curly girl

A year or so back, you'll remember, I did the No 'Poo thing. I made it about 6 weeks, then I succumbed to the temptations of the hair aisle at Rite-Aid once again, and went on a binge of sweet smelling shampoos. I seriously fell off the wagon, hard. I was hiding Cucumber and Melon Smoothing Shampoos in the back of the toilet, and Gardenia Frou-Frou Delight Conditioner under the bed. Everyone pretended not to notice how jumpy I was, and chalked my shaky hands and twitchy eyes up to withdrawal symptoms.

Anyway, my pal, Tawni, is trying the Curly Girl method with her hair, so I said I'd jump on the band wagon with her, because after all, what are friends for, if not for jumping onto beauty band wagons? But because I have absolutely no will power at all, and change my mind frequently, and will be tortured by visions of flat ironed locks even in my sleep, I am writing this down so you all can keep us accountable.

Also, she doesn't blog.
And I don't have a camera.
So, if you were hoping for before and after glamour shots, you'll have to visit us both in person. It'd be cool, wouldn't it, to document, but hey, here are basic, sort of Before Shots:

This is Me

This is Tawni

As you can see, we are prone to frizz, and Raman noodle type curls.

Both of us have very similar hair, and both of us experienced weirdness of the follicle kind after giving birth. She just had a wee babe, a daughter I like to call Melyssa, but they don't. So, post partum, her hair weirdness is really kicking in. I just had a wee babe recently sorta 5 years ago, but I'm still adjusting to my particular weirdness.

As are all of you.

I blame celebrities, by the way, for why us curly haired girls hate our hair. We have ironed the heck out of it in our misguided attempts to look like Gwyneth Paltrow, and instead we end up with huge biceps from the blow dryer, and frizzed out, dried out, haystacks for hair. Sometimes I touch my hair and remember we're out of Shredded Wheat.

So, basically the Curly Girl Method is something along the lines of this:

1.  DON'T shampoo. Use conditioner instead (yep, even on your scalp).  If you get too greasy after a while, you can wash with baking soda, but from everything I've read, you'll be surprised.

2.  Use lots of conditioner. Of course, botanical, all natural, no sulfate is best. Here's what I got, because it said No Sulfates and No Silicones right on the bottle, and also because it was under $4 for a giant bottle:

3. Use No Silicone gel. Or get wild and crazy like Tawni, and don't use any products at all. I'm not ready to be so wild and crazy yet. So, I bought this:

As far as styling goes, I guess you do what floats your boat. Blow dry, or don't, just try not to touch your curls as much as possible. This is key. Don't EVER brush curly hair, people. All of us with curly hair already knows this basic fact, but just in case... Comb through gently when hair is super wet, and that's it.


Well, we'll see. In just a few weeks, I expect our After shots to look a little something like these

This is Me

This is Tawni




My hubby should be thrilled because every time I straighten my hair, he sighs and says, you just ruined a perfectly good hairstyle. 
My students will not be thrilled, because every time I leave my hair curly, they squint up at me and say, what happened to your hair? Did you forget to brush it today?

Also, I'm not super thrilled with curly hair the length my hair happens to be at the moment, and will be for at least a year beyond now, because my hair grows at the Speed of Snail. It's not short, but it's not long, so basically what I get, if I'm not super careful and if I don't flat iron (like I want to already...awk! help! I'm falling off the wagon again! I wanna be Gwyneth!) it can look like a fuzzy pyramid.

Well, I'm off now. Off to NOT shampoo and NOT flat iron. For at least a couple weeks. Then I fully expect to give up and give in to the desire to run my fingers through my hair again, instead of getting them lodged halfway in a mass of tangles.

Who's with me, girls? (We all know your hair ain't that straight naturally).
Join us? (I'll even let you be Catherine Zeta Jones on my blog).

what I've been doing

Not working on the sequel to Shadows Gray. You'd think, since I consider it daily, that I would actually follow through, wouldn't you? Alas. You'd be wrong. I'm worried. You see, it's not about Sonnet...it's about Rose and a new character. I think my readers - all four of them - will be mad. I don't like making people mad. It turns the warm fuzzies in my tummy into butterflies. I need those four readers to continue loving me. They're all I've got.

Giving myself a scalp massage with coconut oil and tea tree oil. My hair has been so incredibly coarse and rough lately, and I found THIS RECIPE from Pinterest for Cora who I am beginning to think has psoriasis. I can't get her in to see a dermatologist until January, so we tried this. I had some left over and zowie, my hair is soft as a baby's bum now. I definitely recommend it if your hair is coarse, overly processed, or like me: coarse AND overly processed. Just make sure you shampoo twice after; otherwise you'll look like you went swimming in a vat of butter.

Bought Anna's Halloween costume (that sound you hear is the vacating of very conservative homeschoolers who heard I had a good blog, but just left in disappointment) at Goodwill; a wedding dress to be the Corpse Bride. It's a size 18. In women's. Umm, yes, let's just say that my sewing machine will be getting a work out. But it was only $10 including the great veil, so I'm pretty sure I can make it work. I think. Maybe. Ahem.

Considered giving up my two cups of coffee with cream and glass of wine. Cutting back to putting milk in my coffee and only having some vino on the weekends. You know, so I could maybe drop ten pounds...in a year...without exercising LIKE I PROMISED I WOULD HERE. But then I thought... nah. I'd rather be fluffy and who will take care of Gloria if I don't? A year of deprivation does not a happy mommy make.

Had coffee and a scone with my Alaskan friend, Camille, who I MET HERE...that was going to be a clickable link, too, but I can't find the original post. I must have deleted it due to it being written during an interesting time in our lives, you know the one. I probably said something like, we dared to crack a smile at our group home kids, and subsequently felt I must delete since that of course, was a no-no.

Mike has been cast in The Nutcracker this year, as Clara's father. He is now leaping through the house, practicing his jazz hands and making Anna very nervous. He warned the ballet studio's owners,

You know how every performer wants to be the Triple Threat? * I'm just a Double.

* a Triple Threat is a singer who can dance and act, or an actor who can dance and singer, or a dancer who can sing and act. You pick the two Mike is adept at.

Yesterday, at 4:32 or thereabouts, the following happened simultaneously:

• I boiled over some poaching chicken, resulting in that icky smell and tough mess and frantic bubbling sound as the broth hits the stove top,

• the phone rang,

• Gianni threw a ball and knocked over this interesting bubble thermometer that Cora got from my grandmother. It's like a sealed vase and has these odd colored glass balls inside that have temperatures on them: when they float you can see how hot it is in the house. Anyway, we'd had this family heirloom for a grand total of three weeks before Pooky Head demolished it. It crashed to the hardwood in a spectacular fashion, sending shards of glass everywhere within a 500 foot radius, and the water - though I cleaned it up as quickly as a bare footed girl could - warped the floor. Sorry, landlords. 

• I forgot that I had a breakfast casserole in the oven (make ahead breakfast for Mike, who is working an earlier shift). In spite of forgetting, I got it out in time. Yay, me.

• The dog's paw started bleeding again. His toenails are gone, from some mysterious episode last week, and the bandages came off a few days ago. Maybe he stepped on the glass. Who knows. He's a close mouthed doggy. Very strong, silent, unemotional type.

Anyway, that all happened at the exact same time. Just another evening at the Williams' house.

