During the graduate school years, Kevin and I would go over to his sister’s house and play with his nieces who were at the time three and eight months. Yes, that would be the 16 year old and 13 year old of my Twilight fandom-I’m old. What I remember most about my sister in law’s house when she had little ones is that she had a lot of one specific thing. What was it? Diapers? Juice boxes? Caffeine and beer to save her sanity? Nope-she had batteries. Batteries of all shapes and sizes-double A, triple A, C, D, more choices than bra sizes. They were all over the house. There were batteries in the drawers, the cabinets, and on top of the mantle piece. I thought to myself, as the twenty four year old teacher and wife of a starving grad student who sometimes worked at coffee shops to support his habit, why oh why did they need all these batteries? It made no sense. We only had a hurricane once or twice a year as far as I could remember.
Then I had Frances, and I totally and completely got why she needed the batteries. Mothers need batteries from day one or four depending on if you have a c-section. The swing needed batteries, the bouncy seat, the baby monitor, the toys that flashed, and the little fishes that swam in the ocean aquarium in her crib needed batteries. One could argue that she was just spoiled from day one and that babies don’t need jack except love and attention, but this is my note.
Frances kind of outgrew a constant need for batteries. She loves her stuffed animals and her nursery rhymes, batteries not needed. Along comes Kenneth and everything needs a freaking battery. He told Santa he didn’t care what he brought as long as it had a remote control. So not only does the car or the robot or the dinosaur need a battery, but the “mission control” as he calls it needs batteries too, and they don’t all need the same batteries, so you have to make sure you have all of the different types just in case. Has anyone ever seen a variety pack of batteries for sale? I never have, does it exist? Where?
Kenneth is hard core about it. He knows if his toy needs a flat head or a Philips head screw driver (in Handy Manny terms that would be Turner or Felipe). He will wake us up with a toy, the batteries, and the correct screwdriver in his hands. Someone needs to have a talk with that boy about being the only early riser in this family while the other four of us sleep in-it must be a Scorpio thing. Someone should also have a talk with us about keeping our batteries and tools out of they way of a three year old’s hands.
My favorite times of the day are when we don’t have the right batteries. On the odd day that Frances does need them, if we don’t have them, you better believe a tantrum will break out until I can find the visuals for “batteries” and “grocery store.” Kenneth has a better answer for the problem. If whatever he wants to play with needs batteries and I’m out of them, he wanders through the house looking for other toys that have the batteries he needs, and yes he knows which toys take which batteries, and he brings me the toy to take the batteries out. I don’t think any of the flashlights, or the timers and buzzers for board games, or the alarm clocks or radios have batteries in them anymore. What could adults actually need batteries for anyway? Don’t answer that.
The holidays are over, but I’m telling you, batteries make or break a holiday season. What good is a remote control car if you can’t use it? I am willing to bet that on Christmas Eve all over the world stores could up the price on batteries to like 50$ a box and desperate parents would pay up regardless of the state of the economy. This reminds me, batteries were very expensive in both Ecuador and Spain. I can’t remember why, but I’m sure someone knows and will put the answer in my comments section.
I think that next year at Christmas time instead of buying toys I’ll go to Costco and buy lots and lots of batteries. Then I will go through the basement and the corners of the playroom and scoop up all the toys they haven’t played with because the batteries died and I didn’t replace them and they got bored waiting for me to do it. Then I’ll replace the batteries and give them their old things back for Christmas. It will be like they have new stuff!
Now “batteries” are on my grocery list as often as bread and milk. Trust me on this, if you are ever going to a baby shower and don’t know what to get, fill up a bag with batteries. All the cutesy-wootsy women who actually enjoy showers will smirk at you for your lack of cuteness when it comes to your gift because the new mommy to be is dying to have twenty onsies with matching receiving blankets. But remember, it is YOU the mommy is going to think of and be thankful for when the vibrating bouncy dies at 11:00 in the evening and the extra batteries are available to sooth her colicky baby. Mommy rule number one in my book: batteries-always have a house full.
Saturday, July 11, 2009
Batteries Should Always Be Included
Loving my imagination
I never thought I would have to wear makeup to watch television, but it has happened. I am five years into children’s programming at this point in my motherhood journey. I have gone through Bob the Builder, Thomas the Tank Engine, and The Wiggles. Especially the Wiggles. My daughter loves those Aussies more than I loved Heath Ledger. We did the whole Greg is sick and Sam has taken his place thing. She actually understood the “goodbye” video. Because I use my free time so wisely, my kids love to watch The Cockroaches videos I found on YouTube. Well, goodbye there mates. There are four new American men in Playhouse Disney town. What’s even better than four American men? Four southern American men!
Disney has launched a new program last fall. The four musicians are also “movers” dressed in mover uniforms: Mover Dave, Mover Scott, Mover Rich, and Mover Smitty. They sing and solve ideas creatively. They look NOTHING like the men who packed and moved my house, I can say that much. The goal of the show is to use your imagination to solve problems creatively, try several different ideas, and not give up. Each week they are faced with a new problem to solve. They work at an imagination warehouse that is inhabited by a cute little mouse. The office next door is owned by Knit-Knots and his niece works for him and visits the movers every show.
What makes them different from the Wiggles aside from their accents? Well, for one thing, their songs are a little bit catchier. It’s like they made a list of “Mommy nags” and wrote nifty songs about them. My particular favorites are “Cleaning My Room” and “Seven Days A Week.” They sing about brushing your teeth and sleeping in your own bed. They have a really cute song called “Brain Storming” and if I were still teaching in a brick and mortar school I would use it to teach writing. The Halloween one about the monster in the closet was good too. They are also able to nail tougher issues. I am going to be bold and say they did this as well as the late, great, Mr. Rogers. On their CD Juice Box Heroes, they have a phenomenal song dealing with Hurricane Katrina. I can't think of a better song dealing with trauma for children. I have seen Rush in concert three times, so I know my music.
The more you watch the show with your children, the more you notice that it is classic camp. John Waters would love it. Uncle Knit-Knots is over the top boring. He and his office are covered in beige. The plants are beige, his orange juice is beige, and the coffee pot is beige. The Movers plan a birthday party for him where they sing a slow song that sounds awful while he staples papers and blows a birthday candle out on a loaf of bread. Nina is kind of like their back-up singer or "pip." Her outfits are quite bright, someone needs to take her shopping. The warehouse itself is a trip. They have a room for whatever they need to solve their problems: a magnet room, an opposite room, and a wind room, to name a few. There are little “bridges” in between scenes of the guys dancing around in front of polka dot backdrops, which is reminiscent of Scooby-Doo and other 70’s shows. All of what I described sounds absolutely ridiculous, but I can’t stop laughing as I watch it.
