Backgammon

twoK found my backgammon set.  I got it when I was about her age--maybe a teeny bit older, I can't remember.  Anyway, I taught her how to play.  I really like backgammon.  Who knew.  I don't really like games, but I do like backgammon.  I remember, I played backgammon nearly every day with a best friend in 6th grade.  Then she moved.  Her name was Angie C___.   We had lots of fun and a secret language, too.  There you go, a little more JK history on the web for all to see.

Break!

Break has been semi-relaxing.  I'm going to write about the good stuff and not the bad, though.

1.  Sleeping in!  MWH and I slept in past 10 (almost until 11) one day!  This morning I set the alarm and went to Zumba!  (The only reason I like to get up.)

2.  Hanging with the girls.... I've been so busy this last semester that I feel I haven't spent time with them.  I have to figure out how to teach, work, and see them more, or else I'm going to have to give up teaching. Teaching, though I love it, is soul-sucking work.  I had 4 - 5 tough students this semester.  Next semester, one of the tough ones will be gone!  I'll have one really tough one left, and she's MAD at her grade from this semester, but we'll get through it.

3.  Playing with 3 kitties and 3 girls!  I love it!

4. Braiding hair.

5.  Zumba!  I've gotten to do some extra classes.

6.  Books (see previous post)

7.  My new favorite song.  You can hear it here, but ignore the talking. (Oh, I do love it!)

I haven't gotten to cook as much as I wanted.  I'm hoping to get to cook in the next couple of days.

One thing, my Mom's death really hit me harder than I expected this break.  She was thinking about coming out to visit us over break, and I have the thought that she should be arriving soon in the back of my head.

Things I want to do in the next few days "off."

1.  A Dailey Method Class (maybe Sunday or tomorrow, but I'd rather do Zumba!)

2.  At least one more Zumba class (Monday morning, for sure... maybe tomorrow morning... but then I probably won't do a Dailey.  I should do a Dailey, but Zumba is WAY more fun!)

3.  Movie night with the girls.  (I watched a silly one with them this afternoon, but I don't think it counts.  Maybe we'll do one tomorrow night for New Year's Eve... OMG it's almost 2012, how did that happen?!)

4.  Work on a new web page for work (it's almost done, now!) and do some related work reviewing web sites.

5.  Create my syllabus for my class in the spring (I think I know what I want to do.  I want to try to make the syllabus in less than 8 hours.  Wish me luck!)

6.  Do an "end of year review here" and make a plan for next year.

Green! Straws!

Before 2011 slips away, I should tell you about one of my favorite new things, this year.  

I got  stainless steel straws for the girls.  I <3 them.  I felt so bad tossing plastic straws all the time.  Three-a won't drink out of them, but oh, well.  oNe and twoK like them and two out of three ain't bad!

(The straws are second to the lunch bags, but they are good.

The best thing about Christmas...

Hold on to your hats, here's a too enthusiastic post.

The best thing about Christmas is BOOKS!

oNe's aunt, sent her a book for Christmas.  I'd never seen it, even though it was a Newberry award winner.  It was written in the 70s so I should have seen it as it would have been around when I was old enough to read it.  I'm embarrassed to not have read it, but I grew up in state that might have banned it.  Sigh.  (In defense of our school librarian, it won the Newberry when I was too young to read it.)

Anyway, since I hadn't seen it before, I decided to read it to make sure it was a good book.  I like to read the books that the girls read (to know what they are learning and to be able to talk with them).  Plus, young adult books are fun and a nice escape!

It's a really enjoyable book.  It's about a battle against good and evil. I'm not quite done.  I plan to finish it today.  I would have liked to have read it last night, but MWH put on a tv show and it turned out to be a 2-hour episode.  Though I didn't finish the book, I got to snuggle with MWH and watch SciFi, so it's all good!

Oh, what's better than one good book?
A good book that is part of a series!  We have a new series to read!  Yippeeee!

I will let you know when I read the series what I think.  oNe's other aunt is planning to send the boxed set of books for oNe's birthday.  (OMG, oNe is gonna be 10!  OMG, OMG!)

Questions for you:

What's the best thing about Christmas, in your opinion?

Did you get any good books?

The kitties are here!!!

See other blog or FB (if you know me) for a picture!

A party game

In oNe's class, fourth grade, they played a little game at their holiday party.  The game was "pass the present."  The rules were to pass around a present to music and when the music stopped the kid holding the present got to unwrap a layer of wrapping paper on the present. There were multiple layers of wrapping paper.  Then the music started up and they passed again until the music stopped, whoever was holding unwrapped... rinse, repeat until all the layers of wrapping paper were removed.  When the last child unwrapped the last layer, that child found a box full of candy and had the option to keep it all to him or herself or the option to share (there was more than enough for the class) with the whole class.

You can see where this is going, right?  The child who unwrapped the last layer on the present chose to keep all the candy to herself.

The teacher and all the moms at the party almost fell over.  The kids tried to encourage sharing, but the child stood resolute.  She wouldn't share.  It was hers, she claimed.

I don't know this child, and I don't know the family situation, but our school has many well-off families and I doubt the child wanted for "stuff."  I am shocked at that child's response.  I don't know what her parents would have thought if they would have been there.

What would you do if it were your child?

My immediate reaction is that if one of my children ever chose to NOT share, I would be so embarrassed. I think I would have my child buy in a comparable present for the class (with her OWN money) and take it back with an apology.  (Did I mention I'd be embarrassed?????)

Who knows if this child will tell her parents that she should have shared with her friends, but chose not to share.  She might just say she won the candy at school.  Who knows, who knows.

So. Sad.  What are your thoughts?

oops, I forgot to buy pants

This fall, I've been a leeeeetle busy.  I was scheduled to the maximum and then my Mom died--not a good combination.  I haven't been doing super well and pretty much everything has been overwhelming.  It was a pretty warm fall so the girls didn't complain about wearing their short, capri-length pants up until last week when it turned colder.

When I went to get out their winter pants, I realized, in my overwhelmed state, that I hadn't ordered any new pants for them.

D'oh!  They didn't have new pants for this fall/winter.  twoK's old pants were too snug and oNe had two pairs that didn't have holes, but were two short.  Three-a was in decent shape.  She had 2 new pairs of pants (a little thinner than they should be for this time of year, but okay; two pair of twoK's old pants; and one pair of her own from last winter that still fit).

For twoK and oNe, I dug through all their clothes and found two more pairs for oNe (I did buy her a pair of cargo pants earlier) and one pair of twoK's that still fit and were long.  With extra loads of laundry and rotating their pants we made it through the week.  The order I placed,* last week, will hopefully arrive soon.

There you go, the story of the pants, or lack thereof.  The end.



*Yea, I could have gone out to buy some pants for them, but I wanted a certain brand and I didn't want to have to fight all the crowds at the mall.  I RARELY go to the mall anymore.  Zappos and Amazon pretty much do it for me.  I don't miss the mall at all.

Kitties on the brain!

I don't know what happened, but last weekend, I decided we had to start looking for kitties for twoK and Three-a.  I became OBSESSED.  We like to adopt from rescue organizations. I think I found two wonderful black kitties!!!!!  We met them tonight.  They are big!  (As big as, or a little bigger, than oNe's kitty!)  They are 2.5.  One is very curious, playful, and friendly and one is a little shy.  They are brothers!  We'll probably get them on Friday or Saturday.  Can you tell I am excited?  There are way too many exclamation points in the post.  Oh well, NEW KITTIES!!!!

OMG we're gonna have 3 kitties.

P.S. I am very busy with work.  I anticipate having a little time off over the holiday break, but not a lot.  I should get to relax on February 15th.  Seriously.  I'm booked until then.  And then I have stuff to do for OLU.  Ai-yi-yi.

Not good...hopefully I can shake this soon

I've been less than emotionally stable this week.  The reality of my Mom's death has now hit me hard.

Yesterday, I was supposed to work (at home) all day.  I knew if I stayed home I'd get very little (besides crying) done.  Instead, I went and worked out (not Zumba, but a good workout), then did a little work, then helped twoK finish her big second grade project and then had dinner with a friend!  I also called another friend to catch up.

I'm feeling a little better today.  I still have a HUGE report to work on, and NO motivation for it.  Then there's the other big project.  Oh, and I also have a lot of grading...  Sigh.  I'll try to get as much done as I can this weekend.

I have FINALLY started entries about each of the girls.  I want to blog about what they are like right now.  They are so fun.  (And noisy.)  (And they should be in bed NOW.)

Endorphins

If you find me depressed, take me to my favorite Zumba class!  I am so much happier than I was before.

One of my nightmares...

is finding a spider on my bath towel.  This morning, in real life, it occurred.  Ugh.  I hope the day gets better.

I'm looking forward

to not being so overwhelmed.  Since my Mom died, so many things have seemed like way too much of an effort.  I find I have good energy and motivation until about 1 or 2 pm. Then I just want to curl up in a ball.

On a positive note, I got the playroom organized.  Woo!  Now, I must go watch hulu with MWH.

oh yea

I have a blog.  I haven't forgotten, but I have been BUSY.  A quick recap is in order.