I haven't been sleeping well for some reason, and my dreams these past three nights have consisted of (but not limited to):

• my dad wrangling a posse with Andy Kohler and shooting some guy, avenging angel type, while the rest of us covered it up, but debated turning them in,
• Cora and I being stuck in a house with a crazy killer chasing us (this was the night we watched The Grey and there was a yucky preview of some Elizabeth Olsen horror movie with this premise, so I'm blaming Elizabeth Olsen. She should have done dumb sitcoms like her sisters and not scared me half to death in my sleep).
• my friend, Heather, bringing like five weenie dogs in my house (I have no theories for this one)
• my kindle was found floating in the bathtub
• other scariness that I no longer recall, but made me cuddle up with Mr. Double Threat in fear.

P.S. 

The Grey was kinda dumb.

The end.

Conservatively Liberal

Election years make my brain shrivel up into yesterday’s raisin. They suck the life out of my normally optimistic mood, and make me want to unplug every social media site, television, phone, and news platforms.

Because I hate politics?

No, not really, though I confess to loving them about as much as I love a slight papercut. That is to say, uncomfortably ignoring them for the most part. There are the issues I care about, and about a million others that make my head swim. But that’s not the reason:

It’s because, like a gawky, awkward pre-teen, I don’t fit in anywhere.

To someone who knows cheerfully that they are Liberal, everything is black and white. 

Too someone who knows happily, that they are Conservative, everything is black and white.

Being a homeschooling, pro-life, Christian, in a heterosexual marriage, I’m much, much too conservative for the liberals.

Being a short skirt wearing, gay friend having, reader of Harry Potter, sipper of wine, I am far too liberal for the conservatives.

Does that make me murky gray?

What’s a girl to do? Bury her head in the sand and refuse to come out? Tempting.

It’s difficult to make friends of any sort when you say something like,

After the baptism tonight, do you want to come over and watch Hells’ Kitchen?

Or,

Hey, let’s go to the Dave Ramsay conference and then go wine tasting!

Or,

We missed the church prayer vigil cuz we were out trick or treating.

I’m one of the most Goody Good Girls you’ll ever meet (ask anyone), yet I don’t even own a denim jumper. I make my bread from scratch, but I’ve also taken my kids to the Anheiser Busch Factory (that’s Budweiser, yes. The beer. Not butter beer, but there are those who would cry that that would be even worse). I wear sparkly eye shadow and high heels, but I believe in modesty. I love my Jesus, but there are times I hate praying over dinner because of the squirmy shenanigans going on and the fact that my hard work is getting cold (Martha, Martha, Martha…I know). I’m certainly not a Democrat, but I’m also the worst Christian you’ll ever meet. Is that me being humble, self deprecating, or just honest? Yes.

I have straight friends, gay friends, Calvinist friends, Buddhist friends, friends with eleventy-seven children with four more on the way, friends with one child and laser beam eyes that will shoot your way if you ask them how many more they want, friends who go to church four times a week, and friends who wouldn’t be caught dead in a church (or that’s the only time they’ll be in there!) Friends who would pray for my soul if they saw me in the beer aisle at the super market, and friends who consider me a light-weight because I draw the line at two. Friends who would never consider even celebrating Christmas, much less teach their kids that there is a Santa Claus, and friends who will only accept “Happy holidays,” instead of “Merry Christmas.”

Am I well rounded? Do I have such eclectic friends because I am non-judgmental, or because I am luke warm in my convictions? I honestly don’t know. I know my liberal friends don’t feel judged by me, because they’ve told me so. But have I watered down the scriptures in pursuit of friendships? Jesus told us to eat with tax collectors, the first century equivalent of lawyers. What to do? Crap, I don’t even know any lawyers.

I love my friends. They’re the greatest group of weirdos you’ll ever meet. But they make me sad sometimes, because while they’re yelling about someone hating them, they’re doing the same thing to my other friend. And even if they don’t know that person personally – well, wait. That’s the problem, isn’t it? Can’t we all just sit down at a Chik-Fil-A and have a book group about 50 Shades of Gray? Hahahaha: 50 Shades of Gray in a Chik-Fil-A. I slay myself.

But seriously, while you feel certain in your convictions, whatever they may be, slamming one of my friends isn’t okay. Because they disagree with you, doesn’t make them a hater. We all suck at love, anyway, don’t we? Who has cornered the market on that? The atheists? The Christians? The muslims? The homeschoolers? I repeat, we all suck at it. That frumpy mom you roll your eyes at for being so religious and close minded; she’s been on a journey you’ll never know about. That lesbian who has just come out of the closet; she was one of my only friends at a time when the religious were too busy for me. That teenager with a mouth like a sailor and no respect; given what he’s had modeled for him, it’s amazing he came out sane at all. That woman who’s been divorced twice; she already feels like a loser without you pointing it out. That mom with the autistic daughter; she doesn’t need your spanking methods. That man with the gay son; he doesn’t want your chicken sandwich shoved in his face.

Does this make me weak, meek, turn the other cheek, we’re okay, you’re okay, all we need is love, hold hands and share a Coca Cola and hum a Michael Jackson song? No way. I think everyone needs conviction and passion and should never stop learning. And do I think we all find our own way to God? Not really, no. Being a Christian I can’t say that and still be a Christian.

I’ve done the legalistic approach, where your spirituality is determined by the length of your hair and your skirt. And I’ve done the “God is in the trees” route, so “don’t you dare tell me what to do,” too. I am fiercely pro-life, but I don’t march in parades. I love my gay friends, but I haven’t been invited to any of their weddings, either. When I go to the library, I might leave with a devotional book and Twilight.

So, what am I, in this election year?

Mostly –

confused. And my nose is full of sand. Could someone smuggle me a People magazine and a glass of vino, please? 

What about you? Black, white, murky gray? Are elections easy for you? Seen anything in your friends that make you sad recently? Talk to me, Goose.

Six Things That Happened This Week

In case your life was not complete without a rambling list put together by a odd blogger who should be folding laundry right now, have I got a post for you!

This week our dance studio had their big Spring performances which involved a seven hour tech rehearsal, a six hour dress rehearsal, and three shows. I be tired. My feet be hurtin - which is strange because I wasn't the one dancing. I was being a cat herder, a stage manager, and trying to recall at which age it is permissible to say "merde" to dancers. Not the cats, I decided. Also, I was somehow volunteered for the job of climbing up a ladder during Act I in order to strategically place satin cherry blossoms and risk my life. I think I was volunteered because I am 5' 3" so I was the logical choice. Anyway, the shows were great and I didn't cuss out any little sprites in French, which is also great. Also, I didn't fall to my death, which was also great.

My mommy and daddy were here which was also great, because I eat enough for a small continent when 1. someone visits me, or 2. I visit someone, or 3. days that end in "y."  We had rib-eyes and salads with feta and balsamic and salami and cheeses and decadent steelhead and tons of coffee and even went wine tasting at RoxyAnn.

Cora keeps growing or maybe her clothes keep shrinking, but either way, it's gotta stop.

Mike was rear ended by a crazy lunatic who totaled his car and drove off. Now we have to go car shopping, which is not nearly as much fun as it used to be when I was, say, nineteen.

I have to decide what homeschooling curriculum to purchase and then finish 47% of. I keep getting homeschooling catalogues in the mail and I don't appreciate them. I toss them in the trash with a yelp. Like I need more choices. For cryin' in the night, I lose a year in the fabric softener aisle and that stuff isn't even important.

