Personal Blog of Author Kathryn Thompson
I’ve written a guest post over at my friend Damomma’s place. She’s the new mother of a 3rd baby and this is my version of taking over a casserole. It’s a puke-casserole, but I hope it helps her out in some way.
I’ve also got a new post up at Parenting about the sweeter side of the motherhood gig. It’s 600 words about how I can’t put into words what I want to say. You won’t want to miss that. [click here to read more]
If you order food at any Taco Bell restaurant anywhere in the country, and I know because I’ve been to at least 6 of them, the person wearing the Brittany Spears head set will ask you at the window if you’d like any hot sauce with your order. Every once in a while she will look you in the eyes and act as if she cares whether you want the spicy stuff or not. Most of the time she will mumble, “Youwantanyhotsaucewithat?” as she stuffs napkins and, get this, hot sauce into your bag.
I always, always say, “no,” not because I don’t like spicy things but because I don’t want one more opportunity for disastrous mess in my car. I repeat. I always say, “Negatory.”
And I ALWAYS get one, if not several, packets of hot sauce in the bag. ALWAYS.
The same thing happens at McDonald’s. When you order a sundae, they always ask you if you’d like nuts to go with it. Over the years, I’ve become intolerant of hard chunks in my ice cream. I don’t trust them. “Was that a peanut or a pill bug?” I ask myself.
So I say, “No thank you,” when they ask if I want the peanuts.
“Does she get peanuts?” you ask yourself.
Yes. Yes she does.
ALWAYS.
If you’re just gonna give me peanuts and hot sauce, why are you acting like I have a choice?
At the grocery store, when they say, “Paper or Plastic?” they then proceed to give you the style of bag you choose, even if you’re like me and choose your own handmade reusable, 100% recycled, free range, biodegradable totes.
Dan and I have been dating a lot lately. It’s like being back in high school but I go out with the same guy every time and at the end of the night, he watches me brush my teeth and put on my muumuu. If he’s lucky, I also brush my teeth before the date and don’t put on the muumuu until after.
Dinner and/or a movie has been working well for us for months but we’re read to branch out and I’d love your suggestions. What are some fun date activities you enjoy with your shmoop?
I’ll give a couple.
Go to an arcade and play like you were little kids. Chuck E Cheese would even work for this. Sometimes it’s fun to go to places you normally take your kids but without them. You can actually enjoy yourself instead of following them around taking pictures and watching them have fun. That can be good too but sometimes it’s fun to enjoy yourself without worrying about who that weird creepy adult guy is crawling around in the tunnel maze with your 3-year-old.
Spend some time at a bookstore, browsing new sections and reading together. Dan and I had to stop reading a particular book last time we did this because we were laughing so hard we were worried we’d get kicked out and Dan was embarrassed by his own laughing man-tears.
Go kayaking in the Puget Sound… or other substandard body of water closer to where you live. We’ve done this once and it was a blast. Hopefully when the kids are older we’ll have the time and money to do this more often.
Okay, now you go. Tell me what we should do for our next night (or day) out.
Magoo is experiencing an explosion of language lately. I know the words have been hanging out in his little noggin for quite some time but they’ve finally overflowed and are tumbling out all over the car, house and the great outdoors. The kid almost never stops talking. At times someone else is talking and he seems not to notice at all, just starts in on a long and detailed discourse on the bad guys and stuff and what he’s playing with and where the good guys are until they got squished by the giant bad guy refrigerator.
I love his stories, which are usually prefaced with a coy smile and the declaration, “Okay guys? I’ve got a story to tell you.” Then the most bizarre tales ensue with really no end in sight until you cut him off or he passes out or an ice cream walks by.
And he makes up explanations for things.
“Mom. Did you know that frogs’ middle names are ”˜Toad?’ That’s why sometimes they call frogs a toad. That’s the sing. Okay?”
He even talks when he’s “sleeping.”
Me [lying next to him in bed]: Go to sleep buddy.
Magoo: I AM asleep.
Me: No you’re not.
Magoo: Yes I am.
Me: No you’re not.
Magoo: My eyes are closed and I’m resting. That means I’m asLEEP!
The thing is, although he chatters away with abandon pretty much all the time, he doesn’t have the greatest capacity for listening. A couple of nights ago at dinner, Dan was explaining to Laylee how airplanes work. It was a table-side science lecture and although it was a bit on the dry side for me, Laylee was eating it UP. She soaked up every word and jumped in with her own bits of wisdom. They were using big words and demonstrating how wing flaps worked and Magoo sat staring at them, a look of growing confusion on his face.