The longer you watch it, the more little quirks notice. Scott appears to have no common sense. Dave is always inventing things and always misses the high five at the end. Rich is the voice of reason.
I did some googling on these guys. They started their band in 2003. Before that, Scott was an elementary school teacher and Smitty was a firefighter. Rich has five kids. Dave was an architect with no musical or acting training. They are from New Orleans and all but Smitty lost their home during Hurricane Katrina. In America, you really can be or do anything.
Every mommy has her favorite mover. Mine happens to be Scott and his special goggles. Other moms enjoy Dave with the red hat. I am sure some mom somewhere loves Smitty and the sensitivity he shows towards his little buddy mouse. He is also the “reader” with a journal to keep ideas in. As much as I love readers, I can’t get over his cowboy hat. Rich, whose southern accent makes me yearn for NC, uses his drumsticks to draw on the television screen. It reminds me of Uma Thurman telling John Travolta not to be a “square” by drawing it in the air before they enter Jack Rabbit Slim’s. Did I just use Pulp Fiction as an example? What kind of mother am I?
The Movers have definitely left their mark on our household. In the grocery store a week ago, when we got to the check out line, the cashier had a goatee and long hair. Frances started screaming, “Look Mommy look! It’s Mover Scott!” One night at bedtime Kenneth was going over which Mover played which instrument, and when he got to Scott I said the keyboard and Kenneth said, “No Mandolin” and I said, “No keyboard honey” and Kenneth kept saying it was the mandolin. I should have known better than to argue with my little musician. Sure enough, the next day, Scott was strumming a mandolin. Crap that kid gets me every time. I guess you can play more than one instrument. If the kids start crying about something frustrating, and I am not in such a hurry that I do it for them, I use my mover skills (“try again try again try again”-great song) and have them think of another way to solve it. I have to keep myself from laughing when they make faces like the movers do thinking of solutions.
The show is a lot of fun. I like it better than Higgly Town Heroes or The Little Einsteins. Here comes another “secrets of a bad mommy” confession, when my kids are being “high strung” (well, bad) I tell them if they don’t stop it I am going to make them watch Charlie and Lola. They both start crying, “No mommy! No!" There is our opinion on that show. Note I don’t say we will turn the television off. I’m awful.
My friend Claire once mentioned that you need a night out when The Imagination Movers start to look good to you. I say it is perfectly normal to want a mover, or even two. Worry when you are after a Doodle Bop. THEN you have a problem.
Disney has launched a new program last fall. The four musicians are also “movers” dressed in mover uniforms: Mover Dave, Mover Scott, Mover Rich, and Mover Smitty. They sing and solve ideas creatively. They look NOTHING like the men who packed and moved my house, I can say that much. The goal of the show is to use your imagination to solve problems creatively, try several different ideas, and not give up. Each week they are faced with a new problem to solve. They work at an imagination warehouse that is inhabited by a cute little mouse. The office next door is owned by Knit-Knots and his niece works for him and visits the movers every show.
What makes them different from the Wiggles aside from their accents? Well, for one thing, their songs are a little bit catchier. It’s like they made a list of “Mommy nags” and wrote nifty songs about them. My particular favorites are “Cleaning My Room” and “Seven Days A Week.” They sing about brushing your teeth and sleeping in your own bed. They have a really cute song called “Brain Storming” and if I were still teaching in a brick and mortar school I would use it to teach writing. The Halloween one about the monster in the closet was good too. They are also able to nail tougher issues. I am going to be bold and say they did this as well as the late, great, Mr. Rogers. On their CD Juice Box Heroes, they have a phenomenal song dealing with Hurricane Katrina. I can't think of a better song dealing with trauma for children. I have seen Rush in concert three times, so I know my music.
The more you watch the show with your children, the more you notice that it is classic camp. John Waters would love it. Uncle Knit-Knots is over the top boring. He and his office are covered in beige. The plants are beige, his orange juice is beige, and the coffee pot is beige. The Movers plan a birthday party for him where they sing a slow song that sounds awful while he staples papers and blows a birthday candle out on a loaf of bread. Nina is kind of like their back-up singer or "pip." Her outfits are quite bright, someone needs to take her shopping. The warehouse itself is a trip. They have a room for whatever they need to solve their problems: a magnet room, an opposite room, and a wind room, to name a few. There are little “bridges” in between scenes of the guys dancing around in front of polka dot backdrops, which is reminiscent of Scooby-Doo and other 70’s shows. All of what I described sounds absolutely ridiculous, but I can’t stop laughing as I watch it.
The longer you watch it, the more little quirks notice. Scott appears to have no common sense. Dave is always inventing things and always misses the high five at the end. Rich is the voice of reason.
I did some googling on these guys. They started their band in 2003. Before that, Scott was an elementary school teacher and Smitty was a firefighter. Rich has five kids. Dave was an architect with no musical or acting training. They are from New Orleans and all but Smitty lost their home during Hurricane Katrina. In America, you really can be or do anything.
Every mommy has her favorite mover. Mine happens to be Scott and his special goggles. Other moms enjoy Dave with the red hat. I am sure some mom somewhere loves Smitty and the sensitivity he shows towards his little buddy mouse. He is also the “reader” with a journal to keep ideas in. As much as I love readers, I can’t get over his cowboy hat. Rich, whose southern accent makes me yearn for NC, uses his drumsticks to draw on the television screen. It reminds me of Uma Thurman telling John Travolta not to be a “square” by drawing it in the air before they enter Jack Rabbit Slim’s. Did I just use Pulp Fiction as an example? What kind of mother am I?
The Movers have definitely left their mark on our household. In the grocery store a week ago, when we got to the check out line, the cashier had a goatee and long hair. Frances started screaming, “Look Mommy look! It’s Mover Scott!” One night at bedtime Kenneth was going over which Mover played which instrument, and when he got to Scott I said the keyboard and Kenneth said, “No Mandolin” and I said, “No keyboard honey” and Kenneth kept saying it was the mandolin. I should have known better than to argue with my little musician. Sure enough, the next day, Scott was strumming a mandolin. Crap that kid gets me every time. I guess you can play more than one instrument. If the kids start crying about something frustrating, and I am not in such a hurry that I do it for them, I use my mover skills (“try again try again try again”-great song) and have them think of another way to solve it. I have to keep myself from laughing when they make faces like the movers do thinking of solutions.
