Hail!

Storms are different out at camp. There aren't as many buildings to absorb the sound of thunder, and there's the lake and the surrounding ledges to magnify it. There was a fast and furious storm when were were there for Memorial Day. I don't mind the storms and Ben really likes them, but Norah was scared and Annie hid under the bed. At one point it became a hail storm which was kind of cool since we were all safe inside.


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Sing-Along

Last Friday was the annual sing-along at Adlani's school. The kids have been practicing for weeks, and they sang songs in English, Spanish, and Portuguese! It was a gorgeous day and we had a picnic afterward.
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Adlani has been having second thoughts about kindergarten...he told me that he doesn't want to leave the "love and joy" of preschool. I'm so glad Norah can go there next year. She'll be in Maria's class which is Spanish immersion, so she should be fluent by the time she gets to kindergarten. I don't know what they're going to do with her at that point since she won't really fit into either of the two typical categories - Spanish speakers who may not have had a lot of preschool, and English speakers who may have had preschool but don't speak Spanish. The principal told me that it's a good problem to have, so I'll leave it to them to figure that out.
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Green Thumbs

When we left for camp last Friday some of our seeds were starting to sprout, so I took the plastic covers off the trays in case they grew more than the 2 inches the cover would allow. This is what we came home to on Monday! I think if I had left the covers on the beans would have just lifted them up or pushed them right off!

The kids are psyched and maybe they'll actually eat a vegetable if they can pick it out of the garden themselves. Maybe not, but I can hope.
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Piglet Flu

Last weekend when we were at camp, Adlani felt hot to me but of course I had forgotten to bring the medical bag with us for our first weekend at camp. It was Sunday night at 8:45 and Sturbridge was just rolling up the sidewalks (Holland rolls theirs up much earlier and the only game in town is Holland Market which is mostly good for beer and subs). I couldn't get to Stop & Shop before they closed at 9, and Cumberland Farms ("We never close!") doesn't carry Children's Tylenol or Motrin. I finally found a QuikMart that was open 24 hours ("But we're only selling beer until 11..." - good to know), so I figured we'd make the 3 a.m. trek if we needed to. He was asleep and didn't seem uncomfortable.

When we got home the next day his temp was about 102.5. He was a little tired and his nose was running, and because of the fever and body aches I assumed he had the flu. By the next morning he was 90% recovered so I asked the pediatrician's office if we could come in for a flu test, to see if he had to stay out of school for a week - the current rule. They said to come right in, but when the doctor finally came in he said that it didn't matter whether he tested positive for the flu because he had to stay out of school for a week regardless.

FEVER+1 OTHER SYMPTOM=7 DAYS AT HOME

Ok...not a big deal. He's the easiest kid to have at home, believe it or not. Later that day I got the call from Aliya's school nurse. Aliya had a scratchy throat and needed to go home. When I arrived at school the nurse told me that we were on Day Zero and she could come back on Day Seven. I literally went home and cried. The more I thought about it, and the more I listened to my 2 healthy kids fight over who had the most Kix in their bowl and which TV show to watch, the more I wondered why Aliya was banished for a week. She was missing a vital component of the formula - the fever.

I emailed the school nurse to check, and she referred me to the Board of Health. The nurse from the Board of Health left me a message that no fever means no banishment, and she also called the school nurse to let her know. Meanwhile, Adlani's school nurse found out that Aliya was home for a week without a fever and called to tell me that she didn't need to be. So she's going back Monday and I'm wondering who's going to compensate me for 4 days of pain and suffering.

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Patience

Annie is so patient with the kids and has calmed down a lot now that she's heading out of puppyhood. She's my best-behaved kid! Well, except that she has an underwear fetish, and she especially likes post-workout skivvies. EEEWWW!!!

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Old Yeller

Before I had kids I vowed that I wouldn't be a yeller, but it's not that easy to get through life with 3 kids without yelling. I know I yell too much and sometimes I wonder when the kids are going to get so sick of listening to it that they won't be infatuated with Mommy any more and think I'm a horrible monster.

