I go thrifting on a pretty regular basis. Sometimes I'm looking for something specific (e.g.: lo, I have partaken of too much ice cream, and require new pants), sometimes I'm just looking. [Sidebar/shameless plug: I'm finally putting some of this thrifting to good use by selling stuff on Poshmark. Here's my closet, and if you're new to Poshmark and put wantnotdotnet as your invite code, you get $5 of credit and so do I.] Usually I just look at clothes and shoes, but sometimes I look at other things. Anyway. A while back I was doing my regular Goodwill rounds and I found a wicker planter...
Chickadee has been home---intermittently, to be sure, as her college pals are mostly elsewhere, and as often as not, that means I'm kissing the back of her head as she leaves for a day or three to be with them---and that means certain things are assured: 1) Her "debris field" (as Otto likes to call it) is a constant reminder that my child may grow and mature but will always be comfortable and, to some extent, toddler-esque in her childhood home, and 2) The time will come when she is lounging on the couch, looks up from her phone, sighs with disappointment, fixes me with a baleful stare, and...
Man, what a long, strange winter break this has been. Monkey goes back to school tomorrow, and I feel like we have simultaneously been both on break for several months AND like he just got out of school yesterday. Everything is off-kilter. We didn't celebrate Christmas until the 28th (scheduling issues); Chickadee was home from campus pretty early in December, but has had her own schedule of events in which the rest of us are relegated to cameo appearances; the pervasive feeling of not-quite-real that's been clinging to everything since November has only intensified. Everything just feels...
... no, the bathroom isn't done, yet. I have decided, however, that we're going to spend 100% of our family and any entertaining-guests time in that damn bathroom once it's complete, as it will then be the nicest/newest room in the house and I want to make sure our enjoyment of it outweighs these weeks and weeks of ineptitude and incompleteness. ("Welcome to our home! Please follow me to the upstairs bathroom. Now admire it. I SAID ADMIRE IT. Yes, very good, thank you. We think it's lovely, too. Can I offer you a beverage? No, don't move, I'll bring it to you here in the bathroom.") In the...
I don't think I ever posted about taking Chickadee to get her learner's permit. We did it well ahead of when we let her start driving---much to her chagrin, because we are simply The Worst---and I guess it seemed like sort of a non-event? The most entertaining part was that it was a twofer---our Bonus Kid at the time who was about half a step above being an orphan also came along for permit-ing due to a lack of actual parental units willing to do the honors, and theoretically you have to be a relative to take a minor to the DMV for this stuff, so when asked if said kid was my child, I smiled...
I don't know if you knew this, but today is a very special holiday. Just in case we all suddenly fell and hit our heads and forgot, my darling daughter made sure to note it on the family calendar pretty much the moment we flipped over to April. That's right---Flerp Derp hopes you are all observing International Flerp Day today. (Translation: It's her birthday. Please to remit candy immediately.) So, I hope you're sitting down, because the scrappy little girl who was newly six years old when this blog started just turned 17. SEVENTEEN. I'm not really sure how that happened, quite frankly,...
Sometimes I look back on things I've written before and just... cringe. It doesn't happen too often, but still. Hindsight, growth, etc. Because I am still trying to grow as a person and life still sometimes sucks, I wrote you a piece about taking care of yourself during a life crisis. I hope it is an improvement over the time I word-barfed about someone being thoughtless towards me during a difficult time. I think it is.
How did I become a vision board person? It's still baffling to me. I am just about the most un-artsy-craftsy person I know, and yet, now that I've done this for a few years, it is without a doubt my very favorite new year's tradition. Granted, my OTHER new year's traditions are 1) taking down the Christmas decorations, 2) vacuuming up bits of fake tree and fuzz from destroyed dog toys once said decorations are dispatched and 3) making large salads because none of my pants fit after The Month Of Eating, so it's not like the bar was super-high, or anything. But still. I don't know how I turned...
