Cheerful Abundance

The temperature finally crossed the freezing line and for the first time in six weeks I was able to get my car out of the garage. Oh, sweet freedom! I ran errands. But it still counts as freedom, right? I had a coffee I didn’t make in one hand, and for a few seconds in each parking lot I paused to enjoy the slightly-more-than-freezing temperatures.

I am counting it. March makes me want to spring clean. Today, the kids were goofing around on the floor while wearing black fleece track pants, and now they look like they rolled in a box of puppies and lint, and I can’t stop bookmarking all those crazy link-bait DIY homekeeping sites that keep popping up, promising me ten, twenty, thirty-five, fifty ways to Get Organized. It’s a hate-read, really. A self-hate read. The more tricks I see for perfect organization, the more pseudo-clever innovations, the more frustrated I get. There is a lot of privilege in being able to write a blog post about how you organized your dedicated craft room, your over-sized mudroom, your enormous kitchen pantry,  your three-car garage. After a while, I start adding the word ‘asshole’ to the end of every organizing tip I read, just to keep myself sane. I mean, really – I am all for being organized, and living in a clean home, but at some point we seem to have substituted ‘decanting everything into chalk-board label covered mason jars’ for ‘having a meaningful life’.

To store your quilt fabric in an organized fashion, fold in quarters and drape over hanging file dividers in a filing cabinet, asshole.

This weekend we went down to the lake with squirt bottles filled with food dye and water, and painted on the giant ice floes piled up on the beach, had lunch with another family and hung out at their house for awhile, and painted birdhouses in anticipation of spring. Tonight I am going to patch all the girls’ jeans, because they wear through the knees of everything they own, make a meatloaf for dinner, practice their sight words with them, figure out a grocery list for the week, update our calendar, and then have a cocktail. Its a perfectly ordinary weekend, only possible because we are out from the oppressive cold of the polar vortex.  It isn’t the end of winter, yet: my front walk is a skating rink so slick that the post office won’t deliver our mail to the house, and we still have flannel sheets on all the beds, but for the first time in months, I have a little hope that the end of the long freeze is coming, and with it, Spring.

So, the “100 Days of School” celebration is apparently a real thing, and not just some elaborate Pinterest-inspired practical joke. Who knew? Since it falls in the same week as Valentine’s day, and a short school week, and because I only have so much patience in my bones for crafty shenanigans, I decided to go simple for the shirts, making them cute enough to double as pajama shirts or play out in the backyard in, but not so cute they would qualify as regular clothing. Fabric markers from Walmart, and boys’ undershirts, and there you go: 100 letters and numbers. G. was kind of  rock-star with this project, and wrote about 35 letters herself before giving up. In her defense, the fabric markers were a bit annoying on jersey. M, on the other hand, was in no mood to do a team project with specific instructions, and gave up, so we made her shirt for her. and then finished G’s shirt up. After a careful proofreading job to make sure we didn’t inadvertently write any good swears or inappropriate words, we were good to go.

I think they had fun at their school’s “100th Day of School” celebration, although it is funny to hear them describe their days, because what a kindergartner thinks is important information to share, and what I think I want to know, are two lines of inquiry that never intersect. I did hear about who cried because their shirt was so uncomfortable to wear (put away the glue gun, PinterestMommy), who wasn’t allowed to wear their shirt because it was so fragile, but did carry it around on a hangar all day, who used an unkind word, who had to go in time out for unkind hands, and who wet their pants. I get the ‘wet pants’ report every week, and I am happy to share with you that pretty much everyone in kindergarten has wet their pants at some point this year. Big surprise! I also learned that while discussing the number 100 in class, one of my girls shared that she wanted one hundred dollars, that her mother was 100 years old, and that our dog weighs 100 pounds. All of that is factual information. Given that she used to tell me I was 150, I am counting it as a win.

Next up, making valentines. 50 valentines. Do you know how much fun it is to do 50 of anything with two children, after a hard day of kindergartening? And I can’t just go buy a few boxes and call it a day, because we are deep into the IEP process, and if I know anything about the subjectivity of public education, it is that appearing like an engaged, screen-time-limiting, fun-project-doing, co-curricular-home-play kind of parent plays a big role in the kinds of services your children can be eligible for. And we need all the services, so…. off to the glitter table for me! If I glue my fingers shut, please wedge a highball glass into my clenched claw-hand so that I can still drink like a lady. Thanks!

