I spent my weekend putting up Christmas decorations, baking cookies, shopping and praying my husband would not fall off the roof while hanging Christmas lights à la National Lampoon’s. As a result, I have laundry threatening to overtake an entire room, a kitchen floor that looks like a sprinkle-coated beach and a pile of gifts to wrap. I may even declare the bathrooms hazmat zones by day’s end. I better get to it.
After a ton of hard work, the Heathens both brought home perfect report cards! My husband and I were thrilled, and decided to slow things down this weekend with some family fun. Friday, my friend N. and I took our kids to a farm for a day of outdoor adventuring in the beautiful Fall weather. Bear rode a horse for the first time, and G-Man ran wild with his best friends. This outing was a much-deserved reward for those straight A’s, and I think the fresh air did everyone a world of good. That night, we piled into bed and watched Gremlins, and which our kids had never seen, let alone even heard of. What started as fidgety impatience immediately morphed into rapt attention the second Gizmo appeared on the screen.
With perfect weather extending through the weekend, my husband packed up the fishing gear on Saturday morning, and we headed to the lake.
After the lake, we had an epic family badminton tournament with our neighbors and fell into bed that night exhausted. Sunday was a day full of cleaning, book reports and catching up, but my husband made several loaves of fluffy pumpkin bread, and a delicious butternut squash soup with sausage for dinner. The older Heathens treated the soup like it was a medieval torture device, but Bean and I gobbled it down.
But, now it’s Monday…*sigh* and I woke up with the sniffles and a sore throat, I have a to-do list a mile long and my house looks like a herd of pigs stampeded through it. Guess I better hop to it.
Last weekend was my grandmother’s 80th birthday, and for the occasion, my far-flung extended family rolled into town for three days of celebration. The days were a whirlwind of gatherings, including a huge meal at our house to wrap up the event. This required extensive preparations on my part, including days of cleaning and cooking, and then cleaning some more. I have since gone on strike, and it’s been Leftover City for the Heathens.
After a weekend of eating too much, drinking too much, and reminiscing, we are worn out. It doesn’t help matters that Bean has been keeping us up with some unexplained sleep regression:
So, for now, we’re chilling on the front porch, enjoying the beautiful weather, and hiding from my neighbor who wants me to take her to the international market to buy some goat.
I kid you not.
The temperature around here finally dropped from “hotter than Hades” to “moderately tolerable.” This break in the punishing heat came not a moment too soon. After a stressful week, everyone needed a change of scenery, even if we were just playing tourist in some familiar places.
We took an impromptu trip to our old college town, and landed smack in the middle of the Meat Pie Festival. We ate, we danced, and we enjoyed some well-deserved time out of the house.
We also gave the Heathens a tour of our old stomping ground, but all they cared about was the prospect of funnel cake.
Go figure.
We watched first Saints’ game of the season, and the boys figured we’d better get Bean used to the routine while she’s still young and impressionable.
After all, her nickname is Drew Brees. For the first three months of her life, she HAD to be swaddled like a burrito to sleep, but as soon as we freed her upon waking, she’d throw her arms straight up, like she was calling a touchdown.
I am blessed with guys that are fairly ambivalent to sports on TV, but Saints’ games are the one exception. If at all possible, they will be watching. Bean was confused by all the commotion, and the yelling, heckling, and (I confess) swearing.
And as you can see, she was unimpressed by that interception. Better luck next week, I guess.
For prayers and positive thoughts for all our friends, family, and fellow Louisianans.
So far today:
And it’s not even 11:00 AM. I think I got some bad juju going on this morning.
This has been a long week, and was definitely not the way I envisioned spending the last week of summer vacation with my kids. I won’t go into the gory details, but the basic rundown is that we experienced a burglary, which triggered a series of events that ended in a frightening confrontation, one which put me and the Heathens in real danger. These events played out here at our home, in front of my children. G-Man actually had to run for the phone so I could call 911, and guard his sister until the police came, which is an experience no ten year-old boy should have.
Since this happened, I’ve been struggling with how to help my kids process these events. At their ages, my boys are old enough to know that bad things happen. However, they understand this concept the same way that they understand that there are pyramids in Egypt…only because someone told them about it. They’ve never experienced anything truly frightening firsthand, let alone something that robbed them of that childlike certainty that Home is always a safe place. Sure, they’ve been scared of thunderstorms, loud noises, and the dark, but we’ve always been there to assure them not to worry, because we are always safe, tucked inside our warm and happy house.
In the immediate aftermath, I did my best to reassure the boys that everything was fine, but I’m not naïve enough to think that they didn’t notice that I was distracted and tense, as I waited for word from the police that the danger had passed. Even if I had an Oscar-winning acting ability, the fact that we were on lockdown kind of clued them in.
