Happy Thanksgiving to you all! The kids are all busy writing in the Thanksgiving book, so I thought I'd steal some time to write.
Of course, I have so much to be thankful for, and I won't bore you with the details, but one of the things I am most grateful for today is to not be cooking or preparing for guests. Our turn hosting comes in just one short month, when H will have large and exotic sea creatures in our refrigerator in preparation for the Italian night of seven fishes, but today, my mother in-law has that privilege. With my family living far away, and the logistical nightmare that is traveling with three small children, I am usually found at my in-law's most holidays, and on occasion, my own family joins me there. While I am so happy to be surrounded by people I am lucky enough to truly think of as my family, sometimes, just sometimes, I wonder what it would feel like to be returning to my childhood home on a holiday to have a meal cooked by my mother.
It's an odd experience to always be a guest at someone else's table. I took for granted, the experience, when I had it, of someone cooking our family's dishes. I don't say "favorite", because, to be honest, overcooked vegetables, gluey mashed potatoes, and boiled turnips fried in bacon grease, really do not qualify. But it's the tradition of the those foods, along with the strawberry short cakes made with those weird little bowl-like cakes that you find in the produce department, that I miss. And it's not just the food. During the post-meal reminiscences I long to hear "Remember the time Mary..." or "When Kathleen was five...", and the retelling of my childhood stories, straight from the source. I wonder what it would feel like for my chldren to hear my mother tell stories of times I was naughty. (And to answer your question, I don't have a plethora of aunts and uncles ready to tell tales as all but one of my mother's siblings died in quick succession in the years after my mother's passing. In fact, my uncle died of a heart attack while we were all on death watch at my aun't bedside, casuign us to have two wakes and funerals with a week. I shit you not. It's like we're the damn Kennedys.)
This is not to say every holiday is wrought with emotion, and I sit there crying in my turkey. In fact, so much time has passed that, sadly, or blessedly, depending on how you look at it, my mother comes to the front of my mind very little. I suppose part of that is being busy with the kids. But every once in a while though, I wonder "what if?" What if she were here? What would it be like for her to greet my kids at the door in her "cooking clothes" of women's golf shirt and sweat pants and full makeup, forehead sweaty from mashing potatoes? What would it be like to get drunk on white wine with my mother and sister after dinner, one of my chldren sitting in her lap, while my husband and father did the dishes (since I'm sure my father would have been dragged into modern times by this point)? What would it feel like to be home?
So if you are lucky enough to be sitting at your mother's table today, or oyur aunt's or your grandma's, complicated as it may be, take a minute to apprecaite it while it lasts. Sure, your mother may irritate the shit out of you, and I know without at doubt were my mother still alive she and I would be aruging over those disgusting turnips.
Thursday, November 25, 2010
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
The new-fangled kitchen
"Oh God, tell me the pear bowl made it...."
This was my first thought the other morning, when I entered the laundry room at the crack of dawn to pull some workout clothes from the ever-present pile of clean laundry in front of the dryer, and discovered that one end of the shelving unit, that holds most of our special occasion kitchen wares, had come out of the cinder block wall, sending all of our platters and seldom-used kitchen appliances and baking pans sliding down to the concrete floor.
I was not concerned, at first, about the Limoge plates my aunt had given me, the Pottery Barn platter that was sentimental favorite, or the artisan chip and dip that was a wedding gift from a close friend*, I was worried about a sea foam green, ceramic bowl, in the shape of a pear. This bowl had been H's grandmother, Mama's. The bowl has two compartments, one, larger, the bulbous end of the pear, to hold pasta, the other, smaller end, near the stem, to hold sauce. Every time we pass this bowl around the table, someone has to say, "Don't hold it by the stem!", the way Mama and Pop used to, as in family lore. This bowl, in and of itself, is not especially breath taking. I'm sure many people would pass it up if it were ever out on a garage sale table, but because of its history, it is very special to our family. This got me thinking about the modern day kitchen and all it contains.