The show is a lot of fun. I like it better than Higgly Town Heroes or The Little Einsteins. Here comes another “secrets of a bad mommy” confession, when my kids are being “high strung” (well, bad) I tell them if they don’t stop it I am going to make them watch Charlie and Lola. They both start crying, “No mommy! No!" There is our opinion on that show. Note I don’t say we will turn the television off. I’m awful.
My friend Claire once mentioned that you need a night out when The Imagination Movers start to look good to you. I say it is perfectly normal to want a mover, or even two. Worry when you are after a Doodle Bop. THEN you have a problem.
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
Frank Black's Caps for Sale
Every now and then at bedtime, I like to pull out an oldie. This week, I found a copy of Caps for
My favorite show from 1996-1999 (even the third season) was Millennium. Frank Black was an ex-FBI agent with a supernatural ability to track down serial killers. He had a pure soul and worked to fight pure evil for the love of his wife Catherine and his daughter Jordan. In one scene in that show, he is reading Caps for Sale to
As I have said before, reading to my kids is a trip, and here is an example. I didn’t major in English, and so I am just going to write a dialogue like a play. P: Page, K: Kenneth, F: Frances. I am also going to paraphrase a little, for the sake of not writing a novel about a children’s book.
P: Once there was a peddler who sold caps.
K: Did he have a Steelers one?
P: No
K: Was there a baseball one?
P: No, he had his own checked cap, then a bunch of gray caps,
F: Where are his pinkalicious caps?
P: No pink
F: Purple?
K: No
F: Sorry….
P: Caps! Caps for sale! 50 cents a cap.
F: I don’t want one…
P: He began to feel very hungry, but he had no money for lunch.
K: Look at that church! I bet Father Tony lives there.
F: No lunch? Could he go to McDonald’s?
P: Do you see one in the picture?
K: How about peanut butter toast?
P: He came to a big tree, “That’s a nice place to rest.”
K: He didn’t notice when a bunch of monkeys took all his caps?
P: No
K: They didn’t make any noise?
P: It is just a story.
F: Keep going mommy.
K: I’ll do it. You Monkeys, you! Give me back those caps!
F: Isn’t he going to wash them? Monkeys have germs, the caps have germs. Does he have Purel?
K: and they bite!
P: Caps! Caps for sale! Fifty cents a cap!
K: He should call the zoo. Where did the monkeys come from?
Maybe we should stick to more mainstream traditional television fathers. I wonder what Mike Brady read to his kids….
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
The Last Grocery Straw
Everyone could write a story on the grocery store. My girlfriend Vittoria in Italy wrote one about her little girl Maggie announcing she had to use the bathroom in the middle of the local market. No one wants to go to the grocery store. Who would want to go there when you could go to Borders? Where would you rather go other than the grocery store? Would you rather take all of your kids to the grocery store, or would you rather go to the dentist? Seriously?
First off, let me tell you how I avoid it. There are three ways to go without kids, or at least all of your kids. The first, my three are in bed lights out asleep between seven and eight, and the grocery store closes at ten. So I can always go at night. This gets in the way of wearing my pajamas, but it is a possibility. The second way to do it is that I have a Thursday afternoon babysitter. This is the day that I scrub the bathrooms and change the sheets. I can go then too. The third way involves taking Lowell, but I can always go when the other two are at school. All three of these options are great, but sometimes I don’t want to spend my “Free” time, for lack of a better word, looking for specials on diet coke and chicken nuggets. So, when I want to spend my time other ways, all four of us go to the grocery store. Some people may be wondering why not leave all three with daddy and go? Ha ha ha. Anyway….
I had only one little baby when Desperate Housewives premiered. I had no idea what Lynette Scavo was going through, especially the scene when her boys send the grocery carts crashing into displays and all the cans topple to the floor. I also think they took out an old lady but I can’t be sure. My kids are not that bad. Yet. I know now why Felicity Huffman won that Emmy.
My rule number one in the grocery store is everyone strapped in. No one has free will in the grocery store. I don’t care if you are hungry, or you are thirsty, or you can walk. You have to sit and you have to be strapped in. Don’t let them act all cute and try to convince you that they are mature enough to walk and help you find what you need in the aisles. It doesn’t matter if you go to the cheap grocery store or the open air freshest of the fresh pesticide free market. Strap them in the cart or wrap them tight in the hippy funky baby carrier. What if they scream? Tune it out. How to tune it out? Well, I have Harry Potter and now Twilight all memorized in my head. Just remember some really good scenes as they scream for junk cereal. (If you give her immortality you are free to go and give my regards to my good friend Carlisle, but you will have to mean it… Mean it Edward, please mean it) or (Expecto Patronum… prongs, his patronus was his father…we love our children, we always protect them…) and yes, people are going to stare, and wonder how you stand it. But a lot of people are going envy your nerves of steel too.
If you can’t take the crying, I get it. There are days when I can’t take it either. All three of my monkeys have a special blankie. If you need the re-enforcement by all means drag it in the grocery store. Just be prepared to stay for hours looking for it if it gets lost. My brother dropped his in a frozen food section if I am not mistaken. My daughter has left several Disney Characters all over the store. They could call it Orlando and charge admission. Don’t be ashamed to go to lost and found and ask if anyone found your son’s tennis shoes either. They were there. Another good trick is the snack or candy routine. They say don’t bribe kids with food, I say do what you have to do to keep your sanity. Goldfish and animal crackers are the best, as my sister Britt will testify.
How do I handle it when they want something they see in the aisles and they aren’t going to get it? Well, you can just say no, and then replay a Twilight scene in your head (The Meadow, Italy, Esme’s Isle, repeat). Or you can lie. I have just decided that it is ok to lie to preschoolers. “No, we already have it at home.” “No, you won’t like it, it is yucky.” It works for me.
Now, you must remember that you have absolutely no control over the rest of the grocery store. I think this is where mommies lose it. There are going to be other people that either never had children or forgot what it was like to have children and they can’t wait for you to move out of their way. You are also going to hear some robot of a woman tell her kids something like, "We dont act that way, do we?" Ignore them, ignore them, ignore them. This is hard, and I don’t always follow my own advice.
