BAD, BAD MOMMY! (AGAIN)

So remember a few weeks ago, right after Halloween, when I wrote about forgetting to put money under my son’s pillow for a lost tooth? How terrible I felt? I mean, how badly I felt that the Tooth Fairy screwed up?

Well, shortly after that, Eric, the son who was forgotten, came home from school and said that a boy told him that he caught his mom putting money under his pillow once and that PROVES that the Tooth Fairy doesn’t exist. It’s really just Good Ol’ Mom. Both boys wanted to know if that was true. They’re 10 now, so I asked them if they REALLY wanted to know the truth and they emphatically said YES. So I told them the truth.

Eric said, “I knew it!” and Adam said, “Noooooo, I didn’t want to know the truth!” Great!

Then, last night, Eric told me that he wishes I didn’t tell him the truth.

Really? Just stomp on my heart some more, little ones! They still believe in Santa Clause and you can bet that I’ll NEVER be the ones to tell them he doesn’t exist. NEVER, EVER, EVER!!!

Karen

Monday Thankfulness

Yes, I know Thanksgiving is over.  I have eaten turkey until it is coming out of my eyeballs and we still have so much pie left  I could have served it as a five course meal for dinner this evening! This year, Thanksgiving seemed to fall into place rather well. I planned to have dinner later in the evening, so my day was not too crowded. My parents came for dinner, then my sister and her family for dessert. 


But something weird-strange happened. Strange to me, anyway. Maybe it's the stage of life I have entered. But over the course of 36 hours, two of my friends' fathers and my great uncle passed away. It got to the point where I was afraid to check any email or answer the phone! I felt a little guilty for being happy and content while friends and my mother were grieving (and continue to grieve).  Let me tell you, though, if you are having a hard time counting your blessings, when something like that happens, you begin to take inventory. You begin to rethink your priorities. You begin to realize that you can't wait until the perfect time to do things. Or that all the noise in the house isn't a bad thing because it means your house is full of life. Or that the extra job can wait until you've played a hand of cards with your little girl.  Or that, yes, it was really nice to have my parents at dinner and be able to carry on a conversation and laugh with them.


Tomorrow I will help in walking Elizabeth's father home. We will celebrate his life, what a giver he was, hard worker, caretaker of the family. And I will continue to be thankful for each and every thing. Nothing is promised, and none of us never know how much time we have. So I'm being thankful for it and making it count.


Yours, continuing to count,


Melissa

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

Once again it is time to reflect on what we are thankful for in our lives. Here is my 2011 list:

• My wonderful family and friends who love me no matter how snarky I can be. Or at least pretend to love me!
• “Vanity sizing” in clothes.
• My hairdresser who, until recently, didn’t tell me just how gray I really was.
• The fact that Robins Eggs only come out at Easter (so I can’t eat them year round).
• Booking “The Sister’s Trip 2012” already. (Only 141 more days!)
• My Cub Scout days are almost over. Dad can take over in Boy Scouts!

Oh, I could go on and on! But mostly, I am thankful that my family is healthy and happy and we don’t have to go without. Here’s hoping the same for your families.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone. Melissa and I are very thankful for all of you as well! We’ll be taking the rest of the week off, but will be back blogging on Monday.

Karen

Monday Madness

Yes, its been THAT hectic today! But I still have a hour and a half left to get my blog finished and call it Monday Madness. :)  Today began with making lists, getting four children to school, getting gas on the rental car (I had to call the rental place because I couldn't find where the button was to unlock the gas tank! Embarrassing!) and return the car, all before 9 AM. Then a quick run by the grocery and on to teaching class. Got there and realized I did not have my parking pass so detour to Public Safety. I didn't want to take a chance on that $35 fine for not displaying a permit. Teach a class then grab a hot dog and on to getting my hair done. AH. And hour and a half in the Sanity Chair. I love my hairdresser. LOVE her. Then on to a three hour rehearsal and do some email and return some calls and come home to a kitchen I JUST got cleaned. I'm supposed to be emailing my class right now, but then I remembered that I had to blog and then.... I realized that Thanksgiving is only THREE. DAYS. AWAY.


I am SO not ready! 


I think I have some sweet potatoes and a can of pumpkin. If I shift a few things around, I might find some green beans, but I cannot attest to their freshness lifestage at the moment.


Guess what I'll be doing tomorrow? 


Yours, wishing for the ability to clone and teleport myself,

Melissa

Friday Fun- The ONLY Explanation is....

So I was watching college football last Saturday night. Both Mizzou AND Kansas State won that weekend, so that made for a pleasant Saturday evening in the B House. But while vegging out to football, I couldn't help but notice some severe uniform design faux pas... the kind that leave you asking,"Huh?"


Let us first consider the infamous helmet sticker. When I first saw Stanford's helmets, from a distance, I thought it was an optical illusion used to distract the opposing team. Then I learned it was a sticker system. Apparently, when a player does something good, he gets a sticker. (Yes, I giggled when I typed that). As a mother of young children, we have used the sticker system. I just didn't realize it would be used in COLLEGE, let alone on the FOOTBALL team. I wonder what kind of signing bonus they get if they fill their entire helmet with stickers?


