It's beginning to sound a lot like Christmas

I'm still blogging my trip over at an audience of me and posting photos on flickr.

If you've got a hankering for some Christmas tunes, check out this little project my son's friends put together for the holidays. It'll make you smile! Bunch of talented kids, they are. I can't swear to it, but I'd imagine all the instrumentation is original, nothing canned. A little traditional stuff, a little funky stuff (I Saw Three Ships like you've never heard it, maybe!). Ryan's friend Kristin does an absolutely gorgeous O Come, O Come Emmanuel, too.

Ryan sings number 4 -- You Gotta Get Up, a cover of a Rich Mullins song, also recorded by the immortal Five Iron Frenzy. (Well, I guess logically Rich Mullins is the immortal one now, may he rest in peace!) We used to pull out the Mullins recording to wake the kids up on Christmas morning. (YES ... we had to wake the kids up. We are a bunch of undying night owls in this family, even as little children.) I can almost picture Ryan's three or four-year-old wonder at Christmastime when I listen to him sing here.

I'm back from my trip to the UK and I'm blogging it over at my other blog.

Hope you'll take a peek now and then. It'll take me a while to get all my thoughts down since I spent all my time there walking, looking, shooting photos, and not writing a bit!

Joe who?

If I make more than $250K per year, I am not Joe the Plumber.

I am Joe the Plumbing Executive.

Just saying.

Kristen and Mom show their respective ages

While traveling to On the Border for Friday night dinner with Todd, Kristen, and my mom, we were talking about the vice presidential debates, and what's been said today among family, friends, and frenemies.

The space of nearly 60 years between two of the female species became apparent.

Mom: My beauty operator said the same thing.

Kristen: Your what? Your BEAUTY OPERATOR??????

To bail or not to bail ...

If you want to read slightly lighter, more exciting stuff, go read my review of the Swell Season (Glen Hansard of the Frames/Marketa Irglova) concert at my other blog.

If you are worried about the state of our economy, this will just take a minute.

I've been receiving various plugs in my inbox for different ways to approach the financial crisis as a taxpayer, citizen, voter, little person. It's still unclear what the best solution is to me, but reading through these is at least educating me. I'm still not sure I'll understand it in time to have any real influence. Sigh.

Dave Ramsey's 3 Steps to Change the Nation's Future

John Mauldin's Who's afraid of a big, bad bailout? (reprinted with permission on Meg Tilly's blog)

These two opinions seem to have common goals through quite different solutions.

What about you? Have you come across anything that make sense to you?

Kristen says ...

In a true demonstration of the pitfalls of the electronic age and its effect on families ...

As Todd, Julie, and Emilie sit with their laptops playing on FaceBook on a Friday night ...

Julie comments that Kristen is the only normal member of the family remaining. She has no laptop, no FaceBook, thus, no 21st century life. Todd chuckles. Emilie mumbles (after having wisdom tooth extraction earlier in the day). Kristen says ...

"Can't y'all just talk on FaceBook?"

Apparently, we were interrupting her movie.

Kitty Kup Sob Story

I was born with a plastic cup in my mouth.

Apparently, so was my cat.

How does one train a cat who is obsessed with drinking out of a tall, plastic Khaki's cup to drink out of the nice, clean, white, ceramic, PRETTY square bowl I purchased for her? She's made the transfer from the old food dish to the new (matches the square water bowl) food dish, but the water seemingly is just not the same.

I understand, really. I don't like drinking from glass glasses unless I have a straw. They smell kinda fishy, if you know what I mean. Give me a good old cheap plastic cup any day. (And my mom gets irritated with me when I call them cups, but I tell her if they're plastic, they can't be glasses, right?) But this is a cat, people. And they don't make cat straws.

So Yentl, she stands pitifully at the bathroom counter, sticking her head way down inside the empty Khaki's cup, hoping beyond hope there will be a few drops she missed the last time she checked. (Hmm, maybe it would help if I got rid of the cup. That was the point.)

I've carried her to the food and drink spot, a short three feet away, even dunked her finicky little nose in the new dish to be sure she KNOWS it's water (Because she's kind of dumb like that sometimes. She also finishes her business, then swishes her paws OUTSIDE the litter box inside of inside where they might actually cover the evidence.)

