signing out for a few days

Today at work something magical happened.  A transformer blew and all our power went out and we were sent home!  I still had my mother/daughter support group but we met at the Chancery and had dinner instead.  I got the whole mid-day to do laundry, play on the Internet, and PACK!

I get to go to Door County and stay in a cabin near Lake Michigan in Ephraim with my parents, Tad, Coen and Lucy.  My goal is not to check my email, my facebook, my blog or anything along those lines the whole time we're gone. 

I want to be on the beach, building sand castles with my kids, or in an ice cream shop, or on a bike, or on a screened in porch with some of my favorite grown ups in the world talking and laughing.  That's it!

I'll write again on Friday when we return. 

Block Party

Coen doing the bean bag toss

Lucy's friend Rain helping her put on her Parade hat

Block Party

I love my neighborhood.  We lend and borrow cups of sugar, cooking supplies and children's items.  Right now my husband is delivering a taped soccer game to our neighbor across the street who always comes over and helps us when we have a household issue.  We trade babysitting hours, skilled labor, and recipes. We watch each other's children, get each other's mail and shovel each other's walkways. 

One thing, beyond all that, that I love about my neighborhood is our annual block party.  The permit to close the street is free.  So at 3:00, we barricade either end of 55th Street and drag chairs, tables, food and games out to the middle of the road.  This year we had a kids parade (organized by me).  The kids wore hats and necklaces and blew whistles, horns and noisemakers and threw candy at their parents. Each piece of candy had a note taped to it with things that parents would like: a nap, a bottle of wine, a few hours off, a night out, and so on.  Then our neighbors hosted a bean bag toss game complete with prizes.  After dark, our other neighbors brought out a projector and showed a movie on their garage for all the kids. 

We had a great time.  It is free and fun and wonderfully cohesive.  I recommend it to anyone who likes their neighborhood!

Possibly a Craigs List world record!

   Our power cord for our laptop stopped working the other day.  As our computer slowly drained its battery until it fell asleep indefinitely, we decided we'd definitely have to get a new one.  Tad took Lucy to the Apple Store yesterday and found to his horror, that a new power cord is somewhere in the range of $80.  WHAT?!!! I love Apple products and everything but come ON!

So, while Tad thought about the worthwhile-ness of that particular purchase, he got an idea. He went on one of the Apple computers set up in the store and went to the Craigslist site.  He searched for an Apple Notebook Power cord and found a man selling one in Milwaukee for $30. 

Cordially thanking the Apple staff at the store, he and Lucy headed out to a Cell Phone store on Capitol Drive where they proceeded to purchase the same needed power cord for $50 less!

I was impressed by this tale and thought I'd share.

