Hello.
We celebrated David’s 14th birthday yesterday. And birthdays are just one more thing that I don’t do very well so it was a rather sad little affair, with one of my traditionally pathetic-looking cakes. Fortunately, 14-year-old boys seem to mainly care about the presents...and he got his Ipod Touch...so he was a happy camper.
But the highlight of the day for me was when we forced him to go out to eat with us, and while we were eating we decided to "bless" him. Which sounds weird, I know, but the "blessing" used to be one of our family traditions and while it is now defunct, basically it involved my mom forcing us to gather around and say nice things about each of her grandchildren, as they turned 13. We gave them "the blessing" so to speak. Of course, most of us thought it was a BLESSING when we stopped having the blessings, because it was supposed to be serious and my family doesn’t do serious too well. And none of us look or sound cute when we cry, so it was just one giant mess of a time. But when all was said and done, I think most of the kids liked it and I know my mom loved it, so I don’t know why we all griped so much about it, except that griping is one thing we do well.
So at Pizza Hut last night, the five of us decided to revisit the tradition. We all said our piece (actually Rachel and Dave said a bit more than their piece) and it wasn’t so bad, and I think David liked it. Everyone had something nice to say...and no one seemed to be making anything up (like in the old days). And it didn’t get too maudlin since it was buffet night, and sometimes in the middle of a speech, a Pizza Hut employee would bring out a new pizza and we would all have to jump up and run to beat the other diners to get our share.
And incidentally, it was a bit easier to come up with some good stuff for the blessing since we had just come from parent teacher conferences, where the kid got good reviews. The choir teacher actually told us, "I don’t know what I’d do without him," which we found strange until she added that he’s one of the only middle-school boys who can sing baritone. But everyone else said nice things as well. This was not surprising because our fall conferences for David are always very cordial. It's not until the spring conferences that things get ugly...where the teachers unanimously recommend a muzzle for him because he talks too much.
Okay, enough about the birthday boy. Let’s move on to the girls.
Due to some scheduling issues at the high school, Emily had to be moved out of her conditioning class and into a fashion marketing class. So no more sweatin’ to the oldies for her. Now she has to learn about fashion design. And rumor has it that this class will go to Dallas in the spring for a field trip...where they will be forced to attend fashion shows, get pedicures and eat at Wolfgang Puck’s Five-Sixty restaurant. Once again, I marvel at the changing face of education. We never went much further than the planetarium 20 miles down the road for our field trips. Except that one year when the art club went to Branson and we slept in sleeping bags in tents which were pitched on very rocky ground, and this was during the coldest weekend in October. That was one miserable weekend, but I guess I was getting what I deserved since I never took an art class and only joined the art club so I could go on the trip.
But back to Emily. She is busy practicing her dances for Senior night (she’s doing two for some reason) and I am dreading the whole night since it’s going to be cold, and sad, and my only consolation is that my brother and his family are supposed to be coming to visit. But I am feeling sort of guilty about that too because I think he thinks he has to "pay me back" so to speak because I went to see his son play ball when he was a senior. And I hope he knows I don’t think watching my daughter dance and prance about in a cheerleading uniform is the same as watching his son actually play football. Not that I don’t whole-heartedly believe that cheerleading is a sport. It’s just not a sport like football.
And one last note on Emily. Last night she watched Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? with Dave and me and she giggled through the whole thing even though we’ve seen it a hundred times. And then she came to kiss me goodnight and sat down on the bed and started talking about this and that...and I finally had to tell her to go to bed sometime after midnight. And then I felt bad because I know she’s not going to be able to hang out and talk to me late into the night for very much longer. So this mother of a senior thing is getting to be a real hassle.
I better write about Rachel and Dave and the basement next time, because this post is getting out of hand lengthwise. Dave won't mind because he doesn't like to read anyway. And I don’t suppose Rachel will mind either, since she can't be BOTHERED to read my blog. Which really hurts since I know she reads a lot of other drivel, as evidenced by the titles on her bookshelf.
And for lunch today, I had some Kraft mac and cheese, and a fortune cookie I found at the bottom of my purse from last time we ate at Pei-Wei.
Much love,
Shelley
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Monday, October 12, 2009
It was the best of weekends, it was the worst of weekends.
So...have I mentioned that we are having an unseasonably cold October? And of course I have no heat on the first floor of my house...because of the dreaded basement project. The bedrooms upstairs are on a separate unit so we are toasty up there, but the temp in my kitchen and living areas is around 50 degrees most of the time. When Dave gets the fireplace going, it can reach as high as 55, but that’s still a bit on the cold side for me. Which is why I put on my leggings, wool-lined boots, and several layers of shirts, sweaters and jackets, before descending to the first floor in the mornings. And this routine is getting a bit old.