The other day I found Post-It messages from Aliya all over the bedroom so I guess I haven't crossed the line yet. Here's what the Post-Its said:

best mother on the erth.
I love you more than the unaverse.
you make me laph
rock on! yaw
your the best at evrithing
your the suitest person on erth
your the best
you do the nisets thing.
you try to learn spanish
you rock
your my love
you do the rhit things
Quen of the World
you make the world beter

Sniff, sniff ;-)
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The Tadpoles Go To Holland

Holland, Massachusetts, that is. Aliya's teacher and I were both worried that the tadpoles wouldn't make it through the long weekend so I agreed to take them home with me. Except that "home" meant schlepping them to our camp in Holland (next to Sturbridge). The poor things were sloshing around like they were caught in a tsunami, and Ben's patience with my passenger-seat driving wore thin around exit 13. We all made it to camp alive and they survived the return trip too. Aliya wanted to take them to the beach but I thought that was pushing our luck a little so they spent the weekend on our dresser.
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They were a lot of fun to watch (for me, anyway...Ben thinks I'm completely "gone") and surprise, surprise, one of them turned into a frog! It was amazing how quickly Tiny went from a tadpole with legs to a teeny tiny frog. His tail disappeared in about 36 hours. Today I headed out to Petworld to figure out how to keep him alive since he doesn't seem to be eating the flakes and pellets we've been feeding the tadpoles. I guess if they don't survive it will help with our dilemma about what to do with them when the school year is over. At this point I'll be happy if he is still breathing tomorrow morning so Aliya's class can see him. I may have to stay awake all night in case he needs medical intervention. ;-)
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Saturday Morning:

Sunday Evening:

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Planes

I saw these contrails when I was driving back from Worcester last week. I'm sure it was an optical illusion (or the planes took off at different times), but at the bottom of the photo it looks like the two planes were side-by-side and then ("Oh sh*t!") they headed in opposite directions.
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Southwicks

Last week I chaperoned Adlani's field trip to the Southwick Zoo. It was fun but between the 1-hour bus rides each way, the time necessary to load about 300 kids, teachers, and chaperones on the buses (twice) and the fact that we only had the buses from 9:30 to 1:30, we spent a very short time at the zoo. The kids didn't seem to mind, though. There were lots of baby animals...my favorite was a baby monkey and the baby giraffe was also really cool. The kids' favorite part was when were in the petting zoo and I looked at a hugely pregnant goat and said, "Wow! What do you think is inside this goat's tummy?" while also rubbing the tummy in question. The goat chose that moment to let loose and the kids all screamed "POOP!!!" Seriously, when I asked them later what their favorite part of the trip was, that was it. As far as I know, nobody got bus-sick, had an "accident" (literal or figurative), and I didn't lose either of my chaperonees, so the field trip was a success.










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Laundry Sucks

For a while I was doing really well at sticking to my routine of doing a little laundry every day, but then Grandma Ginny was here and took over ALL of the laundry so I got out of the habit. Last week was really busy and I didn't do ANY laundry during the week and this is what greeted me on Saturday morning:



What I hate most about laundry is the amount of time it takes to do it. If it could be condensed into a 2-hour hardcore laundry session it wouldn't bother me as much, but it takes more than an entire day to do a week's worth of our laundry. It almost makes me want to take it to the laundromat so I can commandeer 10 washers and 10 dryers and be done with it. Sometimes I get sidetracked in the middle and a load hangs out in the washer for so long that it needs to be re-washed. And it seems like I constantly have piles of clean laundry waiting to be put away. What I REALLY HATE is when I find something that I KNOW HASN'T BEEN WORN, BACK IN THE DIRTY LAUNDRY!!

The "after" photo doesn't come close to representing the amount of time and effort it takes to send my family out into the world funk-free:



At least I know I'm not the only one who hates doing laundry:
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Frog Legs

The tadpoles in Aliya's classroom are thriving now that we've changed to tap water and I'm helping keep the tank clean. Several of them have grown back legs, which may not seem that exciting except that they are the only tadpoles in the first grade that are metamorphosing (yes, that is a word). The other classes have been borrowing tadpoles from Aliya's class to study.