H and I spend a short time every Sunday morning drinking coffee and looking at catalogues, before the onslaught of requests for a second round of pancakes or for Daddy to play Wii, and the Williams Sonoma catalogue is one of our favorites. We love it not only for the high-quality pots and linens it contains, but for the specialty kitchen items we find truly laughable. It seems there is a specialized tool for every kitchen task. There are mango slicers, avocado slicer/mashers, banana slicers, strawberry slicers, strawberry hullers, peach and cherry pitters. Whatever happened to a good old paring knife? And the counter top devices available astound in their breadth of function - rice cookers, bread makers (which I thought went out of style with carbohydrates in 2000), deep fryers, panini presses, ice cream and yogurt makers (seriously, who is making their own yogurt? You obviously live on a farm and probably have no electricity and, therefore, no use for such an appliance). To be fair, H and I own three of the six counter top items listed above (the deep fryer being purchased as a gift for H, in a fit of pre-Christmas idiocy, as was last year's Bacon of the Month Club membership), and cherries are a total pain in the ass to pit, as are olives, but I wonder, what of all this kitchen technology will hold any sentimental meaning to our children after we are gone? Will they look at the deep fryer and think, "Oh remember the ONE time Daddy used that?", or will they merely curse the laundry room shelves full of nonsense that they now have to get rid of?
There are pots and pans, not of especially good quality, that H and I still have that belonged to Mama. What I love most about them is being able to see the evidence of all the cooking they were used for in scratches, dings and dents. Growing up myself, during the holidays at my aunt's, we used one pot that was so dented on the bottom from all the potatoes that had been mashed in its depths, it was actually convex , and would wobble around precariously on the burner. But I loved that pot. Will the same be said about H's Calphalon stainless? There was a potato peeler of my grandmother's (insert Irish joke here) that was so old and rusty I'm shocked no one wound up with tetanus, but every year, there'd be so many of us in the kitchen peeling, someone would wind up using it and it made the day seem complete. Not sure our OXO peeler will ever show evidence of anyone's having actually used it, so ingenious is its engineering.
I would be remiss if I didn't admit H and I (but mostly H) find a lot of this kitchen technology pretty cool (except the new at-home sous vide, that spells food poisoning to me), but I think we need to be careful of our kitchens morphing from the center of our homes, filled with stories, into laboratories, filled with tools. And if you use a tool so seldom, it never has a chance to become part of a story, it just takes up space in the laundry room and winds up on the floor one day. Perhaps, if used often enough, even the most modern of gadgets can be part of fmaily history. I gave H a Henkel knife for our first anniversary and he claims it is still "the best gift you ever gave me" (notice, it's not three kids, or a well-cared for home). New knives come on the market and he shies away, loving the heft and balance of this particular blade. I think part of it might be though, that the kids call it "Daddy's knife" and know its special place in the butcher block. Maybe some day, despite their own kitchens full of super-refined cutlery, they will argue over who gets to have it, remembering all the wonderful meals their father cooked using it.
* all of which made it, thank God.
This was my first thought the other morning, when I entered the laundry room at the crack of dawn to pull some workout clothes from the ever-present pile of clean laundry in front of the dryer, and discovered that one end of the shelving unit, that holds most of our special occasion kitchen wares, had come out of the cinder block wall, sending all of our platters and seldom-used kitchen appliances and baking pans sliding down to the concrete floor.
I was not concerned, at first, about the Limoge plates my aunt had given me, the Pottery Barn platter that was sentimental favorite, or the artisan chip and dip that was a wedding gift from a close friend*, I was worried about a sea foam green, ceramic bowl, in the shape of a pear. This bowl had been H's grandmother, Mama's. The bowl has two compartments, one, larger, the bulbous end of the pear, to hold pasta, the other, smaller end, near the stem, to hold sauce. Every time we pass this bowl around the table, someone has to say, "Don't hold it by the stem!", the way Mama and Pop used to, as in family lore. This bowl, in and of itself, is not especially breath taking. I'm sure many people would pass it up if it were ever out on a garage sale table, but because of its history, it is very special to our family. This got me thinking about the modern day kitchen and all it contains.
