Growing WarriorsJust your typical family…

I often feel like a cliche. But like I should jump up and down and say… no SCREAM….”I’m special! I matter” but then the everyday swallows me. And regardless, I sink into the mediocre. The not special. The overweight, middle class, taxi-mom. The ruts. The routines. Wake up, blah blah blah, go to bed. Life.

But today….when I’m working out this morning – desperately trying to regain my cuteness, I see my youngest daughter…wearing her favorite skirt. The twirly one from the Gap – kind of like a ballet tutu but for everyday. Covered in sparkles and sequins. She’s in the sun puddles spilling in through the front door (you know the ones, the dog’s favorite napping spots..completely gone by early afternoon) and when the sun hits her skirt, it sends diamonds of light all over the place. The walls, the ceilings, into the other rooms, all over the dogs. And she’s dancing. All alone. With the diamonds of light. She’s shuffling her feet, wiggling her hips, pointing – in a particularly disco-esque way, reaching, dancing. Living. And she doesn’t realize that I can see her. She thinks she is all alone. I know that if I were to say something, or if her sisters were to join her, or anything, it would end. Because that’s who she is. She can’t share the magic.

And its BEAUTIFUL. The everyday.

You know that google will try to tailor ads to you – so in your gmail, it kinda looks at your messages, and tries to figure you out enough to target ads your way. Here’s what’s showing up in my sidebar right now. Then ya’ll can have fun determining what that says about me:

Master’s in Social Work – Earn an MSW Degree from USC.
Mom Coupons – Mom’s need a break too!
Lonely Single Parent? – Meet Available Single Parents Here.
Daddyshome inc. – support, education and advocacy for fathers as primary caregivers

I’m so confused! Apparently google thinks that I’m a lonely divorced mom OR dad struggling to make it on my limited education and career options.

I really only posted four times in 2010? Yikes. I’m sorry! It was a busy year, that’s for sure. Ups and downs. Really, in retrospect, it was a bit of a difficult year.

But its over. And gosh, this is my 3rd post for 2011, so already looking better.

In other news, I went to update my links and stuff and realized they are really totally and completely out of date. I had to delete a bunch that were dead or irrelevant to my life right now (cloth diaper blogs? Puhleeze), but I need to add a bunch too. If you’d like to be listed, let me know. I also had to reactivate my tumblr site so it will feed stuff into my facebook…tumblr does NOT like to be neglected.

when I open my google reader and find a new post in hyperbole and a half – http://hyperboleandahalf.blogspot.com/ – seriously. As soon as I see that feed in bold, meaning new post, I immediately grin. Its like a gift.

now you gotta kiss me.

Ok, please don’t.

I can’t write anymore. I used to write really well (or so I’ve been told) but now I can’t seem to find my creative juices. Not only that, but I’ve found that I no longer possess this natural flow. Everything comes out jumbled. Messy. Sloppy. Hard to read. I don’t know why. I’ve also started making stupid mistakes that I never used to make. In fact, they are mistakes that used to make me cringe when reading the writing of others. Things like the dreadful “there, their, they’re” thing. The “your, you’re, and now ur” thing – those types of errors used to make me throw up a little in my mouth. They would actually anger me! I’d want to slap the writer. With a sock full of nickels. Maybe not. But they were annoying. Now I’m doing it! And other even crazier mistakes. That I can’t think of right now (because the point of this is that I’m losing my mind but I’m getting to that) – So very out of character for me.

I suspect early onset Alzheimer’s. Don’t laugh.

In other news… Um. I forget.

I said, don’t laugh.

Today some bobolli pizza crusts flung themselves from my overstuffed pantry landing at my feet. The other day I found food in my freezer from 2005. Yet it seems like we never have food. Something bad is happening with my grocery shopping/meal planning/cooking/eating situation. Seems I buy food that we never eat and we never have anything to eat. Its piling up. And apparently trying to escape. With various restricted diets in the house coupled with crazy schedules and poor time management, this situation has gotten bad. Oh, and add that to a pantry that isn’t very user friendly in the first place and a chest freezer rather than an upright freezer. Things get buried in there. Since I’m not a tall lady, and my arms aren’t particularly long, I can’t reach the bottom of the freezer without actually getting into the freezer. And its cold in there. And we wind up with smooshed peas. Plus I remember the scary stories about kids getting trapped in those things. You never hear about the 40yo moms getting trapped, but I’m quite sure it happens. Families probably pay off the news reporters to save themselves the embarrassment of explaining how mom passed.