Checking out is usually when we have the most fun. I have been known to get in line behind people who pay for something in pennies and hold up a line as the cashier counts them out. This grocery store in CT has a coin system where you get discounts on items when you turn your coins in. That means I have to keep up with the coins or dig through Vera looking for them while the line gets longer. Does anyone else unload the cart and realize things were at the bottom that weren’t scanned or that your son is holding something he randomly pulled off a shelf without your knowledge? Like a cup of ramen noodle soup? I am sure if I add up all that has been accidentally taken and subtract the number from the bags I accidentally left behind; the numbers would come out even.
It is not easy for any mom to load up the cart and the kids and find the car and unload the groceries and make sure all three kids are buckled. Plus she has to make sure the cart doesn’t go flying across the parking lot or that the kids don’t climb out of their seats and run away, or worse take the baby’s passy and hide it. We all do this all the time. I am not writing anything anyone doesn’t already know.
This is where my last straw comes in. I had a great trip to the store three days ago. No melt downs, no accidents, and I did fine checking out. I had four silver coins and ended up saving nineteen dollars total. Then they started screaming over what they were going to listen to in the car. I know, only in America do children fight over the CD in the car, but still, this is my story.
I get to the car and manage to hold on to the “fire truck” cart with all three kids and all the groceries. I get the baby, and the two screaming children inside. I did this all one handed to keep the cart from rolling away. Kenneth is jumping in and out of his seat, Frances is screaming “I want my daddy!” because he would let her listen to whatever she wanted, and then I try to throw bags in the trunk. This is a typical mommy trip to the grocery store.
THEN…I hear a voice behind me. “Excuse me. You dropped this.” I was thinking, oh how nice. Someone sees me with these kids and these groceries and is helping me. I turn around and he hands me a tissue. A TISSUE! The kids are screaming, the groceries are everywhere, and I am holding on to the fire truck cart so it won’t fly away and this guy hands me a tissue. THEN he says, “It’s wrong to throw trash on the ground. Don’t do it again.” and he walks off.
I was frozen in my place. I kept waiting for Ashton Kutcher to jump out from behind a car and tell me I was Punk’d. I promise all of you right now that I had no idea that the clean tissue had fallen out of my jacket or wherever. I was not trying to litter. The town of Guilford thanks him for telling me off. I am not blaming this incident on the north. There are jerks all over this great country of ours.
Like I said, a grocery store note is nothing new. Everyone has these days. When you are having a day, I hope all of you go out of your way to throw trash on the ground in the process. You know we have time to make those plans. How else are we going to entertain ourselves? Oh yeah, The Imagination Movers….
First off, let me tell you how I avoid it. There are three ways to go without kids, or at least all of your kids. The first, my three are in bed lights out asleep between seven and eight, and the grocery store closes at ten. So I can always go at night. This gets in the way of wearing my pajamas, but it is a possibility. The second way to do it is that I have a Thursday afternoon babysitter. This is the day that I scrub the bathrooms and change the sheets. I can go then too. The third way involves taking Lowell, but I can always go when the other two are at school. All three of these options are great, but sometimes I don’t want to spend my “Free” time, for lack of a better word, looking for specials on diet coke and chicken nuggets. So, when I want to spend my time other ways, all four of us go to the grocery store. Some people may be wondering why not leave all three with daddy and go? Ha ha ha. Anyway….
I had only one little baby when Desperate Housewives premiered. I had no idea what Lynette Scavo was going through, especially the scene when her boys send the grocery carts crashing into displays and all the cans topple to the floor. I also think they took out an old lady but I can’t be sure. My kids are not that bad. Yet. I know now why Felicity Huffman won that Emmy.
My rule number one in the grocery store is everyone strapped in. No one has free will in the grocery store. I don’t care if you are hungry, or you are thirsty, or you can walk. You have to sit and you have to be strapped in. Don’t let them act all cute and try to convince you that they are mature enough to walk and help you find what you need in the aisles. It doesn’t matter if you go to the cheap grocery store or the open air freshest of the fresh pesticide free market. Strap them in the cart or wrap them tight in the hippy funky baby carrier. What if they scream? Tune it out. How to tune it out? Well, I have Harry Potter and now Twilight all memorized in my head. Just remember some really good scenes as they scream for junk cereal. (If you give her immortality you are free to go and give my regards to my good friend Carlisle, but you will have to mean it… Mean it Edward, please mean it) or (Expecto Patronum… prongs, his patronus was his father…we love our children, we always protect them…) and yes, people are going to stare, and wonder how you stand it. But a lot of people are going envy your nerves of steel too.
If you can’t take the crying, I get it. There are days when I can’t take it either. All three of my monkeys have a special blankie. If you need the re-enforcement by all means drag it in the grocery store. Just be prepared to stay for hours looking for it if it gets lost. My brother dropped his in a frozen food section if I am not mistaken. My daughter has left several Disney Characters all over the store. They could call it Orlando and charge admission. Don’t be ashamed to go to lost and found and ask if anyone found your son’s tennis shoes either. They were there. Another good trick is the snack or candy routine. They say don’t bribe kids with food, I say do what you have to do to keep your sanity. Goldfish and animal crackers are the best, as my sister Britt will testify.
How do I handle it when they want something they see in the aisles and they aren’t going to get it? Well, you can just say no, and then replay a Twilight scene in your head (The Meadow, Italy, Esme’s Isle, repeat). Or you can lie. I have just decided that it is ok to lie to preschoolers. “No, we already have it at home.” “No, you won’t like it, it is yucky.” It works for me.
Now, you must remember that you have absolutely no control over the rest of the grocery store. I think this is where mommies lose it. There are going to be other people that either never had children or forgot what it was like to have children and they can’t wait for you to move out of their way. You are also going to hear some robot of a woman tell her kids something like, "We dont act that way, do we?" Ignore them, ignore them, ignore them. This is hard, and I don’t always follow my own advice.
Checking out is usually when we have the most fun. I have been known to get in line behind people who pay for something in pennies and hold up a line as the cashier counts them out. This grocery store in CT has a coin system where you get discounts on items when you turn your coins in. That means I have to keep up with the coins or dig through Vera looking for them while the line gets longer. Does anyone else unload the cart and realize things were at the bottom that weren’t scanned or that your son is holding something he randomly pulled off a shelf without your knowledge? Like a cup of ramen noodle soup? I am sure if I add up all that has been accidentally taken and subtract the number from the bags I accidentally left behind; the numbers would come out even.