H and I spend a short time every Sunday morning drinking coffee and looking at catalogues, before the onslaught of requests for a second round of pancakes or for Daddy to play Wii, and the Williams Sonoma catalogue is one of our favorites. We love it not only for the high-quality pots and linens it contains, but for the specialty kitchen items we find truly laughable. It seems there is a specialized tool for every kitchen task. There are mango slicers, avocado slicer/mashers, banana slicers, strawberry slicers, strawberry hullers, peach and cherry pitters. Whatever happened to a good old paring knife? And the counter top devices available astound in their breadth of function - rice cookers, bread makers (which I thought went out of style with carbohydrates in 2000), deep fryers, panini presses, ice cream and yogurt makers (seriously, who is making their own yogurt? You obviously live on a farm and probably have no electricity and, therefore, no use for such an appliance). To be fair, H and I own three of the six counter top items listed above (the deep fryer being purchased as a gift for H, in a fit of pre-Christmas idiocy, as was last year's Bacon of the Month Club membership), and cherries are a total pain in the ass to pit, as are olives, but I wonder, what of all this kitchen technology will hold any sentimental meaning to our children after we are gone? Will they look at the deep fryer and think, "Oh remember the ONE time Daddy used that?", or will they merely curse the laundry room shelves full of nonsense that they now have to get rid of?
There are pots and pans, not of especially good quality, that H and I still have that belonged to Mama. What I love most about them is being able to see the evidence of all the cooking they were used for in scratches, dings and dents. Growing up myself, during the holidays at my aunt's, we used one pot that was so dented on the bottom from all the potatoes that had been mashed in its depths, it was actually convex , and would wobble around precariously on the burner. But I loved that pot. Will the same be said about H's Calphalon stainless? There was a potato peeler of my grandmother's (insert Irish joke here) that was so old and rusty I'm shocked no one wound up with tetanus, but every year, there'd be so many of us in the kitchen peeling, someone would wind up using it and it made the day seem complete. Not sure our OXO peeler will ever show evidence of anyone's having actually used it, so ingenious is its engineering.
I would be remiss if I didn't admit H and I (but mostly H) find a lot of this kitchen technology pretty cool (except the new at-home sous vide, that spells food poisoning to me), but I think we need to be careful of our kitchens morphing from the center of our homes, filled with stories, into laboratories, filled with tools. And if you use a tool so seldom, it never has a chance to become part of a story, it just takes up space in the laundry room and winds up on the floor one day. Perhaps, if used often enough, even the most modern of gadgets can be part of fmaily history. I gave H a Henkel knife for our first anniversary and he claims it is still "the best gift you ever gave me" (notice, it's not three kids, or a well-cared for home). New knives come on the market and he shies away, loving the heft and balance of this particular blade. I think part of it might be though, that the kids call it "Daddy's knife" and know its special place in the butcher block. Maybe some day, despite their own kitchens full of super-refined cutlery, they will argue over who gets to have it, remembering all the wonderful meals their father cooked using it.
* all of which made it, thank God.
Monday, November 15, 2010
Working Girl
I managed to escape the house for a few hours yesterday and go see the new Rachel McAdam's vehicle Morning Glory. I know, I know, total garbage, but sometimes I need to go see something mindless with pretty clothes on the big screen. And while I don't particularly love Rachel McAdams, and did not see her breakout performance in The Notebook, based on the book by Nicholas Sparks, who is to writing what Thomas Kinkade is to painting, because I wasn't either a fourteen year-old girl or a middle-aged woman trapped in a loveless marriage looking for a dose of romance, Morning Glory did have the allure of Harrison Ford, who unfortunately wound up reprising his role as good-looking curmudgeon, of which I am growing tired. Dear Harry, being back the Han Solo smart-assness please. Love, Mean Mommy.
The movie centers around McAdams as a young television producer and her efforts to climb to the top. There was the standard romance component and a lovely cameo by Ty Burrell from Modern Family, and I have new running song courtesy of the soundtrack ("Strip Me" be Natasha Beddingfield the reigning expert of inspirational songs for soccer moms), but what stuck with me after the film ended was just how much I really, really miss working sometimes.