The situation is bad. I’m contemplating a challenge for myself – no grocery shopping (except for perishables) until the end of Feb..Maybe longer. And if I do that, I can take the money I usually budget for shopping and buy myself an upright freezer and get rid of this stupid chest freezer – maybe I’ll buy some pantry organizational stuff too. Can I do that? I like to dare myself…this could be good. Right?

What was I saying?

So before bed this conversation took place between Lydia and myself (with a cameo from Allison):

Lydia – Today was pretty good, I found a four leaf clover and a six leaf clover.
Me – oh yeah?
Lydia – yeah, but the six leaf clover didn’t bring me any luck (as she tosses both into the trash)
Me – but the four leaf one did?
Lydia – yup.
Me – what lucky thing happened because of the four leaf clover?
Lydia – I found the six leaf clover.

ba-dum-dum.

Allison – oh mom, you should totally facebook that.

And I am NOT kidding – earlier today Lydia wanted to go to the store to get a webkinz she’s been saving for. We get there and can’t immediately find the one she wants. While her sisters and I are looking, I hear this itty bitty voice directed to a store employee. “Excuse me, do you have the blah blah blah webkinz?”

I’m going to pause for effect here.

If you have met Lydia, your jaw just dropped to the floor too, didn’t it?

not sure which is longer…my to-do/done list or my to-do/didn’t-quite-get-to list. So lets recap..

This weekend I hooked up a computer to the tv as step 1 in my quest for household media domination, weathered a storm, sat in the hot tub drinking wine, rescued a suicidal mouse with my husband, picked up one kid from a sleepover, took three kids shopping for birthday presents and then took three kids to a birthday party, brought home two extra kids from the birthday party, took five kids swimming, helped husband attempt to fix the pool filter (but actually make it worse), laugh at same husband when water sprays all over him during these failed attempts, took Meredith to a playdate, did some major grocery shopping, put groceries away with help from remaining kids (who put my batteries and peanut butter in the deep freeze….for SOME reason), took maternity pictures for a friend, picked up Meredith from a playdate, fixed dinner. Helped husband some more with pool filter (nope, still not fixed), processed a few photos from earlier photo shoot, did some cleaning, including the dishes, and I did three loads of laundry (still in progress, sigh).

But the things I didn’t do…well lets see. I did not take the kids to an audition that they were thinking of doing for a local play, I did not take the kids to the Alice and Wonderland event at the art museum, I did not attend another friends’ birthday party (sorry ), I did not drive to Independence to get a part for the pool filter, I didn’t help Allison with corrections on her yearbook page, I didn’t record the kids’ reading hours (for a contest they are doing), I didn’t do some administrative work that I need to do for my homeschool group, and I did not do any indexing work at all…even though I should have.

So do I feel accomplished? Or lazy? Hmmm

5 days into 2010 and 4 days of working out. This is my year peoples. Its the year I get my act together. I lose weight, I become organized, I lose the clutter, I find that balance thing I hear of, I learn to walk the walk, not just talk the talk when it comes to my money. I do better by my kids, rock the homeschooling. I find my value. Write my book, speak my truth. Cure cancer. Facilitate world peace. End world hunger. Run for public office, start a new career, eat less sugar.

Ok, ok, that last one is just CAAAARHAZY!

First out of context – its funnier that way, trust me.

Today getting into the van, my five year old daughter said to my eight year old daughter, “Shut the door WHORE!”
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now in context – she likes to rhyme and many things she says she follows with a nonsense rhyme just for fun. So she often says things like, “I’m eating pizza wizza” or “Let the dog in fin” or “This is my favorite game hame” – or “Shut the door whore” – Just ask Jessica about her rhyming with yucky… I dare you.

So whodda thunk I’d be posting about whores two times in one month (appx)? I hope it isn’t prophetic of my children’s futures or anything.

Maybe I should revisit cursing 101 as part of our homeschool curriculum? And with that, all you whores out there, shut the damn (or dam) door.