And then some of my family came in for the weekend...ostensibly to see the girls cheer at our football game Friday night...but in the end, it’s always about THE GARAGE SALE. My sisters and I are, and have been for as long as I can remember, garage-sale-a-holics. And apparently it’s a genetic disorder, because our kids seem to be affected as well. But don’t tell anyone. It’s our dirty little family secret and we aren’t exactly proud of it. But the truth is, we LIKE to set up and hold garage sales. We have the usual garage sale merchandise, including a well-stocked holiday table, a lovely array of used makeup and jewelry, and an outstanding selection of bags, purses and shoes. But then we also like to put out embarrassing things, like our sons’ boxer shorts, to see if they will sell...and they always do. And we find this entertaining for some reason.
So anyway, we held our garage sale this weekend in a rented building because the weather forecast indicated below freezing temps and sleet for Saturday. And this turned out to be a good thing because we needed a warm place to go. But eventually we had to pack up and go back to my cold house. I suggested that we spend the evening in my bedroom playing cards around my king-sized bed, but several people seemed uncomfortable with that plan. Instead they liked the idea of gathering in the living room by the fireplace so that’s what we did. We made s’mores and huddled together under blankets, and even listened to and critiqued Luke’s reading of Memorial Road’s October 10th scripture selection (via the internet of course).
Then we wanted to play cards but couldn’t bring ourselves to leave the fireplace room. So Dave went outside to the garage and found David’s old hovercraft that he made for the 7th grade science fair, which is really just a big round piece of plywood and I thought we could set it on the coffee table and it would be a perfect game-table for Nertz. Sure enough, with a tablecloth, it proved to be a great surface and size for 10 of us to play what we then termed Hovercraft Nertz. So it turned out to be a nice evening with surprisingly few complaints, although a few people said the hovercraft dug into their knees and, obviously, we all could have used those gloves with the fingers cut out.
And for those of you concerned about our health and safety, you should know that Luke also read for us the signs of hypothermia (from the internet of course) and none of us ever passed from the shivering stage into the panting and shortness of breath stage. And while he was at it, he also diagnosed Susan with a few more disorders that she’d been wondering about.
Oh and I almost forgot another entertaining moment of the evening. At about 10 o’clock, David comes stumbling in (from a birthday party) and falls to the floor beside our game, moaning and complaining that he felt terrible. Unfortunately, due to the nature of our Hovercraft set-up, we were basically trapped in the circle and no one could get to him without moving furniture or climbing over things, so we all just pretty much stared at him. Finally, he roused himself and went upstairs to lie down, and soon Emily (who worries about everything and everyone, bless her heart) climbed over some stuff and went up to check on him. But she came back and reported basically nothing, as she is wont to do, and I started thinking he might have meningitis, as I am wont to do, so I moved the love seat to escape the circle, and checked on him myself. And he was feverish, but not delirious, so I dosed him up with Advil and returned to the game.
And I don’t mean to get all sentimental here, but I’ve been thinking about my family lately, and especially about the troopers that were here this weekend. And I can’t help but feel blessed. Yes, even though I don’t have a warm house or kitchen cabinets or a working washing machine, and even though my exposed pipes are freezing up and Fidel doesn’t answer Dave’s calls, and even though I have a pain in my neck, pack-rat tendencies, and unpaid fines at the library. My mom always said "everything in life is a trade-off" and although I usually rolled my eyes at her when she said it, I knew it was true. So maybe if some aspects of my life are not so perfect, it’s just the price I have to pay for having a truly great family.
And Dave made this tortilla-like soup stuff last week and I had some of it for lunch, with chips and cheese. It wasn’t bad, even though the beans weren’t fully cooked
And then some of my family came in for the weekend...ostensibly to see the girls cheer at our football game Friday night...but in the end, it’s always about THE GARAGE SALE. My sisters and I are, and have been for as long as I can remember, garage-sale-a-holics. And apparently it’s a genetic disorder, because our kids seem to be affected as well. But don’t tell anyone. It’s our dirty little family secret and we aren’t exactly proud of it. But the truth is, we LIKE to set up and hold garage sales. We have the usual garage sale merchandise, including a well-stocked holiday table, a lovely array of used makeup and jewelry, and an outstanding selection of bags, purses and shoes. But then we also like to put out embarrassing things, like our sons’ boxer shorts, to see if they will sell...and they always do. And we find this entertaining for some reason.