Wait, wait, this is not going to be another why-am-I-at-home-when-I-have-master's-degree rant. My life is so busy now, I think any nanny I tried to hire would walk away laughing if I offered her anything but my entire paltry teacher's salary to deal with all this nonsense. And wathcing H trudge off to work in a bad mood this Monday morning, meetings galore in front of him, I again appreciated my ability to make my own schedule. No, what I miss is all the non-working stuff related to working. In no particular order I miss:
Getting dressed in the morning. This movie was full of cute skirt suits and jazzy heels, smart, long-legged trousers and tailored blouses. I can't remember the last time I wore anything on a weekday that was dry clean only or that was not peanut butter-proof. Getting to dress for style, rather than functionality is something I miss desperately. Oh, nothing beats that feeling of stepping out the door on a sunny day, hair freshly blown out, coffee in hand, wearing a cute outfit, on the way to work. Makes you want to stand on a street corner and throw your kicky beret in the air.
Lunch. What am I in the mood for? Where should I go? Wanna go to lunch? Oh, I miss such questions. To have choices and takeout establishments and restaurants at which to make them seems like a dream, when it used to be my reality five days a week. Instead, most days I find myself forlornly looking into the freezer to see that over the weekend H has eaten the one good Lean Cuisine panini that was left, even though he can have whatever the hell he wants for lunch Monday through Friday (how he thinks he even gets a vote when we have takeout is laughable, but he is so annoyingly picky about it, it's like living with a fifteen year-old girl, and I just relent and let him get what he wants). And never mind having someone to eat with. I either eat with the kids, whose constant requests for more juice, which will then be spilled all over the table, or scarf down my lunch standing at the kitchen counter, after having forgotten to eat all day, moments before picking the kids up. And don't even get me started about being able to get coffee when you need it.
Work friends. As I have said before, I consider a lot of the moms I interact with to be "work friends", enjoying a little witty banter at drop-off and pick-up, but there is a different tenor to these conversations than there was when I was actually speaking to a colleague years ago. Parenting is very personal and we all make different choices, and someone giving you, unwanted, negative feedback on the way you're potty-training your kid can ruin your whole day.
I have also discussed those women and men who move past "work friend" status and become actual friends and you meet without your kids and occasionally with your spouses, and I miss having frequent 9-5 interaction with these few. I also noticed, watching McAdams chat with a fellow producer who was male, that for most of my life I have had a "work husband", having gotten along well platonically with men, especially when I needed some perspective on the emotional chow-chow some women insist on constantly participating in. While I do currently have one (shout out, A), again, we don't get to really hang out all that much.
I miss joking around about nonsense with a colleague, I miss adult conversation that does not involve discussing bowel movements.
Commuting. Oh, to have an hour and a half each day to read, listen to music or to stare blissfully unmolested into space would be heaven. Yeah, yeah, H, I know you do work on the train and you have practically worn the letters off your Blackberry to prove it, but you did manage to watch two seasons of Mad Men and read a couple of books, so I wouldn't beat the Working Commute drum too loudly. Oh, and the fact that commuting means you actually get to levee work, rather than living there, as I do, is a perk I miss considerably.
Yes, I know I am lucky to be home with the kids and, yes, I know working sucks a lot of the time, but everyone has to admit these things are the definite perks of being employed outside of the home. The moments when you don't actively despise working. That and, you know, pay day.
The movie centers around McAdams as a young television producer and her efforts to climb to the top. There was the standard romance component and a lovely cameo by Ty Burrell from Modern Family, and I have new running song courtesy of the soundtrack ("Strip Me" be Natasha Beddingfield the reigning expert of inspirational songs for soccer moms), but what stuck with me after the film ended was just how much I really, really miss working sometimes.
Wait, wait, this is not going to be another why-am-I-at-home-when-I-have-master's-degree rant. My life is so busy now, I think any nanny I tried to hire would walk away laughing if I offered her anything but my entire paltry teacher's salary to deal with all this nonsense. And wathcing H trudge off to work in a bad mood this Monday morning, meetings galore in front of him, I again appreciated my ability to make my own schedule. No, what I miss is all the non-working stuff related to working. In no particular order I miss:
Getting dressed in the morning. This movie was full of cute skirt suits and jazzy heels, smart, long-legged trousers and tailored blouses. I can't remember the last time I wore anything on a weekday that was dry clean only or that was not peanut butter-proof. Getting to dress for style, rather than functionality is something I miss desperately. Oh, nothing beats that feeling of stepping out the door on a sunny day, hair freshly blown out, coffee in hand, wearing a cute outfit, on the way to work. Makes you want to stand on a street corner and throw your kicky beret in the air.
