I made this

I made this for dinner the other night.

I was so proud of the way it turned out. It looked really good. The hen wasn't as tasty as I'd hoped, but the asparagus was really yummy, which proves the point that everything is better when wrapped in bacon. Also, I improvised an onion stuffing which tasted awesome with the rice pilaf.

The end.

Old Crazy Neighbor Lady

It's been cold here. I know, I know, it's been cold and freezing everywhere. I'm not saying we're any different.

But the other night I came home and the thermometer in my car said "1."

One. 1. It's so insulting when it's a temperature. One.. What is that?

And the kids, they are just so... they refuse to wear hats and gloves. They bring them to school in their backpacks.

A couple of days ago I was driving to the school to pick the boys up, and I saw a girl walking home after the bus dropped her off. She was old enough to walk home from the bus stop. Maybe twelve?

She was carrying her jacket.

In her arms.

The thermometer in the car said "9."

9 is better than 1. But not so's you'd really notice.

I wanted to roll down the window and shout, "Hey! Little Girl! Put on your coat! It's cold!"

Bed Head

Lately the boys have become a little involved with their hair.

Steve actually caught Andy trying to cut his hair.

I have tried convincing them that running a comb through it is the first step.

No one seems very excited about that.

Twilight Zone

We are now living in an alternate dimension.

A dimension where, when in snows, the school does NOT call at 5am to cancel, or even to delay the start time, which is has done in the past.

A reality where the school busses, after being so prompt ALL YEAR LONG, are more than forty minutes late.

A universe in which the school system calls and leaves a message at 9:15 letting us know the busses wil be late, a good 30 minutes after the buss has already passed, and a good 45 minutes after Steve told the kids they didn't have to go to school because they'd been standing out in the cold and snow for so long.

This can not possibly be the same world where the school system called to tell me the busses would be 10 minutes late, and then they were on time.

Alarmingly, this IS the same reality, and the same school district people that called and left four messages and various emails, alerting us that "THERE WAS A NOISE BEHIND THE SCHOOL TEN MNUTES AGO, WE HAVE ALERTED THE POLICE, BUT THEY DIDN'T FIND ANYTHING, SO DON'T WORRY!"

You know how I can not worry? Don't call me about squirrels in the woods. Call me when the busses are going to be fifty minutes behind schedule due to snow. BEFORE the busses get here. THAT is the job they should be doing. Not calling us every day with a new alert or trying to get me to staff the door and check ID's.

7 is a Lucky Number

There are times when I want to put on the brakes, to reach out and yank that lever that won't stop things completely, but will slow things down so that they aren't a complete blur. Then I would appreciate things more, wouldn't I? Then I would know to savor each moment before it evaporates into memory.


Today Nathan turns seven years old. I love him.

That Said...

I still live to share stuff.

I asked Steve to take a picture of us in front of a huge toy train in NY. He got us, but left the train out. I guess one of us missed the point. It is a lovely photo.  Dec. 2012

Not As Often

If you are a regular reader of my blog, you will have noticed by now that I haven't really been... well, blogging.

This wasn't a computer malfunction, or some glitch of the site. It wasn't an oversight on my part, either. No, this was a choice. I made a choice to blog less often. Much, much less often.

And there are a few reasons for it.

First of all, if anything of immediate interest happens to me, I will probably post it on FaceBook sooner or later. I know, I know, it's horrible. And not everyone HAS Facebook. It's OK, Linda, I'll call you and send you emails. You too, Mom. Although I'm not sure what I'd say.

See, another thing is, I feel I am often scraping the bottom of the barrel to come up with something to post about. What was that cute thing one of the kids said the other day? Didn't I snap a photo of the boys in the few moments they were not fighting or eating or playing a video game? I'll use this one, even though it's blurry. Although I actually do believe that everything my kids do is amazing, I know the rest of the world doen't agree, and why should it?

Which leads us to a third reason. When I am looking for topics to blog about, I tend to ruminate on certain things which should NOT be blogged about. There is, surprisingly, a rather long list of these things. I do not wish to embarrass my children (too much.) I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings. I don't want to post about arguments or disagreeable things that will come back to haunt me later. I realize that, in the lifetime of this blog, I've done all three, without meaning to. And if there is something that I am particularly focused on, someone's performance in school, for example, or maybe an argument that I had with someone,.. If I am focused on that one thing, I may not be able to articulate much else.

And let's face it. I am a busy person. Between keeping my home livable and the floors relatively lego free, and making sure my children are getting to school, practicing piano, doing homework, getting to karate, between making dinner, volunteering, church, choir, and all that... well, I find I don't have a lot of extra time. And even when I do have a few moments, I would rather be reading or writing something else.

So.

There you have it. I will not be posting as often. I'm aiming for one or two posts a week. If we're all lucky, there will be photos.

I'm sorry. I really am. I have found that this blog is a treasure of past memories, a record of my children and how they have grown. I hope that not too many of you stop reading completely.

Happy Birthday Early

Happy Combined Early 150th Birthday to my parents, who we all love very much!