I brought in a magnifying cosmetics mirror (do NOT look into one of those!) and it works really well to see the underside of the tadpoles and whether they're growing legs or whether it's another poop false-alarm.

The next problem is going to be that there may not be enough weeks left in the school year to allow them to complete their transformation. The other problem is what to do with any that make it to the end of the school year since I really don't want to kill my babies. (If you missed my earlier post, they can't be released into the wild because they might not be indigenous to Massachusetts and I'd be responsible for disturbing the local ecosystem.) I'm thinking about using them for breeding stock to supply next year's first grade classrooms with their eggs. Budgets are tight, ya know.

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BBQ

We went to a really fun cookout over the weekend - the first one of the season. Adlani's soccer coach and his family hosted a boatload of kids and their families. The kids had a blast just running around or hanging in the hammock, and the grown-ups had a fabulous time eating, drinking, and chatting. There were several kids who will be heading off to kindergarten with Adlani, and a few who will be going to Blocks with Norah in the fall. I was flashing forward 10 years to when these same kids start asking each other to dances, but at least I'll know their families and we'll have some cute pics from when they first met. ;-)

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Mothers Day Video

The video below reminded me of an early-summer day in 1998, when I was walking Rosie (the best dog ever) and I found a litter of kittens in distress. There was a house in my neighborhood that always had about 20 cats in the yard, and the kittens were in the weeds near the house. The mother cat had been hit by a car. The kittens were mewing SO LOUD and were SO DISGUSTING - all wormy and blech. They were about a week old and one had already died when I found them.

I went to the house across the street and asked for some paper towels to wrap the kittens in. The guy gave me an old t-shirt and I stuck the kittens in it like a mini Santa sack and carried them home. OK. Now what? First, I had to de-grossify them so I gave them a quick bath. Then I started calling animal shelters that I thoroughly expected would welcome them with open arms. Ben (AKA Mr. Sensitive) was there to witness my phone calls. I think he said something like, "Don't expect me to get involved."

I'm a problem-solver.
The Problem: 4 extremely noisy starving kitties.
The Solution: Find someone to feed them.

NOT so fast. Each shelter I called said that they couldn't take in kitties that young. Well, what the heck was I supposed to do with them? Drown them to put them out of their misery? When the woman at the third shelter said "no", she added, "even the no-kill shelters won't take them so it's a waste of your time to call." So, I did what any frustrated problem-solver holding 4 lives in her hands would do...I started crying. Mr. Sensitive thought I had finally lost my mind completely, because in Morocco cats are viewed about the same as rats.

When I started to cry and prepared to hang up the phone, the woman said, "Let me tell you how to take care of them. First, you have to help them go to the bathroom." Oy. Mother cats do that by licking their babies' butts. Uh-uh. The woman told me how to help them without any licking and it quickly became obvious why the kitties were in such distress. Then I sent Ben to Petco to buy baby kitty formula...who knew there was such a thing? It took some time to figure out how to get them to eat - they wouldn't take a bottle - but for the next 5 weeks I fed them day and night. I took them to the office with me and kept them in the conference room. One died the first night but the others grew into ankle-biting furniture-scratchers.

Then it was time for us to leave for our vacation in Morocco, so I coerced my brothers into watching them for 2 weeks (the kitties were able to poop on their own by then). Brady & Monica ended up adopting one they named Monkey (they still have him) and Elijah and his friend each adopted another. Problem solved!

Here are some other problem-solving mommies: ..
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Happy Mothers Day to Me!

In a quick poll of my friends who are mothers, I learned that the number one item on almost everyone's Mothers Day wish list was a day off from motherhood. I feel a little guilty about this (since all of the TV mommies of my past would rather be home making cookies with their adorable offspring than anywhere else on earth), but at least I'm not the only one.

Some of you are reading this and thinking that I'm obviously a Bad Mommy, which means that you either haven't experienced the joys of everyday life with an extremely emotional 7-year-old, a superhero-obsessed 4-year-old, and a 2-year-old who thinks she's entering kindergarten...or it was so long ago the memories of wanting to run away from home have faded.

