BOO, CA

I was so sad about the CA supreme court upholding prop 8. I still am. It just seems so creepy that some thrice divorced church-going troglodyte gets to vote on somebody else's civil rights. Let's see, what other civil rights can we get a 53% majority to take away? I'm Jewish, my husband isn't. Let's invalidate my marriage in some states while we're at it!

In more immediate news, Summer has begun! The leaves in my backyard have all filled in, the grass is thick under my feet and my feeble attempts at gardening are looking kind of pretty. We spent the morning at Sandy Beach (now Shannon Beach). We were supposed to go to the WBOS music fest, but the kids were full of psycho energy and listening to music and being mellow did not seem to be encoded in their DNA today. So, we packed up many, many sandwiches, and piles of strawberries and grapes and headed to Winchester. I was worried that since we weren't getting there until noon, the place would be mobbed. But it absolutely wasn't. We got a primo parking spot, right next to the new play structure and practically had the whole beach to ourselves.

Except for The Toddler From Hell (TTFH). Let me explain. TTFH is a child between two and three that runs up and down the beach whilst his guardians schmooze or read a book. I think we've had one at Sandy Beach almost every time we've gone. TTFH then goes and steals other kids buckets and knocks down their sand castles while their parents ignore them from 50 feet away. It ended up working out fine, and my kids just abandoned their buckets to TTFH and played in the water. TTFH's parents continue to chat (usually in a language that is not English, which leads me to belive that perhaps this is a cultural difference, not bad parenting).

Eventually they leave, but not after a big messy diaper change on the beach. Ah, public parks. It was a fabulous day. I'm just being snarky because it was nothing but fun and that's boring, right?

wondering about statistics

I am a big believer in marriage. I'm so happy that 4 states now allow gay marriage. I think it's a huge step forward. Obviously there's a long way to go before true marriage equality is achieved. But I'm absolutely giddy that this is happening. Giddy! I tells ya!

But something's been bugging me. I keep seeing this "50% of all marriages end in divorce!" statistic thrown around willy nilly. And all the anecdotal evidence I see is to the contrary. I have a diverse group of married friends and none of us are divorced, nor do any of us seem to be on the verge of divorce. (Unless there's something that nobody is telling me). This 50% rate seems totally bogus and I'm wondering where it came from. The actual rate seems much lower. I did some digging and found out that the later you marry, the better chance you have statistically of staying together.

This bodes well for my friends and I who all got married in their very late 20's or early 30's. And we're mostly not very religious which helps too... Yeah, it turns out that those very conservative wing nuts that are fighting gay marriage tooth and nail have the highest divorce rate of any other group. Hmmmmm...

Mommy Needs a Mojito... Or Two.

But alas, I have no fresh mint. I do have rum, soda water sugar and limes tho...

Hmmm..

We survived Kaylee's birthday extravaganza. It got ridiculously expensive towards the end. But I didn't want to cook for all those people and to get something gluten free catered is just, expensive. Not that either of my kids ate the pizza or pasta with chicken and spinach that I got. But at least I know that nothing was contaminated. I got my first "Celia Cake" and it was quite good. It wasn't as good as mine, but I just can't make a cake large enough for 30 or 40 people.

A couple of sad moments where some other parents from E's class were talking about another party they had been to this weekend. I feel horrible that E never gets invited anywhere. At least not in this class. And I can't figure out why. He's not the most outgoing kid, but he's sweet natured and he doesn't smell bad. I know in a class of 20 kids, you can't invite everybody to every party. But it's April and not a single invite. My heart breaks just a little. I just wish I knew how to help him be more outgoing and make more friends. We're chugging along at it. We have some new friends from his class. Ironically both of his new friends have a twin. So it's like 4 friends for the price of 2.

The party was great. Kaylee seemed to really enjoy herself and everybody ate themselves silly. We didn't get to finish opening the presents because she to too overwhelmed about halfway through. But there's more for later. She went down like a stone at 7:30 and she's probably dreaming about the fairy costume her babysitters got her.

And, apropos of nothing I must say I can't believe how skinny Seth Rogan got. (We're watching SNL from last night and I think "The Fast and the B-Curious" is one of the funniest sketches I've seen in a while.)

Hey... What's that thing growing out of my chin?

It's getting harder to keep up with those hairs. Not quite ready to write my Roman a Clef about my mustache. But perhaps I'll come to terms with it eventually. At least it's blond.

Kaylee is turning three in a couple of weeks. We're celebrating this weekend. What was supposed to be a kid party has turned into a free for all of everybody we know with kids and 10 families = at least 40 people. I just hope there's enough food.

I am happy to report that we are 99% done with diapers in my house (other than over night) and my need NOT to procreate ever again is so visceral right now. I love these two kids and I NEVER WANT TO DO THAT AGAIN.

'Nuff said.

I'm trying to figure out what do about this little problem I have where I tell Kaylee that she can't have something (her pacifier) or watch something on TV and she throws a HUGE tantrum. I ignore said tantrum and continue to do dishes or think of clever 256 character updates for my facebook page and I realize that said tantrum has stopped because her big hearted brother can't stand the tantrum and has given into her demands.

"I just wanted her to feel better." You can't argue with that, and it's not his job to set limits and teach her things. It's mine. But he undermines me and that's not good. But I spend all this time telling him that he needs to look out for her and take care of her. And I guess in his mind and heart this is just part of that. So, in a sense he's following our directive for him. But it's in conflict with whatever discipline I'm trying desperately to enforce... "No Kaylee a tsunami sized tantrum will not get you your way... At least not from me..." As I watch Eric go solve the problem in his own way.

He's not undermining me as some sort of power struggle. He's following his big heart and I really don't want to F*&^K with that because the world will harden his sweet nature because that's what life does. So for now, I'll deal with a bit of subterfuge in the name of watching an important lifelong relationship bud. A relationship that if I'm lucky will outlive me by a long time.

