Jared's Blast to the Past

Jared came up to me yesterday and asked if he could use the phone. I was a little bit suspicious and asked him what he wanted to use it for. He said, "Mom, do you know what a Game Boy is?"
"Um, yes." [How does he know about Game Boys?]
"It's kind of like a DS but it doesn't have two screens on top of each other."
"Oh, really."
"There's this number I want to call and I can earn my own Game Boy."

So it turns out that he is really excited because he has been reading some old "3-2-1 Contact" magazines that we got from grandma. [Do any of you remember that show-- "Contact, it's the answer, it's the moment, when everything happens, contact!"] He points to the back page of the magazine where there is an advertisement: "Earn Great Prizes and Cash! It takes only one FREE phone call." Jared says, "Look mom. It says you can call anytime. I want to call so I can earn a Game Boy."

Yes, my 8-year-old wants to call this number to sell stuff so he can earn a Game Boy. Yes, one of those Game Boys... the old black and white teensy screen things from my childhood. I try to suppress my urge to laugh and ask him to hand me the magazine. I look for the publishing date and say, "Jared, this magazine was printed in 1991. Do you know how many years ago that was?" He mentally calculates for a moment and then says, "Almost twenty.... But it says I can call anytime." At this point I lost it and laughed out loud.

I don't know if I should be proud of myself or ashamed that his hand-held video game deprivation is so bad that the prospect of a black and white Game Boy is exciting....  I don't know which is funnier: wanting the game boy or wanting to call the company from the 20-year-old magazine ad.

Check out the sweet AM/FM Cassette with Black and White TV and the hi-tech Emerson Video Cassette Recorder. Pretty sweet prizes... I'd be tempted too.

Last Day and Leopards

Today was the last day of school. I celebrated by trying to clean up the boatloads of papers and school supplies that the kids brought home and dumped on the floor yesterday. Camryn and Jared celebrated by having a massive 6-hour-long argument-and-teasing-fest, interrupted only by the 45 minutes that Camryn was in her dance class. The end of school simultaneously filled me with relief and dismay: no more mornings of trying to cram cereal down kids while combing crazy bed-heads in a sleepy haze, but if they fight like this the rest of the summer I may have to resort to covering their mouths with duct tape. Let's hope that today was just a transition day and that they will start settling into a summer routine soon!

In honor of the last day of school, I wanted to share a page from Jared's animal report on Leopards. We are not super-talented visual artists in our house, but I thought the report was really cute and the page entitled "About the Author" was classic.

Here is a quote from the page "About the Author":

Jared, age 8, grew up in [town we live in now-- I love how it is past tense.]. His birthday is [date]... 9:00 p.m. One book that he wrote that he remembers is "Two Cool Kids" based on the story by Spencer Adams. In his family, he has two sisters age 6 and 4 months. He also has a baby brother, age 2/3. His favorite pet he ever had was a female hamster. He's also had a praying mantis and a ladybug. And maybe trying to catch a bee wasn't such a good idea. [Wow, he almost makes it sound like his parents are pet-lovers!] His favorite school subject is Math. He just loves stacked addition. During his free time, he likes to make comic books. He likes making "Super Diaper Man." He also likes r.c. He wants to be an engineer when he grows up. he thinks his speciality is Humor. Too bad he couldn't add any in this book...

He finishes at the end of the report by saying, "Well, I guess it's time to wrap up. So, my three favorite facts were..." and then adds "Be sure to read my other books!" [He's learning self-promotion already....]

Kindred Spirits

"A bosom friend-- an intimate friend, you know-- a really kindred spirit to whom I can confide my inmost soul. I've dreamed of meeting her all my life." -Anne of Green Gables

Friendship means different things to us at different times in our lives. From the six or seven "best friends" of a five-year-old to the "co-parenting" buddies of a young mother, friendships grow with us and adapt to where we are in life. When I was a teenager, I wanted to find that one true "best friend"-- someone who really knew, understood and appreciated me. This person would have all of the same interests and hobbies that I did. They would like the same music, the same movies and the same activities. They would share all of the same opinions on important issues. While I had many good and important friendships, I never found the "one" person who fit all of these things, so my teenager-ly brain figured that it must be because all of those qualities would come together in my true best friend and "one and only," my future spouse.

