Aged

So this is 40.

Huh.

Doesn't feel much different from 39.

To be honest, as I approached my fortieth birthday, I didn't feel the angst or sense of mortality that sometimes comes with these 'pivotal' birthdays.

It was just a day.

A nice day at that.

To be honest, I'm kind of excited to see what my forties bring.

I'm not sure this decade can outdo the last one, though.

I had a pretty good run in my thirties. I bought my first car (the previously mentioned Grand Prix that now has over three hundred thousand miles) I met Tom, gave birth to Alyssa, married Tom, gave birth to Olivia, bought a house.

All in all, pretty good for ten years of life.

So what's going to happen in my forties?

Will I change jobs?

Will I get healthy and be the best I've been in twenty years?

Will I continue to bitch and moan about my husband and quietly fear that my daughters deserve so much more than I'm giving them as a parent?

Or will I grow a pair, tell my husband what I actually need instead of expecting him to read my mind. Will I decide that perhaps being all mommy all the time isn't quite enough and take some time to rediscover Tommie?

Perhaps. Perhaps a bit of everything.

We'll see.

It may just be a sign of some newfound maturity that I spent most of my actual birthday painting our living room. It had this horrible stenciled border around the top of the walls and I couldn't stand it another day.

Of course, we're also having a party for a bazillion family members in just under two weeks and I needed to make the room presentable. But yeah, I painted. Rememberh how much I hate painting? Yes, I still hate it and yet I did it...on my birthday.

So go me, being all mature and all.

Finally

The long awaited obligatory Halloween post. Yeah.

So my stupid camera is REALLY cheap. I got it from work as a service award and if I take out the batteries? It deletes the pictures.

So I'm stealing pictures from my mom's Facebook album.

My mom is awesome.

She is an awesome mom and an even more amazing Grammy. She adores my girls and my nephew. And they adore her. They know how lucky they are.

Growing up, my mom always made my Halloween costumes and they were always amazing.

I was Bat Girl one year.

I was a Jeannie another year (though she made me wear a pink thermal shirt under my tube top that year and I was pissed! You can see the tear streaks in the pictures from that year. I didn't give a crap that it was 40 degrees outside, I didn't want to wear a freaking shirt.)

Anyway...

This year my mom outdid herself with the costumes.

Alyssa was Wonder Woman.

Jaxon was Buzz Lightyear.

And Olivia was a lightening bug.

And they were all cuter than you can imagine.

And since pictures are worth a thousand words I'll stop with the words and attach the pictures.

PP

We have a spray bottle beneath our sink. The bottle contains a water/amonia mixture and has "PP Cleaner" written on it with a black Sharpie.

Tom made the mixture and labeled the bottle.

Obviously, we use this for cleaning up the spots Olivia leaves several times a day when she's too busy, lazy, bored, to come tell us she needs to pee.

I say that O is potty trained. But I wonder if I can say that will honesty when we typically have at least two accidents a day.

Except when we're out in public.

Then, she tells us every single time when she has to pee.

Well, she did have an accident at gymnastics three weeks ago, but that was an odd occurance.

So we know she can both hold it AND tell us when she has to go.

Which makes the accidents that happen at home that much more frustrating.

Last weekend, she peed on the new-to-us couch twice in the span of ten minutes.

She ended up in time-out.

After four minutes in a chair, not caring a bit that she was in that chair, I asked Olivia why she was in timeout.

She gave a pttthhhhht.

I gave her two more minutes of timeout and asked her again why she was there.

She said she was sorry.

I asked her why she was sorry. She repeated the raspberry.

I ignored her for another two minutes as she continued to sit in the chair.

Again, I asked her why she was in timeout and why she was sorry.

She mumbled, "Because I peed."

I asked her where she'd peed.

"On the couch."

I asked, "And where are you supposed to pee?"

"In the potty."

She was released from timeout.

And for the rest of the day, she told me when she had to pee. Success!!!

I think this was the first time she connected her actions (the peeing) to my frustration and her having to go to timeout.

My mom reports this week has been much better, pee-wise.