It is not easy for any mom to load up the cart and the kids and find the car and unload the groceries and make sure all three kids are buckled. Plus she has to make sure the cart doesn’t go flying across the parking lot or that the kids don’t climb out of their seats and run away, or worse take the baby’s passy and hide it. We all do this all the time. I am not writing anything anyone doesn’t already know.
This is where my last straw comes in. I had a great trip to the store three days ago. No melt downs, no accidents, and I did fine checking out. I had four silver coins and ended up saving nineteen dollars total. Then they started screaming over what they were going to listen to in the car. I know, only in America do children fight over the CD in the car, but still, this is my story.
I get to the car and manage to hold on to the “fire truck” cart with all three kids and all the groceries. I get the baby, and the two screaming children inside. I did this all one handed to keep the cart from rolling away. Kenneth is jumping in and out of his seat, Frances is screaming “I want my daddy!” because he would let her listen to whatever she wanted, and then I try to throw bags in the trunk. This is a typical mommy trip to the grocery store.
THEN…I hear a voice behind me. “Excuse me. You dropped this.” I was thinking, oh how nice. Someone sees me with these kids and these groceries and is helping me. I turn around and he hands me a tissue. A TISSUE! The kids are screaming, the groceries are everywhere, and I am holding on to the fire truck cart so it won’t fly away and this guy hands me a tissue. THEN he says, “It’s wrong to throw trash on the ground. Don’t do it again.” and he walks off.
I was frozen in my place. I kept waiting for Ashton Kutcher to jump out from behind a car and tell me I was Punk’d. I promise all of you right now that I had no idea that the clean tissue had fallen out of my jacket or wherever. I was not trying to litter. The town of Guilford thanks him for telling me off. I am not blaming this incident on the north. There are jerks all over this great country of ours.
Like I said, a grocery store note is nothing new. Everyone has these days. When you are having a day, I hope all of you go out of your way to throw trash on the ground in the process. You know we have time to make those plans. How else are we going to entertain ourselves? Oh yeah, The Imagination Movers….
Happy Birthday to the Mommy
Let me start of by saying I am trying not to be a big, fat hypocrite. I play the birthday party game. You can call it guilt. Mommy works guilt, you have issues and they are my fault guilt, or my favorite, Mommy and Daddy went to Paris on your birthday so we gave you a great big Little Gym party the weekend before, guilt. But I have done birthday parties. I didn’t have to play the birthday game this year because we moved, so each kid got a special trip to the bakery and picked out their own cupcake. (No, you thought I made the cake.) Birthdays are all about the mommy, at least until the child is ten. This is like the Halloween costume competition. What can she put together to impress the other mommies and how quickly can she make her little darling happy.
Frances, being the first child, has had three. She had a family party when she turned one and even my grandparents drove from Winston-Salem to be there. The first birthday of the first child is more of a “High five! We did it!” kind of party. The second year she had another family party, only it was a tad bit smaller as I was very pregnant with Kenneth. Year three was at the Little Gym three days before Kevin and I went to Paris ALONE. Year four was the best. We had a petting zoo in the front yard of our Pittsburgh house and people on the street were stopping to ask how much it cost to participate. I could have charged strangers five bucks a piece and made a profit.
On the other hand, Kenneth, having just turned three, has not really had a birthday party yet. We had his grandparents over for his first birthday, and for his second birthday he went to the new and improved dinosaur exhibit that had just opened in Pittsburgh. We had just moved here for his third, so I didn’t know the other moms well enough to have a party for him. He had a lot of fun playing with his train set and eating his Spiderman cupcake with his brother and sister.
Lowell hasn’t had a birthday yet, so we will see what happens. I will say that it is kind of cool to have one baby with a summer birthday, which means I get to plan a pool party eventually.
Now, my name is not Oprah and I don’t have a book club, but if you have time to put down your Twilight books, pick up one by Jennifer Weiner. All of her books make me laugh out loud, and if I am laughing, you know she is funny. If you are in toddler or preschool mommy mode, the one to read is Goodnight Nobody. The main character is a woman named Kate who is a stay at home mom to her three children in a suburb in Connecticut where all the other mommies are posh and put together. She describes a birthday party experience in her town. Now, first, here is her birthday party for her twins:
“Everybody seemed to have a good time, although I did notice that the other Upchurch mothers were keeping their kids away from the Cheez Doodles as if they were severed fingers and asking lots of questions about whether there were artificial dyes in the punch. I saw a few kids staring at our back yard asking where the pony rides were, or when the men were coming to set up the bouncy castle. I figured they were kidding. They weren’t (p.21, Weiner).”
She and her husband take all of their kids to another child’s party two weeks later, and it looks like this:
“It was held at the Upchurch Inn, and it featured a catered spread with a smoked fish buffet, a sushi chef, and a life-sized ice sculpture of the birthday boy. …. The father, a sports agent, had set up a half-sized basketball court in the parking lot and had somehow prevailed upon the entire starting lineup of the Knicks to make the trip to the suburbs and play H-O-R-S-E with the party guests. And lose (p.21, Weiner)."
I read this book four years ago when I was pregnant with Kenneth. Kevin was at Duke and there he was going to stay. I thought this Connecticut lifestyle was a joke when I read her words sitting on my front porch in Fuquay-Varina North Carolina. Five years later I am indeed living in Connecticut and my son came home with a party favor bag filled with real gourmet candy and a ten dollar gift card to the book store. Yeah, Pagie will be kicking it up a notch in the birthday party department.
This year I have decided that, at least the older two, will have a birthday party. The planned babies both have fall birthdays. So Frances is going to have some kind of Halloween theme party. I don’t think anyone in Connecticut is going to have a problem with this. Kenneth is November 20th. Should I plan a Thanksgiving party? Come dressed as a pilgrim or a Native American? We can run around the backyard chasing each other with muskets and hatchets, like that scene in the Adams Family with a pre-indie film career Cristina Ricci. Then they can sit down to turkey and sweet potatoes and pumpkin pie that I am going to have to order from the gourmet whole foods shop (I know you didn’t think I was going to make it.) Then they can each make a take home cornucopia. Hey, this is New England after all.