She condescended to drink from the dishy dish one time--when I fetched two ice cubes from the kitchen and dropped them in, because she loves ice water (she's a kidney disease kitty, and loves water cold, cold, cold). I thought it would clue her in that it's her new watering hole, but no, and we're not going to start THAT every day. I know, I know, some of you over-the-top animal lovers think I'm mean, but we do give her ice in the kitchen bowl. Ahem, the BOWL she drinks from there (that is, NOT A CUP).

By now, you're probably wondering, "What are Khaki's cups?" If so, you ain't from around here, are ya? Khaki's Fresh Food is this wonderful dress-your-own-burger joint that serves drinks in tall plastic tumblers imprinted with their logo. If you live in Arlington, chances are, you have a full set in the cabinet. The way you know it's been too long since you went to Khaki's is when you realize you need new cups. You know, when the old ones are kinda faded? Cracking in spots or overly dishwasher warped? And they are so much better than the four for a dollar crap cups you get at WallyWorld. You can bend them to fit in the dishwasher top rack, the one that's always a fraction of an inch too narrow for things you purchase.

But I digress. Yentl, she needs to move up a notch. What do I do with the plastic cup lovin' kitty??

To she who keeps us all organized

Dadgummit, I'm an hour too late to officially say Happy Birthday to Emilie on my blog!

But she got all kinds of attention today anyway. She went to the doctor last night with fever and coughing and came home with antibiotics and a possible diagnosis of p-u-monia. Yep, two doctors arguing over a chest xray--Is it pneumonia or not?--decided to treat her as if it is so. Because she had "all kinds of squeaking and squacking" going on in her lungs, so they said.

Too much stuff going on in combination with heavy duty allergies=a day off from school for your birthday. Not a bad deal. I know, right? (Just had to say it, after all Emilie says it 100 times a day these days.)

I even heated up leftover taco soup for her lunch when she finally woke up at 2 p.m. after going to bed at 9 last night. I told her never to forget I did this for her and never to say I never fed her when she was sick. ;-)

Because I felt so bad for her, even though I said we'd probably wait to celebrate until the weekend, Kristen and I made a pit stop at Target after piano lessons and bought a little cake and the rest of her heart's desires for her birthday--the sequel to Gregory Maguire's Wicked, and another book he's written about the ugly stepsister or some such character.

I was already in possession of the requested Across the Universe DVD and a few other random movies I thought she'd enjoy after an unfortunate trip yesterday to Blockbuster's previously-viewed-movies-for-sale section. (It's always unfortunate, because I always buy a lot of movies there when they're four for $20. Many I've seen and enjoyed. The pitiful part is I often never rewatch them. I just have some kind of weird emotional attachment to movies I liked. Let's just say this was a *highly* unfortunate visit because I kind of hit the jackpot.)

If we can score tickets for the David Wilcox concert at Bend Studio in November, including one for Emilie, I will be Mom of the Year, except for that minor matter of driver's ed ...

Sorry, sweetie, you don't have time for driver's ed. The only possible time slot in your busy, busy schedule is really already filled. With sleep. Maybe when you're 20.

BUT ARE YOU SERIOUSLY 15!!!!! O.M.G.

Look ma, no hands!

It's pitiful that I haven't updated in more than three weeks, I know. If you're still reading, thanks for checking in faithfully anyway! I guess I'm going to have to start jabbing Kristen in the side to get her to say something new and hilarious, huh? ;-)

Seems like I always post on the first day of school, though, so I must keep up the tradition.

Fall is not in the air here. Not at all. I didn't even get that weird little rush that usually comes with the first day of school, where you can somehow imagine fall is coming, even when it's still blazing hot. Now, if school had started LAST week, in the midst of some cooler, rainy days, maybe.

Today was surprisingly easy for day 1. I'd estimate about 15%, or 10 of the requisite forms are filled out (with exactly the SAME FREAKING INFO as last year! Can we just get a computer generated form to check off "all info the same as last year" puleeeze?!?!).

