conscious

I have too much to do, so I'll get straight to the point.  You know how when you have heavy duty work to do - like painting, gardening, potty training, you put on your "work clothes?"  And then you take a shower and put on something less grubby?  The tricky thing about being a mom is that you're always at work.  I wake up in the morning, look at my limited wardrobe, and instead of maybe that red blouse with the buttons down the front, I always pick old pants and tee shirts.  I consider for a brief moment - something that looks less grubby, something that might even make me NOT look like a crazy drifter - but there's just no point.  The second I put those clothes on, I'm heading downstairs and on the clock, where I'm constantly on the floor, getting spewed with all forms of liquids and solids and sometimes worse.  Even if I had nice day-to-day clothes, I couldn't wear them because they'd get destroyed.  I get to put on a skirt on Sundays, but I have to take into account the fact that I'll be wrestling the kids, so I haven't worn any jewelry in.... I can't even tell you the last time I wore any.

I think about the phrase "letting yourself go" when I look in the mirror, but I have to tell myself that I'm showered and my kids are getting some seriously fine parenting.  I put on makeup the other day for Halloween and couldn't figure out what to do with the eyeliner.  I was never very good at it, but it seriously took me 20 minutes.  To draw 2 lines.  On my face.  And did you know makeup has expiration dates?  I just found out!  I don't have a single bit of eye makeup purchased in this decade.  Wait, except for mascara.  I got that going for me.  But I haven't gotten a haircut (besides the husband chopping off a chunk in the backyard a few weeks ago) or color in over a year and I don't even want to because it'll just be another year until I'll have time to do it again and there's a good chance at least one of the kids will need braces, so that's at least $200 a year saved, right?  Go me!

I can't decide if I'm venting or convincing myself there is a higher reason behind not-so-slowly turning into a cliche.  But this is what goes through my mind when I get ready in the morning:  Work clothes or I'm-Still-A-Woman clothes?

And every day, I make a conscious decision.  Every single day, I choose the t-shirt. My energy and money might shift back to me someday - but by then my kids will all have 17 college degrees, a few Nobel prizes, at least one Van Cliburn prize and can buy me a stylist who lives in my closet and makes me look fabulous every day.

I can wait.

durn it

DAGNABIT.  I missed yesterday.  ARG.  We had family in town and I was crazy busy trying to reign in the screaming.  I can't believe I missed!  Gah.  Here, enjoy this incredibly disturbing picture of a cat:

Here's a palate cleanser:

 Phew.  That's all I have for today, folks.  Tomorrow is where I get back to deep introspection and philosophizing.

WAIT - I do have one interesting thing that happened today.  The Dude and I took a walk to deliver some medicine to a sick friend and while we were walking back I was pointing out all the beautiful things in the world around us - the crunchy leaves, the green grass - and he commented: "It's the earth.  We live on earth!"

"Yes," I said.  "I love the earth."

"I love Jupiter," he said.

"Huh?  Why do you love Jupiter?"

"Because it's HUMONGOUS!!"

Tomorrow I'll make it up to you.  Probably.

sew cool

I'm about to have 4 female nieces under the age of 7 up in here for the weekend, so I have to make this quick. I actually got a topic request (thank you!) for my latest sewing/style creations and I don't have any pictures of those on my phone, but I do have this:

That's a Yoda costume I made for Thing 3!!  Eat your heart out George Lucas!!  Sadly I haven't gotten a great shot of him in it, but here's a snap of the rest of the crew Halloween night (WG had gotten sick of having buns at that point):

I sewed both robe/cloak things!  And I did make two of those humans, so that counts too. I so crafty!

brain order

I read about a study done in 2007 that found oldest siblings have higher IQs.  There's a lot of interesting points in the article, and as the wife of the smartest person I know (who also happens to be an eldest) I don't discount it.  There were lots of interesting things mentioned, such as:

One possibility, proposed by the psychologist Robert Zajonc, is that older siblings consolidate and organize their knowledge in their natural roles as tutors to junior. These lessons, in short, benefit the teacher more than the student.
Another potential explanation concerns how siblings find a niche in the family. Some studies find that both the older and younger siblings tend to describe the firstborn as more disciplined, responsible, high-achieving. Studies suggest — and parents know from experience — that to distinguish themselves, younger siblings often develop other skills, like social charm, a good curveball, mastery of the electric bass, acting skills.
....Firstborns have won more Nobel Prizes in science than younger siblings, but often by advancing current understanding, rather than overturning it.