1.  One of my brother's came to visit over Thanksgiving.  Super fun. We did tourist-y things.  I'll post more about them at the OTHER blog.

2.  My fall class is almost over.  I haven't written that much about the course this time around. I don't know why.  I've learned a lot.  I have mostly fabulous students.  I am more happy than not with this semester.  It's been hard and it's been great.  Boy, I'm vague, but that's all I want to remember.  (Trust me, I'll only remember what I write down.)

3.  I had eye surgery on Tuesday.  Not serious stuff.  I have very dry eyes.  Hopefully the procedure will help alleviate dryness in certain areas.  This doesn't affect my vision.  The negative was that I did have to be put out with "twilight" anesthesia.  I was scared.  It all went great.  I didn't have any negative reactions and the best thing was that I got some caffeine in my I.V.  I felt SUPER after the surgery.  Now, I'm recovering and it'll be about 2 weeks before we know if the operation was successful.  Fingers crossed!  (You can thank me for NOT posting pictures of my eye as it heals.)

4.  Our floor project is finished.  I'm thrilled to have wood floors upstairs and downstairs!  It's going to be much easier to clean.  I love the wood, too.

5.  Despite having just done an extensive floor change in our house, MWH and I bought a new house.  Yup.  It became ours last week.  MWH found it back in September.  We decided to go for it in October.  That's the BIG news that I mentioned before.  It's exciting.  It's a very nice house--it's got a fabulous backyard.  Unfortunately, it needs to be remodeled.  We'll move sometime next spring/summer after the remodel.

We're starting in on the planning process right now.  Today we met with a kitchen planner. Exciting!  I am excited.  It will be fabulous when it's done.  If you sense that maybe I'm not fully excited, you would be correct and incorrect at the same time.  I am excited, but I am also still in disbelief.  I wasn't itching to move. I really like our current house (see #4).  When we moved into our current house, I thought it was going to be the house we lived the entire time the girls grew up.  I was all set for that.

However, there were a few things we didn't like about this house.  The main one was a fence line dispute with the world's craziest neighbor.  Then MWH found this other house and decided we should sell our house and buy this new one.  Since I really like MWH and I want him to be happy, I agreed.  He got me caught up in the excitement of A NEW HOUSE!  It is exciting.  I'm just a little overwhelmed from 1) my Mom dying, 2) teaching, and 3) huge work project. And we have another huge work project coming up.  It will all be okay.

6.  When I was in the out-patient surgery center and all hooked up to the machines, I was happy to see my resting pulse rate under 60 a lot of the time.  Woo.  Go Zumba.

Very boring...

Here's a post about colds...  (NO ONE will care about this post... As it should be.  This is to assist my failing memory.)

oNe had one during our trip.  She had actually gotten it before our trip, but she kept coughing our entire trip and it took her a week after we returned home before she was better.  I don't think she was "sick" the entire time, but given how busy we were she couldn't shake it.  She was NOT getting enough sleep.  Poor girl!

Three-a may have had a very mild version of the cold with the emphasis on VERY mild.

MWH got the cold pretty sufficiently and was kind of sick Monday through Sunday.  He has been recovering steadily since Thursday/Friday and seems quite a bit better today.

The end.

Quick and Easy Black Beans...

My recipe for made-from-scratch is here.  I started making my black beans from scratch and did for about 6 months because I didn't want to get black beans in BPA-lined cans.  When I found organic black beans in BPA-free cans, I sort of stopped making black beans from scratch because it is easier to buy them mostly cooked.

I like making things from scratch, but it's been so crazy around here that it's been hard to even cook much.    (I wish I had the time to do the from scratch thing, but I just don't.) In the spirit of the season, I'll say I'm very thankful for canned black beans!  We're eating lots of them. I thought I'd share what I do with the canned ones to make them taste SUPER YUM!

It's quick!  It's easy! Everyone in our family will eat them!

I use 3 cans (and it usually gives us almost 2 meals for all of us).  I put in 1 - 2 Tablespoons of ground cumin, ~1 teaspoon of salt, and garlic.  Note, I tend to go light on the garlic, but season as you like.  You can use 1 teeny clove to 3 big cloves or if you're using dried and minced use 1/4 teaspoon to ~1 teaspoon.

Bring to a boil and then turn down simmer for 15-20 minutes.  (Note, you can just boil them for 10 minutes and they are good, but they do get tastier the longer you can let them simmer.)

I serve these so many ways:
with brown rice
in a tortilla wrap
in a bowl
in a bowl mashed up (the girls LOVE them this way)
with salsa
with kale
with salsa and kale
with salsa and kale in a wrap
with broccoli
with broccoli in a wrap
with broccoli and salsa in a wrap
with spinach....I think you get the idea.

Beans and veggies are delicious and nutritious!  Add a little carb if you like.

Back...

oNe and I took a trip.  I had to go teach for OLU and she came with me.  She and I got to see my two best friends from high school, and their kids!  Super fun!  We also got to tour around the city and do more stuff with my class.  She had opportunities to learn things you don't get to learn in school. It was super.  It's documented at "the other" blog.  I'll be back here with food thoughts and other stuff soon.  Oh, yea, and to tell you about the good craziness in our life.

Slinky

Don't you hate it when your slinky gets tangled?  Why does it have to happen?  

Now this is bad...

And a little embarrassing.  Last year, I missed my 5th blogoversary by a couple of weeks.  This year, I missed my 6th by a couple of months.  How embarrassing.  I can't even blame forgetting on my Mom's death because my blogoversary was in August and she didn't die until September.  I'll blame teaching at OLU.  I'm having fun teaching at OLU, but it's kicking me in the pants.

Okay, let's reflect on the year of blogging since that's the purpose of this post.  I am proud to report that I have already blogged more in 2011 than I did in all of 2010.  I'm still torn about whether I keep this blog or not.  I don't have tons of time to blog, and I don't have tons of readers, but having tons of readers was never the point of this blog.  I just wanted a little corner of the Internet to make a homey place for recording my thoughts and memories.  I'm delighted I get to share those thoughts and memories with some of my friends from real life and some new ones I've met along the way.  I share my thoughts and memories with others 'cause they are sometimes funny, sometimes a good lesson, and sometimes just something that may make someone else think, "Gee, I'm glad I'm not her."  That's fine.  I'm happy to be me.  I love my little family and my life--even when it's crazy.

My blog is sort of all over the place.  I'd like to make the focus more about health and nutrition, but to do that, I'd probably have to give up my day job and teaching at OLU.  I am not a professional blogger, nor do I have the desire to become an accomplished amateur.  I like to spend time hanging out with my kiddos, working at my other job, and teaching at OLU.  Crazy but good is my motto.

So what's in store for the next 12 10 months until the next blogoversary?  Lots.  I can promise you lots of insanity!  We have a new life-changing event beginning.  (No, I'm not pregnant... And it's good!)  I'll fill you in, soon.  In the meantime, leave me a comment and wish me a happy blogoversary.

The best lunch bags!

I've been meaning to write about the lunch bags I got for the girls this year.  I got bags that are made from plastic bottles.   We got the pink one, the dark green one, and the light green one.

I LOVE THEM.

When I was looking for bags for the girls, my two required features were that the bags were 1) durable and 2) easy to clean.  To me, a dirty lunch box is disgusting.  We had insulated lunch bags last year, from Land's End and they were neither durable nor easy to clean.  After we had used them a couple of months, I wanted to toss them.  They were disgustingly dirty on the outside and their insulation was ripping.  Their ripping insulation made them a lot harder to clean inside, too.  UGH!  I managed to talk myself out of tossing them because it seemed wrong; it seems like a lunch bag should last for at least a year.

This year, I wasn't going to make the same mistake--I wanted bags that would last and not make me cringe when I looked at them.  I spent lots of time looking at choices.  I considered another brand of lunch bags that were made from recycled bottles, but they had insulation in them.  They looked easy to clean on the outside, but the insulation on the inside looked like it would rip pretty quickly.  I decided to look for a bag that was made from recycled bottles without insulation.  I don't care much about insulation; the girls don't take food that has to be kept hot or cold.  By choice, they take PB sandwiches pretty much everyday.  twoK will sometimes take hummus or black beans, but she eats them at whatever temperature and they aren't likely to spoil in 3.5 hours of sitting at room temperature.

So back to the bags, it took me a while to find them, but I finally remembered Google was my friend and I typed in "plastic bottle lunch bag."  I found the  Clean Conscience bags as the fifth link down.  As soon as I saw these bags, I ordered them!

We've had these bags for about 2 months.  The girls take their lunch every day, they throw them around, and they eat on wood picnic tables that aren't very clean.  The bags are holding up GREAT!  I washed them about a month ago when they were getting a little dirty and they came out of the washing machine looking brand new.  I'm planning to wash them once a month (getting time to do the second washing).  I'll let you know at the end of the year how well they last, but they look like they are going to do really well!  I'll keep you posted.

I could...

I could post lots of posts about how hard this time is, but I don't.  I am not sure I want to remember what an awful mess I am right now.  It just hits me and I want to crawl in a hole. I miss my Mom.

A green miracle...

