somehow I feel not as effective. Probably save your money.

 

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6. On the odd chance that someone might think to buy me a purse made from a dried frog corpse, let me just make it clear that I would not accept it EVER…..unless it had fully intact back legs.

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7. It’s cute, really. but people might not understand….
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8. No subtle references to me aging, ‘kay?
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9. I can see how someone might want to incorporate my love for cleaning, with my desire to work out more to come up with a “super gift”. I just think this might not be “the one”.
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10. Whaaaaat??
I think that pretty much covers it. Stay away from the above, and I’ll accept pretty much anything. Or nothing. Whatever.

 

 

Juggling

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mycareertopia.com

I’ve been going through an adjustment the past month or so, some changes in the office that have required me to take a LOT of work home with me. Instead of sitting up at 1am thinking of good blog topics, I’m typing away, bleary eyed, preparing for patients the following day.

The last few days, something occurred to me.

I feel like I can breathe again…..

It’s what happens when you don’t have a choice but to tackle the obstacle in your path. You adapt whether you want to or not. Things find a way to settle in, and you get used to it.

Not that I love the extra time I’m spending….. but at least it’s not overwhelming anymore.

And then I think about what I do in a day, in a week…geez, it’s a lot!

Get up early, shower and get ready for work before I force the two youngest out of bed to get dressed, fed, and out the door to school. We leave by 7:30, which still causes some internal crying and gnashing of teeth, but I act like I love it.

Drop kids off, and depending on the day I may go to the office, or a facility to see patients. Or I may stay at school for an hour and help with a project before rushing off to work. Driving usually to 2 places, timing myself down to the last second so I see enough patients yet get out in time to pick up the kids after school.

Multiple phone calls to different facilities, patients families, my own personal business as I’m driving….

Getting homes means homework with the 1st grader, reading with the preschooler, dinner, cleaning up, all the household stuff like pesky laundry that can’t figure out how to wash itself…..

millions of little things like stop at post office to mail the rental contract that I just co-signed so the oldest can rent a house with some friends at college next year. And not worry at all about my credit being ruined if no one decides to pay…….  Call the insurance company about some missing social security number, email the teachers to coordinate time to come in and paint with the kids for the school project that’s due next month…….

And then after kids are in bed, I can get started on my own “homework”, reviewing prescriptions refill requests, and loading patient data for the next day. Maybe having some tea and cookie. Or six. Going to bed around 1:30am, trying to stay awake to read ’til 2…..

Does it sound terrible?

Honestly, I know I’m not unique at all in my busy life. Most of us are juggling all day long, right?

But I don’t know what I’d really change right now. Overall, I’m happy. I’m lucky to have my kids, my home, my job (s), even though I think waking up early is crap, I just count down to the weekends, and summer…..and look forward to being 76, because surely by then I will be sleeping in every single glorious day.

So for now, I will post when I get time to breathe, usually at odd hours when I’m sitting quietly in my home and world is asleep all around me. Also, because as everyone knows, Twix and snickers are magically calorie free during the hours of 12-2am.

 

 

 

Apples, Hay, and Tacos

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My plans for a playdate are not usually very exciting, so I have my friend to thank for the idea of taking the kids somewhere new today.

I may have been apple picking as a child…. I have vague memories of paper bags and apples on the ground…but no sense of whether I enjoyed it or not. Today I got to try it with the kids at Hillcrest Orchards.

It was a perfect day, sunny and in the low 70’s, and the place was big enough to accommodate everyone without seeming crowded.

Of course there is the requisite hay maze……

As well as the farm-themed cut out boards for the kids to pose as animals, farmers, or pumpkins…..

We finally headed off to the orchard to put the kids to work, getting there on a rickety tractor pulled wagon of course.

We picked honey crisp today, and at first I thought the rows of trees were just baby saplings. I was shocked to see them bearing fruit, an amazing amount compared to their tiny size. Super sweet, we were allowed to eat them right off the trees. Bonus that the kids found that irresistible. Jenna was shocked to find seeds in the middle of her apple….because she has only ever eaten her apples sliced on a plate before. Eating food from it’s original source, off the tree in this case, instead of from the fruit bowl seemed to stimulate their appetites. I wonder what she would do if I pointed at a chicken and told her that’s where her chicken tenders come from??