Yesterday we were at the park and Papa gave Gianni a penny to throw in the fountain. This fountain/penny/wish making stuff was new to the moose and he took the tutorial seriously. He tossed the penny. It landed with a plop. Or maybe it was a kersplash. No matter. He closed his eyes tightly and clasped his hands, as if in prayer. Actually, he doesn't do that during prayer - he mostly pinches his sister, steals something off my plate, knocks over his water, and burps loudly. But he took the whole penny shenanigans seriously. Afterwards, being the nosy mom I am, I totally had to take back the part of the instruction I had given him only seconds before and I forced him to tell what his wish was. It was to get a penny with a dog on it. At first, I thought he meant a dog named Penny, which would have made more sense and also been easier to get for the little squirt, but no. He wants a penny with a picture of a dog on it. So, anyway, he waited four seconds for his wish to come true, which in Four Year Old Boy Years is like, three lifetimes, plus five. Then since a penny with a picture of a dog on it didn't drop from the sky, he thought he'd better cement his knowledge of what the word "wish" meant. Papa said it was like having a dream and then having your dream come true. So he laid down on the rock wall and closed his eyes.

"What are you doing?" I asked, taking the opportunity to munch on his chicken since he wasn't looking.

"Falling asleep! So I can dream! I can't sleep! How am I supposed to dream? How will I make it come true if I can't dream?"

The poor guy was really torn up about the whole predicament, so we had to buy him a hot chocolate because I can't afford therapy.

'Fessions

I have vacuumed up Legos, hair bands, twist ties, stickers, jewelry, and coins instead of picking them up.

I will load up sixty-eleven grocery bags up and down my arms, shout at small children to get out of the way, knock my funny bone on the van, be unable to close the hatch back, press the garage door button with my nose, and give myself a hernia all to save another trip to the garage.  Which I will have to make anyway to close the hatchback.  I will do it again next week.

I don't like massages. They either hurt like heck or tickle. Both make me tense with anticipation and I will leave in more knots than I came in with. Also, I like ending sentences with a preposition. This is a good girl's form of rebellion.

I don't like shoe sales-people who kneel in front of me.  It makes me feel preposterous and snotty.  I tell them to get up and quit being silly; I'm quite capable of trying on my own shoes.  Then they feel sad and lost.  So I tell them to sit down by me and we admire our feet together.  I bemoan my hobbit feet. Then I buy them a coffee.

If the cheese molds, I cut off the moldy part and don't tell anyone and serve it anyway.  This also goes for jam.  And pretty much anything else.

I make my kids make their beds but I don't always make mine.

I'd rather have a clean house than a good homeschooling day.  Don't judge.

I've decided I will never, ever, ever learn the 7s and 8s in the times tables without having to count backwards or forwards from 7x7=49 so one more 7 must be 56 so therefore... etc.  I have decided to be okay with this.  I will also never, ever, ever learn which planet revolves the sun or vice versa.  All I know is 7x7=49 and Pluto is no longer a planet.

I would rather go to a bookstore than a spa.

I would rather go to a library than a bar.

I would rather go to a yard sale than the mall.

I hate buying toilet paper.  Seriously hate it.  It's such a waste.  HAHAHAHA!  Get it?  A waste?  I slay myself.

My dream house is a converted barn.

I don't want to do the converting part though.  I want to buy it fully furnished and ready for me to live in.  I'll bring my coffee, my owl socks, and my Kindle, and I'll pretty much be set.

If my kid's clothes are cute and clean I don't worry about their hair being combed.  If their hair is cute and clean I don't worry about what they're wearing. I adopted this motto early on with my kids and it's just a general rule of thumb now.

I don't brush my teeth before bed every night.  This started when I was pregnant with G.  I was way too tired to do anything extra (i.e. anything at all other than pee) before dropping into bed at night.  Plus, I had horrible indigestion all night long for nine months so I was poppin' Tums like they were going out of style.  All night.  I just knew I'd have cavities once he was born (even though I have never, ever had one).  But I didn't.  So I sorta thought, why was I doing all that extra work for thirty years?  Don't judge. I'm seriously afraid of running into you now because I worry you will be squinting at my chompers.

I don't make my kids wash their hands after every single potty trip.  And I've never used the tissue paper dispenser that's meant for gift wrapping the toilets.

I know I'm supposed to enjoy letting small humans bake with me, but if I'm really honest, I prefer to do the measuring and beating and scraping myself and then deliver the beaters to them.  Cooking though, is different.  They can chop and stir.

I had to borrow nine crumply dollar bills from my middler in order to put some gas in the car. It was embarrassing. Luckily, she knows nothing about the concept of interest. If she complains, I plan to share the gory details of how she was born.

I only recycle if I run out of room in the trash.  Shhh.

I don't think my kid's know our address.  This is probably important info they should ideally know, eh?  Yeah.  I should get on that.  What if they decide to take the city bus?  Oh wait.  We don't have a city bus.  And if we did, they wouldn't take it.  Cuz they could be kidnapped by bus drivers.

I had a magazine article go viral. I've always wanted to say that. Always, since, like, two days ago. It was shared over 3,400 times on Facebook alone. I find it funny because that article took less than an hour to write. This blog has taken me four years to write and my novel took six months, and they don't get nearly that kinda lovin'. The only logical explanation is for me to put a lot less effort into everything I love.

I'm not sure it's possible to put less effort into my hair, but I'll try. I've been going for the bohemian, braided, messy bun, twirly thing, but I think I might look homeless. One of my ballerinas asked me if I had a bad morning and didn't have time to comb my hair. I made her do extra echappes.

How Did We Get Here?

The title alone makes me think of that Talking Heads song, Letting the Days Go By...

One of many songs that I cheerfully sing incorrectly every single time.

Anyhoo, Self, how did I get here? Or more to the point, how did you get there? Well, I'll tell you. By the way, have you noticed that I'm only indenting one space between sentences now? One of my magazine editors smacked me upside the head and reminded me that this 2012, not 1912, and if I didn't stop indenting three spaces she was going to kill me. Not really on the death threat. But I tried explaining to her that I taught myself to type at the age of eleven (back in 1912) from an extremely old, antique, how-to manual for secretaries. Today, we'd call them Executive Assistants, but like I said, this was a very old manual. Anyway, old habits are hard to break. I don't indent to begin a new paragraph anymore; I think that's something.

See? Even though I want to do it like this:

   See?

But letting go of Talking Heads and secretaries, I was going to tell you how a lot of people find this blog. My stats can be amusing. Here are a few of the words people googled and were directed here instead:

she has juvenile bunions. 
Hmm. Are these worse than senior bunions? Less experienced bunions? Why bunions at all? Evidently, they plague America and America must google. Weirdly enough, this sentence is one of the TOP referring sentences of all time on this blog. We're talking, like, 40 people googled this and came here.

fondant preacher. I don't even know what to say. I have never seen a preacher made of fondant. It seems wrong to eat your minister somehow.

jami gertz. Ah, I love her too, but if you clicked here thinking you'd find her moonlighting as a blogger, you'll be disappointed. I did mention her once, during a starry eyed memory of one of my favorite movies, The Lost Boys...how much do I love that whole cast? Great. Now I'm going to cry over Corey Haim again. Just when I think I'm over it...

analeigh tipton hung. Also analeigh tipton feet. Both are disturbing. Please do not plot to hang her or feel the need to ogle her feet. This is a family blog.

