Tuesday, December 10, 2013

Every hour

There's a blog link up somewhere that involves 10 pictures on the 10th similar to the every hour instagram fun.  I took 9 every hour pics today so that I could have a pic of my pics like this.

Starting from the bottom right and going completely backwards they are...

1.  Coffee with pumpkin spice creamer at 8:45 (I had already been up for two hours).
2.  World History with Madi at 9:45
3.  Addressing Christmas cards at 10:45
4.  Reading Economics to Jonathan while he hung more outside lights at 11:45
5.  An embarrassingly unhealthy lunch at 12:45
6.  A picture of the ceramic tree with the unseasonable warm weather coming in the window, I opted for this view as opposed to the computer screen as I was at this point wasting time on the computer. (1:45)
7.  Checking out the FPEA website about Jonathan's graduation (and crying) at 2:45
8.  Jake doing math homework 3:45
9.  Jake made me take 4 more pictures because he has all of a sudden begun acting teenager-like and didn't like the way he looked.

Now my day actually gets busy... I need to drop Jake and Madi at theatre (Jonathan has been there since 1:00), pick up Mary and three more Chinese kids, drop off other kids, then head to the airport to pick up Mary's mother.  Until an hour ago I thought this last part was happening tomorrow...such is the life with a Chinese teenager.

Monday, November 18, 2013

Christmas List link

I recognize that I have my standard 3-5 readers, and I often think if I could get into the flow of linking up with some of the big dog bloggers, I might actually get some comments.  Since I am such an old mom with almost grown kids compared to most of the big dog bloggers that I am referring to, I may have something to say that is worthy of being heard.  So when I came across the link up for Christmas lists and Jake's list has been staring me in the face every time I go to the refrigerator, I figured this was a no brainer.  Without further adieu here is Jake's list.  At the present time, I am fairly certain he still thinks it is Santa who is going to bring some of this stuff.  Every time I attempt to bring up the subject, he shuts me down, clearly not ready to hear it.
Visit Colleen for more Christmas list.

Tuesday, November 12, 2013

Will wonders never cease?

I had to google that phrase because I wasn't sure if it was "will wonders ever cease"  or " ...never..."  Apparently it is the latter.  I'm still not exactly sure what it means, but it seems fitting for a blog title, when I'm on such a role and posting two days in a row.

Speaking of not knowing what something means, I came across the word 'sanguine' twice recently on the internet.  I've know for quite some time that it is a temperament word (I thought that would didn't have an a in it, but it does...temperament I mean, not sanguine).  Anyway... sanguine means confident.  I always thought it meant melancholy.  Doesn't it sound melancholy?  Actually I'm not even really sure how to pronounce it, but the way I say it in my head sounds melancholy.  Am I making a point?  Not sure, but in the two ways that I saw the word recently melancholy didn't make sense so I looked it up, and lo and behold,  it means confident. 

Interestingly while spell-checking 'temperament', blogger told me that 'internet' is wrong.  I was pretty sure it wasn't, but I searched it in my trusty paperback dictionary that helped me with 'sanguine'.  I thought this dictionary might predate the ole internet (sad huh?), but actually it is there and it's supposed to be capitalized.  I'm not doing that, it doesn't seem like it should be capitalized.

Would you believe I actually had an idea of something to write about today, and none of the above is it?

Remember how yesterday (well really the night before into yesterday) Jake had a party?  He's on a Hunger Games kick so the plan was to play that game at least in the morning.  The neighborhood version of Hunger Games is basically multiple house hide and seek with a few plastic swords and back packs that may or may not have bananas in them.  No one gets killed, no one is even supposed to get hurt.  Why do I say 'supposed to'?  Maybe because as the game was winding down and Jake and a friend were running to pick up some nerf bullets, they tripped over each other's feet.  Jake fell on top of his friend more or less smashing the poor friend's face into the road.  It was a very sad scene and like Jake, this poor guy is also in A Christmas Story which opens in just a few days.  The poor kid's face is all scraped up, and Jake feels horrible about the whole thing.  I don't feel very good about this either.  For one thing as the mom, I of course "knew that something like this would happen".  I also know however, that Jake could not wait to have more than just the neighborhood kids here to play this fascinating game.  So I allowed it.  How many times do we as parents let our kids do things that may be fraught with danger?  Basically after being a mother for 18 years, I can confidently answer, "ALL THE TIME!"  Ugh, life is hard!!  Really, REALLY HARD!  Sometimes you can just be running along having the time of your life and all of a sudden your face (or someone you care about's face) is dripping with blood.  Sometimes it's enough to make you want to stay on the couch all day.  There are too many dangers out there, between falling and getting hurt, or saying the wrong thing and beating yourself up for the rest of the day, or finding out that someone's cancer has taken a turn for the worse, or finding out that people whom you respect are not nearly as charitable as they profess to be, or finding out that people aren't as loyal as you thought they were.  It's just a mess sometimes.  People are flawed.  I don't want to get hurt and I certainly don't want my kids to get hurt.  It's painful.  Seriously life is painful. Love is painful.   Pain and love are two sides of the same coin, I think.  If we don't open ourselves up to love, there may be a lot less pain, but what would be the point of that.   Even the guy with the bloody face thinks that the game was all worth it in the end.