Last night, twoK was eating her peas VERY SLOWLY--no surprise there. I think it was going on 40 minutes and she still had 1/2 the bowl to eat. I was getting frustrated and I asked her what I could do to get her to eat them more quickly. She said, wait for it, make me a smoothie with peas, strawberries, soy milk, and banana.

I almost fell over. I wonder if she's been reading this blog. I told her we'd do it tomorrow, and I said, if I made her a pea smoothie, that she'd have to drink it all.  She promised she would.

Tonight, at her request, and with her watching, I made a pea, strawberry, soy milk, and banana smoothie.  She drank 2 glasses full. She said she liked it. I put in way more peas than I usually do. You could see the green-ish color and taste them.  She didn't flinch. I was so proud.

Remember this? Tonight, I told twoK that she'd probably like spinach in her smoothies even better than peas.  She said she'd try it tomorrow. I told her that spinach tastes even less than peas do. It's true. She's been drinking them both for years, but she doesn't know it. I'm thrilled that she's at an age where she'll drink them with awareness. My little anti-vegetable girl is growing up and starting to like them.

Cold #2 of the season

twoK caught it.  It seems milder, but a lot like the one I had.  However, it seems like she should have gotten it sooner if she caught it from me.

Good for a girl and a boy

I file this under another way to make money that is really not necessary, but pretty cute and clever.  We saw these at Whole Foods the other night.  The blue one says, "Frightens monsters from your closet!" The pink one says, "Frightens monsters from under your bed!"  

my new plan

We'll see if it happens.  Right now, my head hurts.  I mentioned I haven't had an aura/migraine, but my head has just kind of hurt for the last few weeks.  When someone I love dies, my head hurts.  It sucks, but at least I know the cause.

On Tuesdays, I spend from 2:30 - 7-ish with the girls.  While I treasure my time with them, they are noisy and that's not so good for a fragile head (TM).  After dinner, that's now, I told MWH I needed a little quiet.  I'm sneaking in a quick blog post.

I am feeling so overwhelmed.  MWH has been wanting me to work less for a while, so that our lives could be a little more sane, but I haven't ever wanted to work less.  This last month has changed that.  My plan is to do everything I need to do for work through mid-January and then take a little break.  I'm not sure if I can do it all, but somehow it will all get done.

In January, I'll do the "go hourly" thing.  We're working on a fun project right now, and I want to keep working on it, but it'll end mid-March.  If we write a new proposal, I'll totally do that, but I'm actually good with a little down time.  There's one other project that I want to work on, but I don't know what the timing is for it, and there won't be a ton of work, but who knows, it might keep me busy through spring.  I just don't know the timing of it.

There's another project that has me down for quite a bit of time in January and I want to get out of it.  I saw a potential escape route today. I'll keep you posted. I totally need some downtime. Totally. Okay, me and my fragile head (TM) are going to make sure the girls are in bed by 9.

Yay! Zumba for me! Today!

In an hour and 1/2, but who is counting?  I love Zumba.  It's my sanity-keeper.  I love to dance.  I'm not very good, and I've been dancing my whole life, so I should be better, but who cares!  Dance like no one is watching--that's my motto.

I am so thankful that I have a love of dance.  I never feel like it's a "have to" work out, it's an I-WANT-to-work-out-thing when  I'm heading for a dance class.  I do feel like it's an "I have to thing" when I lift weights/do Pilates/do Dailey Method.  However, when I think about how strength building helps me be a better dancer, then it's easier to find the motivation.

Yea, I'm avoiding writing about anything but light and fluffy stuff right now.  Here are some random tidbits for now.

Our wood floor is still "acclimating" and being installed.  We are waiting to start on the stairs until some more "parts" come in.  I'm hoping the parts will be here at the end of the week.

I need to write about elderberry.  There's a link if you're curious.

I'm amazed that I haven't had a migraine aura from the grief.  I realize it hasn't been that long, and that I could be jinxing myself by typing these words, but as I said I'm working really hard to stay away from my triggers. We'll see if I can make it through an upcoming trip (in November for OLU) without getting a migraine aura.

What else...  I need to do an update on what the girls are like this year.  That's one of the main purposes of this blog and I'm failing miserably in doing that.   More soon... it's the best I can do right now.

No Zumba for me, today

You know it's bad if I skip Zumba.  Zumba is what keeps me sane.  However, I walked out to the mailbox to mail the check for the payment of my Mom's funeral, yea, very cheery around here, and the walk to the mailbox and back left me breathless and exhausted.

Plus, now I have this tickle in my throat that makes me cough and when I cough I get a stabbing pain in my throat.

Good times.

I'm sitting here, on my bed, with my very sexy black, almost 20 year old sweats that fall down because they are coming apart at the seam in the back.  I'm a sniffling, sneezing, coughing mess.  I bet you want to come over, eh?

But, as Three-a says, it's noro!  Life is good.

Yup

I am sick.  I tried to fight it and not give in, but last night, I might have even been running a fever.  As Three-a reminded me, a cold is MUCH better than norovirus.  My little optimist.  I thanked her for reminding me and told her I loved my cold.  It's true.  Okay, moving on.

Today is our anniversary!  Happy Anniversary MWH.  I love you in sickness and in health.  I'm sorry I am the sick-y today.  We'll take a day to play and hang out in a week or so.  I love you in crazy, insane times, too.

Thank you for taking me to a Vegan restaurant on Saturday night.  It was super fun to go, open the menu and to know that I would happily eat ANY of the entrees on there.  Super fun.  You win the best husband ever award!



P.S.  Hey, P.S., we were thinking we should go there with you and L!

gosh durn it

I don't usually use such language here on this blog, but I have a cold.  I'm trying to take Zicam and make it go away, but it seems to be gaining a little.  Note to self, do NOT stop taking Zicam as it will get worse.  Zicam is helping. Or at least, I don't want to find out that it was helping but then I stopped taking it and got worse like I did one time.


I don't feel *that* bad, but I am feeling worse than I was yesterday.  I'm tired and my nose feels like it wants to be stuffy--it is a tiny bit.  My lymph nodes feel all swollen.  I'm sneezing quite a bit.  My ears are a bit stuffy.   I have a bit of a headache.  Yea, sounds like a cold to me.  I hope I can shake it, soon.

It's almost our anniversary, so it's not surprising I'm getting sick.  I HATE BEING SICK ON OUR ANNIVERSARY.  I love our anniversary.  I love MWH.  I loved our wedding.  Given how much stress has been loaded on me in the last few weeks, I'm not surprised.  Just another thing to be sad about, eh?

Deeply Unhappy

No, not me. I'm very sad, but not deeply unhappy.  There is a difference between being sad and unhappy. I reserve deeply unhappy term for the woman at the drugstore who yelled at the clerk at the check-out stand.  I'm not sure what he did, but he's been working at the drugstore forever, and he's a super gentle personality.  I can't believe he did anything to deserve the violent wrath she spewed his way.  One older woman said, she must have had a big fight with her husband this morning and then took it out on the clerk.  I agreed.

On another note, I am very sad.  I got a very (bitter)sweet email from my friend telling me she got sad being at Grandparent's day at her school.  She was sad for me and the girls--xoxo to her.  I am very sad when I think about the girls not having my Mom to love them.  She LOVED her grandchildren.  My niece, who is an adult, cried a lot when she thought about my girls not having her in their lives at least until they were older.  Okay, can't think much more about this.  I'm getting a headache.  Seriously, my head starts to hurt when I think about her loss.  I hope I'm not a bad person for delaying the processing of her loss.  It really hurts too much right now.

Continuing with the sadness theme, I am very sad about the loss of Steve Jobs.  I was in the same location with him a couple of times, but I don't think I ever spoke with him, not even a "hello."  Like most of the people on the planet, he transformed and made my life better.  I would have liked to have told him thank you, but when I saw him was in his intense days.  He became a gentle, inspiring soul after his illness.  In his earlier days, he demanded more than most people could imagine and he challenged people beyond their limits.  It worked.  He left a dent in the universe.  I'll be forever grateful for his existence.

Okay, that's all I have.  I'm so drained.

He's that good

and he's all mine!

All weekend, I kept looking at the laundry baskets in my closet and thinking about how I really should do some laundry.  I was overwhelmed by them.  I never got around to doing laundry, so tonight, I came home from work and started to put in a load.  I pulled out enough dirty clothes for a load and then looked at the laundry baskets and thought, hrmph, there wasn't that much laundry there.  I must be overwhelmed even more than I thought from my Mom's death.

I carried the laundry to the washing machine and then saw that MWH had put in a load to wash already.  He is truly My Wonderful Husband!  Thank you MWH!  I've been so overwhelmed lately and he's doing so many things to help.  I am lucky.

Planning... I didn't do a good job

When I was planning this fall, I didn't include time for me to sit around thinking, "How can she be dead???"  I don't understand how my Mom can be dead and my head hurts when I try to think about it.  Sigh.

Happiness is...

Thinking you're out of chocolate at work but when you open a drawer you find a WHOLE, brand-new bar!  Woo!  (Trying to type and not get chocolate on the keyboard now.)

(Note, I prescribed extra chocolate during this very sad time, so this is medicinal.)