I created the rosy picture in my mind: he would love classical music and be a music major, just like I was. We would while away the evenings playing chamber music together (sigh! so romantic!). He would love classic literature and old movies and we would discuss books together. He wouldn't really care about sports (I certainly didn't) and we would ballroom dance together on all of our dates. We would share a refined life of art and culture and raise little musicians, just like us.

I still have yet to find that friend who is just like me in every respect. And (please control your shock) even my husband didn't turn out to be exactly like me --and (more shocking still) I married him anyway. Until they legalize human cloning my friends will probably always have just as many differences from me as similarities--thank goodness. The goal to find people just like me was overtaken by the desire to find people who complement me-- and that category is much, much more broad than I had originally supposed. While most of my good friends have several interests that overlap with mine, friendship has become more about appreciating each other than mirroring each other.

Rather than the literary music major I envisioned in my teenage fantasies, I married a sports-crazy chemical engineer. But our love and friendship changed me in ways that would never have occurred to my romantic, book-loving teenage self. Because of my husband I learned how to follow (and enjoy) a football game, I know random minutiae about designing and building semiconductors, I learned to downhill ski (and conquered a black diamond), and I've tried (and loved) sea kayaking, scuba diving, snorkeling and Beatles Rock Band. Because of me, my sports-maniac engineer husband has learned to enjoy opera, has a mean ear for choral and piano music, can rock a couple of cha-cha moves and appreciate a truly fine blue cheese. He still hates old movies. And whipped cream. But I can live with that.

Pictures for "Perspective" or The Big Spill

The big spill.... OK, fine. It's not such a big deal compared to that spill. But this came on the same day that Jared was doing an "experiment" in the kitchen sink involving yeast. He had Camryn put the yeast away for him and she didn't close the ziploc bag all the way, so all of the contents of the lower half of our freezer had a lovely coating of yeast sprinkles. They had a lovely argument over who was responsible for the mess, Jared for getting out the yeast or Camryn for putting it away wrong.

Here is our most-of-a-gallon milk mess.

This was a full unopened gallon of milk....

One bright spot. I sent Camryn to her bed since she was only hindering the clean up and she apparently took me bursting into laughter upon the milk carton breaking to mean that this wasn't such a big deal. After drenching two bath towels, I went to rinse them out in the bathtub. When I came back, Jared was doing his best to clean up the remaining mess with a dish towel. He gave me a hug and said, "It's not fair that you always have to clean up the messes while we play, mom."

As I write this, the kids are all finally asleep. Last of all, Addy in a sweaty but happy post-nursing nap on my lap.

Perspective. Um, Yeah.

Nothing ruins your perspective like having your 7-year-old drop an entire gallon of milk on the floor and have it explode open. (Don't blame her...she was holding the gallon on her head to bring it in from the garage fridge.)

Just sayin'.

If I'd Only Known

I have always been analytical. Maybe it's one of those skills that you learn as a musician, but from my childhood I have always tried to "assess and then do it better." I guess that's what one of the habits you pick up from hour upon hour of piano practice... How did I play that passage? How can I play it better this time? Once you get one part right there is another layer that needs to be added. Don't be too excited about playing the right notes: now it's time to add the right dynamics and make it staccato and.... (Can you imagine how much Jared loves taking piano from his mother?)

I have always been an "analyze and assess" person and, I believe, fairly observant. So I have spent a lot of time in the course of my life evaluating and assessing things for future reference. For example, I really thought it was great that my mom had six kids. As one of the kids it was lots of fun: there were always other people to play with and talk to and lots of fun things going on. But (in all of my 8-year-old wisdom) I thought, "If I was going to do it, I think I would keep the house cleaner, instead of just being in a panic to clean up when people were coming over." I also decided that I wouldn't raise my voice to get my kids to clean up when dad had an interview at our house in five minutes (I couldn't understand why we couldn't still be cleaning-- wouldn't they just be impressed at how hard working we were?). And I would have more structured activities on Sunday instead of just watching Sunday movies or letting the kids run wild. We would have a gourmet, multiple-course family dinner on Sundays instead of popcorn and cold cereal. And I would make sure that my kids kept their rooms clean and made their beds and never had dirty faces.... yes, nuggets of wisdom, tucked away in my 11-year-old brain for future reference.