There were more things for the kids to do, like a track for go cart type bikes. I can’t show you a picture because I spent my time there pushing Sammy on his, or riding Jenna on the back of mine. GREAT workout, but not fond of the unattractive panting after I was finished.

 

More acceptable ride that doesn’t require mom to exert herself…

 

Didn’t mean for this to be freaky…but reminds me of “The Ring” and if she had started crawling on the ceiling I would have left her there…

 

And the day would not be complete without dried corn stuck in everyone’s pants

 

And finally. The best part. The grand finale of my trip. The reason I will definitely more than consider going back……..

Before we left we wanted snacks. There was a little eatery inside with cider, water, apple cinnamon donuts and cookies.  There was a food truck outside, with a menu posted on it’s side.

I was amazed at the selection of food…. and please, please forgive me for not having a picture of the actual menu. I can recite a couple things by heart…. such as the all beef hot dog in toasted pretzel bun, complimented by apple chutney and cheddar cheese….. or how about the rosemary parmesan fries, complete with garlic aioli dipping sauce? Or my personal favorite….. drum roll please….. butternut squash and black bean tacos. Oh my god. I’m so glad I ordered them, because they were amazing. Not what I expected from a food truck at this farm out in the boonies.

I did not take photos of my food because 1. I didn’t want to look weird and 2. I ate it way too fast. But I checked Pinterest and found something close to just give you a tiny idea….

fries

Trust me when I say the tacos and fries I ate today were so much better looking and tasting than these examples, but you’ll have to trust me unless you check out Hillcrest Orchards yourself.

 

 

 

Important friendship criteria

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My friendship criteria….were I to actually  have time to cultivate a friendship…..

  1. Must be funny, but not the annoying funny that just laughs at everything. The kind of funny that can be light and dark, funny ha-ha, and funny “god my life is depressing”.
  2. Must not judge my parenting. Unless I ask. And then always follow up judgement with a story about how they are even a worse parent than me because….etc..
  3. Must be able to keep the secrets I tell them, that are secrets I’ve promised others not to tell. The buck must stop somewhere after all.
  4. Must not be evil or possessed by any sort of demon, this is kind of a deal breaker.
  5. Sarcasm is required

There are more things of course, intelligence and wit, integrity-but not too much, don’t want me to feel bad about myself…… kind of difficult to find someone with all these requirements, probably just easier to continue hanging out with the kids……

What made me start to think of what qualities a new friend of mine would need to have? A conversation with Jenna about a boy at school she’s chosen as her friend. I don’t know if he shares the sentiment, but every day I hear his name.

What made her choose him, out of 13 other kids whose names she’s not in the hurry to remember?

Jenna’s friendship criteria:

  1. Must have a Blaze and the monster machines lunch box.

A simple and effective method to weed out those not worthy……

 

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Blaze in all his glory…….

 

Dinner observations

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I took the kids to dinner the other night, only because Sammy had it in his head that we should go and I liked the idea of not making dinner. Besides, we needed a break at the end of a loooooong week of school.

He picks Cheesecake factory, and we are seated outside. The tables are so close together, you can’t avoid sitting in the middle of the conversations around you.

On my left, is a family of 5. Two parents and three children, all seem to be under 5. They are loud, kids take turns screaming, actual screams…. and the parents both speak a mixture of English and Italian to them. I like the sound of the Italian, but not when the mom is speaking in a constant yell, right into my ear.

Jenna likes to watch other people, she’s still too young to realize it’s rude. And knowing her, she probably wouldn’t care. I keep directing her attention to our own table, but the noise and activity next to us are hard to ignore. First she comments that one of the boys goes to her school. I don’t look over, but I sense the mom turning her head toward us as though she knows they are being mentioned. Jenna says later that one of the boys is looking at her, as she continues to stare at him. I feel eyes on us again, and lightly tell her to just look at me then.

She continues to watch the progress of the family, parents attempting to stop the screaming and fighting of their kids and not doing a great job of it. During a lull in the noise, she comments to me “Yeah, I like the dad better than the kids”… Since the mom is practically in my lap, I am sure she hears it. The head turning toward us confirms it. I think I tell  Jen to eat her dinner and keep her eyes on her food.

But she’s so right. He was definitely the quietest…..

My little monster

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Don’t be fooled by my innocent smile…..