Finally he shook his head and blurted, “TOO many words. Way too many words!”
There are way too many words sometimes. I concur.
Today I moved, I really moved for one of the first times in 4 months. Magoo was at preschool a 20-minute walk from our house and there was a smattering of sun peeking through the clouds.
I was out of breath in less than a block, surprised at how weak and puny and scrawny and pathetic and other words generally used to describe nerdy 7th grade boys I was. But I made it to preschool, sure that Magoo would be enraged when he found he’d need to walk home.
You see, my lay-about lifestyle has become the family lay-about lifestyle and my kids, especially Magoo, are sadly out of shape. Actually, even when I was fit, the kids weren’t all that fit. We’ve spent most of the winter inside and although I’d been going frequently to the gym before the sickness, Magoo doesn’t get much opportunity to get his body moving. I need to be more proactive about it. I didn’t have the pregnancy excuse all winter long but I’m happy to use it now.
He wasn’t that resistant to walking home, until we’d traveled about 50 feet, at which point he asked that we walk home in the car next time. But we pushed forward with little to no choice, up the high hills and even made it to the park for 20 minutes before we had to walk to the bus stop to pick up Laylee.
When I got home, I found I had used every speck of strength and energy I had in my body. I fell asleep, impervious to the mounting disaster that is my home.
I was awakened by the sound of my kids opening the door to one of my dinner co-op buddies. She’s a new co-op buddy and this is only the second time she’s been in my house. The dining room table had dinner dishes from last night stuck to it. The sink was full of filthy dishes, every counter was covered in filth and Magoo led her happily into the kitchen to bring our dinner. But she couldn’t find anywhere to set it down so she stepped over the caked-on spaghetti sauce on the floor and placed our dinner on the cold stove, the only clear place in the room.
I wandered downstairs in a post-nap haze and promised her that although my house had looked like a condemned building the only two times she’d visited, it was the exception, not the norm. (Maybe it’s the norm these last few months but over the course of my lifetime, on average, this is definitely a freakish level of filth that I am in no way comfortable with.) She hugged me and said it didn’t matter and when she left I held back my tears while I read Flylady.com for an hour and then scrubbed the everliving cheese out of my kitchen.
It looks good. And the laundry’s done. For just 30 seconds I considered calling up my friend at 10pm and asking her if she wanted to come over and share some jellybeans… in the kitchen. That seemed like a stupid plan but, unsure of what my house will look like next Wednesday night, I went to get my camera so I could email her a picture of my great feat of progress.
I somehow stopped myself… barely. My kitchen may be clean but that doesn’t make me unpathetic.
Track camp is really the only reason I can hold my head high at the end of a wasted spring break.
[Read the post at Parenting.com]
I’m dreaming, hoping, wishing for summer. I can’t wait to drive my car with the windows rolled down, my hair slamming into my face and whipping my eyes until I’m forced to pull it back into a matted ponytail, while the children yell things to me and I yell back, “I CAN’T HEAR YOU!”
We’re not quite there yet but I’m preparing in every way I can.
We pulled the weather sealant from the windows so they’ll open again. I keep washing the kids’ winter coats “for the last time” only to have frigid weather return. I squint frequently at the chalky gray sky, searching for signs of sun.
Most importantly, I’ve put together a playlist for my Zune full of songs to play with the windows rolled down. When I told Eve it was time to create a “windows down” playlist for her MP3 player of the questionable “fruity” variety, she suggested that songs on this list should be ones that are fun to drive to but also not embarrassing to be listening to as other people will hear them when we’re stopped at a light.
I disagree here because although I don’t know about her MP3 player, my Zune has a “send” button, which I could employ when I’m slowing down at a light if, say, my junior high nemesis is standing on the street corner waiting to cross as I pull up to the intersection. I’m covered.
So here’s my current Windows Down Zune Playlist:
Learning to Fly by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers — Classic, best Tom Petty song of all time, regardless of what Tom Cruise thinks.
What a Feeling by Irene Cara — Get your Flashdance on with this little baby. My kids also LOVE it.
Under Pressure by My Chemical Romance — a slightly harder rock version of the original. Very nice.
Life is a Highway by Rascal Flats — Forget that it’s the McQueen song, this is just a great driving tune, much better than the 1991 Tom Cochrane version.
Two of Hearts by Stacey Q — I think this song originated as the soundtrack for a commercial but I will forever think of it as the song Tootie was going to sing and dance to on The Facts of Life for her big Broadway audition before she totally chickened out.