Although I may occasionally have Bad Mommy moments, I'm not all bad. I know this because for the first time, I received GIFTS from all 3 kids for Mothers Day. Just in case today arrived and there were no presents under the Mothers Day shrub for me, I decided to make a weekend of it and I gave myself a whole slew of gifts.

• I went to Adlani's soccer game on Saturday morning and I talked to my friends for most of the game. I didn't constantly call out words of encouragement and sometimes I didn't even pay attention. I trusted that Ben could effectively watch Aliya and Norah with his peripheral vision while he kicked a ball with some random kid who happened to be in the area (probably being ignored by his mother too).
  
• I went to BJ's alone (a rare treat) and got caught in a total downpour while I was loading the stuff into the car, so I went to Ben & Jerry's to console myself. I did a few other errands alone too, during which I didn't yell, make "the mad face", threaten anyone under my breath, or drag anyone by the arm as they dangled boneless. I didn't have to return any shoplifted merchandise or apologize to other shoppers because my child was screeching like a deranged primate since I wouldn't buy him a bag of gummy tarantulas. I almost felt like a normal human being.
  
• I went to the library and borrowed 3 books from the kiosks of best sellers beside the entrance. I didn't search the stacks for something that would qualify as "literature" and I didn't go to the children's area. One of the books that called out to me is entitled, "I Was Told There'd Be Cake", and one of the stand-out lines from the book is, "People are less quick to applaud as you grow older. Life starts out with everyone clapping when you take a poo and goes downhill from there."
  
• I went to Starbucks and then to the car wash to have my car cleaned inside and out. The attendant told me that it would be an hour and a half, and I didn't care one bit. I had my provisions from Starbucks, my books from the library, and the Brick Breaker game on my Blackberry to challenge me in case I got bored with only myself for company.
  
• I had breakfast in bed while reading People Magazine about how Kirstie Alley gained 83 pounds, which made me feel better about the 7 pounds I re-gained during the holidays and have since re-lost.
  
• I went to Zumba Friday night, Saturday morning, and Sunday morning, and then wore my extremely sweaty, stinky clothes to the events that followed.
  
• I updated the blog with all of the stuff that's been swimming around in my head for the last couple of weeks so I can start fresh and try not to fall behind.
  
• I made homemade mac & cheese and drank a bottle of wine (in 2 sittings). Did I mention that I went to Zumba 3 times to balance out all of the previously-mentioned food rewards?
• I watched all of the shows I had saved on the DVR this week, including a real (happy) tear-jerker episode of Oprah about Harpo Hook-Ups.
  
• I didn't go to Free Swim at the Y, or to a G-rated movie, or the mall, the playground, a birthday party, or to McDonalds, and I didn't sleep with anyone (literally or figuratively). I did go to Chuck E. Cheese Friday night but I only had 1 kid with me who ran wild while I socialized.

Here are photos of my gifts...even Ben wrote me a letter but I think he may have bought it on the internet.

Norah is so proud of the heart she painted for me.



Adlani is sooooo not into arts and crafts but he made this beautiful work of art for me and he was so proud of it. He said that he put the cat on it so we could always remember Lily.



Aliya had a plan to set up a massage station in one room, a manicure/pedicure station in another room, and a makeover station in another room. I told her that what I really wanted was a card with a letter from her. Her card says: Happy Mothersday Mommy. My mom is the best mom on erth. I love my mom more then enithing in the world! Dear Mom i realy think that your trieng hard to maike us happy and its werking. I aprishiatit wen you taick us plaises and saprise us weire wier going. I think your the best mom a girl cold have. Rock on Mom! Love, Aliya.






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Happy Mothers Day!!!

I could add a few lines to this poem that are based on my own reality, but I'll refrain from spoiling it.

When You Thought I Wasn't Looking

by Mary Rita Schilke Korzan

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When you thought I wasn't looking

You hung my first painting on the refrigerator

And I wanted to paint another.

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When you thought I wasn't looking

You fed a stray cat

And I thought it was good to be kind to animals.

