I own this little beauty. My nanny showed up at my garage sale with it in tow, sporting a $175 price tag. I invested the $150 I made at the same sale, plus $25 from my own pocket.
It’s got that new bike scent and everything.
I dread the elementary talent show every year. Is that terrible? I can barely stand to watch the youngsters belt out country music hits about Chevy trucks and boyfriends and things that “his Mama don’t know”. Yikes.
This year was no exception. An hour and a half of smarmy mumbled singing from paralyzed primary schoolers. Of course there were a few exceptions. Like the kid that composed a song himself and played it on his guitar. And three girls that did incredible gymnastic routines. And North and Abbie doing their talents that have been previously showcased in the “Birthday” post.
And then there were my kids. The best of the bunch, of course!
I present to you….Sophia playing “Scarecrow Dance”
(sorry about the links - the videos refused to embed…)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mzk_fKopdxg
And Maya. Oh Maya. I told her that I was against her doing this following number with her friends because she already had a talent. Piano. Didn’t she want to something that she knew she was already good at? When she looked me in the eye and told me that she didn’t think I should be able to tell her what she was good at, I finally, begrudgingly, acquiesced.
And boy was I wrong. She is the one in the middle.
I keep waiting to become magically grown-up with each passing birthday. There were a few years there where I used to look forward to, even yearn for, this magical moment. I am now old enough to know better and will do anything in my power to stop it.
Therefore I throw myself extravagant birthday parties in my back yard.
Sophie was the official photographer of the event and took some wonderfully well composed pictures of some of the decorations.
I call this one “Irises by a Green House”:
And this one…”Candles with Orange and Red and Tan Placemats”:
And “Janice and Roxi’s Joy”:
I received many gifts, not the least of which was this little beauty…
And it comes with recipes!!!
Later in the evening Sophie arranged a Talent Show. She was ony able to get three people (including herself) to participate. Here are the entries in order of performance. I apologize profusely for the darkness, but notice that we have two (count em, two!) fire pits and a many strings of white lights…but no proper movie lighting.
Abbie sings a beautiful song from “Mulan”. By the way? She is in second grade.
North plays the violin:
And MY child. My wonderful, talented Sophie…pulls her pajama bottoms up over her arms and onto her shoulders, making a pajama-pant cocoon. You can barely see it as she strolls past the fire pit.
There is something to be said for the unexpected.
In her infinite wisdom, Maya was having none of it.
Happy birthday to me! I hope you all had a wonderful day on my behalf!
During dinner tonight the topic of conversation was our favorite literary characters. Who was the funniest? The meanest? The nicest? The weirdest? And who had the best name?
We settled on Bottom from A Midsummer Night’s dream. Puck was right up there, too.
Sophie was trying to figure out what story they came from. Here eyes lit up and she yelled, “Oh! He’s from the same story as Herman and Sylander, right?”
Hermia and Lysander, I presume.
Hey! I just realized it is my third anniversary as a blogger! Wow. It all started with this rant. It is completely amazing how far my life has come since that point.
The traditional gift for the third anniversary is leather.
I’ll let you all just use your imaginations on that one.
This spring Sophie was, once again, one of the stars of the Spring Play. When I say “stars” I mean that she had a small speaking part. She is dedicated to these parts that she plays and invariably learns her lines and everyone elses’ to the point she mouths the words as the other children say them during the play.
Being her mother, I find this adorable. It is quite possibly irritating to others.
They had after-school practice for some weeks and I was able to pick Sophie up on one of the last practices before the big show. This particular practice was important enough that many of the teachers and the principal were in attendance. As I waved down my daughter, she came running to meet me with her friend (and my best friend’s daughter) Abbie in tow. It was a dress rehearsal so Sophie had her skateboard under her arm. And Abbie had on a dress, a crown, and……and a VERY interesting necklace.
This was the sort of necklace that immediately grabbed my attention and bugged my eyes out a bit. I looked around at the adults in the room, searching for someone who must have noticed its lack of appropriateness in an elementary school setting. Alas, there was no such recognition. I smiled, chatted a bit while biting the inside of my cheek, and left with my daughter - promptly forgetting the entertaining interlude.
Then, the night of the play arrived. As I zoomed my camera to its most telephoto setting to get a picture of Sophie and Abbie standing at the side of the stage I noticed the inappropriate necklace had made its way through dress rehearsals AND the school performance that day with nary a remark from any responsible adult.
This made me laugh really, really hard.
Through the chortling, I was able to convey to Megan (Abbie’s Mom) the story of the necklace. She looked at her daughter from across the auditorium and gasped. Abbie’s Dad, riding the white horse of heroic Dadliness, sprinted to the side entrance of the stage and snatched the necklace from around her neck right before she was to walk out on the stage.
I don’t know….but I think the faculty should have noticed this. What do you think? (Sorry about the quality of the photograph, but much zooming and cropping had to be done.)
I just got back from the local Comcast office and have officially cancelled my television all together.
From now on:
The girls and I have decided to save the money for a year and then go on vacation to Mexico.
Thank God we have an overabundance of imagination.
I have been busy with the onset of spring. Well….with what should be spring but isn’t yet. It has been cold and rainy and awful here since November. Usually around March things really change. Cherry trees blossom, daffodils do their thing and tulips go crazy. This has finally happened a few weeks later than usual. Unfortunately it has happened under a monotonous grey sky that drizzles and hails unexpectedly almost every day.
As much as I would like to just stay in bed and listen to The Cure’s “Disintegration” CD (the most melancholy and suicidal of all The Cure’s CD’s don’t you agree?), I haven’t! I submit to you the last month’s worth of projects (click on images for larger pics)….