Things that were good

Today, I went to work.  I worked at home Monday andTuesday.  Today, at work, I got to see my best-est colleague and she brought me some yummy homemade (vegan) pumpkin bread.  The girls declared it delicious and told me to tell her it was the best they'd ever had.  TwoK may even email for the recipe.  (Don't hold your breath, though.  She's not very good at emailing.)

Another thing fun at work, I am pretty sure one of our other favorite colleagues is pregnant!  I'd place a large amount of money down as a bet on the side of her being pregnant.

A lot of super nice colleagues stopped by to talk.  It really sucks losing a parent.  If you've already lost one (or two) you're very sympathetic.  If you haven't and you're a clueless person, you will not offer anything helpful as you talk and talk about how maybe it was for the best.  (Yes, I have one very clueless colleague... I can never decide if I like this person.  Today I'm coming down on the side of dislike.  I'm sure I'll get over it and move back to the neutral side.)

I made myself do a Dailey Method workout tonight.  I really didn't want to go, but I knew it would be good for me.  I really like how I feel after a DM class, but before I go, I DREAD going.  The only way I can make myself go is to tell myself how good I'll feel after.  I never dread Zumba.  I had a Zumba class Monday andTuesday.  I totally heart Zumba, but I think you all know that.

That's about it for the good.  I didn't get an actual full-blown headache, but my head is not very happy.  I call it Fragile-Head (TM).  It feels like the slightest thing will set me off into a big, bad headache.  Ugh.

Need to watch bad tv shows with MWH!  NOW!

Can't think of anything good for a title

I can't think of anything good for a title because this post is hard to write.  I'm sitting here, trying to catch up on my work.  I've been almost completely offline for a week because my Mom died.  You didn't see that coming, did you?  Neither did I.

Yes, she was in her 80s. Yes, people don't live forever, but I'm still reeling.  Her death was unexpected.  She fell, broke some bones, and then she died the next day.  She didn't hit her head in the fall.  She was in the hospital getting cared for and she just died.  Apparently, her body couldn't take the trauma.

I didn't get to see her or even talk with her after the fall.  She was in the hospital, but was doing "well."  I don't think she saw death coming for her, either.  My brother saw her before he went to work and she told him not to stay.  She told him she was "fine" and to go on to work.  She died a few hours later.  Another brother had been with her and had just gone to get lunch.  She was sleeping when he left and when he returned they were trying to revive her.

The good news is that I didn't have any major unfinished business with her.  We hadn't just had a fight.  All was normal.  I am pretty sure I told her I loved her the last time we spoke, on Tuesday, (I usually did).  I am sad that I got really busy on Wednesday and that I didn't have time to call Wednesday night or Thursday morning.  That's okay, though, I can live with that guilt.  What I wasn't prepared for  is how I'm left with this horrible emptiness because she's not there any more.  She was always there.  No matter how much we try not to take people for granted, when they are gone, we realize that we did take their presence for granted.  I miss her more than I could have imagined.  I wish I could have spoken with her one last time.  But if I didn't know it was the last time, I'd always wish for one more time.

If I'd spoken to her Thursday, after the fall, I would have told her that I was looking forward to coming home and seeing her and helping her feel better.  That we'd figure everything out.  That it would all be okay.  But would I have told her how much she meant to me?  I would have told her I loved her, but I probably wouldn't have told her everything I wished I could, now.  I wouldn't have asked all the questions I have, now.  I didn't get to speak to her because first, she was getting scans and couldn't have her cell phone and then, after they admitted her to the hospital she was given lots of good pain medications and feel asleep.  In retrospect, I should have insisted on talking to her, but it seemed like there would be more time and that her sleep was a higher priority.

As soon as I heard she'd fallen and broken some bones I was overtaken with grief.  I knew how hard this recovery was going to be for her.  She already had a lot of pain from her osteoporosis and the compression fractures she had suffered in her back because of the osteoporosis.  I knew her pain was going to get worse.  I knew that if she recovered she'd be sad because she'd lose mobility.  I knew she'd get "older" because she wouldn't be able to do as much and that she wouldn't be happy about that.  I was sad for all that was coming.  I was trying to figure out when to go back to see her.  I wanted to be there right then, as soon as she fell, but also later as she recovered; I wanted to be there for the hard part of the recovery.  The only good thing about her death is that she doesn't have to face the horrible recovery.

I am glad she doesn't have to suffer, but I just wish she wouldn't have fallen.  I wish we could have prevented the fall.  My whole family is trying to think about what we could have done to prevent the fall, but we haven't come up with the answer.  If we do come up with an answer, unfortunately, it won't help much because we can't go back and re-do Thursday and prevent the fall.

In some ways, she had a good death.  She had decided to go to a dance class and she fell while she was in it.  She was out living her life and an accident killed her.  She didn't have to suffer for too long and she had lived a long full life.  Of course, it's never long enough.  She was missing Dad, and now she doesn't have to miss him any more. We should all be so lucky, right?

Unfortunately, for me, this loss leaves me feeling like a 3 year old crying for my Mommy.  Where is she?  Where did she go?  I miss her and want her.  I feel like I've been able to be strong and independent because I knew she was always there for me.  She's not there, now, and I'm very sad.

A quickie

Hrm... trying out the new blogger interface. It's cleaner and the input area for making a post is bigger. I wonder if it works better on the iPad / iPhone. I'll have to try.  Not many thoughts on the new interface.  I'll have to use it a bit to see if I like it.

In the meantime, I'll just post a couple of thoughts so I don't forget what's going on in my life. It's very busy! It's good. Ask me at the end of the semester how I feel, but right now, I love it.  Right now, I'm:

 1. Organizing the house
2. Hanging in the girls' classrooms
3. Teaching my class
4. Working on the new big project
5. Trying to find new recipes

Today, in the organizing arena, I worked on my pantry. I started organizing before I realized I was doing it and I didn't get a "before" picture. It was BAD. The "after" looks a lot better, but I can't post it because you don't have anything to compare it to, and to some, it might look bad, still.

I'll try to take before pictures from now on, but sometimes I just start organizing before I realize it. (I'm on quite the organizing kick!)

In the recipe arena: Below is a recipe I found that I'm going to adapt and try. Hopefully, I'll make it tonight. I'll report back on how the girls like it.

(Note, I don't think I'll use ketchup and I imagine I'll try to add a little spinach to mine. I need to figure out what I'm going to do instead of ketchup... I think I'd rather do real garlic... Hrmmm... maybe I'll cook the beans first with some spices and then make into patties. I'll report back.)

From http://happyherbivore.com/2011/08/easy-black-bean-burger/
Black Bean Burgers Recipe
Servings: 4
Description: I developed these burgers in a hotel room: they’re quick, easy and require very few ingredients. (In fact, except for the beans and a seasoning packet, I sourced all the ingredients from the complimentary “breakfast bar”). I make these burgers any time I need a super fast meal or I’m really low on ingredients.

 Ingredients:
⅓ cup instant oats
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp garlic powder
1 tbsp yellow mustard
2 tbsp ketchup
15 ounces black beans, drained and rinsed

Instructions:
Preheat oven to 400F. Grease a cookie sheet or line with parchment paper and set aside. In a mixing bowl, mash black beans with a fork until mostly pureed but still some half beans and bean parts are left. Stir in condiments and spices until well combined. Then mix in oats.

Divide into 4 equal portions and shape into thin patties. Bake for 7 minutes, carefully flip over and bake for another 7 minutes, or until crusty on the outside. Slap into a bun with extra condiments and eat!


Total Time: 20.00 min

Okay, I must get back to work before I get all sleepy and lose focus.  I got up early today and took my FAVORITE zumba class.  (Remind me to tell you more about exercise stuff, later.)

PB pancakes

Giving full credit to http://www.sprint2thetable.com/2011/09/pbj-pancakes-gluten-free-and-vegan/ for this amazing recipe. As it is the policy here, I'm putting in her recipe in case, you know, the Internet ever goes away or something. OMG these are good!


PB Pancakes
1 T ground flax
1 T + 1 tsp water
1/4 C peanut flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp vanilla
3 T unsweetened almond milk (or other liquid)
Note: I used soy. I would have used almond if I had it.
10 drops NuNaturals Pure Liquid Vanilla Stevia
Note: I used a little Xylitol. I didn't measure, but I would guess 1 tablespoon? I'm thinking, next time, I might mix in some maple pancake syrup. We'll see. Maybe I'll try stevia. I like Stevia in my oatmeal and in my tea, but I haven't liked cooking with it, but perhaps it'll be okay with PB. I dislike stevia with chocolate!

Mix together ground flax and water. Set aside for 2-3 mins, allowing the mix to gel into a flax “egg.”

In small bowl, whisk together dry ingredients. Add liquids and flax egg, stirring until just combined.

Spoon on to warm pan (med-high heat), forming 1-2 pancakes. Flip half way through… you guys know how to make pancakes.
Note: This was the thickest pancake batter I've EVER seen. I added some extra soy milk, but I didn't measure. I probably did 1-2 more tablespoons. It was still too thick to pour so I spooned some in the pan and then when I flipped the pancake, I smushed it with my spatula. I had to flip it again so that the first side was down twice, but it all worked out. I did not see any pancake bubbles. WAY too thick for that.