There have been other odd and strange referring words, but I hope you all found what you were looking for when you came, and decided to stick around.

Also, one of my biggest referring sites is http://gothise.com/ which I had never heard of, but makes me feel very rocker chick, indie, bad#$% somehow. Alternative people love me! Aw, shucks. Maybe it's them who are looking for relief for their juvenile bunions? We may never know. They're a secretive bunch.

However you got here, thanks for coming and keep it up.

I Hate Free Speech

The irony of me speaking that does not escape me.

I can say it.
Cuz I have free speech and all.
And that's awesome.

But there's a line and it really, really bothers me when people cross it.

When people mouth off about things that they haven't bothered to research. When they spout off opinions that are ignorant and judgmental and just plain mean, and they do it all with relative anonymity.

That really chaps my hide.

Is the world really full of mean spirited punks? Hateful bullies disguised as grown adults? Is that what we become when we can hide behind the safety of our own little computer? Spoiled, know-it-all, jerks with mouths full of hate?

I hate Youtube because I can't help myself from scrolling down and being appalled at the nastiness. I hate the comments people post about a celebrity who has gone from a size 0 to a God-forbid, size 4, and they trash her for being fat. I hate comedians because they're usually well spoken, popular bullies.

I hate that my girls are growing up during this age of the Tower of Babel run amuck.

I hate the bullying that goes on through kid's text messages and Facebook.  I hope texting and MySpace and Facebook are silly, looked-down, things of the past in a few short years when my kid's will be old enough to want them.

I hate when someone I sort of like and respect actually runs for office, because I hate it when nice enough people and their innocent families get dragged through the mud.  I'm usually glad when they don't win (and typically, no one I vote for ever wins...)

I hate that the lovely midwives who helped me deliver Gianni during a traumatic and dangerous birth have had their licenses suspended for being present at the births of some tragically, now deceased babies.  Their numbers are not high - not as high as the typical U.S. O.B.s even - but because of how much people love witch hunts, they are being destroyed.

What a finger pointing world we live in. People yelling about hate and lack of tolerance while they self righteously do the same thing.

People sitting around, crassly naval gazing, preaching at God for not intervening enough yet never doing anything themselves to help those they say they want to help. Indulgently chuckling at the religious who bring bibles to the poor and saying why didn't they bring food instead? Have they themselves or are they too busy posting judgmental comments and ran out of time?

I wonder sometimes when we are raging at God for allowing bad things to happen to good people, if He doesn't sigh and wonder the same about us. If He has a desk, He is probably banging His head against it just as often as we are, but for better reasons.

We can stop the bad and do something good. It doesn't mean the sky will fill with rainbows and unicorns will shoot Skittles out of their horn for you to munch on while you bask in the glory that is yourself and your awesomeness, but you can still do it. Sometimes, actually, you do it, and it hurts like heck. Like my midwives. Like me and my husband: we gave up everything we had and moved in with seven teenage inner city turkeys. It was incredibly unrewarding. It did not turn out well. There were no unicorns. There was rage and fights and exhaustion and danger and hopelessness. But we did it anyway. I don't say that to toot my own horn, but rather, that when you see a need, step up.

I hate all those things up above, but more than those, I hate the feeling of what if...


what if...I could have helped?
And not added to the hurt?


What we went through basically sucked. There you go. I wish I could tell you how it was all worth it in the end, but I'm not where I can say that just yet. But I am glad we did it; if we hadn't, we'd still be gazing at our navals, sighing over wishing we could do something big with our lives.


As goofy as it sounds, go out and be a light to someone today. It can be as complicated as volunteering somewhere that scares you, giving away money, considering foster care, or stepping in where you're needed, or it can be as simple as complimenting a frazzled mom at the grocery store (a quiet 'you're doing great, Mom' does wonders. I've been on both sides of that phrase), throwing a baby shower for a friendless woman, saying Yes to your kids all day, or leaving a waiter a big tip.

I guess my point is, leave a positive mark in a negative world. See some beauty.

If you close one eye and squint, you might even make out a unicorn.

Gramma's Fitted Sheets

Coming out of a strange and wonky, terrible, horrible, no good, very bad year, we were left with little in the way of personal possessions.  This has been quite tolerable since we kind of prefer the minimalist life anyway and you'd be surprised at how much you do NOT need.  But we were down to one set of sheets for our bed (mis matched of course: a flowery fitted sheet and a solid color flat sheet.  And a squillion pillow cases.  I guess I was worried that I'd have a squillion kids who needed to go trick or treating or something).  And those sheets were ...well, threadbare.

Okay, I totally just thought of a hilarious story involving my grand mother.  She was a young bride and very shy.  She was setting up housekeeping and needed some sheets.  I guess they didn't come in sets back then (this would have been in the fifties) and she was specifically in need of a fitted sheet.  She couldn't find them in the department store and so she had to ask.  Did I mention she was shy?  She found a sales lady and peeped,

"Do you have any fitted sheets?"


Only she didn't say fitted sheets.  She mixed up the consonants in the last two words.

She was so mortified, she ran out of the store and never got her sheets.  To this day, my mom, sister and I cheerfully refer to fitted sheets as !@#! @#$T%&.

Okay, back to the original story.

&^$%@!!!

So, hubby and I got into a conversation about sheets and thread count.  He decided our sheets - which you probably could read a novel right through - had a thread count of two.  One for him and one for me.  Hahahahahaha!  Next to his warm panini press legs, I married him for his sense of humor.  

So we've been keeping our eye out for new sheets.  But I'm too cheap to buy any.  And I actually kind of like super well worn sheets anyway.  Ironically, I get this from my gramma!

Wait.  She probably didn't really like them.  She was just scared to replace them.  I just figured that out!  I probably need a series of detective novels written about me.  Also, an action figure.

But anyway, Hubby texted me from work the other day.

Hey, babe, Obie is going to the Sportsman Show and they have 1200 count sheets for twenty bucks!  Want him to pick us up a set?

Ummm...no.  Not really.  Do I want some guy named Obie to buy me sheets at a Sportsman Show?

Call me old fashioned.

Hey, maybe some guy named Juan could run out and buy me some Always Overnights with Wings at the dollar store!
And some dude named Butch could grab me some pantyhose at the Super Walmart!
And some man named Carlos could snag me a bra while he's at Freddie's!

Heck, I'll never leave my house again!  I'll just get strange men to buy me the bare necessities of life and deliver them to me while I lounge in yoga pants and eat bon-bons! 

Sadly, I turned down the generous offer made by my husband and his shopping pal and now I can't find a better deal.  Actually, I can't find 1200 count sheets at all.  Ross and TJ Maxx - my two main haunts - don't have anything over 400, and they're more than twenty bucks.  But I'll never admit it to him or to Obie.

$^%#$%!!

bad theology

When my husband was a teen he loved to irritate his Italian mamma by putting up posters of evil rock and roll bands and listening to their wicked music.  It gave him no end of pleasure.  His mamma was convinced he was being led astray, especially if he listened to those songs backwards.

