How to Feed Mom Guilt

I'm pregnant with Mom Guilt this evening. Ha! You thought I was announcing that I was pregnant?! You ain't from these parts are ya?

No, I'm just being over run with Mom Guilt tonight and I need to vent it.

I sit and watch my friends' children excel in literacy and extracurriculars and pretty much everything they put their little hands to. And then I look at my first month of school.

Weeks one and two: had almost daily e-mails and phone conferences with boy's teachers to deal with behavior issues.

Week three: get the letter that #1 girl needs to be referred for help with literacy because she may be demonstrating signs of dyslexia and they want to get her help as quickly as possible.

Week three: also get referral paperwork to get boy into speech therapy which we knew was coming but still...

Week four (that's this week): realize hours after the children have gone to bed that I have completely forgotten to work with #1 girl on her site words for this week and her address which she is supposed to have memorized in the next two weeks.

Parent conferences are two weeks away and I feel like a big old flop.

But then I sat on my bed and I read books with them and they hugged me super close and didn't want to stop. They crawled in their beds and we all said it together:

Good night.
I love you!
And when you wake up in the morning
I'll love you even more.

I have to keep reminding myself that I have to give to them from every area. I have to play as much as I work. I have to listen as much as I talk. And I have to get some sleep.

Mom Guilt sucks up exhaustion like a dog following behind a cookie eating toddler. She'll be fine. She may have to work harder and I'll have to be more patient; but she'll be fine. And eventually he'll meet someone who speaks his language, right?

In the meantime, I'm looking forward to morning.

*************

It's morning and I think the boy hacked my blogger and read this post.

Two hours into school and the school murse called to ask me to come get him. He has had another potty accident and is having a melt down about cleaning himself up.

I got there and he looked up at me from red ringed teary eyes and a drippy nose and gasped out, "I missed you Mommy. Did you miss me?"

What do you do? You know that he acted inappropriately and that he needs to have some kind of punishment. You waver because you SHOULD send him back to class and not give him what he wanted in the first place. And then he melts down at the very thought and you see the exhaustion in his face. He slept a full night last night but he was just "off" this morning when you got him up.

I resigned myself to bringing him home and he is spending the day in his room in "solitary." But we had a long talk about how I DO miss him when he's at school but that just makes me that much happier to see him when he gets home. And I want him to get smart and learn all kinds of stuff so he can teach me and he can't do that from home. He needs to go to school. He cried because he could see my dissapointment which of course ripped my heart out.

And Mom Guilt gorged on the whole scenario because now I am questioning AGAIN if I sent him to school too soon. Maybe he just wasn't ready yet.

Jane, stop this crazy thing called ...... Parenting. (Bonus points if you can name that movie.)

Gold Star Thursday - 40 Years!

I don't normally make tributes to my family here at The Bowl but this is an important one so I'm making an exception. Here's to you Mom and Dad.

August 26, 1969 my parents were married. It was a simple ceremony with a justice of the peace in Maryland but what happened next is nothing short of phenomenal in my book.

I'm a lousy daughter because I haven't ever asked a lot of questions about my parents' early married years so I don't know much more than I have lived - a situation I hope to remedy. I know my mother dropped out of college to help my father finish his BA. I know my parents lived in the mountains of North Carolina where my father worked in a fabric plant. He lost the tip of his middle finger on a velvet shaving machine.

I know my sister and I were born in North Carolina and my parents had some dear friends there that we would stop and visit every time we went to visit my grandmother in Florida. I remember many nights falling asleep to the sound of my parents playing cards with their friends and laughing and loving life.

I know that when I was very small we moved back to PA because my grandmother was very sick and needed help. We lived in a small farm house that we actually rented from some friends in the community. I remember being lifted in the front loader of a backhoe to pick cherries from a tree in the back field.

My parents purchased land from my grandfather and built a house from the foundation up and still live in that house to this day. I think I was about 4 when we moved in. My sister and I were a mile and a half from our elementary school. My parents worked in a sewing factory in our town; my mother as a seamstress and my father as a mechanic and manager of the cutting room. My sister and I worked in the evenings sweeping up the factory.