Sprint to the table made a jam for her pancakes...

For the Jam:
1/3 C fresh raspberries
5-6 drops NuNaturals Pure Liquid Vanilla Stevia


Meanwhile, place the berries and stevia in a small bowl. Place in mocriwave ~45 seconds. Remove and stir.

Plate pancakes and top with “jam.” Enjoy!

Notes: Any flour should work here. You can also use a regular egg or 2 egg whites in place of the flax egg.

Makes 1-2 pancakes.


Note: I got 3 pancakes 'cause the batter was so thick. I didn't want to make them huge.
I tried some blueberries on them, but I kind of just liked them without a topping. twoK tried a couple of bites and thought they were pretty good with maple syrup. I'm also thinking about some chocolate chips in these........(then I definitely won't use stevia...oooohh.... one could use banana for sweetness. PB, chocolate, and banana are my favorites!)

Honk if you love Apple

I bet no one else has ever taken a picture similar to this. Heh.

Returning...

It's been busy! The first post back is always hard. I'm going to cheat and make it a list-y post.

1. School started. We love all our teachers. More soon.

2. My brother visited. Great visit. Some day I'll write more about my brothers.

3. School Volunteering is starting up. I'll be working on a project for the library and in each of the classes.

4. Still trying to determine if I should stay working 1/2 time or if I should change it to the more flexible status. More soon.

5. oNe has read HP 6 and is starting 7. twoK wants to read 5 and I'm trying to hold her off.

6. I am very sad about SJ (Steve Jobs) resigning from Apple.

7. Tomorrow is a party with Moms I knew from the first Mom's group when oNe was born. I'm excited to see everyone.


Today I want to:

1. Make a new recipe for dinner. I've fallen into a rut and never seem to know what to make anymore. (This will also mean a trip to the store. Not sure if I'll have time. I'll try.)

2. Write something for a project I dislike.

3. Write something for a project I like (CL).

4. Do a little more work on my class.

5. Do some laundry... (Yea, I like washing clothes... I dislike putting them away, but MWH does it so I'm lucky! He and I make a great team.)

They are actually listening...

I've been threatening (for a while) that if we don't give away some of the toys that we've outgrown that we won't get any new ones. When twoK, oNe, and I were shopping for Three-a's birthday present, I asked if they wanted to give her a toy and they reminded me that they couldn't because they hadn't yet given toys away. We chose something else... (Dress-up clothes don't count as toys in their mind and we went with Harry Potter stuff.)

In related news, twoK did agree that we could pack up the toys they've outgrown and keep them in storage in the attic. Woo! (I'm sure at some point, she'll agree to give them away.) We'll start packing up toys this weekend, I hope. We should have a new wood floor going in downstairs, soon. I need to get things straightened and organized for that.

Aurito

I had an aura, today, at work. It was just a little one, hence the name of this post. Then I had a little headache--hopefully not a migrito.

My head still feels slightly off, but I didn't take anything. I had a teeny bit of coffee and a cup of tea, but no tylenol or advil.

The good news is it's been over a year since I've had an aura (according to the blog). Like the last one I had, it was on the right side.... Who knows why my aura's changed sides! Crazy.

What do I think caused it? I think I was slightly dehydrated, stressed because I am excited about school starting for the girls, this is positive, but I'm still stressed, and I got less sleep than usual. I couldn't go to sleep last night because I was so excited about school. I found out who their teachers were last night... (shhhhh! I found out early from one of my teacher friends. I didn't tell the girls. I let them find out this afternoon with everyone else.) I'm absolutely thrilled about their teachers! It's going to be a fun year! Now, I just need to go to sleep.

This one is just for MWH

Because he is MWH. I am the luckiest wife around and the girls have the best dad. Short, but sweet. I could go on and on, but I try not to gush here, too much. I love you, MWH.

A new vegetable...

I didn't know there were new vegetables to try, but I found one the other night (a month ago, a couple months ago? I'm not sure, my life is a blur!). It's called tat soi. It's yum and a nice change from spinach, chard, and kale.

How'd I make it? I sauteed it with onions, garlic, and a little soy sauce. You can eat it over rice, on a tortilla, on noodles (if you add them in to the mixture it becomes very good like stir-fried noodles--well, 'cause it is).

At our Whole Foods, they have organic girl greens and the tat soi I got came all ready to use, I just had to throw it in the pan and cook it. I'll look for it at other places, now.


You can read about it how another person made it here. (And you can read about more new vegetables! I really want to try mizuna.)

Green is fun!

paper airplanes, pancakes, and brooms

Today, Three-a and I made paper airplanes. We watched a video on YouTube to learn how to make the planes.

twoK and I are going to try a new pancake recipe we found on the web. Then we're baking brownies for my brother also a recipe from the web.

I'd be so bored without my little girls and the web.

(oNe is making brooms and playing with her cat.) (She makes brooms for all to ride so they can play Quidditch. As far as I know, she didn't use the web to find out how to make brooms. She's pretty creative.)

Completely random

Last night, I had a dream where I invented the world's tastiest low carbohydrate and high protein pizza crust. Plus, it somehow helped you delete spam emails in a single keystroke. Now, that's a good pizza crust!




On a different note, when I was pregnant with Three-a, she'd dig her toes into my uterus and push. It felt so weird. At the time, I didn't know what she was doing, but when she came out, she kept doing it and I figured out what the movement was.

Now, at almost six, she still likes to put her feet on me, dig her toes in and push. It's so odd. (I may have mentioned the digging her toes in and pushing thing before, but who knew she'd still be doing it at 6. I wonder if she'll do it when she's grown up. Not necessarily to me, but maybe to her spouse?)


Happy Sunday. My brother is here. We had a fun day, yesterday. Today, I need to get a little work done before we play, so I'm going to go do that, now.

Last week off

We're in our final days before school starts. I'm sad as I love the flexibility in the summer, but I do need more time at work, so it will be good for me.

On another note, I started a post yesterday and it DISAPPEARED ON ME. It was witty, and poignant; I'm not happy. Alas. Here's some of it, not written nearly as well, and some other stuff*.

Yesterday, oNe did a "Mother's Helper Gig." She did a great job. I can't believe my first born is old enough to help little kids. She got paid for it, too. She decided she wanted to donate the money she made to a foundation researching the disease that twoK's kitty had. Yes, I am proud. No, I don't feel worthy to be her mother. But then, she gets loud and sassy and I realize that she does still NEED me. :-)

We're cleaning out the guest room in honor of my brother's visit (tomorrow!). MWH took 6+ bags to donate morning. As I was packing up the things I'd stowed in there, I decided to keep "the dress that started it all." This was a dress I wore on one of my first dates with MWH. The dress was slightly low-cut and loose around the top so MWH enjoyed his view during our dinner. This dress inspired him to want to get to know me, ehem, a little better.

I don't love the dress, I'm not sure why I wore it on one of our first dates, and I haven't worn it in years, but he and I were both feeling sentimental about that dress, so I kept it. If I don't wear it on or near our anniversary this year, I'll need to give it away. It gets a second chance, for now.

I'm working to get to know my students for this year better. They are going to be GREAT. I'm embracing them and all they will bring to the class.

In completely different news, we're getting a hardwood floor put in on our first level of the house. We're getting rid of our UGLY carpet. I.am.so.excited! I got an email that our wood is going to be delivered in this month!! I'm not trying to be vague, I just got a cryptic message from the place where we ordered the wood that said they expect the wood to be leaving the warehouse between 8/18 and 8/24. We'll have it sometime in the next couple of weeks.

I imagine, the process of getting the wood installed will be painful; we'll be restricted to only one level of our house for ~3-6 weeks. Deep sigh, it will be worth it.

I say 3-6 weeks because after the wood is installed, it has to sit on the floor for 2 weeks before it gets sanded and finished. The sanding and finishing process will take 3-4 days. Our floor guy only works nights and weekends, 'cause he has a different day job, so it could drag out a little. I'm hoping it will occur and be done in October, but we'll see.

We'll move the girls' beds upstairs, and some of the toys and we'll hope we can get this done quickly and while the weather is still nice. I view the time when we're out of the first floor as an opportunity for cleaning and tossing, too. By the end of this year, I could have a much less cluttered house! Woo!

In the last 2 days, I've been getting the girls' brains going again. We've been doing math. I printed off lots of worksheets. oNe needs to really memorize her multiplication tables and remember how to re-group. twoK HATES math... she drags her feet and it's really sad. She's not bad, but she is not motivated at all.

What else... There's lots more about summer that I'd like to say, but I should get back to work. I have a babysitter for 4 hours and I should be productive.








*Heh

Not going to let me forget....

Three-a's birthday is coming soon. She's not going to let me forget. This morning, at breakfast, she gave me a list of things she wanted to happen.

She wants a:

1. Reading Light
2. Nimbus 2000
3. Horseback Riding (party/lesson)
4. A chocolate cake with ice cream and whipped cream

There will be more demands, I'm sure. I think this list will be what I stick with doing. I've taken care of ordering #2. I'll let you know about the rest.

Countdown.....

