grrlTravels

Misc scientific bits about Halloween

I spent the day conducting a scientific experiment to determine scientifically which I like better: Twix or Kit Kats (yes, even with the "K"). A random sample was procured and a blind taste test ensued. I can say with 90% accuracy plus or minus 10 pounds that I like chocolate. Seriously, I must get over myself. Although K. was sternly instructed before I left for therapy to Get. Rid. Of. All. Of. The. Candy. he failed in his mission. His slip up is fodder for my laboratory investigations continuing forthwith. Unfortunately. But in the name of furthering the universal pool of knowledge.

E. declared that he wanted to a witch. Then a pumpkin. K. was instructed to make E. think that he wanted to be either a cowboy or a pirate. Cowboy it was. We went to the fabric store and patterns were found, fabric purchased. E. then declared that Secret Agent was it. And Thus, Secret Agent it was.

I love my boy. Secret Agent is the EASIEST costume ever. We got so into it that Z. was a secret agent too, and we all matched while we handed out the candy. Of course it wasn't clear to everyone that E. was a secret agent, as secret agents tend to look a lot like cat burglars. Or yuppie hipsters. See for yourself.

The light was crappy today. It kept messing with my photos. Everything was SUNNY and GLARE-Y and BLOWN OUT and BRIGHT. Stinkin sunny day. And it was warm too.

Empirical evidence suggests that children can have a psuedo-sugar-enduced melt down on candy laden holidays whether or not they consume actual particles of suger. Consider yourself warned.

Secret agents need a break too. It can't be all gathering clues and dangerous liasons and sneaking into secure buildings. Sometimes it is just lounging in the front yard watching the world go by.

Happy Sugar Buzz to you!!

Z. is 3

Z. is three. Her big milestones are generally bittersweet for me, and this one is no exception. Not much has changed with our little Z. She walks. She has a pretty good "f" sound and some new words. She likes to climb into E.'s car seat. There are the ongoing issues and the passivity and the question marks. There is Z., our Z. And now she is three.

This week for no good reason I am feeling hopeful about things, and so I snuggled with Z. and we played and sang and read books and ate yogurt and ice cream and had a dance party. If I hadn't been raining we would have made some time to swing. It was a Z. kind of day. It was a good day. She seemed as happy as she seems.

I do not have it in me to obsess on this day we celebrate her birth. I am thankful that she was born. I wonder about her first mother, her first father, and I feel the loss that adoption brings. I don't know if Z. feels the loss today, but I feel it for her, my version of it anyway. I love her for her as she is right now. I get myself as close to her level and I can and I just...am. Her mother. The best mother I can be today. Loving her as much as I can love her.

Happy Birthday Z.! Thank you for being the sweet, affectionate, silly, deteremined girl you are. May the next year hold many good things, many happy days, much growth, much contentment.

And now a word from the birthday girl herself.

(click to listen)

Me: "What's today, Z.?"
Z.: "Happy Birthday, BaBa."
Me: "Hey Z., can you sing Happy Birthday?"
Z.: (sings)

She spent all day saying "Happy Birthday BaBa" because it was just K.'s birthday and we had spent a lot of time saying just that. No matter how many times we said, "No, Happy Birthday Z.!" she is still wishing K. a happy day.

I make good for once

My parents never really liked to play with us. We spent a lot of time together as a family, but not much of it was spent playing. As a child I used to wonder why my mother refused to play with us most times, and now that I have my own children I know. Playing is pretty dull a lot of the time. I do try to play with my kids, but some days I think a lobotomy is the only answer to 90% of the games my children own. I also have a growing list of things I don't play which includes hide and seek, anything to do with Play Doh, and legos. (I like legos, but they don't like me.)

We do have our favorites here. E. came up with "Flea Market" all on his own, and my passion for other people's junk extends to my son offering me random bits from the playroom. (Mommy, do you want this car for $1 or this thing [random piece of plastic that doesn't seem to go with anything in the house]? It's $400.) Catch is good for wasting an hour or so. Hide the <insert name of closest seasonal object here> whiles away the hours as well. (Right now it is pumpkins; soon to be turkeys.) Many of my favorite games involve a lot of me sitting, and the kids going back and forth, the more back-and-forthing, the better.

The one game my parents would play with us was restaurant. They liked it because all they had to do was sit on the couch and pretend to order food, and on a good day it could waste hours. We would take the order (with some negotiating) and head off into the other room to draw and cut out the food. Much later we would return to present the food with much fanfare. The memories are so good that my children have many sets of plastic dishes and more plastic food than is strictly necessary. Both houses are stocked. I'm getting a bit tired of the plastic chicken legs and the unadorned hamburger patty, which happen to be the favorites of E. and Z. But I never tire of playing restaurant.