When bedtime is not really exactly bedtime

I don't know how it is for other parents.  When my kids go to bed...I just want them to go to bed already.  I love my children. I love spending time with them all day and as many days as possible.  BUT...at bedtime, I punch out, so to speak.  I like to put my kids to bed and enjoy the quiet of the house, watch a movie with Tad or embark on a project of my own or call a friend.  When Tad is not home, then I REALLY cherish bedtime as I have the whole house to myself. And so every time I am going to be alone in the house after bedtime, my mantra is this: Patience, patience, patience.  I try to tell myself to just enjoy reading the stories and singing lullabies and relax with the kids, not thinking about the empty house waiting for me with all my plans...  And usually it goes pretty well, the reading and singing part.  But then there are nights like last night.  The singing and the reading and even Coen adding in his own lullaby to Lucy (which incidentally lasted nearly 10 minutes, I kid you not) and then Lucy singing us a lullaby before we tucked her in.  That was fine.  And Coen's need for a long discussion about worries and concerns that always and only come out at bedtime..that was fine too.  But then I went downstairs.  I poured myself a nice glass of lemonade and set up my sewing machine to work on a project.  Not two minutes into it...  "Mama?!!!"  Coen needed to pee. So, I walked him back and tucked him in and was on the bottom step when "Mama?!!!!"  Lucy needed to pee.  So down and back up we went and I tucked her in.  Back in the living room. "Mama?!!"  I called up, "Yes, Coen?" Can you just come up one more time.  You can do Lucy first."  I hear her little voice calling out my name too.  I go back up.  "I'm not sleepy." says Lucy.  So I tell her that she can cuddle with her stuffed animals and look at her books until she gets sleepy.  "But I'm not cozy!" She says.  What I want to say is "I don't CARE if you're not cozy! I can't do anything to MAKE you cozy! Now shush and let me be!" BUT I do not say that. I tuck her blanket around her and adjust her air conditioner and kiss her on the forehead and go attend to Coen. Coen has piled endless stuffed animals on his bed, with blankets. He is dripping in sweat. "I can't sleep." He says.  "Coen." I say.  "First of all, you have not even tried to sleep yet. I was just up here three minutes ago.  Second of all..." Then I remove the millions of stuffed animals from his bed, toss the enormous heavy blanket on the floor, and help him back on his pillows, tucking a sheet around him.  "Now, that should do it." I say.  "Please, no more calling."  I head downstairs.  I sew a few fabric leaves on my newly designed T-shirt, when "Mama?!!" Lucy has to pee again.  Finally she is all tucked in. Coen calls to me as I am half way down the stairs.  I want to pound my head into the wall.  Don't I deserve to punch out already?!  I am definitely impatient with him.  I tell him angrily that if the two of them keep calling me and don't go to sleep, we can't go to the concert in Washington Park tomorrow night.  Stupid.  Now he is crying.  "Mommy, that makes me really sad. What if I have a bad dream?  I can't even call you then?"  I sigh.  You can call me in the middle of the night, but you haven't even tried to sleep yet. We're going to the concert.  We are." "No matter what?" He says, wiping his tears.  "Yes. No matter what.  Please go to sleep.  I love you." I kiss him on the head and go back to my sewing.  Of course...now I feel guilty.  I try to sew, but guilt washes over me like the humidity in my non air conditioned downstairs.  I go back up and sit on Coen's bed.  "I'm sorry I got mad", I say. "Sometimes Mommy gets frustrated when she has to keep coming upstairs over and over again. Okay?" We hug. I get up to leave. "Mom! I just have to go to the bedroom, can you wait here and tuck me in when I get back?"  Sigh.

Eventually, they both fell into slumber and I went up and kissed their sleeping faces before I went to bed. And I did, in the end, finish my shirt. Here it is in the picture below.  I know we all have our moments of parent hood we struggle with.  We do our best. We loose our cool.  We find it again.  My children woke this morning, happy and rested. No trace of last night's bedtime anxieties, issues and non-coziness.  

And we'll all go to Washington Park tonight for a concert.

No matter what. 

It is hot, but I'm okay with that.

The weather online says that it's 93 degrees but that it feels like 107.  It makes me laugh to see such an odd, prime number.  Seems so randomly chosen.

I am sitting here with Tad on the couch, which has been pushed into the middle of the living room so as to obtain the maximum possible fan blowage. 

I am drinking a mix of Outpost strawberry lemonade, bubbly lime La Croix, and ice. 

I am watching the Brewers play Arizona on mute. 

I am listening to Leonard Cohen's live disc, the Isle of White, circa 1970.  

I worked really hard today at work. Tad worked really hard at today home entertaining our children plus two more in hot weather, weather that feels, apparently like 107 degrees. 

It is hot, yes, but I feel absolutely lovely.  Relaxation earned.  Cold beverage.  Good music. And aesthetically pleasing viewing.

I hope you all feel good out there too.

Good night.

Let's go to the movies

Yesterday we spent the morning with my niece and nephew, after their sleepover at our house.  We had dinner plans at friends of ours in the evening.  Unsure what to do with our middle of the day time, Tad did a little Internet search. 