I would never let my child watch more than 30 minutes of TV in one day (like my little sister who had "The Little Mermaid" memorized!) or probably any TV at all and I would always give my children my undivided attention whenever they wanted it instead of doing annoying projects on the computer. I would always give my kids lots of warning before asking them to do jobs. My husband would never come home late from work like my dad did. He would pull more than his fair share of the house work, to set a good example for our boys of true egalitarianism. We would have a delightful family life of wonderful regularity and order. Oh, and did I mention that I would never, ever let my child go in public with a runny nose? (Yuck! How can you just not care like that?) And I would never tolerate being seen with a booger or barf on my shirt (my piano teacher had a kid's booger stuck on her shoulder during a lesson once and I was puzzled that she either didn't notice it or just didn't bother to change her shirt).

I suppose this is why we grow up and have lives of our own. There are a lot of things that are difficult or even impossible to fully comprehend without experience. I suppose it never occurred to my eleven-year-old brain that maybe my mother had fully intended to have a perfectly tidy house and for some unexplainable reason -well six, to be precise- was just never quite able to reach that goal. (In fact, my mom was a neat freak before she had kids. Much more so than her tidy-when-she-feels-like-it daughter.) It never crossed my mind that my dad probably fully intended to have dinner with his family every night too and wasn't missing just because he didn't feel like it.

I can't count how many times as a mother I have had one of those "a-ha" moments, when I suddenly realized why my mom raised her voice and got panicked to get the house cleaned up, why she let my sister watch TV when she was exhausted, why we often spent Sundays watching church movies or running wild while my dad was gone at meetings and why my piano teacher didn't bother to change the shirt with a booger on it. And it wasn't until I had my first "real" challenging job and found how exhausting and stressful it was-- or until I witnessed first-hand my husband's struggle to meet the expectations of both his employer and his wife-- that it suddenly dawned on me, with startling clarity, what a struggle it must have been for my dad to try to balance a time-consuming, competitive job with a demanding church calling and fathering a large family.


For the record, my intent was good (at least mostly). I wanted to figure out how to do things better. And I still try. But just like piano, we work in layers. And even though we try to get it all right from the beginning, sometimes we should be excited with "just" the right notes. Or even a valiant attempt at the right notes. And the additional layers do come eventually. Just not how we expect.

P.S. I would like to take this moment to say that I am really, really sorry to that one lady I babysat for that one time for thinking that her kitchen was a disgusting mess and being shocked that she would leave the house with it looking that. I can't even count how many times my babysitters must be thinking that exact same thing. But I'm still proud of myself that I cleaned the mess up for her so she came home to a clean house.

P.P.S. I can still quote whole sections of "The Ten Commandments" from memory. And some of my best childhood memories are when we were "running wild" while my dad was at meetings on Sunday.

P.P.P.S. I think eating Reese's Pieces while we watch the church history movies sounds like a fabulous Sunday dinner.

The Finale to "Some Days" or "How Not to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying"

So the day after my last whiny pathetic post I made yet another stab at getting Adelyn's picture taken, this time with success. I also learned a valuable lesson on how to successfully drive a business into the ground. Next time I have the urge to buy a quickie-kids-photo-where-they-run-the-camera-like-a-cash-register franchise, I'll remember it.

I returned to Kiddie Kandids on Friday, but this time I made an appointment. Despite all attempts at promptness, I hit traffic, construction and Jackson's willpower and ended up being late. I tried 3 or 4 times to call the studio to let them know I would be a few minutes behind, but got a busy signal every single time. I apologized when I got there and the photographer (that seems generous, I think "camera operator" is probably more appropriate term) said that "she was on the phone with her superior." Does "superior" translate into "boyfriend" in any English-related dialects? No matter. She was still finishing up someone else's photos when I arrived, so I didn't feel so very bad for being late.