The living room crisis is my crazy attempt at pulling up all the gross carpet and heaving it out the front door. The floors, under the crazy paint and sheet rock putty stuff, are beautiful hardwood that I plan on finishing myself this summer when the girls are in Montana.
The yard pictures try to capture the torturous pain of digging up sod in a strip along my insanely long front fence. I used to like the size of my front yard….Now? Not so much. Sod is heavy. It is also cumbersome. And one thing that I learned early on in this project was that you just can’t change your mind once you get started.
Thanks to Freecycle (yay! Freecycle! Everyone should use it!) I was able to have people come to my house and haul away the sod in their truck. It was like magic. I have also learned that I oftentimes start projects without realizing the implications of my labours. Had I thought of how I was going to get 65 feet of sod off of my lawn once it was dug up? No. No I did not.
Sometimes I get very, very lucky.
And the fancy landscape-y type bushes and ornamental grasses? All free. F.R.E.E. My very good neighbor and friend sets up conferences and trade shows for a living. A Toyota truck display had insisted on hauling in rocks and bushes and other nature-like things….but then didn’t want them once the show was over. This is how I stumbled upon about $400 worth of plants. Once again, lucky.
The girls helped out with all of it, and we left some space by the front of the house for a vegatable garden. Who knows what the price of food will be by the end of summer. If only I could grow rice…..
Oh! And most important of all - my Mom now has a computer and is reading my blog. Sometimes this will be a good thing. Sometimes not so good. But she made it through the last post’s “ass” comment alright, it seems. Everyone, say “Hi” to my Mom. And while you’re at it, tell her where you are from and maybe your favorite color or something.
Mom….click on the “Comments” button below this post to meet all my blogosphere friends!
Hey…it was fun. The “goof off” and “cynicism” statements were right on.
Your Five Factor Personality Profile |
 Extroversion:You have high extroversion.You are outgoing and engaging, with both strangers and friends. You truly enjoy being with people and bring energy into any situation. Enthusiastic and fun, you’re the first to say “let’s go!” Conscientiousness: You have medium conscientiousness. You’re generally good at balancing work and play. When you need to buckle down, you can usually get tasks done. But you’ve been known to goof off when you know you can get away with it. Agreeableness: You have medium agreeableness. You’re generally a friendly and trusting person. But you also have a healthy dose of cynicism. You get along well with others, as long as they play fair. Neuroticism: You have low neuroticism. You are very emotionally stable and mentally together. Only the greatest setbacks upset you, and you bounce back quickly. Overall, you are typically calm and relaxed - making others feel secure. Openness to experience: Your openness to new experiences is high. In life, you tend to be an early adopter of all new things and ideas. You’ll try almost anything interesting, and you’re constantly pushing your own limits. A great connoisseir of art and beauty, you can find the positive side of almost anything.
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Craziness has taken over my life. I submit to you just an example from this weekend’s festivities:
Saturday
· 8:00 am – Leave with Sophie for Science Fair judging.
· 10:30 am – still at Science Fair judging, waiting for John to come relieve me so I can take Maya to her end-of-session skating test.
· 10:35 am – John is late (on purpose, I swear)
· 11:15 am – Just barely make it to skating. Maya passes on to the next level, Alpha 2.
· 12:15 pm - Meet John and Sophie at the fair, it begins to snow.
· 12:30 pm - The girls are so cold that they don’t even want to stay, but we spend some time in the buildings.
· 1:00 pm - We view Sophie’s hand woven bracelet that she made at school. She got a blue ribbon.
· 1:30 pm – drive to Maya’s friend’s house. I promised to help her Mom pack. Remind me to tell you a bit more about this woman someday.
· Rest of afternoon and evening – help clean out garage. It is so full of crap and garbage it is completely unbelievable. There is actually rat crap everywhere. I have to go outside every now and then to hide my gagging. And I don’t gag easily.
· 8:30 pm – Take my girls and hers home for a sleep over.
Sunday
· 8:30 am - Take all the girls back to this woman’s house to help her pack up stuff inside this time.
· 8:45 am – Realize that the inside of her house is almost as filthy as her garage. But on a good note, I found no rat poop.
· 8:45 – 10:30 am – Continually marvel at the amount of nastiness that can be in a kitchen. Use lots of soap, cleaning supplies and magic erasers. Discover that the walls are not actually gray, that they should be white.
· 10:30 am – Go to a co-worker’s house to help her fix her garbage disposal. I am successful and victorious. I also feel quite smug.
· 1:00 pm – 4:30 – Dive back into the filth.
· 4:30 – 5:30 pm – Somehow get the girls and I all showered and non-gross and head to the Fairgrounds for the Science Fair Awards Ceremony.
· 5:30 pm – Maya becomes a pouty horrible brat and is mean to Sophie through the whole thing.
· 7:00 pm – Sophie does not win a ribbon (except for participation) and tries to hold back tears.
· 7:05 pm – Maya teases Sophie about not winning. On the way out of the building I pull her to the side and have a very INTENSE “talk” with her. All the good Science Fair parents stare at us and fear for Maya’s life. I tell Maya that “I will sit your ass down in the middle of all these people and give you a time out if you want to act like a three year old”. Yes. I said “ass” at the Science Fair.
· 7:06 pm – One of Maya’s friends from school walk by with her parents, they look at me like I might be too mean. I look at them like I might rip their heads off if the say anything to me.
· 7:07 – 8:30 pm – Sophie cries a bit about no ribbon, but is okay. Maya cries a lot and does a myriad of chores before going to bed. I feel no remorse.