Secondly, let us consider the Oregon Ducks. To begin with, to say I was a fighting Duck would not really strike fear into the heart of the opposing team. Especially if they were a tiger, or a lion or a warrior.  I mean, all three of these eat ducks, right? ( I can say this because my high school mascot was an owl, which, by the way, if you have ever been walking down a country road at night and had one screech and swoop down upon you, you would understand how deeply fieresome they actually CAN be!) So SOMEONE decided to give the Ducks socks dyed a color I only wore in high school, when punk and Madonna fashion was all the rage. Neon, glow in the dark socks. I'm guessing they were going for blinding the opponent? 


But this third one is my favorite faux pas- Maryland. First, their mascot is a Terrapin. I had to look that up. I had never heard a TURTLE called a terrapin. Wikipedia simply defines this as a fresh water turtle. Not very ferocious sounding to me. It makes being a Duck sound good. The uniforms, however, can only be described as football meets Nascar in one huge fashion DON'T! I couldn't even watch the game it was so bad!




Clearly, there can be only one explanation for these uniform gaffes...


They HAD to be designed by a man!


Yours, still recovering,


Melissa

WHAT IS THAT THUMPING?

My son, Adam, has the room next to ours. Last week we painted it, and in doing so, we rearranged the furniture. Now his bed isn’t in the middle of the room anymore, it’s against the wall that he shares with us. I’ve noticed lately that throughout the night, I hear THUMPS on that wall.

Now let’s rewind about 40 or so years.

I used to share a room with my sister, Margee. She was on the side of the room that shared a wall with my parents. Guess what they heard during the night? Yep! They heard THUMPS! For the longest time my mom thought Margee was banging her head against the wall. But finally, and I have absolutely NO idea how she figured this out, Mom decided it was Margee’s knees knocking the wall, not her head. (Mindy and I begged to differ, but Mom insisted. We still think we’re right on this one!)

So, I’m wondering how Mom knew and if she can figure it out for Adam next time she comes in town.

Mom? Mom? Are you reading this???

THUMP! THUMP!

 

Karen

Monday Madness- "It Wasn't THAT Bad?"

Generally, dear readers, we try to keep a light tone here at Macaroni and Chicken Fingers. With everything that life can throw at you, infusing humor in the day is one of the best ways to deal with it. However, after watching a Sunday morning expose, the first of what I am certain will be many on this topic, I cannot keep silent. 


By now, you are probably well aware of the happenings at Penn State. Head of Athletics, Jerry Sandusky has been accused of "inappropriate conduct" with young boys. While the grad student who discovered it reported it to Joe Paterno, who reported it to the higher level administration, where it was not correctly dealt with until an area high school brought forward allegations and blew the cover of Penn State administration. What sickens me is the statement by one of the people in the chain of reporting at Penn State saying,"He grabbed the boy's private area but it wasn't that bad."


SERIOUSLY?!?!?! What kind of man views an older man taking advantage of a child in a sexual manner and says,"It wasn't that bad"? He needs to be slapped. And then some!


Every time I see something on the news about this, I get sick to my stomach. I wonder things like: Was all of Sandusky's charitable work simply to feed his demented appetite? Will I have to wonder that about anyone in my children's community? I mean, my son is prime age for this... ages 9 to 11. How many other boys and families has he done this to that will not come forward? We know of eight, but how many more?


I once sat on the jury of a murder case. A young girl, age 12 at the time of the occurrence, was laying in bed while a teen boy neighbor of the girl's family came into her room. She was asleep and the teen boy made some inappropriate physical contact with her. He did not rape her, not even close. I remember at the time, the prosecuting attorney said,"Yes, he touched her, but it wasn't that bad." Apparently it was bad enough for the girl's brother to wait for that boy to come home and beat him to death. (To be fair, the intent on the brother's part was not murder, but to send a strong message to the boy not to touch his sister again.) What the prosecuting attorney said sickened me then, just as this case sickens me now. And while I know that what that girl's brother did was wrong, I can't say I fault him for it. Yes, I believe strongly in forgiveness, and I work toward it everyday, I believe in consequences as well. Because if that was my boy, you could bet I would be thinking of ways to inflict the most horrific punishment known upon the person who would dare to cross the line. 


Yours, wondering what this whole Penn State thing will come to,


Melissa

Friday Fun- Thank a Vet!

Today being Veteran's Day, I thought I might post the following story:

An international summit meeting was taking place about 10 years ago. Among the people present were heads of state, prime ministers, generals and presidents representing some of the most powerful nations in the world. It was the evening before the actual summit would take place and everyone had gathered for a state dinner party. During the course of conversation, a French general looked directly at a top American general, and speaking rather loudly said," I suppose we will ALL be speaking in English for the entire summit. It's so infuriating. Must we always speak English?"

