Always Remember That

This weekend, my girls made time capsules and buried them in the backyard. (I actually did most of the digging.) We pinky-swore to dig them up again on Memorial Day weekend, 2020. I'm kind of hoping these pictures help us remember where we put them.

I have been so busy at work I haven't had time to blog. So yes, now you know that I usually blog on company time. Such has been my stress level that I just broke down and used my first 5 free minutes in days to order a new pair of sandals. Because sometimes a girl just has to do that.

The air in Atlanta must be restorative, because an unusual number of people addressed me as "young lady." Daytime soap operas were killed by the Farmville game on Facebook. Having to rely on wi-fi is a real pain. Hence, I obviously need an ipad. Telling my boss, "My kids think you're mean for making me go on this trip," will result in him letting me put their souvenirs on the corporate credit card. If you take all the written content produced between the beginning of time and the year 2003 -- that same volume of content is now being replicated every 48 hours. Caviar is pretty tasty. I needn't have worried about my clothes. There are eleventy-billion varieties of Coca-Cola, including the one in the photo which bears my middle name. Most of them taste pretty awful. Facebook and twitter are old news; email marketers -- which I suppose is what I am now -- would be wise to pay close attention to Quora and Tumblr. I'm not sure I want to ...

Mallory did one of those “Facts About My Mom” booklets for Mother’s Day. Among other things, she opined that “My mom’s personality is nice, quiet, and gentle.” Aww. Also: true! She also said “My mom’s hair is always perfectly in place.” Which: It’s nice she thinks so, but: false! I took myself shopping on Mother’s Day, because I’m going to Atlanta next week for a conference and I have nothing to wear. Once I got to the mall, however, I realized that I didn’t know, at all, what to get. I really have no sense of style; I don’t know how to put an outfit together. I don’t know how to distinguish between “business casual” and “your elderly grandma.” I also don’t know what looks good on me. Bright colors? Black? Grey? I know to avoid, say, sleeveless tops, but should I also avoid v-necks? I found some pants that are super-comfortable and I think they look nice, but yesterday I wore them to work and spent the whole day worrying that maybe they looked too much like pajama jeans . (Also: I’m ...

Phoebe: My mom burned her mouth really bad on a baked potato, so last night all she had for dinner was ice cream . Phoebe's friend: Wow, I wish I were your mom. Phoebe: No...you really don't. Because sometimes, she has to clean up really gross stuff in the bathroom. Happy Mother's Day!

We saw a Little Person in Walgreen's the other day, which meant I spent a few bad moments, while looking for the children's ibuprofen, hoping my children weren't staring too baldly and that they wouldn't say anything too loudly. Fortunately they were polite; it was only last night that Phoebe remembered, and said: "Hey Mommy, I saw an Orf the other day, and she looked like a grandma Orf!" Later, she said, "How come that lady was so short?" "God makes people in all shapes and sizes," I said. "Small, tall, skinny, fat..." "And triangle too!" she said. ------------------------ Phoebe challenged me to a staring contest. "I'm staring...I'm staring...I'm staring...oops, you blunk!" she said. ------------------------ "How do you spell thur?" she asked, crayon in hand. "Thur?" I said. "What's a thur?" "You know, thur," she said. "Like...thur...

Over 50 tornadoes swept through North Carolina on Saturday afternoon. Several houses in a neighborhood not four miles from our house were destroyed. People are not being allowed back in to check on their pets. We didn't even lose a shingle or a tree branch. I don't know why. In a mobile home park outside Raleigh, a 3-month-old baby was swept from his uncle's arms when the tornado hit; the baby was found, unhurt, under a pile of rubble about 30 minutes later. Three other children in the same park did not survive. I don't know why. "Do you feel lucky?" a reporter asked a man whose house remained standing when others around it had fallen. "No, I'm not lucky ," the man replied. "I'm blessed ." I prefer to think of it as luck, honestly. At the end of the storm, I still had my house and my husband and my two children (one in a pretty dress mugging for the camera, one in mismatched clothes refusing to smile) -- but if tha...

The latest from my crochet hook. This first bunny was for Amy's birthday: And this one is for my niece Isabel's birthday. (I'm assuming Isabel doesn't read my blog. If she does, sorry for spoiling the surprise. And either way, sorry it's going to be a few days late.) And, that's what I've been up to.