I remember many nights on the living room floor doing family devotions. Many nights at the dining room table playing Aggravation or Uno or Parcheesi. I remember folding laundry as a family and the laughter we shared when my father became confused by the ladies undergarments. He threw one into the air in frustration and the whirling ceiling fan carried it and our laughter to the rafters.

I remember long summer days in the garden hoeing weeds, picking beans, and plucking strawberries for dessert. I remember planting potatoes by the acres for the whole extended family to share. I remember picking my fair ton of those same potatoes. I remember my father working at a neighbor's farm in exchange for a freezer full of pork or beef at butchering time. I remember my mother making all manner of homemade presents and clothes. I remember canning our own vegetables, making our own spaghetti sauce, the smell of fresh jam, and the shelves upon shelves of mason jars full of supplies for a full winter.

I remember going out to the woods as a family and cutting up fallen trees for firewood for our Goliath of a furnace. I remember many a day my sister and I spent at the woodshed stacking wood as a punishment for some recent quarrel we had subjected our parents to. I remember my sister breaking her finger when she smashed it between a piece of wood and the tailgate of my fathers green truck. Speaking of broken bones, I remember taking the least graceful swan dive off our deck and breaking my own right arm.

There were pets - 4 dogs and an untold number of pigs, cats and goldfish. There were sleepovers. There were barbeque's that my parents threw for my camp counselor friends. There were birthdays and Christmases; Thanksgivings and long summers.

But above anything else in my memory is the total overall love. There was never a lack of love in our house. Not between my parents. Not from my parents to my sister and I. And not from our house to anyone else's. I don't remember my parents ever fighting. I'm sure they did. But I don't remember it. My parents always showed us that family is forever. They showed us that the best way to improve the world is to give of yourself to other people. They taught us that nothing is impossible if you are willing to work hard, be patient, and persevere.

My mother went back to college at the same time I went for the first time. She scored a 4.0 and graduated with a teaching degree which she is still using 10 years later. It was the proudest day for me to say that I finished right behind my mother's GPA. My father took a job at a local camp when I was 15 and has been the maintenance director there for 15+ years. They are not wealthy people until you start to count up their friendships and the people they have touched over the 40 years they have been married.

So my gold star today goes to my mother and father. For being role models for not just me and my sister, but for the people they come in contact with every day and for young couples learning to be married. I don't know that I could find a better example. Happy Anniversary!

I Almost Forgot Pie Day!

Dear Foodimentary! Thank you so much for reminding me! It's Pie Day!! Woo Hoo!!


What? You don't know what Pie Day is? 3-14. 3.14 is Pi in mathmatical terms. Today is 3-14. Therefore it is Pie Day!


Now the big dilemma. Apple or Cherry? Discuss and weigh in my 4 PM would ya? Maybe Marie would have been spared if she had said "Let them eay Pie!" I would have liked her better.

By the way Photobucket admins and morons.

I really wanted a picture of a cherry pie. Just the dessert item that is a crust that contains cherries. Just because other perverts searched "cherry pie" in hopes of finding something lewd or nasty doesn't mean the whole world is. And if you don't host images like that anyway, why would you feel it is necessary to limit my ability to search for a piece of cherry pie? If you don't host them they won't be there and therefore when I search for cherry pie I should only find pictures of the dessert, right?

And now you have ruined my Pie Day. Thanks a lot you knuckleheads!

I still love you Cherry Pie! I think Apple cheated in the whole "As American as..." debate.

You Know you Have an Awesome Friend When...

You say things like "I'm flushing because I just cleaned it; not because I used it" and A) they believe you. And B) They laugh.

You call them crying and end the call laughing.

You talk about nothing just so you don't have to hang up.

You don't even send an e-mail or look at the phone and they still know that you need them.

You can do a million things while they are trying to talk to you and they don't care about the interruptions. As a matter of fact they are comfortable enough to interrupt you back.

Just wanted to say Thank You in a big, public, embarassing way. Thank you.

My Place in this World!

Jen, at TuTu's Bliss stopped by yesterday and left me some love so being the good, kind and friendly blogger I am (most of the time) I popped back over and checked out her page. Holy Homecoming! It's good to know that there are people out there like me.