Our kiddos usually listen to music at night, too.  Of course it's a desperate attempt to get them to sleep longer (ideally, like 20 hours) and it started with the whole Baby Mozart craze of a decade ago.  My babies must listen to zee Mozart so that they will be the SMARTEST babies in the world!  Either that, or they'll get seizures.  It's a toss up, but totally worth the chance.  Motherhood is full of impossible choices.

Do I put them to sleep on their bellies or their backs? Wait!  They have sides.  I can put her on her side.  Flip that baby like a cheese omelet every ten minutes; we must be certain.


Cloth diapers or disposal?  Cloth makes me feel uber hippy sensitive, like I'm single handedly saving the planet with every bowel movement.  Disposal make their pants fit better.


Is it illegal to sign your munchkin up at the Fred Meyer playland/babysitter service and then go sit in your car and read?


Tough choices like that.

Anyway, after the Baby Mozart phase phased out we switched to white noise.  Mostly because I am addicted to white noise while sleeping.  It's like crack to me.  I can't live without it, plain and simple.  My kids don't care so I care for them.  Because that's what mothers do.  If mothers are cold they tell their kid to put on a coat.  If mothers are hungry they force feed a peanut butter and jelly sandwich to their kid.  It's how we roll.  It's how your mother rolled.  We are rollin' in the deep.  Deep in peanut butter.  Well, not me because my kid is allergic so we mostly roll in Nutella.

What in the world was I talking about?
Right.  Music.

So since they weren't digging the white noise, we just learned to hit the Repeat button on their cd players.  This is how my four year old son knows all the words to Mamma Mia and Bon Jovi's Lost Highway album.  But in the last move our cd player became possessed by a strange and evil spirit that causes the volume to steadily increase all night long until Meryl Streep was really cookin' about money, money, money.  So we were forced to switch to the radio, not that we don't love Meryl because she's like the bestest, but really.  In the efforts to keep up with our Christian persona, we choice the popular KLove station for dem babies to croon themselves to sleep to.  Until one night...

My theology obsessive husband informs me that the precious mold-able minds of our youngsters have been inundated with *drum roll, puhleeze*

bad theology.

Which, in his book, is worse than a little Pink Floyd or Poison.
He was frothing at the mouth (husband, not sleeping child).  The offending song?

"Someone Worth Dying For."

"Are you kidding me?" he asks, incredulously.  "When we're feeling down on ourselves and depressed and hating sin, we just have to remember that we were worth dying for?"

"That doesn't sound soooooo bad," I answer, half heartedly.  Half hearted because I am struggling to hear him over my beloved white noise. Actually, I'm not struggling so much as I'm ignoring.

"Not so bad?" he croaks. "Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a fantastically great person like me??"


"Oh.  Oh, yeah.  I see your point.  If we were so wonderful, then it diminishes His wonderfulness, huh?  If we were so fan-freaking-tastic then it makes His sacrifice a nice thing to do instead of a mind blowing thing to do..."

"After listening to this come-as-you-are-and-leave-the-same-way, there's-a-god-shaped-hole-in-your-heart, jesus-lover-of-my-soul mumbo jumbo, our kids are going to grow up lazy, luke warm, Americanized, namby pamby, prosperity driven, pseudo Christians!  I can't take it!  What's next, midnight readings of The Shack? Sneaking out the window to go to Watchtower meetings?  Another year of this and our kids will be out of control." 

And that is why Christian radio has been replaced by heavy metal in our kid's bedrooms.
Also, Alice Cooper is a Christian and he just might possibly have good theology.

attendant has been notified to commit me

Attendant has been notified to assist you...


... but I don't need any assistance.  I just need to pay for my milk and scan my swiss chard.


Please remove the last item from the bagging station...


...um, I didn't put anything in the bagging station yet.  Are you talking about that gnat that flew by?


Attendant has been notified to assist you...


...I don't need assistance!  Ok, fine.  Whatever.  Where is said attendant?  Hello?


Item not found.


You can't find bananas?  They're a pretty common item.  


Quantity?


Umm, looks like nine. 9.  Noooo!  Wait, not nine bunches of bananas - nine total bananas!  Nine bananas!  I'm not running a school for monkeys!


Please remove the last item from the bagging area.


Ok, ok, it's all gone!  I put everything back in my cart!  Stop yelling at me!


Please put the last item back in the bagging area.


Argh!


Why do I do this to myself every time? I like customer service just fine.  I'm not avoiding the friendly checkers.  Why do I think I can do their job faster?  I can't.  They're better.  I can admit it.  They can scan, I can tour jete, they can tally, I can pirouette.  They don't come to the ballet studio and expect to teach their bunheads themselves.  That would be silly.  


And trying to feed crumpled one dollar bills (earnings from your yard sale) into the machine is almost as embarrassing as - well, insert your most embarrassing scenarios here.  Especially if you mention to the skeptical checker-who's-not-a-checker-but-is-just-a-bored-employee-who-carries-a-magic-box-that-can-erase-your-mistakes, that you're a dancer.      

beautiful girl

I was going in the large grocery store doors yesterday and a beautiful young woman was coming out.  we passed each other through the door.  as most gals do i couldn't help noticing her, weighing myself by her standard and found wanting.  she had perfectly highlighted and flat ironed hair.  she was wearing great clothes that i doubt came from her local friendly goodwill.  she had a killer bag that made mine shrink under my arm in shame due to something sticky being spilled in the bottom and the fact that i had a two day old string cheese in there somewhere.  she had a rocking shape that boasted of either daily grueling workouts at the gym or an envious metabolism.  i suddenly remembered that the last time i set foot in a gym was to pick up my daughter from swim practice and i had a mocha with whipped cream in hand at the time.  like most (insecure) women do, i took all this in in the three seconds it took for us to pass one another.  my eyes glanced down at her feet without seeming to do so as i confiscated control of the door and she took it from me.




beautiful high heels of course.  why don't i grocery shop in high heels?


yet.


one was black, the other brown.


the same style.  exactly. 


she must have bought two pairs.  maybe a sale?  maybe just insanely comfortable shoes?


but two distinctly different colors.


and i smiled, but not in a mean-girl way, just in a maybe-we're-all-put-together-with-elmer's-glue-like-our-preschooler's-cut-out-paper-dolls.


and i realized maybe my mom, and your mom, and you when you say it to your kids, are right.  nobody's perfect, child.

Father Time Drinks CoffeeMate

I thought I was the only one with a peculiar habit.  Turns out when I mentioned it on Facebook, lots of people confessed they do the same.

What?  Well, I'm glad you asked (pretend you asked).

We judge the time and space continuum by the expiration dates on our dairy products.  What does this mean, for those of you who don't know this sneaky little trick for telling time?

Well, say, for instance that you are with child.  These tiny humans take ten months to cook.  Not nine.  Don't argue with me on the math; I almost committed spousalcide when Hubby corrected me when I was preggers with Cora.  That's like saying the first month didn't even count.  Whaaaa?  Huh?  I had the tossed cookies to prove it.  Anyway, back to how dairy fits into the biological clock.  You can count off the days using cream cheese.  For instance:

By the time this Land O' Lakes expires, I will be fatter than Shamu and just as shiny.


OR


When this French Vanilla coffeemate has run its course, I will be stuffing cabbage leaves in my nursing bra.


OR


When this cheddar starts evolving into blue cheese I will have a small child and an extra spare tire, both of which will need names.