Last night Phoebe asked me to help find her doll Amanda. “Which one is Amanda?” I asked, because there are twenty million baby dolls in my household and I can’t keep track of which one is Amanda and which one is Chelsea and which one is Megan and which one is Jaquinta. Phoebe sighed. “Mommy. You should know this by now. Amanda is the one whose favorite color is purple. She likes me to sing to her, and she likes baby food, and her name is Amanda .” Needless to say, this information was not very helpful in locating Amanda. -------------------------------- Mallory has been taking her times tables tests; for months she was stuck on her 3’s. Last month she finally passed her 4’s and 5’s. Last Friday she passed 6’s; this Monday, 7’s; Wednesday, 8’s; yesterday she knocked out 9, 10, and 11 in one fell swoop. Go Mallory! --------------------------------- I was just named Employee of the Month for, as my nominator put it, remaining ever-pleasant while focusing on creating a high qu...

I was in the Girl Scout store today picking up some badges and I happened across a book which purportedly teaches Brownies all about "Storytelling." It was cool -- there were activities on writing and putting on plays and recording tales from the past and so forth. But then I flipped to a section about "Girls' Favorite Books," in which a girl named Madison enthused about the Harry Potter books. To paraphrase loosely, Madison says that she likes to imagine ways to help out her favorite characters or to advise them so that some of their situations come out differently. For example, in Book Six, the home of Madison's favorite character, Ginny Weasley, is destroyed by the evil Death Eaters. Madison thinks that if Ginny had asked for help from her friends, this tragedy wouldn't have happened. Wait, what? That didn't happen in Book Six. It happened -- nonsensically -- in the sixth movie , and even then I'm not sure how Madison's advice -- if the...

Saturday afternoon one of my facebook friends posted something about a super giant full moon. I immediately, and without reading more about it -- a point which will become important later on -- seized upon this astronomical happening as a chance to make a memory for my children, perhaps one on par with the night in 1986 when my mom woke us all up and let us look for Halley's Comet. (We might have actually seen it, a speck on the far horizon.) "There's going to be a really big full moon tonight," I announced at around 5:30. "So I was thinking --" "I know! I know! Oh my gosh!" Mallory shouted, already filled with glee. "I know, Mommy, we should take a blanket outside and lay down on the grass and look up at the stars! That's even called something, what's it called?" "Stargazing?" I suggested. "Yeeeah! Oh wow, oh my gosh! Phoebe did you hear ? Where's Daddy? No, wait!" Mallory grabbed a piece of paper...

Alternate title: Who needs a haircut? I promise I'm not going to turn this into a Crochet Critter blog (although, why not?) but I'm new at this and I still want to share. That's supposed to be a cupcake. It looks more like a mushroom person. The owl is my best one yet, I think.

It's Girl Scout week -- the organization's 99th birthday is Saturday -- so I've been gathering up bits and pieces of Girl Scout history to share with my Brownies at our meeting tonight. I've come across great stuff like these old catalog and calendar images: What did the poor Brownie do to make the girl in the background so angry? Because Girl Scouts and lambs go hand in hand. Do I even have to say that this one is from the 70s? Who is the guy in the background? And yet, I had that exact same felt beanie and goofy orange snap tie when I was a Brownie, and did I ever think I was hot stuff. I also found this poem from the 1920s, summing up what a Girl Scout should learn and be: Monday's Scout is at the tub, Her Sunday clothes to rinse and rub. Tuesday's Scout will roast and stew And fry fresh pancakes just for you! Wednesday's Scout is bent on thrift To patch a hole and darn a rift. Thursday is Scout Service Day For helping your neighbor...

My oldest child has been very challenging lately. I don't have the energy to get in to it, but my frustration level is very high. (And I keep wondering what I've done wrong, as her mother -- do all mothers wonder this? I think it's probably just her, but that doesn't stop me from feeling guilty.) Anyway, today I re-discovered a kind of journal I'd kept before I started this blog, about Mallory's younger years. And I found this conversation we had, when she was about two and a half, which made me laugh. And it could be that laughter is all that's going to get us through adolescence. Anyway, here it is: Yesterday evening I was very tired; I lay down on my bed and was watching TV while Mallory read books in her room. She came in after a while and asked for pudding. I said no, it was almost dinner time. She asked for a cookie. No. Candy. No. A popsicle. No. A banana? I said, "Okay, in five minutes we'll go downstairs and you can have a banana."...

