December 3, 2009 | Ottomatic For the People

Tomorrow Otto is having a birthday. His 39th birthday, in fact. My birthday is in the summer, so I happen to love that stretch of time between early December and mid-August when I can pretend he’s an entire year older than I am.

We don’t have any big plans; life has been a little too hectic lately to plan much, but we’ll see what we can do to celebrate the day in style.

In the meantime, as a little pre-birthday warm-up, I thought I’d share 39 Things I Love About Otto in honor of his impending 39th birthday.

1) He puts up with me. (Truly, this should be number 1 through 50,000.)
2) He lets me put my cold feet on him at night. (more…)

December 2, 2009 | My name is Grumplestiltskin

Just because Monkey has this nasty cold and I woke up this morning feeling logy and thick and sluggish does not mean that I am coming down with his cold.

Just because I never actually, you know, stop kissing him on the mouth until he’s leaking snot from every visible orifice doesn’t mean I’m prone to picking up his virus. I mean, I drink ORANGE JUICE. That stuff is like Kryptonite to cold viruses. For Otto, anyway.

Just because I have this weird cold sore thing that sprang up yesterday on the wayyyyyyy back left side of my tongue (in an impossible place to view, but likewise in an impossible place not to move/bump/feel any time I eat or talk) does not mean I am getting sick. Because I’m not.

And all the things that pissed me off yesterday don’t mean I’m getting sick, either. (more…)

December 1, 2009 | Offspring: ecstasy and agony

My daughter owns The Care and Keeping of You, which is a really wonderful and fairly comprehensive book for girls about the changes that puberty wreaks on unsuspecting females. It doesn’t talk about sex, just the various physical and emotional changes of growing up. I recommend it to people all the time, because it’s age-appropriate even for little girls (I think we got it when she was six or seven), but also includes things like illustrated cartoon drawings of how to insert a tampon. (You’re welcome; it’s not often I can work the word “tampon” into the very first paragraph.)

Anyway, I’ve always appreciated that there’s a lot of discussion in there about MOOD SWINGS. It says things like, “You may be angry or unhappy and not know why.” I have considered making that into a giant banner for Chickadee’s room. As it is, I often tell her that she suffers from PPMS (Permanent Pre-Menstrual Syndrome). Because I’m a loving mother.

I do have one quibble with the book, though, and I hope maybe they’ll correct it in the next version: Nowhere does it talk about how hitting puberty activates the Lying Gene. (more…)

November 30, 2009 | It's not a regret, it's an "experience", Offspring: ecstasy and agony

A several-day absence here is somewhat unprecedented for me—even when I had my hysterectomy, even when I was felled by the flu, heck, even when I went and got married, in the five and a half years this place has been around, I’ve generally not gone more than a couple of days between postings.

Which means something really CRAZY must’ve happened this week/weekend to keep me away. Something unbelievable. Something all-encompassing. Something that took all of my time and attention and strength!

Yes. Well. Um. See, we’d had my folks here all week, and then there was Black Friday and there were leftovers to eat and days to spent in pajamas and children to snuggle and a dog to walk, and… then it was Monday. Hello, Monday! (more…)

November 26, 2009 | Offspring: ecstasy and agony

Today I am thankful for many, many things—for my family, near and far, for a houseful of love and laughter, for a table about to be loaded up with delicious food, for a husband who silently worked around me as I wrecked the kitchen this morning, cleaning up after me before I even had a chance to ask him to.

And I would like it noted for the record that even in a time of hormones and angst, I am particularly thankful for a daughter who insists on—and creates—fancy napkins.

Happy Love Thursday, happy Thanksgiving, and I hope you and yours have fancy napkins (real or metaphorical) today, too.

November 25, 2009 | It's not a regret, it's an "experience", Offspring: ecstasy and agony

I didn’t mean to disappear, like that, but I came down with an extreme case of Chickenwithitsheadcutoffitis. It’s not fatal—thankfully—but does cause me to talk to inanimate objects. Example: This morning as I brewed up a nice, big pot of turkey brine (mmmm, briny!) on one side of me while throwing cranberries into my food processor on the other side, I asked the brine how it was doing. To be more precise, I said: “How are you doing, brine?” My father is slightly hard of hearing, but from his vantage point at the kitchen table he wanted to know who Brian was and why I was talking to him.