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When you thought I wasn't looking

You baked a birthday cake just for me

And I knew that little things were special things.

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When you thought I wasn't looking

You said a prayer

And I believed there was a God that I could always talk to.

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When you thought I wasn't looking

You kissed me good-night

And I felt loved.

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When you thought I wasn't looking

I saw tears come from your eyes

And I learned that sometimes things hurt

--But that it's alright to cry.

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When you thought I wasn't looking

You smiled

And it made me want to look that pretty too.

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When you thought I wasn't looking

You cared

And I wanted to be everything I could be.

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When you thought I wasn't looking --I looked

...And wanted to say thanks

For all those things you did

When you thought I wasn't looking.

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Miss Personality

Norah hasn't been getting equal time on the blog, so here's a random chat with her. She's going to give us a run for our money.


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Train Obsession

Adlani is obsessed with trains, so last month I took him to two train-related events - Thomas Live on Stage and a train show at the Shriners Auditorium. He loved both. We had great seats for Thomas, and the train show had an amazing exhibit constructed completely of Legos. He also got to drive a train at the train show. .

The 50- to 60-year-old men playing with toy trains creeped me out a little...I can just see Adlani sleeping in the corner someday like this guy. Playing with trains is tiring.
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Here's Adlani driving the train:

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What Oprah Knows For Sure

I've had an O magazine hanging around in the bathroom since last November because I liked Oprah's Top 20 "What I Know For Sure" list. Here it is:

1) What you put out comes back all the time, no matter what.
2) You define your own life. Don't let other people write your script.
3) Whatever someone did to you in the past has no power over the present. Only you give it power.
4) When peopls show you who they are, believe them the first time.
5) Worrying is wasted time. Use the same energy for doing something about whatever worries you.
6) What you believe has more power than what you dream or wish or hope for. You become what you believe.
7) If the only prayer you ever say is thank you, that will be enough.
8) The happiness you feel is in direct proportion to the love you give.
9) Failure is a signpost to turn you in another direction.
10) If you make a choice that goes against what everyone else thinks, the world will not fall apart.
11) Trust your instincts. Intuition doesn't lie.
12) Love yourself and then learn to extend that love to others in every encounter.
13) Let passion drive your profession.
14) Find a way to get paid for doing what you love. Then every paycheck will be a bonus.
15) Love doesn't hurt. It feels really good.
16) Every day brings a chance to start over.
17) Being a mother is the hardest job on earth. Women everywhere must declare it so.
18) Doubt means don't. Don't move. Don't answer. Don't rush forward.
19) When you don't know what to do, get still. The answer will come.
20) "Trouble don't last always." (A line from a Negro spiritual, which calls to mind another favorite: This, too, shall pass.)
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Kindergarten Tours

Aliya was asked to speak to the potential parents at the two kindergarten tours at her school. She did a great job!



This week was also Staff Appreciation Week at school and she made cards for various teachers. I didn't write down what she wrote to her classroom teachers and the bus driver, but the others were really cute so I've included the text below. I have been assured that she WILL eventually be able to spell in English.

• Library - Dear Miss Morenzeti thankyou for leting me read al the buitful bookes you have in your library. Love Aliya riding [reading] is fun
  
• Gym - Dear Miss Lasi and Miss Loiad gym is now my favrite speshal aspeshaly bicose you gise are the teachers. I love roning! Love Aliya
  
• Music - Dear Miss Macantosh and Miss More thankyou for teaching me music ive lernd abut and now im learning play gitar and piano Love Aliya
  
• Art - Dear Miss Solas thankyou so much for ticheng me al aboiut art. Ive had alout of difrent art teachers but so far you’re the one thates tot me the most. Love Aliya
  
• Principal - Dear Miss Gonsales I realy think you’re a realy osame prinsipal I mean come on you lock and you see a butiful schoole with kids who are acshaly lerning. Thank so much! Love Aliya
  
• Inglesh - Dear Miss Jeanes im so glad that Barbiere has inglish clase and im so glade you cold teach me so much about Japan ive never lernd so muche. Love Aliya
  
• Two-Way Curriculum Coordinator - Dear Miss Zecan Borck thankyou for helping me with my spitch [speech]. And yanow wate I think I think you the teacher in the schoole that is tring hard to mack kids happy. Love Aliya
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Tadpole Farmer

In a tragic accident over April vacation, all of Aliya's classroom's tadpoles expired, leaving a stinky brown soup of decomposing tadpoles in an inch of water. Oy. Aliya's teacher cleaned the tank and gathered some tadpoles from each of the other classrooms, and asked me to help keep them alive. Oh the pressure!!!