She has a great little meme (and I know I'm not the biggest meme fan) called Two Cents. Could there be a more perfect meme for me? I give my two cents all the time so finally I have a reason!

This week's topic of course is Romance what with V-Day coming and all. So here's my two cents on romance. I think romance evolves. So many people say that the romance is gone in their relationships after they have children. I don't think it's gone. Maybe dusty. Maybe a little more evasive but I don't think it every really "goes."

I think romance evolves. I don't get cards and dates and flowers every week anymore. But I get help with the baths. I get someone else to clean the kitchen now and then. I get a hand putting away the laundry or an afternoon to myself from time to time. Sure! The flowers and dates and monkey love scream "I LOVE YOU!" But those other things whisper "I value you." "I want to help you." "We're in this together."

They also blurt out, "Where did all this water come from?" "Who didn't rinse their dishes before they put them in the dishwasher?" "Honey where's the cheese (that is always in the deli drawer if one would move things around and look for 2 minutes)?" "Why are the underwear all mixed up?" And "When are you coming home? I need a nap"

But you know evolution isn't always pretty. Welcome to the primordial slime of love!

Tee Hee! He's Learning!

Beloved was scrolling through the pictures on the camera and came across the pictures from yesterday's Wordless Wednesday (the washers and laundry?) and never said a word. When I realized what he was doing I said, "Honey ignore those pics of the washer. I forgot to take them off."

"I'm really not worried about it. It was for the blog right?"

He gets me! He really gets me!

A Lizard, Boy Parts, and a Bike.

I can't even keep a straight face as I type this. Ready?

New Zealand reptile becomes dad at 111 years old.

Uhh, Sarah? That's not funny? It is if you go read the article. Oh crap! I can't wait for you to get back so I'll tell you the story. This lizard comes to the zoo at the age of 70. He's grumpy and cranky and fights with everybody.

Then they find out that he has a cancerous tumor in his boy parts. They remove it. He gets busy. His name? Henry. Her name? Mildred. And now they are the proud parents of 11.

Am I laughing at grumpy boy parts?

No.

Am I picturing a lizard in a yellow shirt and bike helmet?

You bet!

No wait! There's more.

(And the picture is actually a komodo dragon but I couln't find a picture of Henry. Sorry. I'm just as disappointed as you are.)

This was the #3 story in the Science section on Yahoo news. Number 3. That would be front page of the Science section if this was a printed newspaper. Amazing. There is nothing else going on in the world of science? No new breakthroughs or medical advances? No bizzare finger measuring to do today?

I'll have to settle for Henry, the reptilian Lance Armstrong.

Motherhood means...

But the stipulation is you can only give me one word. No explanation. No stories. Just one word.

This is actually research for a video blog series I am going to post on my blog so all I want is your word. If I use your word, well, you aren't going to get any wonderful prize or huge recognition, but you can say "Hey! That's my word!"

So you tell me. "Motherhood means...."

Go ahead and link back to me if you would like so I can get as many words as possible.

And if you want to see where you will be featured you can pop over to the Zoo (free admission). Posts will start going up this weekend (25th) and will continue through November 30th.

What if "Pay it Forward" really happened?

Would you participate?

Would you go out of your way to do something incredible for another person?

Would you be ok with getting nothing in return?

Would you be okay with not knowing if it even worked in the first place?

I've been watching the news for the first time in 5 years. Everyday I hear more about the economy. More about people losing their homes. More about the demise of the environment. More crime. More cruelty to animals and children. More misery everywhere.

Then suddenly it will pop up. Someone paid for the dry cleaning, coffee, McDonald's for the person behind them. And it will go on for hours at a time. But then it stops. Someone thinks only of themselves and breaks the chain.

What if we all did something that only involved our time? What if money was taken out of the equation? What if we just baked something for a home bound neighbor and went for a visit? What if we just held the door for the mom with the stroller? What if we went to visit at the hospital? What if we just gave blood?

What if we only asked that it be paid forward?

Is it even possible? Is there enough kindness left in humanity to make even the slightest difference?

I believe that there is. I believe that in these troubled times there are plenty of people to love and be kind to. I believe that there are people who can put themselves aside and think of others.

I wonder if you will.