 

I just want to say, the 15 year old was right. As much as I hate to agree, his baby sister is kind of a monster. Sometimes.

She loves school, grabs my hand and drags me into the building in the morning, and is beaming when I pick her up at the end of the day. She believes it is “her” classroom, and the other kids and teachers are there for her entertainment. She does not miss me at ALL.

Monster, right?

And suddenly, she’s way more independent and impatient with the rest of us. As I’m sitting in the car, waiting for the cars in front of me to move so we can park and walk in….she starts to get belligerent in the back seat. “Mommy!, why are we taking so long! My teacher is waiting for me!” She doesn’t seem to care that I literally can’t get out of the car yet, and so threatens to stop being my best friend if I dare continue to keep her away from the teachers who are desperately waiting for her inside.

On the way home yesterday, she is holding her water bottle in the back–thirsty after school. As I’m on the highway, and in no way able to turn around and help her, she decides she can’t hold it a second longer and I need to take it from her now, now, NOW!

I tell her no, hold it herself…. and Sammy starts to talk about wanting to go out to eat somewhere. He’s listing the choices of places for me to choose from, and Jenna breaks in:

“Well, YOU both can go, I’M not going with you! I’m going to stay home all by myself!” (Complete with wide eyes and head bobbing for emphasis) “Because YOU won’t hold my water bottle!”

We have some back and forth, with her emphatic that she will stay home alone, and will also not let anyone in to HER house, and me wondering if I’m going to get pegged with a water bottle in the back of the head…..

And poor Sammy in the background trying to tell me “don’t talk to her momma….” (because she’s mean of course….)

As much as I worry about her strong, super sized personality…… I still love it. I love the attitude and I love knowing she’s got something I never had at her age–call it confidence, bravado, an unrealistic sense of self importance…whatever…..  she’s not afraid to speak up for herself and it took me decades before I could do that.

And then late last night she called out for me, having a bad dream and wanted me to sleep next to her. And I loved cuddling up to her…..it was great for about 5 minutes…. then she asked me to move over and stop touching her 😦

Definitely monster.

 

Friday flop

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Now that school is back in session, we don’t get to stay up late until Friday rolls around.

This week I kept reminding the kids to motivate them through waking up early and going to bed early…..Friday’s almost here!!

We usually let them stay up pretty late, watch movies, eat popcorn, play games. Daddy can always depend on them to wait up for him when he finally gets in from work.

So tonight, we were all set… went to the park for a couple hours after school and got home by 8pm. Everyone had a snack, showered, settled together on the couch to pick out a movie. I had my laptop appropriately in my lap, and was catching up on some emails.

Next thing I know, I wake up to the sound of Dora and her friends singing about how they couldn’t have done it without me…….. and no signs of life around me.

Lightweights…..

Clearly, we need to build up our Friday late-night stamina.

 

 

 

the ongoing hole in my heart

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Last night together before heading back to college 😦

One might think that after having 4 kids, and sending most of them to school every fall, year after year….. I would be numb to the pain of “the first day back”.

Maybe this year feels worse than usual because last summer I didn’t know what it was going to be like without the oldest at home during the school year. This summer, I enjoyed her at home (most of the time…), but I also knew what was coming when summer vacation ended.

And it can’t be avoided… so I loved having her home, but dreaded her going back-for my own selfish reasons.

Adding to my pain, we have the 3 year old starting preschool tomorrow.

She’s ready! She’s soooooooo ready. But I am finding myself really depressed this week, as the days creep by. I squeezed her and kissed her so hard this morning that she faked an injury to get me to stop.

 

Will her school understand the importance of chocolate cake to her academic success???

 

I know I’ll be at work while she’s at school, but knowing she’s not safe in our little nest while I’m gone is stressing me out. Interacting with her teacher and other kids all day, going potty, eating lunch and snack, napping, playing, learning….. all these things will happen. She will be bossy, she will be bossed back. She will possibly be unhappy at some point.

Hyperventilating.

The 15 year is taller every morning. He’s back in high school, no longer a freshman. Lets me hug him at home, I don’t know about in public……

And the 6 year old started first grade today, away from the “baby wing” of the school, and upstairs with the big kids. He wore loafers today for gods sake…..and he loved it. He told me after school that he wants to live in first grade.

And so we are back in the school year, and all that goes with it.

Dammit, they keep growing up.