Okay, we have just one full week off for the summer, and then school starts the following week. YIKES. I don't think I did my usual, OMG, HOW DID IT GET TO BE AUGUST, at the beginning of this month. So, there you go. Also, OMG, WHERE DID THE SUMMER GO?????

This week has been crazy and busy, but when isn't it? I went to meet the students for the Fall class. So far, so good. One will be, um, lots of fun. But, I have figured some stuff out to help (me and the student) and I think it will be okay. I'll keep you posted, don't worry.

Last night, MWH and I got to go see Harry Potter #7 (Part 2) with our dear friends. It was good. Some of it was better than I expected, and some of it could have been more exciting, me thinks. I'm so glad I've read all the books. I think the books are better, but I understand why it all can't make it in the movie.... sort of. I personally would be happy to sit through 3-4 parts of each book so they could get it all into the movies, but perhaps other people wouldn't.

oNe has finished HP #5 and twoK has almost finished HP #4. Three-a is still reading HP #1. Crazy! and Love!

At work, a wonderful summer intern left, this week. Sigh. We will miss him, but we will continue to work together. Maybe, we'll even go visit. He lives in a great place, Hawaii.

Oh! My brother is coming to visit next Friday. He just let me know Thursday. Nice notice. I now have to clean out the guest bedroom in a week (actually less than a week, now). Our guest bedroom becomes the dumping ground for all the girls' clothes as they out grow them. Our last guest use of the room was in May, but it's piled pretty high and deep right now. MWH or I will be making (possibly multiple) trips to donate clothes.

I guess, the week before school starts is a good time to clean out their old clothes and get things all ready for the coming school year. Let's see if I can get things organized and manage to work a full week of time at work. That's my goal for the week. I've been eating up a lot of vacation time hanging with the girls. It's been super fun, and I haven't stressed about it (too much), but I would like to have some vacation left when I start teaching.

Okay, I could continue to ramble about little things, but I think that's enough for now.

Tact...

Three-a needs to learn some tact. Of all the girls, she's embarrassed me the most with her lack of tact. All things considered, iIt hasn't been too bad, but I feel at almost 6 (OMG, she's almost 6... HOW DID THAT HAPPEN???) she should have a better understanding of what is appropriate to say, and what isn't. Her latest embarrassing questions...

Scene: Grocery store line

Three-a: Mom, is that woman Chinese? (pointing to a woman in line a couple of people in front of us.)

Me: I can't tell, she's not looking at us. (bending down and saying it quietly and telling her shhhhh....)

Three-a: (perhaps a notch louder) She has REALLY dark black hair. She's probably Chinese. Or maybe she dyes her hair. It's REALLY BLACK. It has to be one of those things.

Me: (Bending down and hoping the woman was engaged in conversation with the checker).... Um, look, honey, there's chocolate over here....let's pick out some chocolate.

We get back to the car and I explain why she shouldn't do that and if she has questions about people how they should wait until we are alone. We re-iterated these concepts tonight at dinner. I'm hoping she learns quickly.

Learning and memory

Tonight, the girls learned about crucifixion and amnesia. They learned over dinner* (crucifixion) and then from a Tom and Jerry episode (amnesia). Someday, maybe, they'll read this and have a lightbulb memory flash** to this night. Both topics probably made quite an impression, not to mention some new schema (organizers) in their little heads. twoK's face was especially horrified as I explained crucifixion. I wasn't trying to be graphic, I was doing "just the facts, Ma'am," but I may have added a little too much detail for her (twoK). MWH told them about amnesia, I missed that discussion.



*Also, they got reprimanded for always being smart alec-y when we're trying to tell them something. Thank goodness, they don't do that at school. Hopefully, we can get them to stop doing this at home. It's really annoying.


**Lighbulb memories are very salient or strong memories. Many people have them to different events. Those who were around when the Challenger crashed, or 9/11 often have flashes of everything around them (like in a picture) when they remember those events. I have flashes to both.

My Challenger one was in high school and G.M. told me about it after he'd run home (or come in late) that morning. He'd watched it on t.v.

My 9/11 one is in my house (on the mountain), standing in my kitchen (green counter and white and green kitchen floor) listening to the answering machine (in the corner of the kitchen by the laundry machines--white washer and dryer) as my brother left me a message on the answering machine. He said something about the World Trade Center being blown up. With that brother, I often can't tell if he's joking or not. I woke MWH and ran for my computer to Google. MWH turned on the t.v. We were glued there for hours. I was pregnant with oNe and she went crazy kicking that day (from all my stress hormones).

Losing it... (what is IT, anyway? I've forgotten)

I'm losing it... I couldn't remember a friend's name, I could remember details about her but not her name, and I had to look them up by searching on terms (in my email) that I knew we'd discussed before I could email her. Granted, I don't email her very often, and I haven't actually seen her for ~3 years, but GEEZ, embarrassing. I'm not actually 80. However, my brain is overworked.

In all fairness, I've been reading a lot of technical papers... Like 4-6 a day to determine the absolute BEST 2-3 papers on each specific concept I'm covering in my class. My brain is exhausted. (These are not light/easy reading papers... For each paper I read, I also look up 2-3 other papers to refresh specific concepts and read portions of those. I'm teaching doctoral students, so I have to get all the details in MY head because they will ask me a LOT OF TOUGH QUESTIONS. But, yes, I love it.)

status report

1. Less than 20 days until school.

2. twoK got her first day of school outfit. She looks so grown up. It's a cute flowery skirt with a navy blue top.

3. oNe doesn't want a new outfit. She doesn't want to dress up. She and twoK are so opposite. I did talk her into a new t-shirt.

4. Three-a picked out her new outfit. It's cute! Purply-dress with flowers. It looks like a Three-a outfit.

5. Hrm... Need to think about their shoes for fall/winter. (It's always something.) I wonder if we're going to have a long Indian Summer. It's been such a mild summer. Last fall, we had very warm days after school started.

6. I've made some progress on my class. I want to get the syllabus done THIS WEEK. I don't know if I will manage. I meet the students, soon, but the course doesn't start until September. I feel behind and the course hasn't even started.

7. I need to tell you about chlorella... my new favorite supplement, but that will have to wait.

8. I also need to tell you about my new favorite food, a tofu spread, but there aren't any pictures of it on the web. I'll have to take some and share, soon.

9. The girls continue to delight and be easy and enjoyable. We went to the beach, this weekend, and I didn't have to get in the water, nor did I have to worry about one of them running off. It was so good.

good girls!

Today, the girls came to work with me. They stayed in an empty office while I was in a meeting all afternoon (1:30-5:30-ish). They had a few bathroom breaks (when they wondered the halls, but they were quiet!). I was really proud of how well the three of them did hanging out together, with very little adult supervision, for the entire afternoon. There was no bickering. They watched a Harry Potter movie, read books, and played on an iPad. I wouldn't want them to do this every day, but one day of all electronic media all the time isn't going to hurt them.

I'm so proud of them! I didn't even bribe them before hand. They knew what was expected and they did the right thing. So proud!!

Lunch Boxes 2011 - 2012

I'm thinking about getting these lunch boxes, this year. I've seen them at our Whole Foods and I want to go look at them in person, again, before I order them. I'll let you know what I think. I was really disappointed with the Land's End ones we got last year*. They were canvas and pink and were dirty after the first day of school. Ugh. I have hopes that those (see link) will wash off better. I'll keep you posted.


*I don't blame Land's End, but rather, I blame myself for not thinking through PINK not hiding the dirt.

Overwhelmed

But trying not to think about it... Here's a start on a list of stuff for the next 4.5 weeks:

1. Finish up Syllabus for OLU (actually one for fall and one for spring)

2. Get lunch boxes and backpacks for back to school

3. Assess clothing of children and determine what they need for school (I know I need to get a few more t-shirts for twoK.)

4. Go to the beach (this Friday!) (Yay, a family day. We took the girls to a little amusement park on Sunday, so we should be good on all the little trips. I also took them on the train on Friday and to lunch with Daddy!)

5. Figure out wood floor order.

6. More soon.

Bee End

Today, at the pool, oNe and her sisters rescued a cute little honey bee from drowning. oNe carried it, in her swim goggles, over to a grassy area. On the way, it started to crawl out of her goggles and she dropped it. I saw it crawling on the cement. oNe was unsure what to do to help it, and she was looking for a suggestion when, out of the grassy area, a lizard darted.

Oh, the horrors...

The lizard ate the bee. It was just like Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom! oNe looked like she was going to cry.

I quickly told her how the lizard was just doing what lizards do and it was all part of the cycle of life*. She held it together, and didn't cry, and we discussed the cute little lizard. (Whew.)


Bee end.



*Did I tell you how all 3 girls have decided it's wrong to eat the meat of animals and are now lacto-ovo vegetarians.

A sweet spot

When the girls were little, and things were crazy ALL THE TIME, MWH and I used to look forward to the day when the girls were big enough that it was easy. I think the time has arrived for us to enjoy.

The girls are super fun and are all at a wonderful age. They are "big enough," but not too big.They are good conversationalists, rational most of the time, sleep through the night, eat well, and are generally easy to take out and about. They haven't hit puberty yet, so they are still sweet. (I'm hoping we get another summer or two like this, but oNe will be a tween soon... Ai-yi-yi!) I remember HOW HARD it was from 2005 - 2008. It's been slowly getting easier since 2007*. I am definitely counting this time as "the good old days!"