So when I was trying to think of something to make for the Half the Sky auction I considered aprons, because they are easy and quick to sew (if you aren't me, that is) and popular right now. I wanted to do some aprons for kids, and eventually I settled on doing a few aprons which are perfect for pretend play. Sadly my aprons weren't ready for the start of the auction, but happily I finished them yesterday and listed them today.

Make your kids play restaurant! Do it!

Support Half the Sky! Rah! Rah!

The auction has begun. The items donated to Half the Sky will be listed on eBay for the next week. Things have just started and so there isn't all that much action just yet. The excitement, well, I hope it's building because right now it's kind of s---l---o---w. But that is how eBay works. Like basketball (which I loathe and detest) the interest is all in the last 2 minutes. But you should go over and browse anyway.

The Half the Sky Auction items

I will admit that I haven't bid on anything yet. I am waiting for them to list the Scrubs! thing. K. says, "Where is it filmed? Probably LA, right? Because if it was NY you could bid on it." The Scrubs! thing happens to be one of those things that sounds good in theory, but when I think of touring the set and potentially being forced into making small talk with people I think are very funny on tv but probably complete jerks in real life the desire dwindles quickly. But that is just me. If you think you can swing LA you should totally bid on it and I am sure that you and Zach Braff won't be making awkward small talk at any point during your tour.

I do manage to participate

All of my big plans and pronouncements have come to naught. Despite my continued obsessing over making something for the auction I have not in fact made anything for the auction. Shame on me! You can say it! I have been shaming myself into a corner for a week and a half now. The grandiose plans for the contributed items have been scaled down and scaled down and scaled down, and still no items! Ack. I have a faint hope that I can get something together between now and Saturday and throw it in, but that is probably my obsessive crazy lunatic mind that thinks it might still be possible. Even when it isn't.

I am going to make something and list it this weekend.

In the mean time I am selling a bunch of shoes that we bought for Z. that she never wore. It's a bit sad for me. The reason she never wore them is because she walked so late and for a long, long time we carried her everywhere and she didn't need shoes and by the time she started walking she had outgrown them all. And. We probably aren't going to have another girl. So I'm selling the shoes. The red ones at the top are the hardest ones to let go. I am having a time of it.

Did you bid yet? The rambling is designed to drive you from the entry to somewhere, anywhere, well why not click on the link up there and get the heck out of here? And then bid?

(I just found that there are 15 listings for the exact same red shoes shown above on eBay right now. Huh? We bought them randomly somewhere between Changsha and Guangzhou, but apparently they are the bees knees of squeaky shoes. I must, must, must go and make something that someone might want to buy. I have a minimum amount that I have committed myself to donating through the auction, and I am not even going to get close. Why am I still typing. I need to go work.)

the dentist promises I am not a bad mom

The fateful decision was to get E. corn on the cob for lunch. It didn't seem all that fateful, and then it was, and then we got to feel like lousy parents.

The weekend was going fine. It was K.'s big birthday weekend and so we were away celebrating. K.'s preferred method of celebrating involves theme parks, and since my preferred method involves flea markets and/or fabric stores I really can't say nasty things to him about it. The hotel was fine except that it offered a bit too little for a bit too many dollars. The kids were fine except when we were trying to sleep. The car was fine except when it was telling us that we had a flat tire when we really didn't. But really, it was all just fine.

We went to the chocolate-themed amusement park on Sunday per K.'s request, a park which I can highly recommend to those of you who like amusement parks and have small children. It was chock full of kiddie rides, so many kiddie rides that your head began to spin with the wonderful spinniness of it all. We took full advantage of the many wonders therein, meaning that I was dizzy by noon, nauseated by 1:30, and had a pounding headache by 3:15. (I do not like getting old. Oldness means that I cannot throw my body through the air any which way with abandon without consequences. The spinning used to be good, so, so good, and now it is not all that good. It is more just spinny, with a hint of vomit.)

Lunch was around 2, and K. stood in line while the kids and I looked at ducks and fish. We looked at the ducks and the fish until we were really quite sick of them and still no K. More ducks. More fish. Ducks. Fish. ducks. fish. ducksfishducksfishdishfuc... and there was K. with some food. He had gotten some mac n' cheese for E. which I would not have, and some corn on the cob which I probably wouldn't have. Then again there are days when I forget to feed the kids until it is really too late to be called breakfast or even brunch, and sometimes lunch, so I sat to eat my sandwich. E. tried to eat the macaroni but he ended up playing with it mostly. And he tried to eat the corn, but he ended up telling us his tooth hurt.