Before the American general could reply, a top English military man replied,"We speak English at these meetings because the Americans ensured you would not have to speak German for the rest of your life."

Thank you, Veterans, past, present, one and all, for ensuring that I will have the freedoms I so enjoy, especially freedom of speech and the write to speak any language I CHOOSE.

Sincerely Yours,

Melissa

CHIROPRACTORS? WELL, MAYBE…

Let me just say here and now: I DO NOT BELIEVE IN CHIROPRACTORS! I’m not going to be disrespectful and say they are quacks or anything like that, but my past experience with them has been less than positive.

BUT, I am an open minded person (most of the time) and when I recently read an article on how chiropractic care can help with bedwetting, I thought I’d give it a try. (For my son, not me!) Within months, my 10 year old went from wearing Good Nights, and filling them EVERY night, to being completely dry. AMAZING, right?

Then my knee starting hurting me during spin class, so of course my first stop was my doctor, who sent me to an orthopedic surgeon. My x-ray looked fine (beautiful, in fact, for a 40-something year old woman, he said!), so he didn’t want to do anything invasive, especially since it only bothered me during cycling.

So I “hmmm”ed and I “hawwww”ed and finally decided to visit my son’s chiropractor. And guess what? After a few weeks, I can go back to spin class! WOW!!!

Does this mean that I believe that everything can be fixed by adjusting the back? NO WAY! But does this mean that I MIGHT start believing that chiropractors MIGHT know what they’re doing SOME of the time? Well, I’ll give them that much!!!

 

Karen

Monday Madness- YAY for K!

So it's Monday. Pour the coffee!What have you got on your agenda today? Your MUST list? How about your life goal list?In case you're new here at Macaroni and Chicken Fingers, you have to know about Karen's journey to get in shape. Doing it the right way, she exercised and ate right and lost a bunch of weight. She looks FABULOUS!And I do mean fabulous! 


Something else you may not have realized about Karen- she's a giver. Not the kind of person who gives and brags about it. She never makes a show about it or embarrasses people. She just goes about, quietly doing her bits of good wherever she goes. 
Now she's going to get paid for it! YAY! And believe me, that's not the reason why she's doing it. She will tell you that it's because she needs to get out around other people, mainly ADULTS, and she enjoys doing what she'll be doing. She's going to work for Weight Watchers.


But if you know her at all, you'll know she just wants to make a difference in other people's lives. Nothing makes her happier. So she's going to share her health journey and inspire other people to achieve their goals.I love that about her. 


Yours, thinking I want to be like Karen when I grow up,


Melissa

Friday Funny- Excuse Me?

Time for Friday Funny. I have to admit this is a little more on the "I'm glad that's not me at the moment" side. As well as a little on the,"Hmmmmm, I wonder if it's time for a serious conversation?" side. 


The setting: Kitchen, 6:30 AM. It's dark outside. I'm still brewing coffee, meaning that I have not ingested any caffeine whatsoever and am clearly not cognizant enough to handle what comes next.


My two, beautiful, perfectly naive and innocent children are playing with the dog.


The conversation as I was brewing coffee...


Z1 (who, btw, is 10 yrs old): Mom, what are the worst cuss words EVER?


Me (taken aback, because, it IS 6:30 AM and I wasn't really expecting to start my day off with something he had clearly been pondering for a bit): Uhm, well, you probably don't need to know those since they are NEVER coming out of your mouth, right?


Z1: Okay the, could you tell me what the "F" word means?


Me: Honey, you don't need to worry about that right now because even if I explained it, you still won't use it, and you may not understand it when I explain it anyway.


Z2 (who is 8 yrs old) says to Z1: Don't worry Z1. I'll tell you later.


I think it's time for that talk.....


Yours, spending time with my children this weekend,


Melissa

TOOTH FAIRY FAIL!!!

The Tooth Fairy screwed up Monday night, big time! Yes, I know it was Halloween and she was busy, but my son lost his first molar and she FORGOT him. Seriously, how do you overlook a 10 year old boy who lost his first molar? And it was a rough one coming out. It cracked first and came out in pieces. We almost had to go to the dentist for this one. Really, Tooth Fairy?

Luckily, I’m a FABULOUS mom who can explain these things away so my son didn’t feel slighted by her. I explained that on Halloween, a lot of kids eat a lot of candy, and have unfortunate accidents that involve losing teeth. So she has a lot of emergencies to keep up with. It seems that he, having been a scheduled stop, just somehow fell through the cracks.

I would have told him that had it not been Halloween, this wouldn’t have happened, but, well, the thing is, it actually has happened before. A couple of times actually. See, the Tooth Fairy is rather forgetful at our house. I don’t know why. Does she have something against me? Did I do something wrong to her when I was a child? Did I accidently see her?

Whatever the reason, I don’t know why she has to take it out on my kids! Lucky for her, she made up for it last night by not only remembering, but leaving MUCH more money than she usually leaves. I was going to hide out in my son’s room and wait for the Tooth Fairy so I could have a word with her about forgetting him Monday night, but, well, I forgot!

 

Karen