We decided to take our kids to our first ever movie theater movie as a family.  I took Coen to see "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs" when he was five.  Tad took him to see "Ramona and Beezus" when he was six.  But Lucy's never been to a movie.

We went to Mayfair's AMC movie theater to see Winnie The Pooh.  To save money, I packed snacks. (naughty, I know)  I brought trail mix  and fruit snacks for the kids, caramel bugles for all four of us, chocolate covered raisins for me, and sour patch kids for Tad.  The movie was great.  Lucy alternated among clutching my arm, sitting on my lap and sitting on Tad's lap. She was mostly silent and transfixed through the whole thing.  Only once did she speak loudly...to say, "Mom! It's too dark in here for me to see what color my fruit snacks are!"  Coen giggled through the whole movie.

The best was in the beginning, they had a short about a Loch Ness monster who was looking for a nice wet place to live. She was having trouble finding one.  Everyone was telling her to be brave and strong, keep a stiff upper lip and not to cry.  This was apropos to something we've been going through with Coen. He has been easy to cry about small issues, which has been frustrating to us. But we're trying to remember our policy that it is always okay to cry...and we want our boy to feel good about his sensitivity.  In the end, she finally cried. She cried and cried until she cried a whole lake and thus, a place to live.  The moral was.  It's alright to cry.  (which, of course, made me cry).

We spent money on the movie...but we had a nice family activity indoors on a hot day.  That's worth it.

Bear bear's near death experience

I have been remiss in blogging due to the fact that I am surrounded by thirteen very intense teenagers this week. But today my family came home with a harrowing tale of a teddy bear's fall into the river. Here is the story (in pictures) of Bear bear's near-tragic accident and heroic rescue.

Lucy leans over on the bridge and *gasp!* Bear bear falls into the river

A local fisherman tries to get him out while Lucy looks on nervously.  The waterlogged bear proved to be too  heavy and broke the hook right off the line.

A local kayaker (mom of another child at Urban Ecology Center camp) is summoned and heroically saves Bear bear from a watery demise.  Tory of the UEC returns Lucy her beloved bear.

Back at home, Lucy gives Bear bear a bath in the coaster wagon.

Coen hoses off the river water.

A traumatized Teddy dries on the line.

THE END.

The Flaming Lips live...or my kind of church.

I had the happy privilege of attending not one, but two Flaming Lips shows over this weekend.  Thursday I got off work a little early and Tad, our friend Erik and I drove down to Chicago and saw the Flaming Lips at the Aragon Ballroom with Erik's sister. 
Now those of you readers who know me well know that I am not a church going person. That is not to say that I'm not spiritual.  I am.  But anyway, a Flaming Lips show is something of a spiritual experience for me. Its like my version of church.  Wayne Coyne is an amazing front man, lead singer, stage presence, and sermonizer.  He gets up there in between songs full of love and light and balloons and confetti and talks about LOVING EACH OTHER and appreciating life and personal growth and doing things that mean something to the world and those around you.  If that's not a message that a roomful of joyful, sweating, dancing people needs to hear, I don't know what is.  Below is a link that someone posted on youtube of the show, the opening number... Race For the Prize...

And they ended with Do You Realize.. the song Tad and I had played at our wedding after we were officially husband and wife.

Do you realize
That you have the most beautiful face
do you realize we're floating in space
Do you realize that happiness makes you cry
Do you realize that everyone you know, someday, will die

But instead of saying all of your goodbye's
Let them know you realize that life goes fast
It's hard to make the good thing last
You realize the sun doesn't go down
It's just an illusion of the world spinning round.

Saturday, Tad and I met friends at Summerfest and saw them yet again at the 10:00 show at the Harley Stage.  The crowd was more Milwaukee...  lots more connectedness, lots more drunkenness :)  And the show was more rocking, less ethereal.  I favored the Chicago show, while Tad favored Milwaukee.  But it was the best to have seen both.  My favorite number at the Milwaukee show was WHAT IS THE LIGHT.  It is a song that makes me proud to be who I am.