I crocheted this all by my own self, and I can’t wait to do some more. I can only see imperfections in this penguin – its eyes are crooked, its flippers are not symmetrically placed, its feet are different sizes. Using black yarn for my very first project wasn’t such a good idea, since it was at times impossible to figure out where my hook was going, and I have a lot to learn about tension and finishing – you can see some stray yarn here and there, and for attaching the appendages I used the same technique I use for sewing on buttons – basically, use a ton of thread and hope for the best. Still, it was fun to do, and I like to think that I’ll get better with more practice. I think next I’ll make an owl. Then Mallory wants a panda, and Phoebe wants an elephant. What’s your favorite animal – I’ll stitch one up for you too!

I have been reading the Ramona books to Phoebe at night. We finished Beezus and Ramona last week and have moved on to Ramona the Pest . A friend of mine told me that Beverly Cleary got the idea for Ramona’s character when she saw a little girl walking along the sidewalk eating a stick of butter. I think few authors have done such a good job writing real children, and parents too. I was surprised by one passage of Beezus and Ramona – when the girls, walking by themselves to the library (!) – met some elderly neighbors, and one of the neighbors told Ramona she had beautiful eyes. Beezus was used to hearing this , the narration ran, but it didn’t bother her – Mother had told her that blue eyes were just as pretty as brown . I had to read that twice to make sure I had it right – that it was brown-eyed Ramona who usually got compliments, rather than blue-eyed Beezus. In my family it’s the opposite – in fact, it kind of bothers me that not a week goes by without some stranger telling ...

I realized that I haven't taken many pictures of the kids lately; so today when they asked to have a picnic in the backyard, I packed the camera along with the pb&j's and potato chips. I thought I'd try to get a few frameable shots that captured both of my daughters' elegant beauty. Well. Instead I got these: Goofy and giggly and precisely what these two are like, most of the time. I think they're keepers (the pictures and the girls).

You are not as sympathetic as you could be, no doubt, when you hear your bedroom door creak open and a little voice say, “Mommy, I threw up.” You roll over and look at the clock and groan, “Really? You did?” and then hesitate a moment, thinking of the thoroughly unpleasant task ahead of you. You get up, turn on the hall light, look at your daughter, and say, “You should change your pajamas.” You walk into her bedroom and immediately realize that you should’ve obtained more information from the child before stumbling into her bedroom in the dark, in bare feet. You turn on the light and assess the damage – great, lots of ketchup with dinner last night – and then dither around for a few minutes wondering what to do. Do you need a washcloth? A towel? Maybe you should just move out? “Do I have to go to school tomorrow?” your child asks, still in her yucky pajamas. “That is not the most important thing at this moment!” you snap. You reflect, as you look for the Oxyclean, that you have no...

Mallory’s illness has been hard on Phoebe. It’s not that Phoebe is consumed with sympathy for her big sister. Nor does she wish that Mallory would get up off the couch and play with her. No, the problem is that Mallory’s being sick has visited upon Phoebe a series of perceived injustices, which are the worst things ever for a 5-year-old. First, Mallory was, as I said, supposed to go to a sleepover on Saturday night. Phoebe had determined in advance that she would sleep with me that night. (Neither girl likes to sleep alone; both regard sleeping with me as a big treat. Don’t ask why.) Since Mallory did not go to her sleepover, however, I told Phoebe she had to sleep in her own bed. Well. You would have thought I’d killed a kitten. Phoebe cried for hours about this. (Mallory, it must be said, cried only about 2 minutes when I told her she couldn’t go to her party, even though she’d been looking forward to it for weeks and had packed her bag days in advance.) “It’s so unfair!” Phoebe ...

Mallory fell ill Friday night with what has now been determined to be strep throat on top of flu. She had to miss a birthday party sleepover Saturday night and, yesterday, had to communicate by Magnadoodle messages because it hurt to talk. Poor girl. I went to check on her around midnight on Friday and found her very, very hot. I woke her up to give her some Tylenol and then sat with her while she fell asleep. "Mommy," she said, "before you came in here, I think I heard the Kleenex box talking to me." "Did you?" I said, startled, as you would be too. "Yeah...and it kind of freaked me out. So I said a prayer to my guardian angel to protect me, and after that the talking stopped." "Well, I'm glad that worked," I said. "Yeah." A moment of silence. "Do you ever pray to your guardian angel?" she asked. "Not for a long time, I haven't," I said. "I think it really works. Mrs T" -- h...