Cruisin’ by Huey Lewis and Gwyneth Paltrow
Can’t Stop This Thing We’ve Started by Bryan Adams — Definitely most drivable Bryan Adams and he has to be included since he was my first rock concert.
Bruises by Chairlift
St. Elmo’s Fire (Man in Motion) by John Parr — You may want to get out of the car and start running while listening to this but you must control yourself, especially if there are children in the car.
Lovefool by The Cardigans — Sophomore year of college in a single song
Baby I Love Your Way by Big Mountain
Eye of the Tiger by Survivor — This will likely show up on every playlist I publish. You can’t really go wrong with The Eye.
Just like Heaven by The Cure
Cowboy Take Me Away by Dixie Chicks
More Than a Feeling by Boston — My dad and summer vacation road trips in a bottle. He was not ashamed to roll the windows down and blast it. I remember blasting this song out of our mini-van while waiting in line for a Ferry to Victoria one summer.
Kokomo by The Beach Boys — Inviting the warm winds
Forever by Chris Brown — This one works for both cars and spaceships
Miss You Much by Janet Jackson
Viva La Vida by Coldplay
Come Go With Me by The Beach Boys
Roam by B-52s — Roam all you want. Just stay in your own lane.
The Way You Make Me Feel by Michael Jackson
Fly Away or American Woman by Lenny Kravitz — For some reason neither is available on playlist.com.
Free Fallin’ by Tom Petty
Everybody Wants to Rule the World by Tears for Fears
I Plead Insanity by Belinda Carlisle
Feeling Good by Michael Buble
Hold the Line by Toto
Suddenly I See by K.T. Tunstall
Kiss Me by Sixpence None the Richer
If you’re planning on buying any of the songs here, stop supporting proprietary digital formats and buy from the Zune site. They’ll work on ANY device, including those of the fruity varieties. Your software will suck up any songs purchased on Zune and transfer them over.
Any songs I’m blatantly missing?
A few years ago, I started having a weekly tip smackdown on Tuesdays and after a while I got sick of it and petered out. But I’ve been missing it for quite some time (Oh how I love harvesting your minds for ideas!) and so I’m starting it up again. Today we’re talking about one of the never ending chores of family life, feeding the people so that the people can live.
I get sick of making dinners but unlike Tip Tuesdays, I can’t just discontinue dinner. Someone might notice. Someone might complain. Someone might call the authorities.
So I try to make it as easy as possible. Here are a few of my tips.
1. Make a plan. If I wait until dinner time rolls around, things will get grim. Boxes and cans that should really be saved for the apocalypse due to their shelf-life, lack of nutritional value, and imperviousness to nuclear radiation are often brought out and combined in unappealing ways. These meals can involve canned meat. They never involve happiness and satisfaction.
First I have a list of emergency meals I can make in a pinch. These include scrambled eggs, quesadillas, sandwiches, spaghetti that I boil and then pour the bottled sauce on top and let the noodles warm it, pancakes, etc.
Then I plan a week’s worth of “real” meals and shop for them. So, I’m never left wondering “What’s for dinner?” and even though I may decide not to really cook one day, I can use one of my fall-back meals.
2. Form a Dinner Co-op. I’ve talked about dinner co-ops and super swapping before on this blog. I’ve done this off and on for years and I love it. It’s really saved me during this pukey part of the pregnancy. Once a week I’m forced to cook a really nice main dish for a few other families and deliver it to their homes. Then the rest of the week warm delicious meals magically arrive at my door and all I have to provide are the veggies to go with them.
We all buy matching pyrex and tupperwares and pass them around as we cook so we never worry about getting our dishes back. We have a scheduled drop-off time so we know when we can expect to be fed. Once a month we send a list of the meals we’re planning on making to the scheduler, who makes a calendar for the month, spreading out the foods so that we get a good variety each week. When you’re only cooking once a week, you bring you’re A-game so we get some really delicious food. We save money buying in bulk. I don’t have to worry about dinner most of the week. It helps the kids feel a sense of community as we deliver and receive meals from various families. Each night they ask who the dinner came from. It’s like a commune but with more frequent deodorant usage.
3. Have an emergency back-up plan for crazy times in your lives. I found this in the form of a book by Mary Jo Rulnick. The book is called The Frantic Woman’s Guide to Feeding Family and Friends. It does all the planning for you, complete with shopping lists, recipes, meal plans and preparation tips for every season of the year. It’s really a great resource even if you don’t follow all of her recipe plans but if you do, it’s like a brain vacation for dinner preparation. She does all the planning and all you have to do is follow her daily instructions for shopping, prep and cooking. The recipes are simple and it’s the perfect answer for those times in your life when you just don’t have the energy left to plan one more thing.