One started 6th grade, and bopped off with her friends for her second year in a school she likes. One started high school, and I have to admit that Julie of the non-teary first days of school (Can anyone shout, "FREEDOM!" with me?) had just the tiniest little lump in her throat as she drove away from dropping her oldest girl off. (First day privilege. She'll be waiting for the bus at 6:30 a.m. tomorrow with all the other freshmen whose parents believe in building character, saving gas and the environment, and the statistics that say it's safer to rider the school bus anyway.)

I simply had a quick realization that this is child two of three to start high school, and that really makes the remaining years of my hands-on job as a parent seem short. Even more considering how easily she jumped out of the car (well, not really jumped, but she wasn't nervous at all and neither was I). I must be doing something either really right or really wrong for her to be so confident. :)

My consolation is I had my children fairly far apart (five years between 1 and 2, and four years between 2 and 3). Originally, I said it was so I'd never have two in diapers at once, but more to the point, I realized how much I'd enjoy getting to know each one of my kids individually for a pretty long period of time and that I'd be a much better mom that way. We are not all wired the same as moms. (It was also nice having older kids who could tote the stinky diapers to the garage.)

So, Kristen will be a while in coming to this day of starting high school, but I'm sure it'll be here in a flash. And she'll be the one sitting in the car, clinging to my hand, saying, "Noooo! I'm not ready!"

Or maybe she won't, and I'll shake my head again.

Now, if I could just figure out the second-year college student and exactly where my responsibilities lie in helping him become an adult, I might sleep at night. This is harder than I thought it would be.

(photo credit: macwagen, creative commons)

Ding ding ding!

Haven't done a Kristen says in a while ... so.

We've been trying to get her to bed earlier the last few nights so we can start gearing up for the new school year. She's nearly as bad a night owl as me, which is not a good thing come school time. So, about five minutes ago, I gave her instructions to get her teeth brushed, etc.

Todd saw her dawdling on the stairs on her way up.

Todd: Are you going to bed?
Kristen: No.
Todd: Wrong answer.
Kristen: No, sir.

Are you my mother?

I got the call last night. The one every parent dreads when their children learn to drive, or go off to college, or spend the summer in their first rental house.

Well, not really a call. It's 2008; it was a text message. Four a.m. and I was sound asleep for a change. But, even when "sound" asleep, I'm still a light sleeper, which is why, I'm sure, my son sent me a message. He knew I'd hear the phone. And here was the bone-chilling, earth-shattering text conversation that followed:
(Pardon the language, or hint of such. Tough times call for tough language.)

Ryan: I just woke up to a possum crawling on my back in my bedroom. What the f?

Me: Wow. Are you ok?

Me: Are you alone?

Ryan: Yes, it just scared the mess out of me. Ben and I caught it in a laundry basket. It was small. Only like a foot long.

Me: Ok, good. Did you scream? LOL. I can't stop laughing picturing it. How did it get in, I wonder?

Ryan: I jumped up, yelled OH S&%#! Turned on the light grabbed a laundry basket and a shoe. i had him cornered and stuck. I called Ben on my cell phone in the next room.

Me: Ok. I'm going back to sleep if I can stop laughing now. Glad you're ok.

Ryan: Yeah thanks. I think I found the line between a college house and roughing it! Good night.

I have never laughed so hard at 4 a.m. in my life. Every time I started to relax and think I might be able to fall back asleep, I started again and had to grab a tissue to mop up the tears. I, personally, would never be able to fall asleep in the house again. You know, the amazing house.

(photo credit foreversouls'/creative commons license)

Products you can't live without

I can see why these are at overstock dot com.

Oh, how they grow

It amazes me to realize this is the fourth year I've blogged on the birthday of my baby girl, who is not so much a baby any more. I just broke my middle child's heart, though, by commenting that I haven't been so faithful about blogging on her birthday. In typical middle child fashion, she hung her head and slunk into her room, then giggled. Then I reminded her she gets a national holiday and a three day weekend around her b-day every year. Blog schmog. Of course, then the younger daughter announced she gets a whole summer vacation.

For her birthday this year, we plan to remove the sign we put up over the window last year. Every now and then we notice it and comment, "We should probably take that sign down sometime. Naw, maybe next year after Kristen's birthday. Why waste a good sign?"