Birthday parties have also got a bit of paranoia about them. Gymnastics parties and those parties at those blowup and jump places must have a signed waiver before your child can participate. You can find all kinds of news reports online about freak accidents at birthday parties. Some kid somewhere choked on the cake, tripped over the coffee table looking for the donkey to pin the tail on, and then got hit in the eye with a piece of candy flying through the air when the piñata was smashed. Alfred Hitchcock played that up. The first time I saw The Birds was actually at Angela Goode’s birthday slumber party. All those little kids were attacked by birds amongst the cake, ice-cream, and presents. Fortunately or unfortunately depending on how you view it, old Alfred made it look incredibly real and possible. The memory of that would keep me from sending my kids to a birthday party for maybe fifteen minutes, until I realized I would have to come up with something else to entertain them with for the rest of the afternoon. A little bird peck or my free time, which one is more important?
The traditional birthday party diet and activities are changing too. It used to just be cake and ice-cream. Now you have a fight over who is on the cake. We have had Spiderman, Shrek, and the Wiggles to date. I have a feeling Diego will be making an appearance soon. You also have to put out all kinds of snacks and make sure they are healthier than Doritos and M&Ms. And the poor piñata! As a Spanish teacher, I can say this. The piñata used to be made of clay. You are blindfolded, given the stick, and then turned THREE times before you get to walk toward where you think the piñata is and start whacking. Then candy and clay pieces would go flying through the air. Later the clay was replaced with papier-mâché and I have no complaints about that. Now they make happy non-violent piñatas where everyone pulls a string and the candy falls out. Read my mind on that one.
There are certain stores that will allow a child to register for birthday presents. I don’t think so. My kids would just go through the store and throw everything in the “wish basket.” No. We will not be registering for a party. Ever. In the ‘80s when I was the one going to all the birthday parties, it was cool to get stationary, lots and lots of stationary with cute little pens, erasers, and stickers. Who was I writing to on all of this stationary? I did go to camp for four weeks every summer, but that was it. Did we pass notes on stationary? We must have. And you had to write it with the matching pen and seal it with a sticker. What has taken the place of the staionary? Kenneth picked out a Polly Pocket last time we went for a gift. I don’t know if this is tacky or not, but I always include the gift receipt. Another memory I shouldn’t have is from the book, Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing, when Fudge got a third copy of a book he already had and threw it across the room and made the kid cry. So, to avoid a tantrum and hurt feelings, the gift receipt is taped right there for the other mom to see. Other than that, remember to include a set of batteries if they aren’t included in the gift.
I like the Spanish traditions when it comes to birthday parties. The whole family and all the friends and neighbors are packed in the apartment flat or the country house compound. Everyone is eating, drinking, singing, and watching soccer. The kids are running around crazy, and it goes all night long.
I’ll end this with party “themes.” Certain things are sacred unless you do them correctly. We are not having a Harry Potter party ever. I will just get mad. If she asks for a princess party, we are not going to do it Disney Style, but Brothers Grimm. And if Kenneth wants pirates, Frances has an awesome book my brother bought her all about the female pirates, Booty, so she can be included too. One request: please, Frances, please don’t want a party at the beauty parlor. It goes against everything mommy stands for.
How about a party at Cup-A-Joe on Hillsborough Street? Everyone can play cards, write a poem to read on the open mic, and they get to take home ½ pound of Dave’s best Colombian as their party favor. I have a feeling it might just be us and the Cowans. Maybe Clyda will let Tate and Mia come too.
Frances, being the first child, has had three. She had a family party when she turned one and even my grandparents drove from Winston-Salem to be there. The first birthday of the first child is more of a “High five! We did it!” kind of party. The second year she had another family party, only it was a tad bit smaller as I was very pregnant with Kenneth. Year three was at the Little Gym three days before Kevin and I went to Paris ALONE. Year four was the best. We had a petting zoo in the front yard of our Pittsburgh house and people on the street were stopping to ask how much it cost to participate. I could have charged strangers five bucks a piece and made a profit.
On the other hand, Kenneth, having just turned three, has not really had a birthday party yet. We had his grandparents over for his first birthday, and for his second birthday he went to the new and improved dinosaur exhibit that had just opened in Pittsburgh. We had just moved here for his third, so I didn’t know the other moms well enough to have a party for him. He had a lot of fun playing with his train set and eating his Spiderman cupcake with his brother and sister.
Lowell hasn’t had a birthday yet, so we will see what happens. I will say that it is kind of cool to have one baby with a summer birthday, which means I get to plan a pool party eventually.
Now, my name is not Oprah and I don’t have a book club, but if you have time to put down your Twilight books, pick up one by Jennifer Weiner. All of her books make me laugh out loud, and if I am laughing, you know she is funny. If you are in toddler or preschool mommy mode, the one to read is Goodnight Nobody. The main character is a woman named Kate who is a stay at home mom to her three children in a suburb in Connecticut where all the other mommies are posh and put together. She describes a birthday party experience in her town. Now, first, here is her birthday party for her twins:
“Everybody seemed to have a good time, although I did notice that the other Upchurch mothers were keeping their kids away from the Cheez Doodles as if they were severed fingers and asking lots of questions about whether there were artificial dyes in the punch. I saw a few kids staring at our back yard asking where the pony rides were, or when the men were coming to set up the bouncy castle. I figured they were kidding. They weren’t (p.21, Weiner).”
She and her husband take all of their kids to another child’s party two weeks later, and it looks like this:
“It was held at the Upchurch Inn, and it featured a catered spread with a smoked fish buffet, a sushi chef, and a life-sized ice sculpture of the birthday boy. …. The father, a sports agent, had set up a half-sized basketball court in the parking lot and had somehow prevailed upon the entire starting lineup of the Knicks to make the trip to the suburbs and play H-O-R-S-E with the party guests. And lose (p.21, Weiner)."
I read this book four years ago when I was pregnant with Kenneth. Kevin was at Duke and there he was going to stay. I thought this Connecticut lifestyle was a joke when I read her words sitting on my front porch in Fuquay-Varina North Carolina. Five years later I am indeed living in Connecticut and my son came home with a party favor bag filled with real gourmet candy and a ten dollar gift card to the book store. Yeah, Pagie will be kicking it up a notch in the birthday party department.
This year I have decided that, at least the older two, will have a birthday party. The planned babies both have fall birthdays. So Frances is going to have some kind of Halloween theme party. I don’t think anyone in Connecticut is going to have a problem with this. Kenneth is November 20th. Should I plan a Thanksgiving party? Come dressed as a pilgrim or a Native American? We can run around the backyard chasing each other with muskets and hatchets, like that scene in the Adams Family with a pre-indie film career Cristina Ricci. Then they can sit down to turkey and sweet potatoes and pumpkin pie that I am going to have to order from the gourmet whole foods shop (I know you didn’t think I was going to make it.) Then they can each make a take home cornucopia. Hey, this is New England after all.