I'm not sure when I started doing this but it is an interesting measure of time.  I pulled out the milk yesterday and it doesn't expire until December 18!  This was so helpful to me because I had no idea it was time to turn on the holiday music, but, YES!  The milk tells me so!  And Horizon Organic 1% never lies.  They're like the Mother Theresa of milks.


Naturally, things expire at different rates, but this works out well because you can divide your fridge into sections according to your calender.  For instance:


The pickles don't expire for three more years.  By the time I eat this last pickle I will be meeting Cora's boyfriends,  dropping Roo off on Broadway for summer camps, and Moose will be finishing up #2 in the bathroom without hollering for me and my talent with the toilet paper.


OR

This half and half expires tomorrow.  By the time this half and half expires I will have showered!  My feet smell like pickles.


OR

This can of whipped cream expires in one month.  I shall start that diet in one month and one day.


It really is a handy dandy way of telling time and planning out your life.  Try it.  You'll never go back to clocks.

I have a problem.

My name is Melyssa and I am a thrift store addict.

*hi, melyssa!*

The first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem.

I do.

I brake for yard sales.

Some house wives dream of running away with the I Can't Believe it's Not Butter! guy and going to some tropical local where they can sip drinks in coconuts with little umbrellas.

I dream of running away and becoming an American Picker.

I admit I have a disease.

Picker's disease.

Recently I was with Anna (my little picker in training) and we were at Goodwill looking for Halloween costumes. Yes, we dress up, which in some circles requires us to surrender our Christian homeschooling card for a month.  Anyway, I purchased this for Anna, being blinded by the price tag - a mere $3.99! for original art work! of a ballerina! - and I didn't look too closely.

It's certainly one of a kind.

Original.

Perhaps less Dega...more Dali?

Dem four legged ballerinas are hard to come by.  She must have had an frightful time getting into a company!  I admire her persistence.  Also, the man with no legs; I can't imagine what he went through trying to find a partner.  No-legs-man with four-legged-girl = match made in ballet heaven.

Either that, or I'm looking at it all wrong and she doesn't have four legs, she only has two legs which evidently both sprout of her right hip (youch) and the man is only a man from the torso up.  He's like a centaur except instead of stately horse legs he got saddled with lady gams with bad turn-out and no ability to point.

So, it may not have been the purchase of the year.  But it has character, by golly! I sorta want to see more from this artist.  A three armed gymnast perhaps?  A two headed figure skater?  Let us have a moment of silence for extra limbed performing artists out there.  We appreciate you.  We really do.  Although we're not sure where you go to buy tights.

It's the name of a musical

So my blogging window is limited because we're totally stealing internet access from our neighbor's because the router we bought was bad.  We only get a sliver of a half of a fraction of a percentage of a bar and only if I place myself precariously on the side of my craigslist mattress which folds in the middle like a cheese sandwich, and aim the computer towards the window.  I don't think our neighbors would mind because they are listening to country music as they work in their yard and anyone who listens to country music are good people.  I know this. Anyway, I have to blog fast before the sliver of a half of a fraction of a percentage of a bar becomes nil and void and poof! vanishes into a world wide web graveyard from which no one ever returns.  Dead zones follow me.  It's weird.  I'm like those people who can't wear watches because they're magnetized or some such thing.  Luckily, good ol' blogger saves what I'm writing every few minutes.  They're good people too.  Except when it comes to allowing people to leave comments and then they twirl their handlebar mustaches and tie those comments to the railroad tracks where I never get to see them again.

I've been a little obsessed with hair lately.  Not the stuff on my head, which is just irritating beyond belief and going gray at the speed of light, but the other stuff.  I bought a new razor, spurring my budget conscience obsessed husband to say sweetly,

Hey, honey, could you quit spending like a drunken sailor?
 
I almost felt guilty for my shiny new green razor all perched pretty like on my shower wall, but only almost.  It had been almost six months since I had a new one and I might as well have been shaving with construction paper for three months of that time.

May I remind you that I am a pale-ish white person with nearly black hair?  I am not one of these lucky duck blonde girls who only have to shave bi-annually: we're talking daily in the summer and even then I sport a five o'clock shadow on my ankles by dinner time.

I know, I know.  This is really more than you want to know about me.  Be quiet.  I'm sharing my soul here.

So I refused to feel guilty about my splurge and I even didn't care about the cut on my shin bone that almost made me bleed to death.  It was the sign of a freakin' good razor!

But sadly, the whole purchase came back to bite me in the tushie.  Late last night a huge, we're talking ginormous, crash rocked through our sleeping house.  I tend to suffer from what is called Emergency Situation Tourettes Syndrome which basically means I cannot be held responsible for what I say when confronted with ginormous crashes in the middle of the night,  loss of blood,  scary movies, or scary movie previews.  I also suffer from Pregnancy Tourettes,  which means I can't be held responsible for what I say when confronted with smells, bad drivers, empty cupboards, or toilet paper commercials.  But I don't have that malady currently, so no worries.

Great.  Now I want a baby.

But back to hair.  The crash from my bathroom made me jump to the logical conclusion that mutant alien zombies were coming through the window.  But it was only the new razor falling off the shower wall where it was SUPPOSED to be hanging nicely from its included-at-no-charge shower wall hangy thing.  I still suspect mutant alien zombies.

Mutant alien zombies with suspiciously smooth legs to boot...

The second hair story that's been on my mind because I recently shared it on Facebook (like good anti-social people do who avoid real relationships but talk freely online) is about when I was pregnant with Gianni, a scant four years ago.  Confession time:  my belly button gets a little fuzzy when gestating humans.

That rustling sound you just heard was the sound of all males leaving their computers in disgust.

Okay, now that it's all women here, let's dish!

I grow a tummy like a cute little fuzzy peach.  Or a kiwi.

So, I get this brilliant idea while eight months pregnant to use this hot wax thing I've had in my bathroom cupboard for like, ages.  This seems super dooper logical to someone whose braincells have recently leaked out their ears and onto the floor.  What?  Your brain cells don't do that when pregnant?  Huh.  Interesting.  Well, anyway, I smear the hot wax all over my sasquatch belly and poor little Gianni, who is swimming around inside, all fishy like and bouncy and practicing his own stunts.  I wait until it hardens.

If you've never waxed. it's a painful procedure, but heck, at least it's fast, right?  All I had ever done at this point was my eyebrows, and that's like, a centipede worth of skin you're messing with, so who cares.  You can do it!  Grit your teeth and it's over in two seconds!

Well, not so much with a giant belly that holds an eight pound sumo wrestler and all the baggage and furniture and supplies said wrestlers carries.  We're talking major real estate.

Needless to say, Pregnancy Tourettes reared its ugly head.

I did finally get all that wax off, but it was not without tears and begging for my life to be spared to the Waxing Gods.

If ever I become with child again, I will embrace my kiwi belly, for it is beautiful and round and furry like a kitten.  And who doesn't love kittens?  Ummm, no one.  Everyone loves kittens.

Now that I think about it, no small wonder poor Gianni was bald.

A List

Time for one of those list type blog postings.  A couple reasons for this: 
1. I can't get my thoughts organized cohesively enough to make blackberries segue nicely into ballet, or homeschooling segue into bacon.  Actually, there's a lot of bacon in homeschooling, so that might work. 
2.  I should be making a list of homeschool supplies instead of a list of nonsense.  But I'm not.  And it's getting harder to deny that school is starting soon.  Stoopid back to school specials and sales and commercials.  How am I supposed to bask in denial and procrastination if ad genius' keep throwing it in my face?  Also, I want a Trapper Keeper.  And Sharpies...lotsa Sharpies!