So...conclusion? Timeout works for my kid as long as I make sure she gets why she's even in timeout.

Yeah, even I can learn something every day.

2nd Grade Angst

Way back when I was in second grade, we didn't go down to the cafeteria for lunch. The lunch lady brought our trays/drinks to us. I know, it was A LONG TIME AGO.

The school I attended housed kindergarten through 12th grade. The elementary was in a separate wing from the jr./sr. high but we shared a cafeteria.

I am not a milk drinker. Never was. Can't stand the stuff. Ugh!

So I got to drink Jungle Juice when I happened to eat the lunch provided by the school. It was an orange kool-aid type drink. Not good but not nearly as bad as milk, as far as my seven year old self was concerned.

One day the lunch lady, Mrs. Fee, forgot my Jungle Juice. I'd always felt this woman thought I was a spoiled brat for not liking milk and for getting my mom to write me a note saying I didn't have to drink it. That day, I was sure she'd forgotten on purpose.

She told me if I wanted the juice, I'd have to go down to the high school cafeteria and get it myself. She didn't have time to go back down there herself. She had other lunches to deliver, she snotted at my second-grade self.

So off I went.

But I was sort of scared because I'd never been to the high school part of the school before and I wasn't sure where I was going or what I'd find. I did find the cafeteria and the Jungle Juice and headed back to my classroom.

As I walked quickly (but didn't run! I loved rules at that age and running in the halls was against the rules.) back toward the safety of the elementary wing, a wing with which I was very familiar, having spend the better part of almost three years of my life, I was accosted by three high schoolers.

Now, looking back, I realize they never touched me, they weren't in any way threatening. But the scared the shit out of little seven-year-old me.

They stood in front of me, blocking my way. They made a semi-circle and stood there, saying things like, "Ohh, she's so cute." "Look how little she is!" "I just want to take her home with me."

I was terrified. I couldn't get past them and I was sure they were going to keep me there in that hallway forever.

I don't even remember them finally letting me go but I do remember crying in bed that night, begging my mom not to make me go to school.

She kept asking me what was wrong.

I wouldn't tell her at first. I told her she'd laugh.

She persisted and so I spilled the entire story.

And...she laughed. I was horrified. She laughed at the most terrifying experience of my life.

I begged her to promise me I'd never have to go to high school.

She reassured me that by the time I was ready for the high school part of that school, I'd be five years older and much bigger than I was now.

I ended up doing just fine in that very high school.

Now, I've told this story because, well, for one thing, I'm an over-sharer and so I share, but also because last night was a parenting win for me and Alyssa.

When we got home, she announced that she was hungry.

I started to prepare food when she suddenly announced she wasn't hungry after all.

Then she told me her tummy hurt.

I asked her if she had to go to the bathroom. What? It's what we moms ask.

She said no. She said it just felt funny.

I asked if her tummy felt like she was nervous about something.

She shook her head but said, "Maybe."

Uh oh, I knew something was up.

I knelt down before her and asked her what was wrong. What had happened at school that day to make her feel bad.

She explained that during recess, she'd stayed in to finish her journal but couldn't find her journal in the pile of unfinished journals.

Through tears, she explained that first thing in the morning, the students write in their journals and she couldn't find hers and she was sure she was going to get into trouble.

I offered to write her teacher a note explaining the missing journal but she cried that sometimes a student takes all the notes to the office before the teacher reads them.

In the end, I called my boss, left a voice mail explaining that I'd be about a half hour late and when I dropped Alyssa off at school today, I went in with her and talked to her teacher.

And what do you know, the teacher had the journal because she wanted to share it with me during our conference this very evening. She was very apologetic to Alyssa for not telling her that she'd taken her journal. Alyssa cried with relief that she wasn't in trouble for having 'lost' her journal.

And...they weren't even going to be writing in their journals today.

Yet I came through for my girl. She got that I was there for her, no matter how trivial I might have thought the journal issue was, I took her seriously and helped her through her angst.

It's tough to be seven, even when you have an awesome mom.

Okay, so...

Yeah, the last few weeks have been pretty much nothing but a bitchfest about Tom.

