Champ

Tonite's Agenda

1. A bottle of champagne.
2. Chocolate cake.
3. A friend's 40th birthday.
4. Sleeping 3 year old girls.
5. A goddess card reading.
6. Incense.
7. Girl bonding.
8. Island breezes.

Clare's Comments

This afternoon Clare "met" her cousin via ultrasound picture for the first time. Her comments went something like this:

1. Why is it dark in there?
2. It kind of looks like a crab.
3. That baby has a big belly.

Introducing...

Baby M&M

Due to arrive: March 2010

Clare and Wesley are super excited to meet their sweet new candy cousin!

Lunch

Raw Kale and Avocado Salad. Super yum. I added golden raisins, flax seeds and sunflower seeds for extra flavor love (and if Mario were eating it I'm sure he'd add feta and bacon).

Maybe my yoga classes and the running are directing my nutritional needs. Lately I have been paying a lot more attention to what I'm putting in my body and giving even more thought to how I feel after I eat certain foods. The result is leading me towards foods that are closer to their natural source and l-o-n-g hard thoughts about eating the mini Twix bars in the snack jar. I still want them (and the entire pan of brownies I just made) but I know that I'll feel crappy after I eat them.

Instead I look forward to our afternoon post-rest-time ritual: strawberry/banana/peach/rice milk smoothies. I also put together combinations like date rolls and apples to = caramel apple taste and texture. I'm learning to listen to my body and my taste buds but if any one knows a natural substitutions for a frozen Twix bar please let me know.

My New Apron

Cost: $1

Found at: Shandon United Methodist Garage Sale

Ordinary

We are falling into routine.

School.
Lunch.
Rest time.
Home/Play date.
Dinner.
Bed.

While Clare is at school Wesley and I run errands.

During rest time I do home things.

The play dates in the afternoon are the best parts.

Dinner is a struggle because I'm not feeling the allergen free love. I'm also pretty sure Mario will rebel if I serve chickpeas, lentils, or peanut noodles one more time.

Highlights include seeing friends at pre-school drop off, yoga classes, running, and reading before bed.

So we are doing stuff and I'm enjoying doing the stuff more than I enjoy writing about it this week. Maybe next week will be different.

Then and Now

1979
2009

Single Mama Reign

There are a few things I like about being a single mama.

• burning my new favorite incense a lot. (Mario hates incense.)
• doing evening yoga.
• having the whole bed to myself.
• eating raw kale and avocado salad for dinner and being vegetarian. I LOVED this salad and can't wait to make it again.
• being able to go to bed really early or really late.
• missing him and wanting him to come home.
• getting stuff done.

Pre-School 2009-2010

This is Clare after the fourth day of pre-school. As I write she's throwing a tantrum in her room so the Montessori approach hasn't necessarily transferred to our home life yet. She started school with two days of orientation last week and now is going from 8:30 a.m. till 11:45 a.m. at a local Montessori school.

I am in heaven. I miss her some but am enjoying the thrill of 'just one' until Wesley starts pre-school next month. If Clare could unbuckle her seat belt and open the van door by herself I think she would in order to leap out and run to her new school. Today I unloaded her sans the backpack containing her sacred blankie and she said 'bye Mama!' and left me.

So far so good.

Her only issue: she didn't like the peanut butter crackers they had for snack on the first day.

Today's Treasure

$3

Garner's Ferry Road Goodwill

11:20 a.m.

BFF

Thanks to a lot of very special people Wesley is in Diego heaven. He eats Diego, walks Diego, plays Diego soccer, sleep with Diego and soon will even potty with Diego.

The best part is when he belts out "go yego go!"

Chuck's Place

1:00 p.m. today
Chuck E. Cheese
Hunter's 5th birthday
Lots of tokens
A few tickets
Chocolate birthday cake from Publix
Pizza
Tiffin lunch for Wesley
Noise
A band
Mouse terror
Singing
Veggie platter for adults
Unlimited refills
Skee-ball
Mama friends
Future playdates planned
A very happy birthday party.