Eventually, the situation was resolved, at least temporarily, but then came the larger task of getting our home back into some semblance of normal. We’ve been doing this the only way we know how: the comfort of togetherness and routine. My husband played the same game he does with them every day. I cranked up my kitchen stereo, and cooked dinner to the tunes of Bob Marley, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Mumford & Sons, while the Heathens wandered in and out of the kitchen and my husband danced Bean around the house….just like we do every evening. Maybe French Toast wasn’t the most healthy dinner choice, but it sure was comforting. We snuggled in bed to watch a movie, and then kept the same bedtime routine we’ve had every night this summer. By night’s end, I think we made definite progress in healing the damage of that awful day.
Things have improved this morning, and we’re staying busy by readying ourselves for the first day of school tomorrow. Though we feel better, the Heathens still notice the subtle changes that have stolen into our routine. G-Man wondered why he couldn’t take out the trash without my supervision, and Bear keeps asking why I have the phone with me all the time.
So, yeah, it’s been a long week, but school starts tomorrow, giving my oh-so-bored kids plenty to keep them occupied…which in turn, keeps them from trying to beat each other to death with foam swords.
For these small things, I am grateful.
How much laundry can a one family go through in a single weekend? Excellent question. So glad you asked:
By midday Monday, this was what I had already washed and folded.
This was what I still had left to do. And yes, I had actually been caught up on laundry that Friday. I maintain that our dirty laundry breeds when no one is watching. Or, my guys change clothes three times a day just to punk me. Either way, I’m about to teach the Heathens to fold their own dang clothes, because this is just frapping excessive.
In unrelated news, I’ve been in school-supply-shopping-hell for two days now, and rescue is nowhere in sight. I feel like we’re competing in a cross between a scavenger hunt and Survivor. We went to three stores yesterday, and only completed about 90% of the list…for just ONE of the Heathens. Navigating the overly crowded aisles, which were clogged with equally snarly parents, was like a reality show gone wrong. Even the most genial southern gal loses her patience when she has to wait 10 minutes just to approach the crayon display. Some parents may find it acceptable to block the aisles, while their kids undergo an intensely existential debate about the best color for their safety scissor handles. Me? Not so much. My school supply shopping strategy is reminiscent of Supermarket Sweep.
I nearly had my first meltdown when I realized that one teacher wanted $20 worth of pens…JUST pens. That does not include the pencils or the red ink pens…nope, this is $20 worth of black erasable pens for my 5th grade child. If my budget wasn’t hurting before, it’s certainly on life support now.
Today, we continue on our epic quest to find notebooks in the following colors, as required by the ridiculously specific school supply list: red, blue, green, yellow, purple, navy, orange and (wait for it) lime.
“Lime?!?”
Ha…ha…Mwhahaha!
Riiiiiiggghhhtt…
Needless to say, I’m dangling a cocktail in front of me like a carrot, as a reward for making it through school supply shopping without pulling a Linda-Blair-in-the-Exorcist routine.
The only bright spot in my week has been Bear discovering the awesome power of breakfast cereal:
I know what you’re thinking. What kind of mother is proud of her kid for eating overly-marketed sugary puffs with little to no nutritional value? The fact that I am excited about this should give you a clue as to just how DANG PICKY my picky eaters really are.
Clearly, we are descending into madness.
I blame the lime notebook.
The past week has been incredible, for both me and the Heathens. My parents flew us to San Francisco for vacation, and it was a rip-roaring adventure from start to finish.
Despite living in California for many years as a child, this was one area I never had the opportunity to see, so I was understandably excited about exploring another side of the state I practically grew up in. The prospect of temperatures under 97 degrees didn’t hurt either. Furthermore, the Heathens had never ventured outside of our tri-state area, so this trip also represented a slew of new milestones for them, including their first plane ride, train ride and exposure to a little concept called “toll bridges.”
“What do you mean we have to pay money to drive down the road??”
We saw some amazing things:
Including some places that the Heathens personally selected. Like the Pez Museum (*sigh*):
And the House of Air trampoline park:
Pay close attention to Rule #10
In between the Heathen-directed activities, we squeezed in a whale watch:
Museums:
And plenty of good food:
I even managed to find a local yarn shop, which I am embarrassed to admit put a nice dent in my expendable income. Unfortunately, I didn’t get pictures of some of our more hilarious adventures…like the time we ended up in a back alley in Chinatown so Bear could see how fortune cookies were made. Or, the moments when my mom and I had anxiety attacks driving on streets so steep, I nearly threw up just riding down them.
Traveling with Bean was a challenge:
But it went better than I hoped, thanks to the power of the Ergo:
If there is one thing I took away from this trip, other than the bucketful of memories, it’s that I really want my kids to have more opportunities to travel to new places and see new things. I was blessed as a child to travel across the country, on road trips, plane trips and everything in between. I bounced between Louisiana, Los Angeles, and Ohio, and saw everything from Niagara Falls to the Grand Tetons. I think the adventures of traveling not only build lasting memories, but also help kids open their minds by showing them true diversity.
So, we’re home again…and about 10 seconds after we got home, G-Man got a virus, Bear broke out in some type of allergic reaction, and we found out Bean is anemic. So, our house is a den of fever, rashes and other gross stuff you don’t want to hear about.