This is what they looked like the first day I went in to clean the tank, armed with my internet research on the care and feeding of tadpoles. I need to take an updated photo because they are much bigger and happier now. None of them have sprouted anything yet...I thought I saw something one day but it was a hanging strand of poop. My procedure is to suck up the old food and poop off the bottom of the tank with my turkey baster, which I have permanently donated to the cause. Then I refill the water with tap water mixed with water conditioner to remove the chlorine. The school had been using distilled water, which apparently won't support life because it has no minerals or ions. I also read that tadpoles need a rock so they can climb out of the water when they sprout legs, or they can drown from being forced to swim 24/7. Who knew? After a week of trying to get to the pond to find a suitable rock, I grabbed one from the yard and stuck it in Aliya's backpack this morning. I hope it didn't kill them off.

The sad thing is now that I'm fully committed to sustaining life and easing the little suckers' way through metamorphosis, if they eventually turn into frogs they can't be set free to go and frolic amongst the native pond inhabitants because they may be frogs that aren't indigenous to Massachusetts. So now I need to research how to humanely kill them. WAAAAAHHHHHH!!!
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Mystery Marks

I should post this photo as a little contest to see if anyone can guess what the heck you're looking at. You should be able to tell by the spider veins and orange-peel texture that it's my thigh, and I'll give you a hint. It's the reason I'm not getting my 5 hours of good sleep per night.

It's a frickin' footprint! Those are 5 little toes imprinted on my thigh! When I woke up early this morning I looked down and was momentarily flummoxed about the mystery marks, but that's what they are. And not so shocking either, since I woke up (AGAIN!) with 3 kids in the bed. When will they stop liking me so much and become remote ornery pre-adolescents?! Go slam your door and crank up the tunes already! I'm old and uncool, and no fun in bed! GIT!!!
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Staff Appreciation Day

This photo seemed like a good idea at the time, probably because it hid most of our bodies and exposed only our heads. As you can't see, all of the Zumba is really paying off.

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I co-chaired the staff luncheon at Aliya's school and helped out with the one at Adlani's school so I ended up taking 2 personal days. I usually work at night when I have something to do during the day that keeps me from working, but Wednesday night I was EXHAUSTED and Thursday night we went to the circus and then I met the ladies out at Samba, so I didn't do my second shift. It was actually kind of nice to take the personal days...it took some of the pressure off even though the emails and voice mails were waiting for me today.

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The luncheons went really well and the teachers were all very appreciative. At Aliya's school, the PTO bought a Cricut die-cut machine which is SO COOL. I am coveting it and it's on sale at AC Moore for Mothers Day weekend. You can cut out letters, numbers, shapes - different sizes, different fonts - it's so versatile. I'm going to sneak into the teachers' lounge when I need to cut out something for Adlani's school, because I guarantee I won't be finding my own Cricut under the Mothers Day bush since Ben picks a fight with me on my birthday and Mothers Day every year so he can ignore those days again. Just wait and see.

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Visitors

Last week, Ben's sister Bahija and niece Rasha, came to visit from Holland. We had a great time but the visit was too short and we only got to see them a few times during the week they were here. Bahija offered to give Ben a haircut on their last evening with us. When I acted surprised, she said she was a hairdresser. She only cuts women's hair and this was apparently her first men's cut, but she did a good job. Ben was wearing a shirt made out of a tall kitchen trash bag because he didn't want his man-boobs to show in the photo. Thank you for that, Ben.


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The more kids you have in the photo, it's exponentially harder to get a good shot:

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