It snowed again last night, and now we have about a foot and half of snow on the ground, drifting up over three feet everywhere I have to actually shovel. My husband, who is a blessed saint, bundled the kids up in winterwear, a half hour process that always includes giggling, crying, a fist fight, a reconciliation, and a dance, and took them to the park, to slide in the snow and generally burn off some of their restless energy before we all went crazy with Housebound Psychosis and killed each other. Now I think he is trying to bore them into taking accidental naps, a ninja parenting skill that I heartily endorse, while I get started on making Kielbasa, Kale,and Tortellini soup. I first had this at a friend’s house for lunch, and although I was there to conduct Adult Lady Business and plow through a pile of charity work, it was all I could do to keep from making those little happy mouth sounds kids make when they are eating something that they love. Our gracious hostess shared the recipe, and in my house we refer to it as her soup, and it is heaven on a cold day, with crusty bread.

This snow and cold makes me crave carbohydrates. I could eat an entire loaf of bread right now, preferably while lying in bed under 8 duvets, in between naps. This is winter in the Midwest, and I am done with it, mentally. My online shopping keeps turning to pretty things in pastel shades, impossibly thin cotton cardigans with embroidery around the cuffs and buttons shaped like seashells, cabochon earrings in palest blue. Playing with the Jack Rogers colour picker and designing sandals. Researching summer rentals on faraway beaches.

I am going to try to blog every day in February, however, that obviously doesn’t mean blogging well, or saying anything worth reading! Sorry, Internet: let’s pick this up tomorrow. I will try to have a fabulous adventure between now and then to write about. Or make the kids do something cute and/or funny. Or poke something with a stick.

Winter, you have won. You have killed me. A month of subzero temperatures, two little kids housebound, mainlining juice and out of their minds with the need to jump and run and be physically active, and I am calling it. I give up.

School was just cancelled for tomorrow, and likely Tuesday, and I can’t even deal. I just need five days in a row of the kids in school, nobody sick, me not being sick, to get my house in order and my head back in the game. Right now, everything is grimy, the laundry is stacked up (clean, but so much folding and putting away), the baseboards are dusty, and the floors need washing, and the dirt and constant mess of everything distracts me in ways that make it hard for me to deal with life. I am no clean freak, either. But we have been locked away, housebound, for a month now, and I want my days back, to get things done. I need some sustained quiet time to find my own thoughts again, and settle them. I need some sustained quiet to just let the world be, without commentary.

My FB feed is hilarious: a few sanctimommies, eager to remind us how they love, love, LOVE snow days, and getting more cuddle time in with their darling offspring, and then the moms like me, who are like, please, I really need to clean my house and drink a few cups of coffee in peace, without little people jumping up and down in front of me, asking me to help them wipe. Seasonal Affective Disorder, I think I have you. And I am starting to worry about how much my children have backslid academically from the long break and then the on again, off again school schedule.

I miss the sun.

My girls were in their first assembly last week, and sang three songs, one of which is a really cute ode to Martin Luther King, complete with hand gestures. They are so in to it, which is sweet to watch, but I mistakenly cracked a joke on Facebook about how happy I was to see the end result of all this speech therapy be the two of them singing about “Martha Loofah King”. Which someone in a transracial adoption group I belong(ed) to on Facebook took umbrage with, missing the point (that I was making fun of my kids) and deciding instead that I was being disrespectful of MLK. I pointed out that as a Pastor and a dad, I believe Dr. King probably had a sense of humour when it came to little kids and the ridiculous things they say, and the next thing you know, I had to start deleting mean comments from my Facebook wall, and got to watch my character be ripped to shreds on a message board normally filled with parents bemoaning the rude things people say to them, as white people raising black kids. So, yeah. That happened.

Since I try to keep Facebook completely drama-free, by following what I believe to be the basic tenets of online adult lady life (no vaguebooking, nothing passive-aggressive, stay positive, be self-deprecating, and don’t post more than 2-3 times a week), it was a bit of a shock, but honestly, most online adoption groups are just fueled by women itching to be insulted by something, and begging for a fight.