Birthday parties have also got a bit of paranoia about them. Gymnastics parties and those parties at those blowup and jump places must have a signed waiver before your child can participate. You can find all kinds of news reports online about freak accidents at birthday parties. Some kid somewhere choked on the cake, tripped over the coffee table looking for the donkey to pin the tail on, and then got hit in the eye with a piece of candy flying through the air when the piñata was smashed. Alfred Hitchcock played that up. The first time I saw The Birds was actually at Angela Goode’s birthday slumber party. All those little kids were attacked by birds amongst the cake, ice-cream, and presents. Fortunately or unfortunately depending on how you view it, old Alfred made it look incredibly real and possible. The memory of that would keep me from sending my kids to a birthday party for maybe fifteen minutes, until I realized I would have to come up with something else to entertain them with for the rest of the afternoon. A little bird peck or my free time, which one is more important?
The traditional birthday party diet and activities are changing too. It used to just be cake and ice-cream. Now you have a fight over who is on the cake. We have had Spiderman, Shrek, and the Wiggles to date. I have a feeling Diego will be making an appearance soon. You also have to put out all kinds of snacks and make sure they are healthier than Doritos and M&Ms. And the poor piñata! As a Spanish teacher, I can say this. The piñata used to be made of clay. You are blindfolded, given the stick, and then turned THREE times before you get to walk toward where you think the piñata is and start whacking. Then candy and clay pieces would go flying through the air. Later the clay was replaced with papier-mâché and I have no complaints about that. Now they make happy non-violent piñatas where everyone pulls a string and the candy falls out. Read my mind on that one.
There are certain stores that will allow a child to register for birthday presents. I don’t think so. My kids would just go through the store and throw everything in the “wish basket.” No. We will not be registering for a party. Ever. In the ‘80s when I was the one going to all the birthday parties, it was cool to get stationary, lots and lots of stationary with cute little pens, erasers, and stickers. Who was I writing to on all of this stationary? I did go to camp for four weeks every summer, but that was it. Did we pass notes on stationary? We must have. And you had to write it with the matching pen and seal it with a sticker. What has taken the place of the staionary? Kenneth picked out a Polly Pocket last time we went for a gift. I don’t know if this is tacky or not, but I always include the gift receipt. Another memory I shouldn’t have is from the book, Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing, when Fudge got a third copy of a book he already had and threw it across the room and made the kid cry. So, to avoid a tantrum and hurt feelings, the gift receipt is taped right there for the other mom to see. Other than that, remember to include a set of batteries if they aren’t included in the gift.
I like the Spanish traditions when it comes to birthday parties. The whole family and all the friends and neighbors are packed in the apartment flat or the country house compound. Everyone is eating, drinking, singing, and watching soccer. The kids are running around crazy, and it goes all night long.
I’ll end this with party “themes.” Certain things are sacred unless you do them correctly. We are not having a Harry Potter party ever. I will just get mad. If she asks for a princess party, we are not going to do it Disney Style, but Brothers Grimm. And if Kenneth wants pirates, Frances has an awesome book my brother bought her all about the female pirates, Booty, so she can be included too. One request: please, Frances, please don’t want a party at the beauty parlor. It goes against everything mommy stands for.
How about a party at Cup-A-Joe on Hillsborough Street? Everyone can play cards, write a poem to read on the open mic, and they get to take home ½ pound of Dave’s best Colombian as their party favor. I have a feeling it might just be us and the Cowans. Maybe Clyda will let Tate and Mia come too.
Reading Mommy Style
Nothing is better than snuggling up with all three of them around me and reading to them. It makes me feel like no matter what else happens during the day, we will always end on a calm note. Frances broke the refrigerator shelf trying to eat a stick of butter. Kenneth jumped off the couch playing Tarzan with a jump rope. Lowell tried to eat a Barbie doll leg. But when they beg me to read “In the Night Kitchen,” it is all worth it. When we follow it up with “Where the Wild Things Are,” I know that I am one of many moms who will always have Maurice Sendak to thank for the bedtime routine and heaven for about five minutes. You all know a loop hole is coming. A big one, right now.
Reading to the three of them is literally a three ring circus. It takes a good fifteen minutes to decide what we are going to read, and another five on which book is first. Frances wants letter books. She loves letter books. She could care less about stories where a paper bag princess realizes she is engaged to a bum and dances off in the sunset. We have two sets of books about letters and she has them memorized. She can recognize some site words, and if I make a mistake or forget something, she can correct me. She is also obsessed with nursery rhymes. When I say nursery rhymes, I mean all nursery rhymes and their various versions and the alternate endings and the verses no one else knows. For example, after he fell, Jack went home to mend his head with vinegar and brown paper. We could go on who wants to be a millionaire nursery rhyme edition and walk away without using a lifeline. She likes repetition, visuals, and a routine in her story time.
Kenneth needs real stories, preferably with some action. He also feels the need to ask a million questions during a reading. For example, he was very skeptical about Little Red Riding Hood. I put some of it in a status once, but here is the dialogue that took place:
“Mom, that is not a Grandma. That is a wolf.”
“He is wearing a disguise.”
“It isn’t a good disguise. I can see that it is a wolf.”
“Kenneth it’s a story.”
“OK, keep going.”
“Grandma, what big eyes you have.”
“And then he eats her.”
“No, Kenneth, then the wolf says, All the better to see you with my dear.”
“Why would he say anything? He is a wolf, he should just eat her.”
And so it went mixing what he knows from Animal Planet with what I am trying to read to him from fairy tales.
Lowell is still in the “board books are good for your gums” mode. That is fine. He loves to just be in the room and laugh. The other two love reading to him and making sure he gets it. That is fun to watch.
Children’s books have come a long way since Curious George. Some of their favorites I don’t think my grandmother could have read to them, I can’t see G.G. reading “Walter the Farting Dog” or “Stinky Cheese Man and other Fairly Stupid Tales.” I am not kidding when I think she rolls over in her grave at least twice a week by what goes on around here.
When they get on a topic, they want to check every book they can find out of the library on the subject. Right now, it’s Venus Flytraps. We have all of the library books just on this carnivorous plant, and we have read them. They both sit still to learn about how this little plant eats bugs. We have also watched several Youtube videos of this plant eating spiders, flies, and once it tried to eat a frog. They both seem to understand that they are too big for a Venus Flytrap to eat, thank goodness. The cool thing about this is that I learn something new. I took one science course in college, and now I get to go back and learn more. For example, the Flytrap needs nitrates from the insect’s body because it grows in bog soil. Each leaf set can eat three bugs, and then the leaves turn black and fall off.