We both dismissed him almost immediately. K. said, "EAT THE CORN. BITE IT." I said, "He is just messing around and he isn't really hungry and he can't concetrate on food and he doesn't know how to eat the corn off the cob." E. repeated that his tooth hurt. We threw all of his food away, I tried to spend $3.50 on a bottle of gatorade (THREE FIFTY. I mean seriously, THREE FIFTY.) and we went on the airplane ride and the frog hoppers and the kissing tower.

Much, much later E. was walking towards me and I happened to really look in his mouth and suddenly I was cold. So, so cold. There was something wrong with his bottom front tooth. I whispered to K. there is something wrong with his tooth. get a good look at it. and K. did and he turned to me and said, "Yep. That tooth is coming out." I got all wild looking and he said, "What's wrong?" and I said, "He is much too young for his tooth to be coming out. He's only 4!" and I turned my head away and started to cry.

We interrogated E. for a long time, casually, hours and hours of asking, "Honey, do you think you hit your mouth yesterday or today?" "Sweetie, did you bang your chin on the roller coaster?" "E., think about it, when did your tooth start hurting?" All to no avail. We could not recall the dire situation which had occasioned our son's tooth to be so traumatized that it was loose, so very, very loose, and ready to fall out of his head.

This afternoon the dentist pronounced his tooth situation "completely normal", caused by either "trauma, or the tooth is just ready to come out" and patted us on the head and sent us home. He did mention that the adult tooth might not show up right away, perhaps not for a few months, perhaps not even for a year or longer. Which causes me wonder just a tiny bit how completely normal the current tooth situation really is.

And now in exactly one hour I have to go to the dentist to get my teeth cleaned and if that doesn't bite then I don't know what does.

The catsup on his chin is for effect.

Or because our personal hygiene is somewhat lacking.

Happy Day to K.

I am generally pretty darn excited about not only being married to K., but being such a big part of his life and being his best friend. This year all of those feelings are magnified. A lot.

We had a tough year in a number of ways. As individuals. As parents. In our relationships. In our work lives. With our long terms plans. With our finances. And through it all K. has been a person of strength and integrity, determination and conviction, affirming and loving the kids and I through the best and worst of it. He does what is right when it is hard. He stands up for the oppressed. He strives to help the helpless. He is a good person, responsible, motivated, funny, interesting, dedicated, affectionate, and a little strange.

I love him like crazy for all of it. Still pinch myself most mornings. Still smile when I see him. Still have to hold myself back from calling him 30 times a day to hear his voice. Still laugh at his jokes. Still crave his touch.

Happy 37 K.! I wish you a year of goodness and joy and fun and all of the wonderful things I would want for you all wrapped up with a bow just for you. Thanks in advance for letting me be a part of it.

bacon saves the day...well, the night anyway

Tonight as I was frenching the green beans my mind was wandering to and fro. I thought of this, I thought of that, I thought, I thought my brain was flat.* Well, not really. But my mind was wandering and it wandered into a semi-zen state where I was suddenly one with the string beans. And the question that siezed my mind was "Who the heck am I frenching these beans for anyway?" Not K. Not E. Surely not Z. who after feeding therapy this afternoon clearly would not touch green beans with a ten-foot-pole, assuming such a pole were available to her, which it isn't.

I was a little thrown off by dinner tonight. I had bought some pre-made red meat thingy at the fancy schmancy grocery store on Monday thinking it would be right up K.'s alley. The packaging said "Cook Tonight!" and "Ready in 50 Minutes or Less!" and "Buy me! Buy me! Buy me! Your husband will love you forever and shower you will affection and praise!" (That last bit was implied, but definitely there.)

But when I examined my little packet of goodness more closely I noticed that other ingredients were required as well as braising.** Even worse, there were carrots sticking out of the meat and K.'s current dietary considerations do not allow carrots. I felt angry. I felt silly. I felt manipulated. I hated the stupid little meat rolls that had sucked me in at the fancy schmancy grocery store. And more importantly, I had nothing for dinner.

I panicked. Then I rooted around in the fridge. And I found the bacon.

I can only stand bacon about every sixth month. I love the smell and sometimes the taste. But raw bacon shows its ugly underbelly—fat. The fat in the bacon gets to me, and quite often chewing the fat of the bacon makes me nauseated. I prefer my bacon nice and crisp and by crisp I mean ready to crumble into tiny, bacon-y bits as soon as you touch it. All the better to hide the fat.