So anyway, we held our garage sale this weekend in a rented building because the weather forecast indicated below freezing temps and sleet for Saturday. And this turned out to be a good thing because we needed a warm place to go. But eventually we had to pack up and go back to my cold house. I suggested that we spend the evening in my bedroom playing cards around my king-sized bed, but several people seemed uncomfortable with that plan. Instead they liked the idea of gathering in the living room by the fireplace so that’s what we did. We made s’mores and huddled together under blankets, and even listened to and critiqued Luke’s reading of Memorial Road’s October 10th scripture selection (via the internet of course).
Then we wanted to play cards but couldn’t bring ourselves to leave the fireplace room. So Dave went outside to the garage and found David’s old hovercraft that he made for the 7th grade science fair, which is really just a big round piece of plywood and I thought we could set it on the coffee table and it would be a perfect game-table for Nertz. Sure enough, with a tablecloth, it proved to be a great surface and size for 10 of us to play what we then termed Hovercraft Nertz. So it turned out to be a nice evening with surprisingly few complaints, although a few people said the hovercraft dug into their knees and, obviously, we all could have used those gloves with the fingers cut out.
And for those of you concerned about our health and safety, you should know that Luke also read for us the signs of hypothermia (from the internet of course) and none of us ever passed from the shivering stage into the panting and shortness of breath stage. And while he was at it, he also diagnosed Susan with a few more disorders that she’d been wondering about.
Oh and I almost forgot another entertaining moment of the evening. At about 10 o’clock, David comes stumbling in (from a birthday party) and falls to the floor beside our game, moaning and complaining that he felt terrible. Unfortunately, due to the nature of our Hovercraft set-up, we were basically trapped in the circle and no one could get to him without moving furniture or climbing over things, so we all just pretty much stared at him. Finally, he roused himself and went upstairs to lie down, and soon Emily (who worries about everything and everyone, bless her heart) climbed over some stuff and went up to check on him. But she came back and reported basically nothing, as she is wont to do, and I started thinking he might have meningitis, as I am wont to do, so I moved the love seat to escape the circle, and checked on him myself. And he was feverish, but not delirious, so I dosed him up with Advil and returned to the game.
And I don’t mean to get all sentimental here, but I’ve been thinking about my family lately, and especially about the troopers that were here this weekend. And I can’t help but feel blessed. Yes, even though I don’t have a warm house or kitchen cabinets or a working washing machine, and even though my exposed pipes are freezing up and Fidel doesn’t answer Dave’s calls, and even though I have a pain in my neck, pack-rat tendencies, and unpaid fines at the library. My mom always said "everything in life is a trade-off" and although I usually rolled my eyes at her when she said it, I knew it was true. So maybe if some aspects of my life are not so perfect, it’s just the price I have to pay for having a truly great family.
And Dave made this tortilla-like soup stuff last week and I had some of it for lunch, with chips and cheese. It wasn’t bad, even though the beans weren’t fully cooked
Monday, October 5, 2009
Bierocks and other weekend wonders.
Hello.
Well, so far it’s been one great Monday...and how often do you get to say that? And I have our awesome (hello) basement project to thank for it. Because this morning, the crew actually cranked up some really great Mexican music and were SINGING down there!! Priceless. I wanted to head down and take some pictures, just in case they were having some sort of Mexican hoe down or something, but I was afraid to even let them know I was still in the house for fear they’d stop. So I tiptoed around and just enjoyed the free entertainment. Well, free if you don’t count the $35,000 price tag for the basement.
And I’m pleased to report that I had a wonderfully relaxing weekend...mostly because my sister Sally got sick at my house. Which I feel bad about (naturally) but still...it turned into one of those "dream sequence" weekends (except for her being sick of course). I should probably start at the beginning...
You see Sally was coming out for the weekend and we thought...why not have a "prequel" garage sale on Saturday? Prequel because more of the family is coming out next weekend for the REAL family garage sale. But Saturday morning when I came downstairs, Sally informs me that she can’t stand up without feeling dizzy, which then brings on nausea. (With the help of my medical book, I later diagnosed her with either Mineire’s disease, where she possibly could go completely deaf, or the less serious Labyrinthitis, where she just gets to go to bed for a few days, but all this is neither here nor there to the story of my weekend.)
Anyway, so we sat around for a little while, hoping she’d get better, but she didn’t. So instead of garage selling, I spent the day talking to her and puttering around my kitchen (which I actually LOVE to do even though I don’t really know how to cook). And I have to give Sally credit for acting like my near-monologues were interesting, because of course I did most of the talking, trying to keep her mind off her dizziness and all. I mean, sometimes I’d look over there in the middle of a story and she’d be sitting up but her eyes would be closed (which I’m pretty sure meant that she was sick and not bored), and I would carefully bookmark in my mind where I was in that particular story so when she was more alert, I could finish what I was saying.