Lunch. What am I in the mood for? Where should I go? Wanna go to lunch? Oh, I miss such questions. To have choices and takeout establishments and restaurants at which to make them seems like a dream, when it used to be my reality five days a week. Instead, most days I find myself forlornly looking into the freezer to see that over the weekend H has eaten the one good Lean Cuisine panini that was left, even though he can have whatever the hell he wants for lunch Monday through Friday (how he thinks he even gets a vote when we have takeout is laughable, but he is so annoyingly picky about it, it's like living with a fifteen year-old girl, and I just relent and let him get what he wants). And never mind having someone to eat with. I either eat with the kids, whose constant requests for more juice, which will then be spilled all over the table, or scarf down my lunch standing at the kitchen counter, after having forgotten to eat all day, moments before picking the kids up. And don't even get me started about being able to get coffee when you need it.
Work friends. As I have said before, I consider a lot of the moms I interact with to be "work friends", enjoying a little witty banter at drop-off and pick-up, but there is a different tenor to these conversations than there was when I was actually speaking to a colleague years ago. Parenting is very personal and we all make different choices, and someone giving you, unwanted, negative feedback on the way you're potty-training your kid can ruin your whole day.
I have also discussed those women and men who move past "work friend" status and become actual friends and you meet without your kids and occasionally with your spouses, and I miss having frequent 9-5 interaction with these few. I also noticed, watching McAdams chat with a fellow producer who was male, that for most of my life I have had a "work husband", having gotten along well platonically with men, especially when I needed some perspective on the emotional chow-chow some women insist on constantly participating in. While I do currently have one (shout out, A), again, we don't get to really hang out all that much.
I miss joking around about nonsense with a colleague, I miss adult conversation that does not involve discussing bowel movements.
Commuting. Oh, to have an hour and a half each day to read, listen to music or to stare blissfully unmolested into space would be heaven. Yeah, yeah, H, I know you do work on the train and you have practically worn the letters off your Blackberry to prove it, but you did manage to watch two seasons of Mad Men and read a couple of books, so I wouldn't beat the Working Commute drum too loudly. Oh, and the fact that commuting means you actually get to levee work, rather than living there, as I do, is a perk I miss considerably.
Yes, I know I am lucky to be home with the kids and, yes, I know working sucks a lot of the time, but everyone has to admit these things are the definite perks of being employed outside of the home. The moments when you don't actively despise working. That and, you know, pay day.
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
Has it been three years already?
How could I not write today? Happy Blogiversary, dear readers!!!! Can it really be three years have passed since I wrote that first, angst-filled entry in the basement of the old, tiny house, home alone with a five year, three year and ten week old?
A lot has changed since then, but a lot has remained the same. I still can not get everything I need to get done accomplished in one day, I still hate laundry, my kids alternately drive me insane and humble me with their love and beauty, H is still drives me wild, and I still eat too much peanut butter. What also has not changed is the fact that this is my outlet and keeps me sane and I am very grateful to all of you for reading. Seeing how many of you check in on days I have not written, motivates me to keep it up and it is a great feeling that people not obligated by blood or friendship like what I write enough to keep coming back. Many of you have been here since the very beginning, but for those of you who haven't, today's post includes a lot of back links to old posts, as I review all that has transpired since Mean Mommy came to be. So to steal the ending to Bridget Jones' Diary, a recap, in numbers, of the last three years.
Number of children potty-trained: 1.75. Little Man is so close I can feel the shoes I will buy with the monthly diaper budget on my feet as I type. We have even ventured into I-Make-Pee-Pee-Like-Daddy Land and I now have the joy of trying to manage a wild spray of urine every time we go potty. I am also not that wild about touching his junk since he has recently come up with a descriptive for it in it's erect state. "Look, I make it bouncy, Mommy!" Miraculously, #2, who nearly broke me in the effort to train her, no longer has any issues. Unless you count clogging the bowl every night when she sneaks out of bed to poop. We call her The Stealth Bomber.