I took this picture on a walk we took after dinner the other night. When they were little, I used to fantasize about the day when I could take them on a walk after dinner. Up until this year, we had too many bedtime meltdowns if we tried to do a walk after dinner. So far, this summer, we have done a few after dinner walks with no bedtime meltdowns. I need to make it a goal to do more after dinner walks in the remaining 4.5 weeks.

*I remember how HUGE of a milestone this was!

Not perseverating

I'm a little less disgustingly happy (see previous post), but not too bad. I had a little procedure done on my left eye to help relieve some dryness in it and now I'm healing and recovering. I think, I imaged that the relief from the procedure would be instant and that I wouldn't have any downtime. Certainly, I figured, I'd be all better by now, two days later, but nope. My eye is very irritated from the procedure. It looks awful, it hurts and itches. My eye is consuming most of my thoughts and energy. I'm worried that it will never heal. I need to get over it and move on. It IS healing. It looks better than it did Friday, but it is taking a while. Good things take time, right?

Moving on... The girls are enjoying horse camp. I can't believe it's here and 1/2 way over. I also can't believe there are only 4.5 more weeks of summer. OMG!

What else....

A friend is coming on Friday. (I hope my eye looks better!) MWH's company has a party on Saturday. (I hope my eye looks better!) I'm still planning my class. (At least my eye is feeling a little better today than yesterday so I can read a little.) I need to go shopping to find some new black pants that oh heck, I already wrote what I want in black pants. My needs haven't changed, but styles have, so I must go shopping. (When I go shopping, I'll be wearing my new pink lens sunglasses the entire time...My eye looks horrible.)

right now

Right now, I'm very thrilled with everything I'm doing and I understand how I get so busy. I truly am lucky to have a great family, a great job, great friends, great hobbies, and because I like everything, I never want to say no to anything. It's always my own damn fault that I get overwhelmed. I'm kind of bursting with love right now and not feeling too overwhelmed at this moment; it's kind of sickening, but nice. Ask me at the end of the day how I feel, though.

Long lost friend

This week, the girls went to gymnastics camp. It's the same one we've been going to since 2007. It's still poorly organized. Our nanny picked up the girls and was appalled by how poorly it was organized. She's 19. That's saying a lot, me thinks.

Way back in 2007, I was worried the girls would be lost if I left them alone there. Now, with three of them looking out for each other, I know the girls know who they are supposed to leave with and not leave with, so that's good. I have to rely on them to do the right thing and not the camp.

Anyhow, that's not the point of this post....

Camp was fun! Three-a had the most fun and she's ready to go back again, later this summer (not sure if we will or not). twoK and oNe had more fun than they expected. oNe was pleased she didn't get sore and twoK was excited because we ran into a little girl who was her friend when she was very little. I wrote about M, here. I'm thrilled M and twoK found each other, again. We lost touch with M in 2008, after my friend D died. M's Mom and D were similar; being around M's Mom reminded me too much of D and it was too painful for me to do it. I hope, now, 4 years later, it's not too hard and painful.

Fountains

I just thought I'd post a picture of our favorite fountains. We often run through them. These fountains are one of the places Three-a first walked (almost ran). She was so excited to go play in them.

accomplishments

I have so many balls in the air, I feel like nothing is getting accomplished. Little things are, but not BIG ones. Perhaps the problem is that I only write down the BIG things I need to do. I just keep the little things in my head. Maybe I should write down the little things I have accomplished so I can feel better about things.


The Floor.... I told you we decided to put in wood floor on the first floor of the house. I found a floor installer (our old one disappeared) and then he found the wood. Then, the place where he found the wood raised the price. I told him I'd call around. I did find a place that is cheaper. It all took time, though. Just think, I started this back in April. I had hoped to have a new floor in August, but now it looks like September/October. It's OKAY. (I move slow around here. I guess, I am thankful that at least I am moving.) So my accomplishment is calling about the wood, and getting that going again.

The Class.... I have gotten my online access (email and faculty stuff) all set up for the university. I have all my library access set up again, too. Life is good! I have started meeting the students. I most likely will have 20 students. (It's kind of a lot. Last time I had 17. I was hoping it would be more like 15, but it'll be okay, even at 20.)

The syllabus.... Not done. I have a book to finish reading, another one I just ordered and when it arrives I have to read it, too. I have about 4 more articles I want to read and one more activity I want to think about things a bit more. This all takes time. I should realistically set next weekend (7/15) as my deadline so that I can slip until 7/22 and be fine.

One of the graduate students.... Already friended me in FB. Super cute or s/he'll end up being a big pain... It could go either way. I approach it all with the hope that everyone in the course is coming to learn and is eager and excited plus scared. This is a huge endeavor for them. I just <3 the grad students!

The new project.... I need to learn about a new technology and start setting up some stuff in it. Since we don't yet have an official project yet, I am hesitating, but I should spend a little time thinking about it.

The pool.... We're going to our first social event, tonight. It's a kids thing.


Okay, back to work for me.

I did it, again

I am overwhelmed and it's all my fault. I'm putting together my course for the fall for OLU. I'm not done, yet and I want to be done. I haven't worked on it long enough to be done, but I'm feeling antsy. It's okay, deep breath.

Book report

twoK finished HP 1. oNe is working on HP 4 (for the second time). Three-a has asked me to read HP 1 aloud to her and we're on page 5 (this could take a while). It's fun, she reads some of the words with me. I continue to be amazed and delighted by the process of learning to read. I have finished Book 6 and started Book 7.

Oh, and MWH and I have watched about half of movie 6. (We bought it on iTunes for $5. It was 2.99 to rent or 5 to buy. And! No DVD lying around and getting in the way! Love the virtual!)

July! And a question!

It's July. We have already discussed how crazy it is that the year is more than half-way over. We will move on to other things. I'm finally re-reading the later books in Harry Potter series. I've been putting off reading them because there aren't e-book versions. I finished Book 6 (started it Thursday night), so apparently I haven't forgotten how to read print on paper.

I'm going to keep this post short and sweet because I don't have a lot to report. We're getting ready to go to a party with our friends, today. Tomorrow we'll do more hanging out by the pool we joined and I'll read more Harry Potter. I hope to finish 7 this weekend, too. Then, I'll turn my attention to finishing the planning of my class for the fall.

The girls continue to be super fun and I almost feel like I'm getting to enjoy summer with them. I haven't been working as much as usual at work; I'm going to be busy soon, so I'm trying to enjoy this downtime. (They start their camps, next week, too. June is over.)

---

Heh... I'm sitting here blogging and twoK is with me reading--she's reading HP book 1. She just looked at the floor by my side of the bed and asked, "Why do you tell us to clean our room when your room is messy." Great question, my love. I'll get right on the cleaning up, after 1) take a shower, 2) go to the grocery store, 3) make food for the party, and 4) make sure you are all ready to go. The better question is, would my room be clean if I didn't have other responsibilities.... We'll never know.

And then I drove in the carpool lane....

Yesterday was a tough day as we'd just returned from a visit to see MWH's family. Everyone was tired. Three-a was slightly under-the-weather; she was tired and didn't want to eat. Being tired and not wanting to eat was a great improvement from when she was on the plane (two days ago) and thought she was going to throw up. It's good times when your 5 year old just wants to hold the air sickness bag up to her mouth and she's coughing violently. Yes, we were the ones that kept running down the aisle of the plane to the bathroom (holding the air sickness bag). (I'm happy to report that Three-a never threw up.)

For me, yesterday, I was just tired... not under the weather. I didn't even realize how tired I was until I found myself driving in the carpool lane, and I was alone. OOPS. All I can say is I'm glad I didn't get a ticket. I felt bad and it was a complete oversight on my part. I wasn't doing it to be slimey or because I was in a hurry. I just wasn't paying attention because I was tired. 1,000 apologies to the traffic and freeway gods.


So, the trip (Last Friday - this Monday)... It was super fun to see all the relatives. It's not fun because:

1. Grandma's house is not set up for us.

-The girls sleep on the floor and we sleep in a teeny tiny bed in a cold room.

-It's hard to get the girls outside to run around and burn off energy because it rains a lot. It's hard for the girls to burn off energy in the house because the house has a lot of breakable things in it.

-There's no park close to Grandma's house

-Grandpa smokes and though he doesn't smoke in the house, our clothes end up smelling like smoke and my (very sensitive) eyes hurt.

Note to self, if I ever have grandchildren coming to visit, make sure to plan activities and times for the kids to JUST PLAY and just be kids in locations that will work for kids.

2. My relatives don't understand that I don't eat dairy and they don't seem to eat veggies.

-I had to eat cheese. It won't hurt me, too much. It seemed easier to eat the cheese than to have MWH's Mom look like she was going to cry when she realized I don't eat the food she worked hard to plan. I should be awarded lots of daughter-in-law points, but I doubt I'll get them.