So, here she is, my blue-eyed beauty, another year older, another year bolder, eating our national family food, fresh pineapple, and sporting a hairdo of her own making. I told her when she's 16 or 17 and going to prom, her friends are going to hate her for that curly hair. Let's hear it for the girl.

Sorry for the photo quality. I'm loving taking pics with my cell phone and sending them right to my inbox and have gotten quite lazy.

Thank you ... thank you very much

For exciting news about my alter life, check this out on my other blog!

Expired, more or less

We are not the best at scanning the pantry for expired items. In fact, I've been known to use items if they're within reasonable reach of the expiration date. (Like, you know, a couple of years if it's not obviously perishable. Or sometimes, within a few weeks for cold stuff. Case in point, we are all still alive.) I tend to think of those dates as "guidelines." And don't worry, if you're a guest in my home for a meal, I'll serve you only the freshest food.

But it came to my attention this afternoon that we've been overly lax. My daughter was digging through the pantry and stopped to stare at a box of Hamburger Helper Lasagna. Now, I've scanned this same package many times (I shudder now to think how many) and never found an expiration date, but the thought of making lasagna from Hamburger Helper just doesn't appeal. So, I pass it over, but leave it alone ... just in case.

I heard an exclamation from the kitchen: "GROSS!"

After a few minutes, when I was ready, I responded: "What?"

"Mom, this box of Hamburger Helper has a Jurassic Park sweepstakes that ended October 31, 1997!"

Dang.

I told her to throw the sauce mix away, stick the box on the recycle shelf, and put the pasta bag back in the pantry. I'm pretty sure pasta doesn't ever die, but I'll check to be sure in a few years.

Bow to the Queen in Charge of the Cat's Delicate Stomach

At 7:30 a.m., I dragged myself out of bed to take the middle kid to colorguard camp, which she has every day all summer. nearly every week all summer. (It feels like every day.) As we walked through the front hallway, she asked, "You know there's cat barf there?" and pointed to the very edge of the carpet--the half inch that comes right before the tile, because that's how our cat rolls.

She has kidney disease and frequent hairballs and pukes a lot. We're not sure from which affliction, but at least a few times a week.

A few minutes ago, my younger daughter passed through and pointed to the same spot. "You know there's cat barf there?"

I predict that before the day is out, my mother or husband will point to the same spot and say, "You know there's cat barf there?" Well, maybe my husband won't. He might actually clean it up because he's cool like that.

If my son hadn't already absconded after only one year of college, he'd probably stroll through and say, "You know there's cat barf there, right?" (He'd add the "right," just for kicks.)

And I even know what you're saying. "Julie, you know there's cat barf there, right? And you haven't cleaned it up a full seven hours later?"

To all of you (minus my reading audience, unless you are one of the other mentioned parties), I say, "YES! I KNOW THERE IS CAT BARF THERE. BUT IF I AM APPARENTLY IN CHARGE OF CLEANING UP THE *FAMILY* CAT'S BARF, I WILL CHOOSE WHEN AND HOW TO CLEAN IT UP. IF I FEEL LIKE PASSING IT BY AND CLEANING IT UP LATER, DAG NABBIT, I WILL. AND ... BESIDES ... HOW AM I ANY DIFFERENT FROM YOU?"

Hmm?

Really, I'm not bitter. I'm not rebelling. It honestly just cleans up better after it dries and gets hard and crusty. Then you can just scoop it up, spray a little Oxy miracle spray on it, and voila! No cat barf or nasty stain from scooping it while it's ... okay, never mind that detail.

But, still. I'm just saying.

Bored already?

Here is a sign that summer vacation may already have gone on too long. While I work and ignore them, the children are practicing piano. In their pajamas. At 3:45 p.m.

While balancing footballs on their heads.

Redirect

If you're yearning for an update, check out the latest over at my other blog, where I share about our star sighting on the way OUT of Los Angeles.

Two things that disturb me

1) I hear birds chirping in my chimney.
2) I am the only person in the house, the tv is on, and I am staring at the Hannah Montana show.

This cannot be good.

Just saying

I'm still alive, I'm just in ...

Where my brother just escaped ...

Just kidding. He's really a pretty normal guy.

Spending time with him and a few more of my favorite guys ...

And one of my favorite girls ...

Not to mention the scenery.

See you when I get back.