Archives for November 2005

I never finished Moby Dick. This may not come as a complete surprise to my American Novel professor who graded the exam where I answered that Ishmael, THE NARRATOR OF THE ENTIRE BOOK, dies at the end. (The first words of the book are “Call me Ishmael” which should have been my first clue that he lived through his dealings with the massive beast from the deep in order to record his experiences. Alas, I remained clueless.)

To the rest of you, this may seem shocking.

The truth is, I just couldn’t do it. It was so long and there was so much information about whale anatomy, I was taking a billion classes and we had only one week to read the book. So, I read until he started describing each whale species and every single atom it possessed. Then I read/skimmed the Cliff’s Notes and moved on with my life.

It is a happy and full life and I don’t really feel bad about it. I still got a B in the class and they even let me graduate.

The Mobe-ster still sits on my shelf of “great literature” and one day maybe Laylee will read it and tell me what happens. Until then, at least I can comfort myself in knowing that Ishmael is still alive to write his life story.

The coveted Daring Young Mom gear is now available, “just in time” for Christmas. Check it out if you’re bored. I had fun getting it all set up.

I think the yellow bag with the giant picture of my HEED is the best item. I’m trying to redesign that with just the simple logo but am running into “issues.”

All the stuff says:

We know we’re all supposed to eat about a bazillion veggies every day. We are also encouraged to coerce our children into consuming said vegetables. Even I, a self-proclaimed veggie lover, struggle to eat enough because they seem to take so much time and effort to prepare.

What tips can you offer for making this process a little less painful for all concerned? How do you conceal these healthful morsels or make them more appealing to your family members? How do you get down your 3-5 servings each day?

A couple of ideas:

Orange or Green Mashed Potatoes – My aunt taught me to boil carrots or spinach within an inch of their lives in a small amount of water, just barely to cover. When they are super-mushy, add the whole pot (water and all) to the potatoes you’re mashing for dinner. This becomes a novelty food – green or orange mashed potatoes.

For young toddlers who can’t chew carrot sticks yet – Every few days I boil several carrot sticks and then stick them in the fridge. When Laylee wants a snack, I hand her a couple of carrot sticks “just like mommy eats” and she loves them.

Now I want your tips. Gimme, gimme, gimme!

When I am sick, I am often irritable. When I am irritable, I am often snippy. When I am snippy, I am often embarrassed or annoyed by my children repeating phrases of my snippidity over and over and over again.

Tonight Magoo was whining, part of his teething ritual. Laylee was also whining and saying my name over and over and over again and asking me to do impossible tasks. “Mommy. Mommy. Mommy. Please put this 10’X10’ blanket into my purse the size of a sandwich baggie.” “Please. Mommy. Mommy. Mommy.”

I think that’s why we all just tell them our name is Mommy and keep our real identity a secret for as long as possible. We don’t want to grow to hate our own names.

Amdist all this whining, I was stomping around the house looking for some important papers I’d misplaced during my days of pathetic sickness. My two-year-old stalker was hot on my heels and I turned to her and said, “You’d better leave me alone now or Mommy is going to HAVE A COW.”

Laylee: Are you going to have a cow, Mommy?

Me: Yes.

Laylee (delighted): OH! Can I have a cow too Mommy?

Me: Sure. I think you already are.

Laylee: Can Magoo have a cow too Mommy? How about Daddy? Can Daddy have a cow?

Me(madly shuffling through papers): Yes, we can all have a cow. Let’s everybody have a cow. Yippee! It’s cow time. Let’s all have a big fat cow.

Laylee(very excited): O-KAY!

An hour later it’s bedtime and Laylee won’t stop crying

“I can’t go to bed. Mommy said we could all have a cow. I want a cow. Can we go to the store and get a cow? I want a pink cow. Daddy, do you want a white cow and mommy do you want a pink cow like me? Let’s all have a cow. Please. I don’t want to go to bed………WAAAAAHHHHH”

Luckily DY Dad saved the day with a great old trick called, “Let’s-pretend-this-pink-doll-jamma-is-a-pink-cow-and-eat-you-and-tickle-you-all-over-with-it-until-you-forget-why-you-were-in-fact-having-a-cow.”

I am a very conflicted person. I was raised on fairytales and magic and had a sweet and wonderful childhood. Then I went to college and studied Film and English and became a sort of jaded “Into the Woods” – “Don’t Lie to Your Children about Santa Claus” sort of person.

Now that I have kids, I want them to have as magical a childhood as I did and I want them to use their imaginations and dream and see the world as a wonderful place. Like my parents before me, I will teach them what they need to know when they need to know it.

A Quote from last month’s book club book, The Hiding Place, by Corrie Ten Boom:
Corrie as a young child had asked her father about Sex. “He turned to look at me, as he always did when answering a question, but to my surprise he said nothing. At last he stood up, lifted his traveling case from the rack over our heads, and set it on the floor. ‘Will you carry it off the train, Corrie?’ he said. I stood up and tugged at it. It was crammed with the watches and spare parts he had purchased that morning. ‘It’s too heavy,’ I said. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘And it would be a pretty poor father who would ask his little girl to carry such a load. It’s the same way, Corrie, with knowledge. Some knowledge is too heavy for children. When you are older and stronger you can bear it. For now you must trust me to carry it for you.’”