I look forward to the day I no longer have to travel with the potty in the van.
Number of pictures of feces: 2
Number of pictures of shoes: 4. Hopefully this will increase in the next year, as mentioned above, as H and I have started a new tradition of Christmas Shoes (not at all related to that repellent Christmas song). Last year he bought me a pair of great shoes I had been lusting over and he did so well I decided I'd like to make it an annual thing. His only guideline is that I be able to wear them with a black dress and they not be practical in any way. I also told him finding the gayest sales clerk on the floor would be helpful.
Number of television appearances: 1. Still one of the best days of my life.
Number of home improvement projects completed: 6. Many of these took place in the old house getting it ready for sale. There were major ones, there were minor ones, and there was a lot of painting.
Number of rabbits killed: 1
Number of posts involving Reilly: 4. Most of them involving a crisis of some kind. The irony is lost on me that I had to drag him to the vet at the last minute yesterday with a massive eye infection after what happened two years ago.
Number of houses bought and sold: 2. Days it took: 3.
Number of "celebrity"-related hate-filled comments: 2. I still think it was Bill himself.
Blatant children's book rip-off posts: 2
Weddings attended: 5
Souls saved: 5. If that's what you get from spordic church attendance and half-hearted home-school CCD lessons.
Pieces of writing published: 2. Well, one was a letter to the editor, but beggers can't be choosers.
Thank you, thank you, dear readers, for all the great feedback and laughs you've given me in return for the paltry smattering of writing I throw at you every few days. With Thanksgiving fast approaching, once again this year, this blog is one of the things I am most grateful to have in my life. I wish we could all go out for a drink to celebrate.
Hugs,
MM
A lot has changed since then, but a lot has remained the same. I still can not get everything I need to get done accomplished in one day, I still hate laundry, my kids alternately drive me insane and humble me with their love and beauty, H is still drives me wild, and I still eat too much peanut butter. What also has not changed is the fact that this is my outlet and keeps me sane and I am very grateful to all of you for reading. Seeing how many of you check in on days I have not written, motivates me to keep it up and it is a great feeling that people not obligated by blood or friendship like what I write enough to keep coming back. Many of you have been here since the very beginning, but for those of you who haven't, today's post includes a lot of back links to old posts, as I review all that has transpired since Mean Mommy came to be. So to steal the ending to Bridget Jones' Diary, a recap, in numbers, of the last three years.
Number of children potty-trained: 1.75. Little Man is so close I can feel the shoes I will buy with the monthly diaper budget on my feet as I type. We have even ventured into I-Make-Pee-Pee-Like-Daddy Land and I now have the joy of trying to manage a wild spray of urine every time we go potty. I am also not that wild about touching his junk since he has recently come up with a descriptive for it in it's erect state. "Look, I make it bouncy, Mommy!" Miraculously, #2, who nearly broke me in the effort to train her, no longer has any issues. Unless you count clogging the bowl every night when she sneaks out of bed to poop. We call her The Stealth Bomber.
I look forward to the day I no longer have to travel with the potty in the van.
Number of pictures of feces: 2
Number of pictures of shoes: 4. Hopefully this will increase in the next year, as mentioned above, as H and I have started a new tradition of Christmas Shoes (not at all related to that repellent Christmas song). Last year he bought me a pair of great shoes I had been lusting over and he did so well I decided I'd like to make it an annual thing. His only guideline is that I be able to wear them with a black dress and they not be practical in any way. I also told him finding the gayest sales clerk on the floor would be helpful.
Number of television appearances: 1. Still one of the best days of my life.
Number of home improvement projects completed: 6. Many of these took place in the old house getting it ready for sale. There were major ones, there were minor ones, and there was a lot of painting.
Number of rabbits killed: 1
Number of posts involving Reilly: 4. Most of them involving a crisis of some kind. The irony is lost on me that I had to drag him to the vet at the last minute yesterday with a massive eye infection after what happened two years ago.
Number of houses bought and sold: 2. Days it took: 3.
Number of "celebrity"-related hate-filled comments: 2. I still think it was Bill himself.