With anyone else I suppose that would’ve been awkward. But with Dad it was more like, “I’m chatting with the brine. OBVIOUSLY.” And he nodded and went back to what he was doing.

Then again, I’m pretty sure the menfolk have already been sent to the store or on various other errands four or five times in the last day and a half, so he was probably just relieved I wasn’t going, “DAMMIT! I forgot the [fill in the blank with some ingredient here]!” I never realized that men require other men to go to the grocery store, but I guess Publix and husbands turns out to sort of be like women and bar bathrooms. (more…)

November 23, 2009 | It's not a regret, it's an "experience", Offspring: ecstasy and agony, Oh look! Something furry!!

The parentals are here for Thanksgiving, and I know that many people find visitors—and in particular, family—stressful, what with the extra bodies and noise and dishes and foibles, but I am generally delighted to have other warm bodies in the house. Especially ones who are happy to entertain my children and buy me dinner.

(Sometimes it doesn’t take much to make me happy.)

These sorts of visits are always All About The Eating, and the fact that the Most Eatingest Holiday falls this week is just a bonus.

The new twist, this visit, is that of course last time they were here, we didn’t have the dog. So where the house is normally buzzing with excitement because GRANDMA AND GRANDPA!, this time we also have a small worried animal underfoot. (more…)

November 20, 2009 | Friends, It's not a regret, it's an "experience"

Once upon a time there was a kind, beautiful, talented, and extremely mentally ill woman who said to a few friends, “Do you know what we need? We need to start one of those group blogs and do a weight loss challenge, because it will keep us accountable and honest and I am rabidly competitive and I will mop up the floor with you. Doesn’t that sound FUN?”

I am pretty sure I was eating some cookies and didn’t really hear her clearly when I said, “Sure! Great idea!”

Oh, well. I’m stuck, now—I’ve committed to actually diet and exercise in the new year, and be publicly accountable for it, and here we are headed into the Season of Eating and a little voice inside me says, “Oh, I could probably just GAIN ten pounds before January, then take THAT off!” I’m pretty sure that wouldn’t even be cheating.

Anyway. Won’t you come join us over at Five Full Plates? I can pretty much promise you that I will have a full-on tantrum at some point during the competition. Maybe even more than one.

November 19, 2009 | Offspring: ecstasy and agony

Thank you for all of the suggestions regarding delicious baked goods. I’m ten pounds heavier, now, having read the comments, but I appreciate it from the bottom of my straining zipper.

The meeting Wasn’t, which is to say that we thought it was scheduled and then it wasn’t and then we were left hanging and then I had to send some Very Stern Emails. Now we are rescheduled, which gives me more time to plan. And bake. In the meantime, the OTHER child (surely not wanting to be left out) came home with news of a “uniform violation” which required another Stern Email (the response was priceless, if electronic backpedaling is your thing), and also there’s the small matter of a missing project, which is a whole ‘nother story and frankly, I felt pulled in ten different directions last week, and this week it feels more like twenty.

Yesterday I had meetings and today I had meetings and I arrived home to a blinking answering machine. (more…)

November 18, 2009 | Haven't been hit by lightning yet!, Offspring: ecstasy and agony

I’m hip-deep in preparations for our next IEP meeting, which I’m told should NOT include some of my brilliant ideas, such as screaming, “You people are inefficient, heartless asses” or suggesting that my child could, in fact, receive a better education in a cage full of premenstrual orangutans. (I only believe one of those statements, actually.) (But I’m not saying which one.)

This time we’re bringing the Big Guns, by which I mean that we have hired representation because it’s become clear to us that that’s the only way anything’s going to get done. Sad, but true. And really, all of that pesky money I had tucked away was making my mattress all lumpy.

In addition to having many other brilliant ideas, our shiny new advocate has suggested that I bring food to our next meeting. (Don’t you love her already?) She suggested a number of things which are easy enough to pick up at the store, but you know me. If I’m going to kill them with kindness, I’m going all the way. I’m baking, baby.

Have a recipe guaranteed to turn even the most curmudgeonly drone to pliable goo? Please share. I need a good one.