A psychiatrist once told me that he thinks encouraging imagination and belief in fairies and Santa Claus, etc. encourages children to think on a higher conceptual level and to develop empathy.

This weekend, we went the magical route and headed for a high school production of Cinderella. What a blast for the kids. The moms had a great time too.

The girls all dressed like Cinderella in honor of the occasion.

Laylee didn’t have a Cinderella costume so she wore a blue dress and we told her she looked like the Cinder-one anyway. All three girls got magic necklaces from their “fairy godmothers.”

We all settled in for a great show. An announcement was made that no photos were allowed to be taken inside the theatre. I heard and ignored this warning. I don’t think taking pictures of my own kids violates the school’s copyright agreement with Rogers and Hammerstein….and I didn’t take any during the performance.

I did not, however, hear the warning that people in the back half of the theatre should keep the isles clear during the second half of the show. This would be very important later.

Despite the fact that it was a Saturday matinee starring all of the understudies and they charged a fortune for tickets, there was a pretty full house.

As the orchestra began playing the overture, Karli and I both started tearing up. It made me remember being in theatre and going to musicals with my mom. The tradition is alive and well. Karli also misses performing. We made a vow to do some sort of community theatre one day (something with no kissing scenes since we’ve both made a previous vow concerning this aspect of theatre with our husbands). Laylee clapped wildly when appropriate and yelled out, “OH!” “That’s the FAIRY GODMOTHER!” and “I think the MICE ARE COMING!” at all the appropriate places. About an hour in, she was on my lap with her head resting on my arm. Did I mention the play started right about naptime?

At half-time, we stood in line to buy wands.

The wands were waved wildly in the wind ….until they broke. Many tears were shed.

Much repair work was done.

After my four-hundredth intermission photo, a voice came over the intercom reminding the audience that no photography was permitted in the auditorium (read this: Kathryn, you flash-happy nut, stop taking pictures already!).

Laylee was very tired during the second half. Since I was sitting on the isle, I laid her coat out in the isle like a pillow and let her rest her head where she could still see the show. A minute later, I heard loads of screaming and feet pounding down the isle. I snatched her out of the way just in time to avoid being crushed by 50 giddy adolescent glass-slipper-trier-oners. That was scary, or as Laylee would say, “That was cloast!” The theatre was really dark and they could have crushed her head like a grape. I remind myself to listen the next time “they” explain how I can use my airplane seat cushion as a flotation device.

When everything was proclaimed “Happily ever after,” we had pictures taken with the royal couple, bundled up the kidos and headed out into the cold Puget Sound fall.

Luckily the King had enough gold in the treasury to pay for his son’s orthadonture.

The drive home was wet.

Laylee finally got to sleep.

What a great day, until a few hours later when the hideous parasite took over my body. Thanks for all your well-wishes. I’m feeling much better today. Hopefully tomorrow I’ll be fully mended and no one else will come down with it.

Speaking of tomorrow — the tip is how to convince/trick your kids, your spouse and yourself into eating more vegetables.

I think I might be dying. Last night I came down with a wicked stomach bug. After hours of fluid loss, body aches and chills, I called my insurance provider’s nurse advice hotline and she told me to go in to the ER or Urgent Care for rehydration. So, they tested me for dehydration and our whole family spent 4 hours in the Urgent Care while they pumped me full of 3 liters of IV fluids. Magoo had to go 6.5 hours with no food b/c he will only take the breast and the nurses wouldn’t let me give him what little fluid I had left.

The fluid was so cold and I just laid there and felt the cold spread over my whole body. The nurses kept complaining about how hot it was and even called maintenance to come fix the heat problem. I laid there with a sweater and a blanket on, shivering. For the grand finale, I got a shot in le rear to help control the nausea. Overall, not the best Sunday on record.

Luckily DY Dad is taking the day off work tomorrow. He’s spent all day watching the kids, bringing me small sips of liquid, folding the laundry and cleaning the kitchen. He is a great little nurse.

Man, I pray no one else in the family gets this. For now, I’ve put all of us in lock-down mode. I don’t want one of us to unwittingly pass the bug to someone else outside the family.

Laylee: Can I use the phone to call Ducky pretend?

Me: Okay sure.

Laylee: How’re you Ducky?
Are you good?
Are you in time out?
Because you were mean and you were kranky?
I hope you have a great day!
Because I’m playing with mommy.
Sooooo…..
The end.
Have a great day.
Talk to you later Ducky.

She hands me the phone. Can you guess if anyone else had to go in time out today? Do you think anyone else was mean or kranky? No, it was not me! You take that back.

NANOWRIMO Word Count: 6733 (at least 500 of which don’t bite the big one. Yippee!)

I really can’t stop. It is somewhat ridiculous. Here it is for show and tell. I’m addicted to books. And it’s not just reading them. It’s holding them, smelling them, feeling them, buying them and surrounding myself with them. I love books.