WHAT IS THE LIGHT
THAT YOU HAVE
SHINING ALL AROUND YOU?
IS IT CHEMICALLY DERIVED?

Cause if its natural, something glowing from inside, shining all around you, its potential has arrived.

Here is the link....

Flaming Lips at the Aragon in Chicago

The 3rd of July

We had a lovely third of July.  The whole morning, Tad was ill and Coen seemed out of sorts, falling down in tears or stomping off in anger about every little disappointment.  After feeling frustrated in the morning, about Coen's reactions to things, I took both kids upstairs and talked to them about 'appropriate' or pleasant and 'inappropriate' or unpleasant reactions.   We had a role-play where Coen and Lucy were the mom and dad and I was the kid. I had them  in turns saying yes or no to things I asked and I sometimes would fall on the floor and whine and cry or handle things in a better fashion. I had them calling out "Good Reaction!" or "Bad Reaction!"  They loved the game and honestly, it seemed to color the rest of the day, as anytime anyone began to whine or fuss, I would say "oooooh! is that a good reaction or a bad reaction" and it would end in laughter.

Tad did end up feeling very very ill so he stayed home.  My friend Brian came over and he and I packed up the kids, the stroller, the cooler and some blankets in to the Subaru and headed down to the lakefront.  We played games and talked and ate and at about 6:00 my friend Rebecca joined us.  Back at home, around 5:00, Tad woke up from his sleep and felt well enough to join us. He took the city bus.  We were all sitting on our blankets talking when my sister said "Tad!" I looked up, and there he was!  Suddenly I was transported to 2001. My heart was pounding, my cheeks felt flushed and I was newly in love all over again.  Just seeing him there by surprise did that.  How lucky am I?!!!

The display was long and lovely with a wonderful double grand finale. During the display, Coen leaned over and said, "Mama? When is the grand finale."  I looked at my son, channelling my own mom, 31 years ago and smiled, saying "You'll know."

And he did.

My two friends, my family and I crammed into our Subaru for the ride home...me in the trunk, my legs slung over the handle of the wagon, my back against the cooler and my hand on the stroller to keep it from tumbling upon me.  Lucy was asleep before we pulled out of the parking lot and Coen dreamily listened to our adult chatter all the way home.  I felt happy in the back of the car, thinking how happy I was to be with these people that I love for my favorite event of the year and also that I'm 36 years old and can still cram in the trunk of a car!

Happy Fourth, everyone.

My favorite day

Today is my favorite day of the year.  The third of July.  Today is a big, fun, FREE event that happens every year in Milwaukee.  The "US Bank" fireworks (formerly known as the Firststar Bank Fireworks).  I have only missed this event two years of my life--the two years I was in the Peace Corps in Estonia.  I have gone every year since I was one month old.  Both my kids have gone every year of their lives.  I. Love. This. Day!

My parents go down there at 9:00 in the morning and stake out our spot.  It is amazing to me how respectful everyone is of each others' claims for space. Blankets, tents, canopies, and in our case four wooden stakes and some yellow twine mark off the spot where we will sit.  Then later on we all go down with blankets and coolers and activities for the kids around 3:00 in the afternoon.

 We sit and eat sandwiches and treats. We play games. We talk.  We take little walks around to see all the people who've come.  I love it that this event continues to be free year after year.  I love it that my family spends a concentrated six hours on a blanket together waiting for the main event.  I love the fireworks themselves.  Usually one of my children finds their way to my lap where we cuddle and watch the display, making ooh's and aaah's along with the crowd.

Today Tad woke up with a sick stomach.  Coen seems a little tenuous, falling apart at little things.  At the moment he's terribly affronted as his sister has chosen to sit on a chair nearer the TV rather than on the couch with him.  Me?  I promised myself I'd keep positive today, enjoying this day I love so much, no matter what happens.  I'll post again tomorrow and tell you how it all turns out.