She also has great general tips on saving time and effort in the kitchen and sections on what to do with holiday leftovers, an entire week of ham recipes and an entire week of leftover turkey ideas.
So here’s the part I like best about Tip Tuesday, the part where you leave your tips in the comment section. What do you do to make dinner time easier or more enjoyable? Do you have any simple meal ideas you can share with us?
We had a great Easter today. Magoo woke up bright and early and came into my room ticked that there was a baby gate at the top of the stairs. Yes, young padawan, you really think I trust you not to run down there at the crack of dawn (as though dawn exists in Seattle before June) and eat yourself into a diabetic coma? Not so much with the trusting. Very much with the child restraints. He calmed a bit when I told him to snuggle in bed with me while Dan finished his shower. Calmed and then fell almost immediately back to sleep. It’s like he’d been awakened by his chocolate radar and once he realized that the chocolate was surrounded by a parentally-induced force-field, he lost the will to remain sentient.
I mean come on, after all the trouble we parents go through to help put out the baskets and make our home a welcoming environment for the bunny-man, we deserve to see the looks on their faces when they run down and dig through that grass for treats and prizes. This year Dad was in charge of “setting the mood for the bunny’s arrival — edible division” and the sugar flowed FREE-LY. Holy Dina Cow! There were a lot of chocolate and marshmallow things brought into this house, many of which will be finding their way to Megacorp in the morning.
Some things that did stay were the two giant chocolate bunnies. Each a foot tall, containing almost a pound of chocolate. They may not ever make a return trip to this house but the video of the kids gnawing on them is priceless.
I “helped the bunny feel welcome — toy division” and the kids ended up with flashlights, a big Frisbee and a rubber snake.
Church was a good opportunity to get the kids grounded back in the real meaning of the holiday, although their thoughts were never far from their treasures at home.
At one point this afternoon, Magoo ran up to me. “Oh Mom! My snake is so cute!” He then stared up at the ceiling and yelled as if to the heavens, “YANK YOU EASTER BUNNY!”
I’m not sure he lives “up there” so much. But I’m sure he heard the thanks and was grateful for it.
I cut way back on dinner this year — ham, potatoes, corn, green beans and Pillsbury crescent rolls. It was nice, not overwhelming and I think it may be a foreshadowing of Easters to come. I usually go a little crazy overboard with the side dishes and homemade everything. But this year it was simple and Laylee called me “The Best Mom Chef Ever.” Dan agreed that it was the perfect Easter dinner, not too much, just enough. Lazy pregnant Kathryn is teaching regular Kathryn many tricks and shortcuts that regular Kathryn will remember and revel in for years to come.
We then scooped up the kids, took the new gospel art book our church has just come out with and narrated through many of the major events of Christ’s life with the chronological paintings. Then we did the Easter egg lesson about the days leading up to Easter. The whole thing lasted a little over half an hour and it was fun and the kids stayed with us most of the time and participated, making me feel less guilty about the party atmosphere that accompanies the serious stuff.
I think the best part of the day was at dinner when I told Laylee and Magoo that some of our friends have asked the Easter Bunny not to visit their homes because they want to focus more on the Savior and what He did for us and less on the candy and treats. They looked horrified and then an analogy came to me.
Can you imagine if it was your birthday and some friends threw a huge party and celebrated and had treats and gave each other presents and food and played games but never looked at you or talked to you or wrote your name on the cake? Technically it was your birthday party but everyone there ignored you. This was shocking. I told them that for a lot of people that’s how they celebrate Easter and Christmas, not giving any thought to what the celebration was really about.
Laylee thought this was awful. But I explained. Maybe a lot of those people didn’t even know it was your birthday or that birthdays were even important. Maybe they just knew there was a celebration and thought it would be a great time to get together with family and friends to have a good time. But we know when your birthday is and why we’re celebrating so we need to make sure to celebrate for the right reasons. And we know what Easter’s for so we need to be sure to celebrate what really matters.
I think Laylee got it. Magoo was still clutching his snake and shoveling Marie Calendar’s pie into his grinning face. At least he knew that the answer to most of our serious questions today was “Jesus?” We’ll work on him some more next year.
I was lounging around on Sunday, napping upstairs in my room when Dan went downstairs to help the kids with something. An hour later, I wandered downstairs and found them like this:
Playing the eternal game that makes everyone cry but then beg for more.
The apron is because he had washed all the dishes before starting the game.
While he washed the dishes, he had them clean up their toys, using a game of Sorry as incentive.
I’m really starting to like this guy.