All good stuff.  But this has been irking me and bugging my brain lately.  And it's not because I'm a 3rd child and feeling defensive about my own traits - because I freely acknowledge I am not the sharpest crayon in my family, and the data makes a lot of good points.

I'm irked as a mother... like, if my other children are going to have lower IQs, why try?  I'm destined to fail?  It doesn't help that my eldest is far smarter than I am.  They put her a grade ahead, and I have always been trailing the pack.  But what gets me is this:

The Dude had a speech delay, and has proven to be an incredibly unique human from the get-go.  When we were finding out all the things that made him tick through therapy and prayer*, I was told by more than one friend (read:non-professional) source that he wasn't talking as young as WonderGirl had because I'd simply spent more time and energy with her.  And that hurt - it still hurts, and is just untrue.  WG is brilliant, but because of who she is, not anything I did.  I spent the majority of the first 2 years of her life sobbing on the couch while she watched hours of PBS kids.  A few times sobbing on the kitchen floor.  You get the point.  The fact she is as bright as she is is a miracle of biology, not environment.

So she's a freakin' genius, but I really hate it when people assume it's because she was given more than her siblings.  I was doing some looking back on things, and found the Dude was reading a year before she was, and even sooner on the violin and piano.  And you guys, he is a really, really good little pianist.  It's freaking me out a little bit.  The truth is, the Dude simply got a better mother early on the WG did.  And I watch Thing 3 watching the Dude's piano and violin lessons with this laser beam of attention.  He's a Suzuki sibling dream!

Not that this was much of a rant, but /rant.

* by the way, the Dude has caught up verbally. And WON'T. STOP.

yo. lo.

We're still in the single digits of this NaBloPoMo and I've run out of things to say. In over 13 years of blogging, I don't think this has ever happened. My daily life is just not as interesting as it was back in the day. Oh, it's waaaaaay better, but it's more in the "you had to have been there" category.

So I went digging I the archives to see that I used to write about, and found this gem from March 2002: 

Okay, I need answers people.Last night at 12:44am I got a message on my voice mail from a male at a blocked number that went kind of like this:"REVA, THIS IS THE ALMIGHTY GOD SPEAKING. I WAS JUST CALLING YOU TO SAY - WHAT ARE YOU THINKING??? CALL ME BACK, BYE."I've called several people that it might have been, but out of the men in my life that would call after midnight, I haven't found the person yet. It gave me a nice giggle. I'll play the message for you if you want - it's hilarious. If not a tad creepy.

See?  The nuttiest thing that happened around here lately was last night when WonderGirl and her daddy were doing done science experiments in the kitchen and I hear her exclaim "Daddy, that's a capillary action!"
I still don't understand what that is, and both of them tried to explain it to me. Apparently she'd learned about it in a science class. Which is awesome and all, except when you realize that 3 weeks ago in first grade she had assignments where she had to circle the pictures that started with a k - and then this in 2nd grade - she's having a ball, but I'm officially useless to her in homework help already. She's SEVEN. Gahhhhhh. 
Can they please test her in something I have a slight chance in understanding?  Concerto structure, perhaps??

PS - help me out here, people!  Anyone have a topic you want me to cover??  Help me get the creative juices flowin'?? Also, can you believe I've used 5 sentences in a row that end with question marks????

quick!

I don't have a laptop, the kids are going to be home in a bit, the baby is asleep and I have approximately 15 minutes of alone time. So I'm going to hide under the covers and watch half a hulu plus show, and blog the first pictures my phone would spit out. 

I do believe my priorities are in the right place. 

blaaahhhg

That's me, circa 2007 with my one human.  And then I wrought this on humanity:

Oh.... the humanity...