So, there you have it. I got thrown out of a private Facebook group, and now I guess the next step is Instagramming a bunch of morose-faced selfies with a lot of passive-aggressive hashtags. Or not. I am not even sure where this story is going, except that I think the phrase ‘Martha Loofah King’ is the funniest thing my kids have said all week, except for that other time they told me the milk was drunk (which is why they couldn’t get it off the shelf in the fridge. Drunkenness), and that other other time that one of them pointed out the difference between the two of us, by explaining that she is FIVE, and I am one HUNDRED and FIVE, and then I told her I was scratching her name out of my will and called her Froggy Fartsinpants, and she screamed with laughter while I tickled her into submission. How on earth do people find the time to get so riled up online when there is so much offline silliness to be had?

“Live on the edge? I was born on the edge, baby. This is what badass looks like, Suburban-style.” *** drops the mike.

It turns out, my best and most regular holiday tradition is … getting sick. And this year is no exception. Charmed by my inability to get out of bed for the past few days, and the hacking cough that makes me sound like a 4 pack a day grandad, and unimpressed with his own ability to keep food down, my lovely husband swept me out of the house on Thursday for a mid-day romp at the local urgent care, where they let us see the doctor together (romantic!), swabbed our noses, and gave us the news. Influenza.

Getting a flu shot is on my to-do list. Guess I can cross that one off, now! Progress!

Going to urgent care is such a different experience than going to see our GP. For one, my GP treats me with acute suspicion whenever the topic of medication comes up. “Rest and fluids” is his answer to everything, which is great when you have a cold, but if something is more treatable, I probably want to treat it, you know? He also never tests for things, I just realized, after having my nose swabbed. He listens to your symptoms, and then hands over a ‘scrip for a Z-pack (grudgingly), or does the ‘rest and fluids’ song and dance. And he is big on Neti pots, which, dude, if I wanted to pour water up my nose I’d visit a waterpark, thanks. But this Urgent Care GP, when I explained the whole ‘two kids, and I am the Mom, and its Christmas in a week’ was like, “I hear that”, and walked me out with a prescription for two different kinds of inhalers, TamiFlu, something for nausea, and a narcotic cough syrup that has turned out to be a complete gamechanger. I still am sick as hell, and this is the first time I have sat upright without falling over, but I can already feel the meds kicking in, and I can see that by Christmas, we might be okay. At least 75% operational, which is all I need. I can fake the rest. God bless this doctor, though. I think it is time to fire my old GP and start looking around, because I had completely forgotten that your doctor isn’t supposed to make you feel worse about yourself, not better. Narcotic cough syrup! It’s a real thing! A real good thing!

I am working through my Shame List this week, the list of stuff that really needed to get done that always got pushed back or overlooked on my to-do list because, you know, career, etc. First on the list: get a new debit card. Because I went grocery shopping last May, and when I swiped my card it was declined, and I had that moment of irrational panic, like maybe we actually had no money at all, but then the cashier told me the card came up expired, and I was all, ‘oh, no, that can’t be’, but it was, and I was wrong. So I put it on the list, calling the bank to get a new one. And I ended up charging my groceries, on a credit card, which felt all kinds of wrong, and this is how the economy tanks.

That list, that list from last May? Was still sitting in my to-do notebook, all of its items unchecked, in November. Shame! And what is worse is, I didn’t have access to our bank accounts, for over 6 months. Yet I am the one who does the money in this household. It just does not get stupider than that, but the longer I waited, the more shame was heaping up on my to-do list, and then I decided to pretend like I am some bohemian free spirit who doesn’t need money (but does need an American Express card), and that got me through August, but at some point you have to bite the bullet, and so I did.

Luckily, the woman at my bank was so nice, as I told her my shame. She asked me what happened to the replacement card they had mailed me, and instead of making up some lame excuse, I told her the truth: that I vaguely remembered them sending me one, well in advance, and how I put it someplace very safe, so safe that now I have no idea where it is. Then I told her how I didn’t call for 6 months because the longer I waited, the stupider I felt, and that angel at the bank FedExed me a new card the next day, and told me how refreshing it was to have someone not lie to her about what happened and what they need, and we both laughed at how safe that first replacement card must be.

New bank card: off the shame list. Sadly, what didn’t get off the shame list in time was, ‘pack up the backyard before it snows’. It snowed yesterday – first snow! – and it snowed all over my patio furniture, patio umbrella, and grill, which I have been meaning to put away for the past month. I blame Obama, really.

Snow tomatoes! We had such a weird growing season that in October, my raised bed suddenly sprouted a late set of lettuce, tomatoes, and peppers. All of which are now under snow. As is my lavender!