(They had fun I promise. They were not happy at all to be leaving the party just before this photo was snapped by Susan.)

Demo Party

You know your Saturday night is exciting when it involves a crow bar.

Frustrated with the shower in the master bathroom I decided that it was time to go. We were 'making do' with it in nasty mauve and gold. Then the kids broke the door off while going in and out playing some game. And tonight after months of showering in the hall bathroom I gave up. It doesn't look that hard to install (it certainly was easy to pry apart) so as long as I'm willing to pay someone to help me at any point I've given myself a green light.

Mario came in after hearing a bit of clatter and had a few questions about what exactly I was doing. Seeing that the demolition was already in progress he trooped along and helped me rip it out between Buffalo Bills football. He's hoping for the 'let's call someone' route but I'm confident that his putting things together talent will be fantastic.

I have home projects on the mind. Yesterday I put pearl grey paint in the hall bathroom (so we are currently totally showerless like our CA friends). Today we travelled to Ikea to return a few things, to let the kids eat free kid's meals, and to buy a few more treasures. Tonight I painted and visited Lowe's in search of bathroom lighting and toilet paper rolls. The least expensive toilet paper roll I could find that was $9 and it was ugly. Bummer.

So the question of the hour: do you know anyone that would install a corner shower kit? If so please please please send me an email. I hear that living in the middle of construction is fun but I would really like to just take a shower this week (or next).

Psychedelic Smoothies

Tuesday we tie dyed t-shirts at Jennifer's house. The results are fabulous and yesterday all three of us wore our shirts in public. Using these kits may have been cheating, but we dyed six t-shirts in about 40 minutes. The kit included instructions to make swirls, sunbursts, and gradual color changes. We opted for spirals and rubber banded all of the shirts before inviting Alex and Clare to help us squeeze the dye. As a pre-caution we did everything on a large vinyl tablecloth and stripped the kids to their underwear. Later we made smoothies with our frozen strawberry stash. Good stuff...now we need to go to Sam's Club to buy a plethora of bananas to make more.

Psychedelic Smoothies

7 frozen large strawberries

2 frozen bananas

a handful of grapes (Wesley wanted to add something to the blender)

1 cup of rice milk

Blend. Blend. Blend. Serve with lots of straws.

Maybe next time we'll get bold and try our hand at green smoothies.

Transformation

Lately I am leaning towards calmer less complicated things. The busy pace of doing to do and going to go and doing to said I've done and going to say I've gone does not feel authentic. I'm not spending as much time on line, running out to run out, or trying to balance too many insignificant things. I want to be softer but grounded and right now I feel grounded in who I am and what I am doing with my life.

I can see the impact of these changes in my journalling, my daily agenda and our home. I want to tone things down, get rid of things that don't serve a purpose, and make our home feel like ours again. We moved into our house nine years ago, did a bunch of stuff, and then left it alone. We aren't the same people we were so it's time for some changes. I'm on a painting kick with grand plans for the next few weeks and certain rooms are going to have major color makeovers.

First up: the tangerine room. Nine years ago I craved my very own space where I could make things. We painted it together, roped it off, and it served it's function. Now we crave serenity and peace so we remade the room into a Sunday football oasis for Mario and a yoga zone for me. We are both really happy with the changes and most importantly it is a child-free zone (except for an occasional television treat).

During:

After:

Tidbits

• We spent five days on Hilton Head Island for the South Carolina Trial Lawyers annual meeting. The whole thing was family friendly, the kids loved playing in the pool, we survived and thrived in a regular 2 double bed hotel room, and I ran in a 5K Saturday morning on the beach. One morning I asked Clare if she wanted to go to the beach or the pool. Her answer "the pool, I've never done that" meaning that the beach was old news in her world and not worthy of her time. To top things off Mario won a kayak. A tangerine kayak! Forge Consulting gave it away in a vendor drawing Saturday morning and we were both shocked to see his name on it as the winner. Other highlights: Wesley peed in the elevator in front of some judges, another judge told us we had the cutest kids he's seen in a long time, we got an unexpected night out at Red Fish due to some generous babysitter sharing, and each day I remained thankful that the cast was gone.
• Today we went to Greer to visit friends. While the little kids slept, Jennifer and I tie dyed t-shirts in colorful pink/blue/green spirals with the older kids. The shirts are now in the dryer and I am hopeful that the kids will wear them tomorrow with great pride. I think we've decided that just getting together and letting kids be kids in there own environment is less stressful and more fun. I'm amazed that we can have a conversation in the kitchen while four kids play upstairs in relative harmony...we just have to listen for the muffled cries. Planned super dates have their place for sure but just being is kind of nice too.
• We painted the tangerine room rainwashed (a grey, blue, green color). The 37 inch tv is in place. On Sunday Mario watched his first pre-season Buffalo Bills game in there. It is also going to double as my yoga zone and we are really happy with he space. While we sometimes dream of having a much larger house I am enjoying (painfully at times) the exercise of redesigning our existing space to meet our changing needs. In all the conversion was cheap: 2 cans of paint, a new rug from Ikea, moving existing furniture, and taking a LOT of stuff to Goodwill.
• Yes. Wesley is still on his special wheat free/soy free/dairy free diet. Today we treated the kids to ice cream at Whole Foods and I stocked up on a few more essentials for Wesley while we had access to the store. The prepackaged processed stuff is $$$ so I'm back to baking banana breads with oat and spelt flour, researching new things for him to eat and planning more than ever to make sure I don't get caught with a starving child while we are out and about.
• My brother and Mikie are moving to Baltimore. We are super sad that they are leaving the area but excited for them as they move on to bigger better things.
• I haven't taken a picture in a week. It feels kind of odd to me to be without my camera documenting our little world yet also liberating to just do things without the burden of recording them.
• Clare starts school on Thursday. The parents have orientation on Thursday night. Hello Montessori World!
• Wesley is in love with Diego and tonight is sleeping with a very special Diego doll.

Latis: Goddess of Water and Beer

Recently, one of my favorite people gave me a goddess card reading on her breezy porch. Between swirling incense, girly togetherness, and very big questions Latis, the goddess of water, made a strong appearance urging me to seek continued therapy and renewal near water.

Between the lake visits in New Hampshire and Michigan we certainly have been near water. But now as we settle into life as a hotel family we have a chance to actually get in and partake of the water experience.

Yesterday afternoon Mario took Clare to the orthopaedist and they slid her cast off. That's right. No saws, no tortured cries, no princess promises. It just slid off, they did new x-rays, and sent them on their way.

While Mario does his conference and meeting thing today I'm taking the kids to the beach. I will take new pleasure in letting go, letting kids be kids, and letting them get very wet and sandy. Last night I fought the urge to buy waterproof mascara just in case I ran into any people that I am supposed to know and greet while chasing kids down the hotel hallways. Instead I went with my stronger urges to just be me with wild kids and to only have SPF 50 on as a cover up.

Tonight, Mario and I will follow up on the second part of Latis: beer on the balcony by candlelight.

2 Things

1. Clare puked on her cast and it is stinky. Today Mario is taking her to the orthopaedist to maybe just maybe get the thing off. I'm hoping that the rank puke smell will help push them towards taking it off.

2. I'm annoyed at myself for spending $6 on a local organic watermelon. Not so much the $6 part, but that I now have a giant watermelon with SEEDS in it that is beyond toddler friendly. I'm not even sure they've ever seen seeds in a watermelon before. Maybe organic and local just don't jive with seedless?

Home.

We're back and settling into home life. We spent the week in Three Rivers, Michigan with family isolated on a lake with close to no signals from the outside world. And we survived the road trip home on Saturday (so much so that I'd consider doing it again without much hesitation at all). More to come in this space soon.

On our agenda: converting the tangerine room into a football/yoga zone, getting Clare's cast off, connecting with a few friends, travelling to Hilton Head Island for a few days, getting ready for pre-school next week, and uploading many many photos.