I cooked the bacon to within an inch of its life in two separate pans. In one pan I cooked pork chops in the bacon grease and in the other I swooshed around the frenched green beans. I crumbled a bit of bacon on the beans, plated the food***, and took it to the table.

K. and E. got big, dewy eyes, practically crying at the thought of all that bacon! For dinner! On veggies! K. ate the green beans first, every single bite. I have never, ever seen him eat veggies like that. E. requested some beans and ate them with relish. Dinner was saved, even if our poor little arteries struggled mightily for the rest of the night.

The bacon was for K. As it turns out the frenching was for me. We were both happy. I'm still not sure what to do with the evil meat rollups****, but I'm thinking frenching and/or bacon may help. If not, perhaps some Dr. Seuss.

Fat. Fat. Fat in that. The fat in that made me spat. Carrots. Schmarrots. Feed the parrots. Feed the parrots carrots.
Meat. Meat. The meat has feet. The feety meat should walk out the door and find a new home where people want to braise and eat carrots.

*Channeling Dr. Seuss. It happens.
**Not just braising. A cooking time 3 times longer than that on the package, according to some random person who posted on the grocery store's Web site.
***Too much Iron Chef America and way, way, waaaaay too much Food Network TV.
****D$%()^*(%^&@#n Wegmans and their pretty, pretty, pretty food.

Scenes of Marburger

flying is weird

The vomiting didn't even phase me. I heard the unmistakeable sounds and watched the two poor parents in the row in front of me start scrambling. They were clearly surprised and unprepared for such an event. I took a few moments to pity them and send them some peaceful vibes. Then I began mouth breathing. I had to mouth breathe for more than an hour. That didn't phase me much either.

I am never sure that we are meant to be flying. Airports, airports I love. Airports are full of bustling goodness, foodstuffs you don't regularly eat, magazines and candy and t-shirts and crappity souvenirs, the ever popular duty free liquor, perfume and cigarettes. The airport sends you off with a happy wave and attempts to prolong your vacation with last minute indulgences. The airport means you no harm.

But the airplane? I'm not so sure about the airplane. Life is just so strange. Of course there is the tiny sphere of seat/tray table/floor/seat pocket/arm rests/overhead bins that becomes the whole world. The teeth rattling, eardrum filling vibration. And the odd smell of recirculated air, booze, airplane food, and creepy, gas filled toilets.

But it's more than that. It's the dreamy, crushed, inert, hopeful, sad, smothered, veiny, yawning, tedious, exhilarated, hungry, peculiar you that sits crammed in that seat.

I will admit that I was a bit wobbly when I got on the plane. Not drunk, goodness no. You couldn't pay me good money to fly impaired. No, emotionally...strange. Not right. The airport soothed me with the book stall and the donuts and the gazillion toilets. But the plane sent me spiraling. Dislocated, I struggled to be...somewhere. Somewhere recognizable. But there was just the seat leaned into my forehead and awful tiny "cheeseburgers" and lurching. Desperately I took out my book. I read an essay about a woman's beloved dog dying and I began crying. I couldn't stop. I sniffed and sniffed and the tears ran down. I had no tissues. After a bit I stopped caring and I let myself cry it out while trying not to freak out the kind father and his two-year-old son sitting beside me.

The vomiting started. It wasn't surprising. I breathed slowly through my mouth. I put the book away. I stared. I breathed. I willed myself to embrace it all.

We finally, finally, finally landed with a thump. The plane simultaneously thrust us forward and pushed us back. Push, pull. Forward, backward. Up, down. Here, there.

Stumbling into the terminal eventually breaks the spell. Thankfully.

we aren't really photographers

Every time I hang out with Shelba I assume that we will be shooting like crazy. Not in a Thelma and Louise sort of way (although Shelba DOES insist on bringing that movie up repeatedly) but more in a We Love Photography And Our Nikons type of way.

We don't.

There are lots of reasons. But it seems that when we get together we get in this chatty, relaxed, half comatose state which requires Coke (her) and snacks (me) but does not require documentation.

Undocumented thus far:
--Three days at the GIANT flea market with another good friend
--An odd wander through the small farm animal part of the flea market
--Two visits to the Chinese buffet
--Rummaging at Goodwill
--Luxuriating at the fabric store

Today we go to Marburger, another smaller, filled to the brim with expensive antiques flea market. I'm taking the camera, but if I come home with one or two shots, it will be a lot.

Documented thus far:
--View from my window at the Holiday Inn Express

--Lola and Kallie