Monday, November 11, 2013

Jake and stuff

I guess since Jake is finally having a birthday party tonight, almost a month after his birthday, the timing is probably right to put up a little birthday post for my 11 year old! 

This picture is Jake's head shot for the Christmas Story program.  He will be playing Schwartz in A Christmas Story when it opens in a few days.  Schwartz is the kid who tells the other kid (Flick) to lick the pole.  Since I need to kill three birds with one stone, this is actually Jake's "school picture" turned black and white via instagram, and his 11 year old picture.

Jake is really thriving in school.  We really are homeschoolers at heart, and he will definitely be home again next year, but I'm really happy that he is going to that sweet school this year.  They put on a really touching Veteran's Day program on Friday that Madi and I went to.  Jake and his classed 'signed' God Bless the USA and sang the Armed Forces Medley. 
 
 Now it's the next day.  I had planned to write more, but that's not happening, so I'll leave you with a few more pics...
 






 
 
and remember when...





Leaving the sideways one, it's an illustration of my lack of time and energy.

Monday, October 28, 2013

Families

I'm kind of obsessed with families.  I always have been.  I have been analyzing families for the better part of 30 years, maybe longer.  My degree is actually in Human Development and FAMILY Relations with a concentration is Early Childhood Education.  Some people would argue that I'm not using my degree (I've had a lot of people asking me where I work lately), but really I've used it every day of my life (even before I got it), I just don't get paid (in money) for it.  I remember watching the way other families did things when I was little, and deciding which things seemed to work and which things didn't.  The family that didn't let their teenage kids open a box of cookies when the parents weren't home...not so good!  The family where the mom always had an after school snack for the kids... better!  The girl who always got the same pair of Sears jeans that I got (specifically the pair with the roller skate on the pocket)... a little spoiled, she was the youngest of five kids.  When I started babysitting, I loved hearing everything about how the families functioned, their rules, their meals, their bedtime rituals.  I still love this.  In some ways I've always known this about myself and in other ways I'm just confirming it.  Last weekend I was at a place where a lot of people were giving "talks", I was reminded how much I enjoy listening to any speaker who uses examples from their own families in their talks.  I was reminded of this again this morning when in between doing some school with Madi and laundry and dishes, I read all of a new to me blog written by a 28 year old mother of one baby.  I'm decades (almost) past that stage and yet, I just kept reading and reading.  Recently I met someone and a couple minutes into the conversation I asked her if she had kids.  She didn't.  All through the rest of the conversation I had to keep mentally checking my face to make sure I didn't look like this
I can't really relate to no kids.
 
I have more to say on this subject, but my family calls...

Thursday, October 10, 2013

3000 words

Time to blog?  HA!!  This was supposed to be the year that I cleaned my house and baked lots of cookies.  I think it's pretty safe to say it'll be another 8 years before we get to that point.  Yesterday Jake forgot his Social Studies book at school and had homework and a quiz to study for.  He was able to borrow it from the boy down the street so we could make a quick copy of the chapter (the boy next door had forgotten his book to) {have I mentioned that if ever there was a year to send Jake to school it's this one with next door buddy and down the street boy both in his class, his (former homeschooling) teacher is rookie teacher of the year and the other team teacher is teacher of  the year}  Anyway, when he was bringing the book back to down the street boy I was wishing I had some nice baked goods to send them as a thank you, but with a CCD class to teach last night, a toddler and preschooler at my house, an exchange student with field trip permission slip issues and three Chinese friends who I had also brought home from school and who had needed to stop at Target for something, this was not the time to thank people with baked goods. 

It's not the time to blog either apparently.

In the meantime here are pictures (remember a picture is worth 1000 words) illustrating what is not getting done in my house these days.


 
Yes Jake has been sleeping sheetless for an embarrassingly long time!  On a positive note, Madi and I just finished our 19 hour audiobook for bookclub (with three hours to spare), and I'm fairly confident that the downstairs bathroom no longer smells like pee.  That's the best I can do, and I'm not afraid to say it.

Tuesday, October 1, 2013

Eighteen Years!!

In the morning I will be the mother of an adult!! The pictures aren't coming out in the right order, but that's just the way it'll have to be.