But anyway, I baked some stuff at first and then thought I would "whip up" some bierocks. Which sounds weird I know, but I’ve had sort of a mini-obsession with bierocks since last summer when I ate some that my friend Angela made for a fundraiser concession stand. And then when Emily brought home that head of cabbage instead of the lettuce I asked for, I started thinking it was probably some kind of sign that I should make my own bierocks.
Of course, just saying I was going to "whip up" some bierocks must tell you that I’d never made bierocks before. Because honestly, now I know there’s no such thing as "whipping up" bierocks. And I want to take this time to publicly apologize to my friend Angela for thinking her churlish when she refused to make some bierocks just for me, even after I practically begged her. Because she did offer to make me some for my birthday. And seriously, after going through the ridiculous amount of chopping and kneading and dough pinching and mess-making involved in this process, I now see that she is perhaps the best friend I ever had for even offering to make me some for my birthday.
So anyway, I did in fact make 36 bierocks on Saturday. And they came out all different shapes and sizes, but since I had formed them with my bare hands, I found them to be quite beautiful and even took the pan in to show sick Sally, and I think she was appropriately impressed. And at that point I was feeling a bit like Scarlett O’hara, when she said she’d NEVER go hungry again, because I was thinking that I’d NEVER make bierocks again, not in this house or any other for that matter. But then I tasted them, and I decided, I MIGHT make them again. Because they were as delicious as they were beautiful. And I figured out why people go to all that trouble, but not for their friends.
Other parts of the weekend deserve some mention. Of course Emily lost her homecoming queen bid Friday night, but to a worthy opponent and friend. And the consolations were some nice sympathy pats on the head, and a text from her cousin Ben welcoming her to "The Club" of family homecoming losers, which includes some of her very favorite people. She told me she sang "we are the losers, we are the losers, no time for winning, cause we are the losers, of the world" to her escorts as they walked off the football field. So all in all, I think she took it pretty well. Not to mention dodging "the kiss" bullet...which had her a tad bit nervous.
There was a sweet part during the evening, when Emily was introduced and they were reading her information. They said the person she admired most was Rachel, because she was always herself, and didn’t worry about what other people thought of her, and because she was always there for Emily, blah blah blah. I was touched of course, but then they bickered for the rest of the weekend, and I decided it was like those funerals where everyone says all this great stuff about the deceased but it’s really just a bunch of hogwash.
And in other weekend news, Rachel had her first symphony concert Sunday afternoon and as I watched and listened to her, I thought this was the coolest AND weirdest thing that any of my kids have done. I mean the music was beautiful and she seemed to enjoy playing, but I couldn’t help singing under my breath, "one of these things is not like the others..." because she doesn’t exactly fit in with the other musicians, who mostly could be either her parents or grandparents. Emily came along willingly to the concert, probably because we were eating out beforehand, but we basically had to drag David with us and promise him some sort of reward for inflicting the pain of classical music upon him. But he did perk up a bit when they played the "Variations on a Sea Chantey" which apparently is a Sponge Bob favorite, and when they played some Halloween-ish song where one violinist would let loose a blood-curdling scream every so often. So all in all, it was a nice afternoon.
I believe Dave had a nice weekend too. Although I’m not sure he enjoyed having to load and unload and load and unload the tables for the garage sale, with no resulting decrease in the junk in our house. Also, he had to attend David’s cross country meet Saturday morning by himself because I was busy holding Sally’s hand and making bierocks. But David did well, placing 10th and getting another gaudy medal, so that was some consolation.
So that’s about it. I didn’t mean to drone on and on, but it’s what I do.
And I had a lovely lunch with Rachel at Ranchito where I enjoyed the single combination.
Well, so far it’s been one great Monday...and how often do you get to say that? And I have our awesome (hello) basement project to thank for it. Because this morning, the crew actually cranked up some really great Mexican music and were SINGING down there!! Priceless. I wanted to head down and take some pictures, just in case they were having some sort of Mexican hoe down or something, but I was afraid to even let them know I was still in the house for fear they’d stop. So I tiptoed around and just enjoyed the free entertainment. Well, free if you don’t count the $35,000 price tag for the basement.
And I’m pleased to report that I had a wonderfully relaxing weekend...mostly because my sister Sally got sick at my house. Which I feel bad about (naturally) but still...it turned into one of those "dream sequence" weekends (except for her being sick of course). I should probably start at the beginning...