So here are my thoughts, happenings, and desires, posted in a lovely numbered format for you.  Try to keep the excitement to a minimum.

1.  Last night my smurfs (or is it smurves?) picked blackberries on the side of the road.  Today, we make pie.  It's another reason to love Oregon, the wild blackberries.  They are delicious.  Gianni eats them as fast as I can pick them (obviously he can't pick them himself, he's far too busy eating them).  He has a strange fear of "pokies," something I believe his hypochondriac sister instilled in him, so it takes him approximately three weeks to approach a bush.  We also weren't dressed for picking last night (we were supposed to be taking a bike ride but were ambushed by a strange and irresistible jonesin' for blackberries five minutes in) and so I was forced to carry him a bit.  He was nice enough to lay his head on my shoulder and cheer me on by saying, 'you can do it, Mom!  I'm not heavy!  Just a few more miles to go!  Yaaah, Mommy!'

2.  My first column for Home Educating Family came out this month.  I'd love to tell you how great it looks, but I sort of am not a subscriber.  Yet.  I will, I swear!  But the Trapper Keeper comes first.  Budgeting is everything.  Anyway, if any of you readers subscribe would you tear out the article entitled Everything I Need To Know I Learned in Sunday School and mail it to me, please?  Thanks.  It was based on this  original blog posting if you want to refresh your memory.

3.  We have found a house we very much want to rent so I will let you know if the landlady accepts us.  Thinking of delivering fresh blackberry pie to her... It's a super cute 1950s house (yes, very us) in a lovely neighborhood. 

4.  I entered my first writing contest, but alas, did not win.  I didn't expect to, but it would have been a nice shot of motivation.  Ah well.  Still plugging along on the book: 25,000 words!  That's a quarter of the way through!  Yaah me!

5.  We bought a second car from some of our closest friends, which is just another step in the Get Thee Back To Normalcy Project we've been working on since June 15th.  Before you know it, we'll be living like YOU!  Like EVERYONE ELSE!  Joy, rapture, hallelujah, and pass the bacon!  I'm going to dig myself a wonderful rut and never come out.  You'll all wonder, where's that strange girl with the fifteen children and the pink carpet and the crazy lifestyle? and I'll be like, here I am, in the rut down here!  Basking in normalcy and writing a book.  That's me.  I may even, I don't know, get a gym membership or something totally Americana like that.  Or a Starbucks punchcard!!!  Oh yeah.  Totally getting one of those.  And shop at The Gap!!  Nah, I'm never gonna do that.  I went on a date with my LuvahBoy last weekend and we went to see Crazy, Stupid Love (cuz when you've been married more than ten minutes the husband goes to see what the wife wants to see) and there's a scene where Ryan Gosling (who may or may not be married to me in The Movie in My Head) tells Steve Carrell he is better than The Gap.  And then he makes fun of his Great Clips haircut, which made us laugh because we had literally just walked out of Great Clips not two hours before.  With a coupon. 

6.  Nutella has become a food group 'round these parts.  If that's wrong,  Roo and Moose don't wanna be right.

7.  According to my stats if you type in Fondant Preacher in a search engine, you will eventually be directed to my blog.  I find this funny, odd, and weird, since I don't recall ever in my life having written a word about fondant.  I've never used the stuff.  Wanted to, but never have.  I can't buy fondant when I need Sharpies and magazine subscriptions.  Also, silverware, beds, garbage cans, towels, chairs, and all that other stuff we have need of and don't own, but would look great in our 1950s style rental house.  Dishcloths, waste baskets, curtains, pillows, soap, spoons, bowls, water glasses.  Good grief, I should be making lists of other things... Pots, pans, footstools, why did my font just change on me?

8.  I don't actually have anything to say about bacon, sorry.  Except that's it is excellent on potato and leek pizza. 

9.  When we went to the coast a few weeks ago, we all went zip lining.  Great fun.  Gianni had no fear, quite like he is in water.  Segue into...: the little water rat taught himself to swim.  He's only three!  What the??  I don't know if I like it.  Water scares me.  Anyone who knows me, knows this.  I think it goes back to when Cora disappeared during the Episode of Which We Do Not Speak.  She was gone for an hour and a half at the age of four, lost in the mountains and I really thought if the kidnappers didn't have her, then I would find her face down in a stream somewhere.  At least, that's my psychologist take on it.  Maybe I've just seen Jaws too many times.  Whatever.  Anyway, the last thing Moose needs is more confidence in the water, so I'm not sure his doggy paddle is something to be happy about.  If only the water was full of "pokies" he might exercise a little restraint.  Anyway, I would put photos of the little man zip lining but it would make his Gramma toss her cookies, so I won't.

10.  I don't have a #10 but you can't end a list on a 9.  That's be weird.

On my mind

Not Georgia.  Never been.  Would like to, but only in say, January.

Yumminess. It's what's for dinner.

My Moose peeking at me as I type from behind bars.  The bars on his top bunk, don't fret.  In a minute he'll climb down and accost me with his savage morning breath.  It may melt my face, but I can take it, cuz he's my Pooky Head.

Trying to convince Pooky Head to get a haircut.  He is opposed.  He may be a hippy before I know it; hanging out on the corner, wearing love beads and tie-die, driving a VW bus and crashing my commune.  Hey, get your own commune, boy!  I was clear on the tie-die rules.

He just asked me if I was typing to the boys.  That makes me sniffly.  I miss them.  You guys reading this? I MISS YOU TURKEYS!

Finding a house.  Always starts out So Incredibly Super Fun, then slides down the Richter Scale to Not As Much Fun, then all the way to This Is Frustrating.  Scouring craigslist though just never gets old however.  I can buy a wheat grass juicer!!  Not kidding.  I can commiserate with the mad guy who wrote a diatribe about property managers exploiting all his money for application fees and then telling him the house he wants is already rented to someone else (except I'm not at the point where I'll cuss about it and use all caps.  Yet).  I also liked the ad for a wine rack that announced WINE NOT INCLUDED SO STOP ASKING!

Babies.  I can't help myself.  If anyone has an extra, please mail me one immediately.  My neck has not been drooled on for quite some time.  Dang Moose is about to be four.  What happened to my baby??  Did he eat him?  I need someone to snuggle and cuddle and hug and kiss and name George.

First payday on Thursday!!!!  Do the payday dance!!  Pirouette and chasse, pas de bouree, and LEAP!!  Repeat!  One more time!  This time, FASTER!

Settle down and have a wheat grass smoothie.

Speaking of haircuts (yes, we were, try to focus, dear reader) Cora wants one.  My little tomboy.  I'm thinking of allowing her to get an Audrey Hepburn pixie cut but only on the promise that she'll wear cute headbands, or barrettes and learn to style it.  Thoughts?  Not you, Papa, I know you like it long; other people's thoughts?

Seeing my bachelor brother get hitched soon.  I hope the Mr. and Mrs Downum enjoy their wine rack (WINE NOT INCLUDED, SO STOP ASKING!)

My book.  I'm at a stage where I feel as though I'm writing filler...books are long.  How do authors churn out all these books?  I'm creatively depleted and I'm only on 16,000 words. 