Blatant children's book rip-off posts: 2
Weddings attended: 5
Souls saved: 5. If that's what you get from spordic church attendance and half-hearted home-school CCD lessons.
Pieces of writing published: 2. Well, one was a letter to the editor, but beggers can't be choosers.
Thank you, thank you, dear readers, for all the great feedback and laughs you've given me in return for the paltry smattering of writing I throw at you every few days. With Thanksgiving fast approaching, once again this year, this blog is one of the things I am most grateful to have in my life. I wish we could all go out for a drink to celebrate.
Hugs,
MM
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
B-O-O-T-S...BOOTS!*
Quick post this Tuesday - although I am long overdue for a few long ones - since I will spend, yet another, entire day, traipsing back and forth between home and the elementary school - this time for the book fair - since God forbid I be the only mother who doesn't come for each of my children's half-hour sessions, to wander with them around the cardboard displays of Captain Underpants and Junie B. Jones books. I suppose the bonus is at the end of the day when I don't open two backpacks filled-to-overflowing with Hannah Montana and Phineas and Ferb "books". I mean, can we really call them books when they are poorly transcribed, full-length, television episodes?Behold, the latest addition to the Mean Mommy shoe collection! I did not have the foresight to have H take a picture with me actually wearing them so you can not see that they are the slightly over-the-knee boots that are in every magazine this season. They are also the slightly-over-the-knee boots that I spent the late summer/early autumn months scoffing at. Am I Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman? I was even wary of them once I was in the shoe department with H, looking for a casual brown boot to wear with my leggings and skinny jeans, since the the cold weather's arrival (who are these women with nerveless ankles who can wear flats in the winter?). Yes, I am lucky enough to be married to a man who willingly accompanies me into the shoe department and without spending the entire time sighing and tapping his foot in an agitated manner. I think I put an end to that during a shopping trip after #1's birth, by telling him my free time had been drastically cut caring for an infant, and unless he wanted me to limit my shoe shopping to self-serve stores, and all the sensible pumps those stores favor, no longer having time to wait for the queen working the floor to search for my size in the back, he'd better get comfortable looking at high-end footwear. Fearing a future with a wife who wears crepe-soled flats, he got with the program.
On this day, it was the fifty year-old non-cougar, trying this exact pair on, and looking really cute, who prompted me into trying them on myself, despite H's calling them "Luke Skywalker boots". Then, when I was trying out the folded-down-top look during my test drive, he asked me where my Merry Men were. I said he comes willingly, I didn't say I he left his acerbic wit in men's wear. But, despite his comments, I was thrilled with these boots to the point I wore them out of the store like Little Man with a new pair of Buzz Lightyear sneakers.
So if any of you out there are contemplating a pair of these boots, I highly recommend them - if you can get your husband to move past his fictional character associations. Wearing them with a green tunic I was Peter Pan, with a parka on, I was Han Solo. With anymore comments, he's going to be missing a testicle.
*Laurie Berkener - Anyone? Anyone?
Friday, November 5, 2010
Wanted: My free time
Last seen being spent cleaning up from a Halloween party for thirty girls, setting up and cleaning up the pre-school fund-raising bazaar, attending Visitation Day at the elementary school - both the morning and afternoon session (since God forbid my daughters understand I have to go see their other sibling in the same session, as I am apparently, the only parent in either of their classes to have reproduced multiple times or in quick succession), attempting to go the mall with the self-decided-no-longer-napping-yet sleep-deprived-crank-pot Little Man to get everyone much needed gloves and hats (even though we were wearing capri pants last week), only to have him fall asleep on the way (trapping me in the van for TWO HOURS hoping allowing him to sleep would transform him from the devil-child he has become), and dragging the kids to the state aquarium, two hours away, and to the movies, as they are off from school for the teacher's convention, while H is away in Arizona for work until Friday night, giving #1 and #2 an actual leg to stand on as to why they can sleep in my bed with me, ensuring I spend every moment of my day with an offspring.
Free time is wily and elusive, but anonymous informant says it may come out of hiding next week. Report any sightings to authorities immediately.
Free time is wily and elusive, but anonymous informant says it may come out of hiding next week. Report any sightings to authorities immediately.
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