You see Sally was coming out for the weekend and we thought...why not have a "prequel" garage sale on Saturday? Prequel because more of the family is coming out next weekend for the REAL family garage sale. But Saturday morning when I came downstairs, Sally informs me that she can’t stand up without feeling dizzy, which then brings on nausea. (With the help of my medical book, I later diagnosed her with either Mineire’s disease, where she possibly could go completely deaf, or the less serious Labyrinthitis, where she just gets to go to bed for a few days, but all this is neither here nor there to the story of my weekend.)
Anyway, so we sat around for a little while, hoping she’d get better, but she didn’t. So instead of garage selling, I spent the day talking to her and puttering around my kitchen (which I actually LOVE to do even though I don’t really know how to cook). And I have to give Sally credit for acting like my near-monologues were interesting, because of course I did most of the talking, trying to keep her mind off her dizziness and all. I mean, sometimes I’d look over there in the middle of a story and she’d be sitting up but her eyes would be closed (which I’m pretty sure meant that she was sick and not bored), and I would carefully bookmark in my mind where I was in that particular story so when she was more alert, I could finish what I was saying.
But anyway, I baked some stuff at first and then thought I would "whip up" some bierocks. Which sounds weird I know, but I’ve had sort of a mini-obsession with bierocks since last summer when I ate some that my friend Angela made for a fundraiser concession stand. And then when Emily brought home that head of cabbage instead of the lettuce I asked for, I started thinking it was probably some kind of sign that I should make my own bierocks.
Of course, just saying I was going to "whip up" some bierocks must tell you that I’d never made bierocks before. Because honestly, now I know there’s no such thing as "whipping up" bierocks. And I want to take this time to publicly apologize to my friend Angela for thinking her churlish when she refused to make some bierocks just for me, even after I practically begged her. Because she did offer to make me some for my birthday. And seriously, after going through the ridiculous amount of chopping and kneading and dough pinching and mess-making involved in this process, I now see that she is perhaps the best friend I ever had for even offering to make me some for my birthday.
So anyway, I did in fact make 36 bierocks on Saturday. And they came out all different shapes and sizes, but since I had formed them with my bare hands, I found them to be quite beautiful and even took the pan in to show sick Sally, and I think she was appropriately impressed. And at that point I was feeling a bit like Scarlett O’hara, when she said she’d NEVER go hungry again, because I was thinking that I’d NEVER make bierocks again, not in this house or any other for that matter. But then I tasted them, and I decided, I MIGHT make them again. Because they were as delicious as they were beautiful. And I figured out why people go to all that trouble, but not for their friends.
Other parts of the weekend deserve some mention. Of course Emily lost her homecoming queen bid Friday night, but to a worthy opponent and friend. And the consolations were some nice sympathy pats on the head, and a text from her cousin Ben welcoming her to "The Club" of family homecoming losers, which includes some of her very favorite people. She told me she sang "we are the losers, we are the losers, no time for winning, cause we are the losers, of the world" to her escorts as they walked off the football field. So all in all, I think she took it pretty well. Not to mention dodging "the kiss" bullet...which had her a tad bit nervous.
There was a sweet part during the evening, when Emily was introduced and they were reading her information. They said the person she admired most was Rachel, because she was always herself, and didn’t worry about what other people thought of her, and because she was always there for Emily, blah blah blah. I was touched of course, but then they bickered for the rest of the weekend, and I decided it was like those funerals where everyone says all this great stuff about the deceased but it’s really just a bunch of hogwash.
And in other weekend news, Rachel had her first symphony concert Sunday afternoon and as I watched and listened to her, I thought this was the coolest AND weirdest thing that any of my kids have done. I mean the music was beautiful and she seemed to enjoy playing, but I couldn’t help singing under my breath, "one of these things is not like the others..." because she doesn’t exactly fit in with the other musicians, who mostly could be either her parents or grandparents. Emily came along willingly to the concert, probably because we were eating out beforehand, but we basically had to drag David with us and promise him some sort of reward for inflicting the pain of classical music upon him. But he did perk up a bit when they played the "Variations on a Sea Chantey" which apparently is a Sponge Bob favorite, and when they played some Halloween-ish song where one violinist would let loose a blood-curdling scream every so often. So all in all, it was a nice afternoon.
I believe Dave had a nice weekend too. Although I’m not sure he enjoyed having to load and unload and load and unload the tables for the garage sale, with no resulting decrease in the junk in our house. Also, he had to attend David’s cross country meet Saturday morning by himself because I was busy holding Sally’s hand and making bierocks. But David did well, placing 10th and getting another gaudy medal, so that was some consolation.
So that’s about it. I didn’t mean to drone on and on, but it’s what I do.
And I had a lovely lunch with Rachel at Ranchito where I enjoyed the single combination.
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