Breakfast.  See ya!

Nothing much is happening these days so I'm treating this blog more like a diary.  


Dear diary...nothing much is happening these days.


Note:  when I was about my daughter Anna's age my diary was name DeeDee.  I thought that was an unbelievably lovely and grown up and sophisticated name.  I also remember very suddenly at this very moment a moment of Who's The Boss?  where Sam had a friend who wanted to change her name to Vivian.  Sam said why?  She said dreamily, Isn't it obvious?  Sorry.  Sometimes I have random flashbacks of episodes of Who's The Boss.  Actually, it may have been Full House.


Last week there were all sorts of job prospects happenin.'  This week:  nothing.  A void of internet emptiness and despair.  Being unemployed and living with family alternates between chaos and boredom.  It's like a lovely vacation ... that doesn't end.  It was wonderful of my in-laws to thoughtfully pick out a home in a subdivision with a pool, ten years ago when they moved here.    It's like they knew - instinctively knew - that somehow at least one of their six children would move back in with his spouse and three kids.  They're thoughtful and prophetic people like that!  So as much as I despise pools (the bathing suits!  the pee!  the loud small humans! the deep water that could harbor sharks!) we have spent so much time there my children look like I kidnapped them from Mexico.  Their tan lines are adorable, especially Gianni's whose white little bottom peeks out from beneath his Star Wars swim trunks.  I, on the other hand, have a lovely burn on the backs of my thighs (i.e. tushy) and it now hurts to sit down.  Alas.  I was going for Bronze Amazon Goddess when I laid out with my SPF 4 Banana Boat tanning oil and got immersed in a Dean Koontz Frankenstein novel.  They just don't make SPF 4 like they used to.


Frankenstein is another one of those words that the ol' I before E except after C rule doesn't apply. Is there a second verse to that totally errant expression? Or does it just not apply when the word is ... German?  


It's actually good I have so much time on my hands;  I obviously have been philosophizing quite a bit.  


I have to go now because I'm making my father in law watch Runaway Jury.  I'm hoping the ending surprises him but I don't think it will considering the last movie I forced him to watch was The Usual Suspects and he totally figured out the ending before it happened!  I mean, who does that?  No one knows that little ol' lame Verbal Kent played by little ol' Kevin Spacey is REALLY Keyser Soze!!!!  Umm, spoiler alert.  But it's like 15 years old, so if you haven't seen it yet, you ain't going to.  I heart movies with shocking endings.  The Others and Arlington Road, two of my other favorites.


Signing off, dear diary.
Moi.

My husband told me yesterday he was going to lock me in our room with a glass of wine and a box of Cheezits and not let me out until I blogged about "something funny."  Or maybe it was a box of wine and a glass of Cheezits.  Whatever.  Let's not split hairs.

Is he supportive or just plain abusive?

Three reasons why I haven't been able to blog about anything funny lately:
1.  Life is not super dooper amusing right now.
2.  I'm still stinging from getting slapped down from my last blogging adventure.
3.  I can't think of anything to write.

What IS funny:  I'm writing this on a mattress on the floor of my in-law's house, with a large Care-Bear blanket.  In the attempt to make our new digs more romantic, we re-named the yellow one after Marvin Gaye and call him Let's-Get-It-On Bear.

That was so inappropriate.
But sort of funny.

A somewhat funny conversation I had not ten minutes ago with Moose:

Him:  Mom, why we not live in Michigan anymore?  (Stop judging his grammar, he's three, you monster).

Me:  Because we were fired by a bunch of holier-than-thou turkeys who have no sense of humor.

Not really.  I only thought that.  What I said was, my heart in my throat, feeling like my poor little pooky bear is scarred beyond belief and the load of guilt I feel for ruining his life weighs on me like a freight train,
'Because we just don't live there anymore...that's why....want some ice cream?  Or a pony?'

Not really.  I didn't say that either.  But I did ask him what he missed the most, stealing myself for the replies I thought I'd get of the big brothers we left behind, the friends, the house, the tractor...

Him:  I just REALLY miss the XBox.

Shallow, callous, or merely a realist?  You decide.

It is really nice to be back in the West.  I missed mountains frantically.  I love mountains.  We even have a volcano here.  It still has snow on it.  Hardly surprising since Mike and I are single handedly responsible for global climate change.  Al Gore should probably just draw and quarter us right now and save the planet.  The whales.  The spotted owls.

There are job prospects cookin.  Not wanting to jinx a single one, I am not telling you what they are.  Sorry.  Feeling superstitious.  Or fretful.  Or something.

See?  I'm not funny these days.  My funny bone is broken.  Give me topics, I shall try to oblige.  I have time.

In the meantime, until you topic spam me, I am sipping on wine, munching on Cheezits and hulu-ing dance shows.  Because in this time of unemployment, it's the responsible thing to do.

What To Do In Daze Of Time-Off

Four days a month, we house parents get "time-off."  This means you pack up any belongings you find necessary (coffee, books, suntan lotion, chocolate bars) and any and all small children you may have birthed yourself (one without drugs, thankyouverymuchcanIgetanamen?) and GET LOST.  Us being the lone wolves we are and being so very far away from the people who are related to us, whether in blood or in spirit, we only get lost as far as across the driveway, to the little cottage we lived in a for a few weeks when we first moved here.  We rent movies and check out lots of books and eat whatever we please without having to submit our menus to the state of Michigan so that they can see we do indeed eat a well balanced diet.  We spend time with the mini-Williams who don't have to share their parents with anyone, and scratch Milo behind the ears more often, and hold up the laptop next to the window in the hopes that we can get enough of a signal to have the internet.  Here are the other things we do:


1.  Eat cheeses, French bread, salami, and apples for supper.  Gianni said and I quote,  'This was the best dinner of my life!'


2.  Mike conquers the world in Civilization.


3.  I blog.


4.  The kids watch Gnomeo and Juliet.  Fourteen times.


5.  We eat chocolate donuts dunked in tea.


6.  I realize all three books I brought were from the YA section.  I think I'm having a midlife crisis.  I'm just thrilled there is nary a vampire in any of them.  So far.


7.  Talk with that guy I married over a dozen years ago and actually get to finish a sentence.  


8.  Send the kids out to catch turtles and frogs.


9.  Go find new parks to visit.


10.  Go stroll downtown with Anna, who is my antiquing partner.


11.  Hit the farmers market for the first time this year!


12.  Go to dinner at a friend's house and watch O Brother Where Art Thou?


13.  Rent more movies.  Suggestions, anyone?  I just got Red, because I have a fondness for Brucie.  Also want to look for Waiting for Superman.


14.  Ride bikes to this country cemetery we recently found.  I have strangeness in my blood and so do my kids.  We love cemeteries.  We race around trying to find the oldest tombstone and make up stories for all the deceased.  We look for names the same as ours for shivers-up-our-spines moments and everyone politely waits while I cry over any and all children's tombstones.  Told you I was strange.


15.  Smoosh bugs with shoes.  I bought a twin pack of fly swatters but Schroeder and Moose used them immediately as light sabors and destroyed them in five minutes flat.  We get these crazy box elder bug invasions in the summer.  Plus, the skeeters are getting fierce; poor Cora's legs look like she was chomped halfway to the bone and left for dead.


That is all for now...I must drink more coffee and finish The Hunger Games...