We got down to pictures and, all in all, they went pretty well. Except that Jackson thought it looked like great fun, so he climbed down from the shopping cart and attempted to get in the picture with Addy. And distracted her so she looked at him instead of the camera. And generally interrupted the process however possible.

When I made the appointment, they informed me that the studio was under new ownership and a few things had changed. For one thing, they didn't print out your photos immediately any more: you had to wait two weeks and come back. That was definitely sad news, but hey, it still beat having to park at the mall, find the elevator at JCPenney's and wait 45 minutes when you had an appointment, right? I still got to pick out the photos on the spot. The difficulty was that there was someone with an appointment for pictures immediately after me and the other girl who was supposed to be working that morning hadn't shown up yet. So the camera operator asked if I could come back in 15 minutes to pick out the photos. Addy was getting fussy and wanted to nurse, so that actually worked out rather well. I went and nursed Addy in the mother's room (at least one plus for being in a Babies'R'Us store) and then went back. And waited. And waited. And waited. It was at least 30 minutes after I got back from nursing Addy that I waited just to get a chance to look through my pictures to pick which ones I wanted. You can imagine how patient and obedient Jackson was by the time we had puttered around a store for 45 minutes.

Finally, camera operator #2 showed up and she was able to help me look at my pictures. With only a quick "Sorry, I was detained," for my 45 minutes of confinement in a store with a two-year-old and a baby, we went on to the pleasant process of selecting pictures with a whiny two-year-old who refused to stay near me. "Just wait a moment please, while I put together some collages for you. Typically we do this during the 15 minutes while you are waiting," she added. I internally retorted, "I don't need to pay extra for fancy writing and a cheesy border. Just show me my pictures already. Finally we got to it.

"Let me show you our Premiere package," she began. "Actually," I interrupted her, "I just want four 8x10s please." She stared in disbelief, like I had just turned down a chance to purchase a Picasso for pennies and then proceeded with her spiel, adding only, "Well, just in case, let me show you our packages anyway." Translation: I am forced to try to sell this to you. It is my job. I don't care that you have a fussy baby and a whiny two-year-old, of whose whereabouts you are now uncertain. So I sat while she patiently explained that while the Premiere package was $999.99, it was on sale for only $459.99 and with the special discounts running right now it was a bargain at $429.99. She finally got to the last package and emphasized that this was the last package that included the CD with the digital images and rights to the photos. If you opted out of the wall portrait, it was only $199.99! I earned myself another shocked stare when I turned this opportunity down without a second thought. "But what if you want them someday?" she protested. Hmmm... maybe I'll take that money and use it on a real photographer?

I finally got to the photos themselves. I asked if there was any way to compare two photos side by side. There wasn't. So back and forth we went. I tried to go as quickly as I could in between breaks to race off and drag Jackson back from whatever part of the store he had wandered off to or lure him back with a toy. As I sorted past photos I didn't like, she would interject, "I really like that one. It's so cute." Or she would randomly butt in and say, "I think you should get this one with the fluorescent green border. It really brightens it up!" Well I don't, OK?

I tried to keep Jackson in the near vicinity by grabbing some toys or the floor model of a tricycle for him to play with and the camera operator had the gall to scold him at one point, "You need to be careful! This isn't a playground!" Well, he wouldn't be at the end of his rope already if we hadn't been waiting for 45 minutes (through the middle of his lunchtime) for you to show up for work! By the time we finished we had been there for two and half hours. With no lunch.

I finally got my four 8x10s, as predicted, along with a sheet of 5x7s and a free collage. That is, I got them ordered. I still have to go back and pick them up. So, how is that for being more convenient than JCPenney? I had to make an appointment, I had to wait around forever, I have to come back and pick the pictures up later. Well, at least I didn't have to go up an elevator....