-I got to eat many less veggies than I wanted. Next time, we go to the good grocery store and stock up. MWH offered, at the beginning of the trip, but it didn't seem like a good time to go and then it was busy and suddenly it was Monday. I got lots of veggies on Sunday. I'm so happy to be home back with my yummy food and veggies. I'll have to tell you about the new veggie I found last night at the grocery store.

Now, to whine about today.... I'm still feeling crappy / overwhelmed.

This morning, we went to our lawyer about our STOOOOOOOPID neighbor and the fence issue. Note, I will not document it here until it's resolved, but needless to say, the law is on our side, but the STOOOOOOOOOPID neighbor has the advantage. It could potentially cost us a lot of money and be tied up in court for a long time....I could be optimistic, but right now I'm feeling very discouraged.

Then, this afternoon, I find out bestest colleague and I will be going on a work trip for 2-3 days, in November. I'm going to have to stay an extra day. I'm not excited. Now, I have 2 trips scheduled for November. One trip is for OLU and one trip is for work. UGH. I want to do the project for work, and it's going to be a fun and important project, but I really dislike traveling. Maybe, I can talk MWH into going and taking the girls, but I doubt it. It will be easier to "just go by myself" but I hate leaving.


Okay... is that enough whine for everyone???? I'll be back later to tell you about the new vegetable.

Haircuts

We went to get (girls) haircuts, today.... oNe did fine. She should, she's 9 for heaven's sake. twoK (age 7) through a fit because she didn't want her hair trimmed. GOOD GRIEF. I told her that she would have to pay for the hair appointment if she didn't get her hair trimmed. She cooperated, she's motivated by money, but she gathered up teeny bits of her hair from the floor to keep as a remembrance--each chunk was like 1/2 inch long. (Again, I say good grief.)

Three-a (age 5) did just fine. She's pretty much always cheerful and full of sunshine. The contrast between twoK and Three-a is startling.

Why does everything have to be so difficult and with drama, twoK? Do you know, when you cry your big FAKE crocodile tears that I am not going to be manipulated???? You may be upset, but a hair trim is NOTHING to cry about. Those big fake crocodile tears only make me angry when you are being ridiculous. They are so contrived. When you are really upset, your tears are different. Trust me, I can tell. twoK, I know you want to grow your hair longer, but 1/2 inch trimmed off every 4-6 months is NOT much. Your hair grows 3-5 inches in that amount of time. Seriously.

I feel bad that I don't have a lot of sympathy for twoK's tears, but I dislike how she tries to manipulate me with them. I also dislike how she feels everyone and everything in life is out to get her. I wish I could change that about her personality. Life would be easier and she would be happier. Alas, I know that you can't change people.

OMG how is it almost JULY???

I think I'll title all of my blog posts that way until it's actually July. I'm in complete and utter shock about how fast this year has gone. Let's review the year, quickly, since that's how it went.

January--VERY BUSY with oNe's birthday and two online workshops for a seminar that I led.

February--celebrated my birthday, planned follow-up for online seminar, and went to Hawaii

March--planned follow-up two for online seminar, wrote survey for online seminar, wrote a report for another project, attended annual meeting of another project and made a presentation, dealt with Norovirus, celebrated MWH's birthday

April--planned follow-up three for online seminar, read through tons of data, organized closing online workshops for seminar, visited my family over spring break, learned C-kitty is dying

May--did hospice for C-kitty, did the two online closing workshops for seminar, made 13 debrief phone calls, collected data and started to organize it, celebrated twoK's birthday

June--online seminar over and even though there's more to do I can't do it because of project rules so I switched gears to write a different report, did dance show, (soon) will go visit MWH's parents, (soon) will do kick-off for new project (next week)

---

Today, before summer completely slipped away, we joined a neighborhood pool. I agonized about doing it because it wasn't cheap, but it's a good investment for summer fun. Now that we've joined, we just have fairly low membership fees, until we sell our membership to someone else.

I hope it's going to be super fun belonging to the pool. The girls love to swim and now we have a place that is about 5 minutes from our house. It's super laid back; they want you to think of the pool as an extension of your backyard and they ask you to be smart, safe, and respectful and that's it. The girls can jump off the diving board (no swimming test--an example of how laid back the pool is) and believe me they jumped MANY times today.* It's got wi-fi! I hope the pool makes summer easier and more carefree.

It's a small neighborhood club, so we'll get to know the other members. They have social events. They have a club house. They let you have parties there. I'm thinking maybe Three-a will have a big swim party for her birthday right after school starts, rather than a Pump it Up Party.

I'm nervous about whether we'll 1) like the other members and 2) want to socialize and 3) get kicked out because we're not super social. I wasn't social today. I tried to smile at people, but no one really smiled back or even looked at me. I wondered if I was invisible because a couple of people almost walked into me. Whatever.

Oh, I should someday record the saga of our fence, but not tonight. I will record that today, I made iced coffee with my free post-Zumba cup of coffee. It was so yummy.






*As soon as we walked in Three-a wanted to jump off the diving board. She's never done that before. She did it well and swam over to the side of the pool. I was worried she was going to be scared. She wasn't scared at all; she's fearless and enthusiastic. Also, she lost a tooth today. One of the top ones. oNe and she were having a pillow fight. It was a very loose tooth. A whack from the pillow knocked it out and Three-a swallowed it. Her other top tooth is also loose. Soon, she'll be singing all I want for Christmas is my two front teeth. Oh, one last thing, she has a lisp now and it's adorable.

Happy Father's Day

He's still that wonderful!


Today, the girls made pancakes for breakfast for him. They did most of it themselves. oNe has been on a cooking kick, and she has learned to flip them, so it's pretty cool.

All day long, MWH and the girls worked outside. They cleaned the garage, they painted, they power-washed, and did lots of stuff that I don't even know about, yet. MWH had fun teaching them home improvement stuff.

Earlier in the week, I had asked MWH what he wanted to do for Father's Day and he said, home improvement with the girls. Alrighty.... (Yup, he's that wonderful! You can't make this stuff up.) He works a lot at work, so he doesn't get a lot of time to do home improvement, but when he does, he's damn good and the girls got to learn from the finest.

I spent most of the day in the house. I did some organizing in our closet...It looks better, significantly better, even, but it could still use some help. (I should have taken before and after pictures...) I also went through other piles of paper in the bedroom. I made some progress, but I still have a ways to go.

(The big problem is that I work on so many different projects that never quite go away. I have two big stacks from a project I did in spring. I can't toss them, yet because we have a report to write this fall. We can't write the report until then. It's tough. Then there's the class I'm teaching, as I went through papers I made a "potentially use in the class pile." I won't have time to sort through it until July, though. Sigh! OHMYGOODNESS it's almost JULY!!!!)

One other memory, at dinner tonight, MWH told them stories and they kept asking for "one more old story." Super cute!

Remind me to tell you more about socca bread, later. Right now, I must go hang with MWH!

Insane

It's insane where I work. I feel it most when I'm working on a deadline. I have one, now. I'd hoped to be further along, but I will be chugging away this afternoon and tonight, probably tomorrow morning. Sigh. Anyway, I just got these in a "humor" email, this morning. I actually laughed out loud at most of them--perhaps I'm just punchy.

To Maintain A Healthy Level Of Insanity

1. At lunch time, sit in your parked car with sunglasses on and point a hair dryer at passing cars. See if they slow down.
2. Page yourself over the intercom. Don't disguise your voice.
3. Every time someone asks you to do something, ask if they want fries with that.
4. Put decaf in the coffee maker for 3 weeks . Once everyone has gotten over their caffeine addictions, switch to espresso.
5. In the memo field of all your checks, write For Marijuana.
6. Skip down the hall rather than walk and see how many looks you get.
7. Order a diet water whenever you go out to eat, with a serious face.
8. Specify that your drive-through order is 'to go'.
9. Sing along at the opera.
10. Five days in advance, tell your friends you can't attend their party because you have a headache.
11. When the money comes out the ATM, scream 'I won! I won!'
12. When leaving the zoo, start running towards the parking lot, yelling 'Run for your lives! They're loose!'

I personally plan to adopt #5. What about you?

Of course she waits until bedtime...

At bedtime, Three-a asked me, "How did the first animal get on earth if there wasn't anybody to born it?"

I kissed her because it was the best opener for explaining evolution. I explained how we started as single-celled creatures in the oceans and slowly those cells learned how to join together and do specialized jobs so they could become multi-cellular creatures.

She had quite a puzzled look on her face, so I did a quick web search and showed her this book. We previewed it and read (click to make it bigger):






We talked a little more about evolution and I said, "You're not going to understand it all tonight, but I'll get some books and we'll read them and keep talking. But now it's time for bed.

Despite me telling her it was bedtime, Three-a tried asking more fun questions to stall... they too were good.

Her: Do computers know everything?

Me: No, computers keep track of the information we humans have put in to them. We can find information on the computer, read it and then create knowledge and develop an understanding.

Her: But what if we still don't understand it?

Me: Then we look for other sites to explain it and we talk to people who can help us understand. Asking questions is the best way to learn... BUT NO MORE QUESTIONS as it's 10:15. Go to sleep.


Heh..... Recently, someone told me about this book. I may need it!

(I think I may have to give Three-a an award for asking the most insightful questions for a 5 year old! See previous example.)