When Kenneth found out they grow in NC, he said, “Mama! That’s where I was born.” (I wanted to say, no kidding, but I didn’t.) He is mad we moved because he used to live where the Flytraps grow. Now I can add “Has Venus Flytraps” to my list of pros for the south, of course here lately the bogs are being drained for pig farms.
I have tried very hard to indoctrinate “books” into them. They each have a shelf in their room of books. They have books in the playroom and books in the bathroom. They get books for their birthdays, Christmas, and in their Easter Basket. We go to the library once a week just like all the other good mommies. I could write yet another novel on library behavior, but I will just share this one story. Once during story time, the hippy librarians, not to be confused with the little old lady librarians, were doing a felt board of “There was an old lady who swallowed a fly.” I loved that song as a kid! No one told me that now she cries instead of dies, oops. But I mean really, that is up there with Grandma being confused with a wolf. How is she going to eat all that and live?
I remember when I was pregnant with Frances; I made a list of all my favorite books that I was going to read to her as she got bigger. Yes, I read to my stomach-Harry Potter, big surprise. I did not have the luxury of reading to the other two in the womb, but maybe they were listening when I read to their siblings. I love it that they love some of the ones I used to love. Right now they are in to “Pinkalicious,” Dr. Seuss’s “Hop on Pop,” and the letter “I.” It changes from week to week.
I wonder if I wouldn’t read to my kids if it weren’t for all those actors in the commercials on television telling me to read to my kids. It must be because the cast of Will and Grace shamed me into it most definitely. Once Frances had her Bible story book out, and I really felt like Miss Wonderful Supermom when I thought she was looking at that, until I heard her flip to pictures of David the Shepherd and she started singing, “Baa Baa Black sheep…” oh crap. There goes my grandmother again.
Reading to the three of them is literally a three ring circus. It takes a good fifteen minutes to decide what we are going to read, and another five on which book is first. Frances wants letter books. She loves letter books. She could care less about stories where a paper bag princess realizes she is engaged to a bum and dances off in the sunset. We have two sets of books about letters and she has them memorized. She can recognize some site words, and if I make a mistake or forget something, she can correct me. She is also obsessed with nursery rhymes. When I say nursery rhymes, I mean all nursery rhymes and their various versions and the alternate endings and the verses no one else knows. For example, after he fell, Jack went home to mend his head with vinegar and brown paper. We could go on who wants to be a millionaire nursery rhyme edition and walk away without using a lifeline. She likes repetition, visuals, and a routine in her story time.
Kenneth needs real stories, preferably with some action. He also feels the need to ask a million questions during a reading. For example, he was very skeptical about Little Red Riding Hood. I put some of it in a status once, but here is the dialogue that took place:
“Mom, that is not a Grandma. That is a wolf.”
“He is wearing a disguise.”
“It isn’t a good disguise. I can see that it is a wolf.”
“Kenneth it’s a story.”
“OK, keep going.”
“Grandma, what big eyes you have.”
“And then he eats her.”
“No, Kenneth, then the wolf says, All the better to see you with my dear.”
“Why would he say anything? He is a wolf, he should just eat her.”
And so it went mixing what he knows from Animal Planet with what I am trying to read to him from fairy tales.
Lowell is still in the “board books are good for your gums” mode. That is fine. He loves to just be in the room and laugh. The other two love reading to him and making sure he gets it. That is fun to watch.
Children’s books have come a long way since Curious George. Some of their favorites I don’t think my grandmother could have read to them, I can’t see G.G. reading “Walter the Farting Dog” or “Stinky Cheese Man and other Fairly Stupid Tales.” I am not kidding when I think she rolls over in her grave at least twice a week by what goes on around here.
When they get on a topic, they want to check every book they can find out of the library on the subject. Right now, it’s Venus Flytraps. We have all of the library books just on this carnivorous plant, and we have read them. They both sit still to learn about how this little plant eats bugs. We have also watched several Youtube videos of this plant eating spiders, flies, and once it tried to eat a frog. They both seem to understand that they are too big for a Venus Flytrap to eat, thank goodness. The cool thing about this is that I learn something new. I took one science course in college, and now I get to go back and learn more. For example, the Flytrap needs nitrates from the insect’s body because it grows in bog soil. Each leaf set can eat three bugs, and then the leaves turn black and fall off.
When Kenneth found out they grow in NC, he said, “Mama! That’s where I was born.” (I wanted to say, no kidding, but I didn’t.) He is mad we moved because he used to live where the Flytraps grow. Now I can add “Has Venus Flytraps” to my list of pros for the south, of course here lately the bogs are being drained for pig farms.
I have tried very hard to indoctrinate “books” into them. They each have a shelf in their room of books. They have books in the playroom and books in the bathroom. They get books for their birthdays, Christmas, and in their Easter Basket. We go to the library once a week just like all the other good mommies. I could write yet another novel on library behavior, but I will just share this one story. Once during story time, the hippy librarians, not to be confused with the little old lady librarians, were doing a felt board of “There was an old lady who swallowed a fly.” I loved that song as a kid! No one told me that now she cries instead of dies, oops. But I mean really, that is up there with Grandma being confused with a wolf. How is she going to eat all that and live?
I remember when I was pregnant with Frances; I made a list of all my favorite books that I was going to read to her as she got bigger. Yes, I read to my stomach-Harry Potter, big surprise. I did not have the luxury of reading to the other two in the womb, but maybe they were listening when I read to their siblings. I love it that they love some of the ones I used to love. Right now they are in to “Pinkalicious,” Dr. Seuss’s “Hop on Pop,” and the letter “I.” It changes from week to week.
I wonder if I wouldn’t read to my kids if it weren’t for all those actors in the commercials on television telling me to read to my kids. It must be because the cast of Will and Grace shamed me into it most definitely. Once Frances had her Bible story book out, and I really felt like Miss Wonderful Supermom when I thought she was looking at that, until I heard her flip to pictures of David the Shepherd and she started singing, “Baa Baa Black sheep…” oh crap. There goes my grandmother again.
Oldies but Goodies
I am moving some old posts from Facebook over here. Mostly because I am not convinced about their policies on what is and what is not Facebook property. If you have one you want to see here, let me know and I will add it.
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