The kids were home for Veteran’s Day, and in the basement all day watching movies and reading books, so they didn’t realize how much snow was falling until they came upstairs to help with dinner, and at that point, I realized that old-me would have made them stay inside so that I could get dinner on the table on time, and new-me wanted to play in the snow, so out we went! It didn’t quite cover the grass, but we had fun, making angels and playing snow-soccer as it got darker and darker out.

I kept having to restrain myself from curtailing the fun. In my old life, fun never got to happen spontaneously, because nothing happened spontaneously. Every block of time in every day was rigidly accounted for, and I was always behind, behind, behind, and running to catch up. But last night, I just stood on the patio with my husband, arm-in-arm, watching our kids play, watching them get soaked, watching them revel in the excitement of playing outside in the dark, and I tried to focus on just relaxing, just being in the moment.

It is a process, I think. A muscle well-atrophied, that I want to rehabilitate, little moment by little moment. Tonight I put my kids to bed, a job my husband had taken over so that I could eke more work time out of the day, and we snuggled and read Bedknobs and Broomsticks, and then their eyes got big and their eyelids heavy and as they drifted off, one of my girls said to me, “Mommy, I missed you,” and then she fell asleep. The Shame List is bigger than I thought.

We are working with our kids to develop appropriate ‘public’ manners, and at five, they are doing pretty well most of the time, which makes me proud. Nobody is perfect, but they are definitely getting the concept, if not always nailing the execution. For example, right now, there is a 60% chance that my children will say ‘excuse me’ to other children and adults, and a 99% chance they will say it to dogs, plants, and inanimate objects. Nothing charms me more than watching my kid pet someone’s dog, and when she is done, look it in the eyes and say a heartfelt “thank you.” To the dog, not the dog’s owner. And at Target last week, she was steering my cart through an aisle that had a bunch of stuff strewn around in it, and when our cart brushed against an errant Christmas tree, she said, “excuse me” to the tree, and kept going.

We take the kids out to eat lunch every weekend, as a way of practicing our ‘restaurant manners’, which include being polite to the server, not pointing at other diners, or commenting on other people. Yesterday, we were at a sit-down burger joint we often frequent, and both kids were able to order for themselves while making good eye contact with the server, and saying ‘please’ and ‘thank-you’ unprompted by me, which made me so happy that I got a little effusive with the praise, which I then suspect prompted what happened next.  After we had all ordered, one of my little turkeys kept going with her ‘politeness’, by saying to the waitress, in a loud, cheerful voice, “I love you!” And bless her, that waitress, she didn’t miss a beat, just said it right back to my beaming little girl. I think Miss Manners would have been so proud … of our server.

Today was a completely ordinary day. We got up early, stuffed food in the kids, and then, because there was no school today (thank you, Rosh Hashanah!) we let the kids watch a little TV in the morning, and my husband supervised while getting some work done, while I balanced the chequebook and paid some bills and screwed around a bit on the internet.

By noon, everyone was showered and dressed, and boo-boos were kissed and hurt feelings were addressed, and everyone was packed into the car for a quick trip to the library, where the kids picked out their own books, and we let them, and then off to their favourite restaurant, Steak and Shake, where we ate food that is guaranteed to make me sick, but they love it.

Afterward, we came home and my husband mowed the lawn, and I started dismantling our vegetable garden and weeding, while the kids made a mud-pit out of the backyard, first digging in it, then just spraying each other with the hose while yelling, “Summer VACATION!! SUMMERVACATION!!” at the top of their lungs.

While their father scraped about six pounds of mud off of each of them in the bath, I puttered around, put away laundry, and then got the mail. My front door is just a few feet away from our neighbour’s kitchen windows, and as I stretched to get the mail [ed note: a rant for another day, the stupid placement of our mailbox], I heard the most beautiful voice, singing a song I didn’t recognize, and then I realized that it was my next door neighbour, signing while she cooked dinner, her kitchen windows open to catch the breeze. It was so lovely that I didn’t want to close my door, but stopping to listen felt intrusive, so I went back inside and helped two now-clean girls get yoghurt and water to snack on.

It wasn’t a perfect day, by any means. There were some tantrums, and some fighting, and at one point I had to lay the parental hammer down on one of my kids, and someone had to spend some time alone in her room, thinking about her choices. It wasn’t a perfect day, but it was a perfectly ordinary day, and all I can think is, how important it is to remember days like this, and to give thanks for them. And how lucky I am to have had this one.