“I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.” — Jorge Luis Borges

“The true university of these days is a collection of books.” –Thomas Carlyle

“A library is the delivery room for the birthplace of ideas — a place where history comes to life.” — Norman Cousins

“A good library is a place, a palace where the lofty spirits of all nations and generations meet.” — Samuel Niger

“I cannot live without books.” — Thomas Jefferson

Last week I posted about my friend “Lucy” and her home school preschool. Well this week was my turn and I’ve come to the conclusion that our kids (yes 2 and 3 year olds) have very-extremely-way-muchly-super-duper-uber short attention spans.

Yes.

(moment of silence brought to you by They’re All In Bed)

It’s true.

So after Lucy’s Herculean efforts last week, I planned what I thought were a ton of activities.

1. We sang several songs, sitting or standing on cushions, including a version of The Eensy Weensy spider called The Big Fat Spider, where you sing in a really deep, scratchy voice.

2. They asked to go play with toys.

3. We learned a color, number, (asked for toys) shape (escaped for toys) and letter.

4. We had exercise time (Picture Simon Says where Simon always says and the kids don’t know the difference anyway so they just do what you say. Man, I wish this worked at nap, dinner and cleanup time.).

5. They did a coloring and sticker project.

6. They tried to scale the baby gate to get to the toys.

7. We made pumpkin spice sugar cookies.

8. I read them 4 Halloween stories (wherein each child felt the need to touch each page of each story in succession regardless of whether it was a touchy-feely book).

9. We learned a song about a Jack-O-Lantern but first we learned that a pumpkin with a face is called a Jack-O-Lantern. (Notice that actual learning did occur.)

10. They ran about wildly and asked for toys.

11. I told them a story of a witch looking for a house that turns magically into a pumpkin.
You fold a sheet of paper in half and hold it up with the fold to the bottom. Then the witch needs to make a roof so you cut the top corners off to look like a sloping roof. Then she needs a door so you cut a rectangle up from the bottom of one side. Oh, she can’t fit through with her pointed hat so you cut a triangle up from that. Then you make a triangle door for her cat. Then a square window and she has a beautiful house. You open it up and ……SHE LIVES IN A PUMPKIN! This is when all the kids gave their full attention and clapped like I was a flippin’ genius. It was nice.

12. I made them all witch houses.

13. They pleaded for toys.

14. They colored the pumpkins.

15. ONLY 50 MINUTES HAD PASSED AND I WAS SUPPOSED TO KEEP THIS UP FOR 2 HOURS.

16. I gave them the toys.

17. They played and attempted to share and take turns, learning valuable life lessons in the process. Only 1 time-out was issued.

18. I sedated them by playing every song I know on the guitar:
–Leaving on a Jet Plane
–Where Have All the Flowers Gone?
–When You Say Nothin’ at All
–Leavin’ on a Jet Plane
-An Up-Tempo version of Nearer My God to Thee (not exactly the way they sang it on the Titanic, I’m guessing)
–Where Have all the Flowers Gone?
-And for the Grand Finale — Leavin’ on a Jet Plane.

18. And then they did…..leave.

NANOWRIMO word count: 2287

To get along in this world and maintain the portly beauty of your massive rolly thighs, you must learn two things:

Skill #1: Eating amidst distraction — Yes, Laylee is fascinating and it’s hard to look the other way when she is yelling “RAARRRRR” like a tiny but very loud tiger 2 feet from your face as you nurse and patting you “so tenderly” on the head. Yes, I understand your need to pop off and look up at any noise you hear or movement you catch from the corner of your wandering eye.

“What if something actually HAPPENED at our house and I missed it because I was just sitting there eating like a baby?” you ask. “What if I don’t look at Laylee every time she does something hilarious and so she STOPS putting on a show for me at all times?” These concerns must weigh heavily on your mind and so you maintain your constant vigil. However, this must stop, young padawan. You must use the strength of your mind to block out these distractions and focus on the task at hand. That is eating for more than 10 seconds at a sitting.

Skill #2 — Not using me as a human teething ring between each swallow of milk: I don’t think I need to explain this one other than to say —

“If you do not cease and desist, I will cease and desist with the feeding. Get it? Got it? Good!”
~Kathryn, the Daring~

(One of the most hilarious sites I’ve ever seen is by a guy named Rod Barnett who will give $10,000 to anyone who introduces him to his future wife. He lists deep quotes throughout the page and then lists the source of the quote as ~Rod Barnett~. So funny. After seeing his site, I knew that one day I would quote myself on a website. I had to. I must. It was…..my destiny. I’m so sad. I just went there for the first time in 3 years and the site is all smooth and professional now and I couldn’t find any of his self-quotes. It’s still worth a look, though.)

News Briefs:
Magoo has officially achieved army-man crawl status.
Laylee is just breaking her 2-year-old molars which explains some of the crabbishness. She also gave all her diapers to Magoo as a present today so that she can begin her life as a potty-going big girl in earnest.
DY Dad Rocks.
The date for the painting of the house is set for mid-November.
NANOWRIMO word count — 998 (yeah, yeah, I know.)