If you'll excuse me, I'm going to go see if there are any hairs longer than an inch growing out of any part of my face now. Because you never know...

Baptism by Tire

I've been in a cleaning frenzy lately. We've lived her over three years and there are cabinets and closets in my house that have gotten so disorganized that it's almost impossible to find anything and they're half full of garbage. There's things that we put on high shelves to keep away from the kids that we need to move to low shelves to give the kids access to now (like cereal). So, with a motivation so bizarre that it could only have come from drugs slipped into my food by some altruistic neat freak, or an alien takeover of my body and soul I have spent the better part of my weekends cleaning and organizing my closets and cupboards.

So, yesterday it was the kitchen cabinets. I cleaned out the cabinet over the oven where I keep oil and vinegar, alcohol, soy sauce and generally anything that's tall because it's a very large cabinet like "Fix a Flat" which is this can of putrid goo and compressed air that you hook into a flat tire and it usually gives you enough air and time to get home or get somewhere and get a tire fixed. I gave Rich the can of "Fix a Flat" that was in my olive oil/liquor cabinet to take to the garage. He had never heard of it be cause he "had never had a flat tire before."

Famous last words, right? He went into the garage for something else and was going to put the Fix a Flat into his car but his car was locked, so he stuck it into the minivan.

Later that SAME day, he had a Man Date with his friend Ben in Arlington last night. He's needed a Man Date for a while and the last 2 out of three got canceled so this was really important to him. On the way back, his car slid down an icy hill towards a red light. Rather than slide into the intersection, he decided to hit the curb instead. The car stopped and he continued on, but soon realized that his tire was flat.

At 11:00 PM I got the call. The Fix a Flat was in the minivan. He was in the CRV. The kids were asleep and I was alone so I couldn't go bring it to him. I have a long history of driving old junkers in my teens and twenties and I gave him a few pointers on how to change a tire (If 17 year old me could do it alone, you can do it too!). And then Iwaited. And waited. And waited.

There was something wrong wit the Jack where it didn't lift the car quite high enough to line up the holes on the new tire once he had the old tire off. He ended up stuffing a small, flat rock between thhe jack and the car and that gave him the room he needed to get it lined up. But it took hours to get all that figured out and he was doing this in the middle of a snowstorm.

Poor guy. His plumber's crack filled with snow.

Sorry.. shouldn't have gone there. Stopping now.

Kindergarten Future: The Things I'm Dreading

I am very excited for my kids to start school. But the blogosphere is ablaze with a very specific nightmare that I await with a certain type of dread usually reserved for the gynecologist or oral surgeon.

Homework. Not mine, the kids'.

I am a slacker mom. I totally admit it. That's why I suck at being a stay at home parent. Oh yeah.. I found a certain groove with it. But it was mostly about getting through the day so I could rest. I'd take the kids out to do fun stuff, and we did have fun. But my ulterior motive was ALWAYS to exhaust them so that they would sleep.

So I am DREADING the new emphasis placed on homework for young children. I think cognitively most kids below fourth grade do not have the organizational skills to navigate multiple assignments, flashcards, reading, math problems, science experiments, building scale models of the Taj Mahal entirely out of marshmallows --or whatever they're teaching in school these days.

I've been through grade school. It was a long, dark painful period in my life that I look back on and can't believe I went through that hateful, spiteful environment that was public school in the 70's and didn't end up a raging psychopath. But I didn't really have to do homework until the 4th grade.

I was not raised by helicopter parents. If I messed up in school, it was my problem. My husband was in pretty much the same situation. I slacked in High School? Boo freaking hoo... My parents instilled enough pride in me that I cared about my grades. They did not need to monitor my every move to make sure I was doing my assignments. I just did them.

But today we're expected to hover over our kids and make sure they do their homework and that it gets into the backpack in the morning. And why do they pile the homework on to first graders? Because there is a completely unproven theory that it will set up better habits when it matters in junior high and high school. Yeah.. show me the study! Our kids are missing their childhood afternoons for an unproven theory. Yaay!

And if they don't get it done, it's our problem, not just theirs.

The media loves to mock helicopter parents mercilessly. But I think we're being set up. I have no desire to Children are being required use organizational skills that developmentally aren't generally available to them. I'm not talking about the work level. I'm sure it's just reinforcing whatever they're learning in school. But six and seven year olds just don't have the skills to organize a bunch of homework projects without a lot of help. So what other choice will we have but to hover?

I'm just dreading it.

Dreams Coming True

Things are changing in my house. It's like these great big kids swooped in and ate our little babies and replaced them. But I can't say I miss that phase of life. I love having bigger kids. They play together and genuinely enjoy each others company. It's just so much easier when you don't have to supervise every second of their time.

But the most exciting part is reading chapter books to Eric. We just finished reading The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe and he loved it. I thought he wasn't that into it, because we didn't read it for a few nights. Then as I was drying him off after his bath on Thursday he asked, "Let's find out what happened to Edmund?"

OK!

Tonight we finished the second to last chapter and I tried to put him to bed and he said "Please can we read a little more?" So, we finished it.

Now, I'm just composing lists in my head of stuff we should read. Rich read him A Christmas Carol and Legend of Sleepy Hollow when he was 4 and he seemed to get them so I think we have a lot of options.

But each book takes at least a couple of weeks, so I need to choose wisely. I want to read him Harry Potter and The Graveyard Book and everything by Roald Dahl (did you know he was a real spy during WWII?) and the Wizard of Oz, The Phantom Tollbooth, A Wrinkle in Time, My Side of the Mountain and The Great Brain...

There's only so much time before he'll want to read on his own... I must choose wisely.