I know.

And...there are still somethings about which I'm frustrated.

But...

Last night when the girls and I rolled into the driveway at 6:30 (we spent some extra time at my mom's. Olivia wanted to stay naked a little longer.) he was there, installing a storm door on the front entrance into the house.

And he'd bought a remote to the garage door opener.

Maybe I'm having a good day but I realized today that he's taking care of in his own way. He's doing what he can to make sure his family is safe and warm and cared for.

Sure, my emotional well-being isn't always priority, but I really think he doesn't even realize that.

A friend asked me recently if I didn't think I deserve better.

Hmmmm...

Do I? Don't we all, to some extent? Heck, Tom probably deserves better than me. At least, to his thinking. He probably deserves a wife who takes better care of herself physically. He probably deserves a wife who is a better housekeeper. He probably deserves a wife who cooks better.

And the girls...they deserve a mother who doesn't yell so often. A father who is around more. A mother who does crafts and cooks and plays Barbies.

But we're in this together, Tom and girls and I. We're a family and to be honest, I like our little family, even if I would like it very much if Tom's presence in the house weren't so much of an event that it turns the girls into maniacs who can't be calmed for hours.

We'll keep muddling through, making the best of each other and this life we're living. In the end, we're pretty darned lucky to have each other. I have to believe that.

Shadows

Yesterday afternoon, Olivia had found a nice long beam of sunlight coming through one of my mom's kitchen windows and was dancing with her shadow.

Every few minutes, someone would step across her beam of light and disrupt her choreography and she'd whine or grunt at them, letting the perpetrator know of her frustration with them.

Alyssa discovered O's dance floor and tried to take over, standing just behind Olivia in the light, taking away her shadow.

This did not sit well with Olivia. She tried to push her sister out of the way, but a 32 pounder doesn't have much power against someone who weighs 57 pounds.

I stepped in and told Alyssa to go find her own sunlight in which to play.

I know. The stupid things we say to our children.

But my girls have always enjoyed shadow dancing.

When Alyssa was about two years old, she announced to my mom one day, "Grammy look! My shadow thinks I'm big!"

My mom loves to tell that story. She thinks it's one of the most clever things she's ever heard.

There have been a lot of shadows these days.

But watching Olivia dancing in that sunbeam, seeing her and Alyssa fight over the warmth and glow of the light reminded me that there can't be shadows without light.

And when I see a shadow looming, I need to remember to turn and seek out the light that is making the shadow possible.

My world is a good one.

Sure, I'm bogged down with the day to day stuff, but I wouldn't trade my day to day with anyone in the world. Even if Tom were to offer to trade with me, I might take him up for a few hours, but I can't imagine not being there to watch Olivia dance with her shadow, or Alyssa flip across the mat at gymnastics class.

I'm the lucky one and I need to remember that more often. My girls are my light and sure, my shadow is lurking behind me as I bask in their light but wow, the way they shine amazes me every single day.

PBS Kind of Day

After the busy, busy weekend, yesterday (Sunday) was a PBS kind of day. We started the day with Miffy and Friends on our local PBS and it droned on all day long.

Friday was hectic with a school party, trick or treating and just being out until after 9:00.

Saturday brought another party and another evening not getting home until after 9:00.

Sunday dawned beautifully, the sun shining through the blinds, letting Olivia, who'd been awake since before 7:00 that I'd get up soon and find her some food.

We got up, leaving a sleeping Alyssa to find us when she would.

When A did finally lumber down the stairs, she settled on the couch with us and enjoyed two back to back episodes of Saddle Club, munched berries and relaxed. After the running she'd done the day before, she deserved it.

I made my way to the basement and started some laundry and then vacuumed the living room and the family room.

When Olivia asked me to sit beside her, I decided that mopping the kitchen could wait.

It was a PBS kind of day. We watched Sid the Science Kid and she wandered away, leaving me alone with the cartoons.

I realized that sometimes, even doing nothing can feel good. It can feel like you're accomplishing something.

We had a no-yelling day and it wasn't even declared.

That's MY kind of day.