A few weeks ago, the husband gave a ride to some folks from church and they were surprised/shocked/freaked out to hear the radio station in the car - it was a normal rock station, heck, a mild one at that, but they were new to the church and were like - "Bishops listen to rock music??"  It was pretty funny.  Especially if you know the husband.  I can't resist sharing this pre-shackled husband pic:

The caption is there because I used that on the treblemaker blog and I'm not sure where I put the original, but let's focus on the crazed bass player pose there.  Niiiice.  I was thinking of that when I snapped this pic at that 80s party last week and put it on instagram. 

I call it "Axl Rose is not amused."

And to make things fair and wrap this up, here's what I was doing in the 90s:

I'm on the right.  But oh, so wrong...

sunday's warriors

All hail Sunday!  

About 6 years ago when we were living in ATL and had a baby WonderGirl, there were a one or two Sundays a month where the husband had early meetings and I was left to get myself and the baby ready for church at 9:30. If his meeting got out early enough, he'd call to check up on me and see how I was doing. Sometimes when I was exceptionally overwhelmed, he would run home quickly and help gather things up and take us to church. Where we would sit in a row with his parents - 4 adults and one WG. Pretty even odds, actually. 

I thought about that briefly this morning while I ran around the house trying to round up this circus and get out of the door for church.  I sniggered. Oh, silly new-mommy Reva. One child?  9:30?  Helpful grandparents?  Ha, I say.  I haven't taken the same car to church with the husband in 4 years. Heck, I haven't sat with him in church for 2, and there are no sainted grandparents nearby. 

I know there are people out there who could totally show me up. But I'm not thinking about them. I AM sniggering at the Reva who struggled to get a baby and herself ready for church, where there were family members with available arms to help out. 

And you know what?  This isn't even as nutty as when we both had 7:30am meetings and still had to take 2 different cars. 

Here's to the Sunday Warriors!

ME,ME,ME.

Day 2 of NaBloPoMo.  Digging...

Actually I went back in my blog for a few months to see if I could find a post that didn't revolve around the kids, and I finally gave up.  I'm not knocking this mothering gig at all, but they say we're supposed to not loose ourselves or something.  Keep wearing makeup?  Heck, I don't know.  But this is MY blog and I've been blogging for over 12 years now so I should probably keep to the main theme that is ME,ME,ME, yes?  At least attempt to post something that shows deep down, I am still a female human who can function outside of my role as Supreme Leader over the humans I created.

Yep... yep...

I, um...

There was this thing...

I got nothin'.  I am officially lame.  The best description of my life is this:

... just waiting for the humans in my life to come back.  And also trying to keep the baby from .... wait, nope, ME,ME,ME theme here.  Just me, waiting for humans.  And then going bonkers.

WAIT!  Here's a picture of not-the-kids.  Halloween me:

I don't do my hairs ever, but I did stick snakes in them in an attempt to be festive.  AND DEADLY.

OH - and then there was this last week:

We went to an 80s party and I was the lamest person there.  Even the husband made me look lame because he wore vinyl pants.  MY vinyl pants.  That will almost certainly never fit on these birthin' hips again.  GAH.  Seriously, most of the dudes wore wigs, the girls were spackled to perfection, there was awesomeness everywhere and the only cool I brought was that I still own a crimping iron.  Which was too subtle, and now that I type it out sounds mega lame too.  GAH SQUARED.

But hey, look, a post that reflects the true essence of blogging, ME,ME,ME!!!  I'm going to go reward myself with a cookie.  If the mini humans don't catch me, that is.

buns of destiny

Did I mention the husband introduced Star Wars to the kids and then they loved it and decided they wanted to dress in Star Wars costumes for Halloween and then the library did a Star Wars day a month before that so we got the costumes all ready for that completely with homemade light sabers by the husband and then the kids ended up on the cover of the newspaper?

So the kids dressed up for the church Trunk or Treat Wednesday in the same garb, and then again for the school parties on Thursday.  I'd done WonderGirl's hair up in Leia form for all the other stuff, and she asked for it again, but after I dropped her off at school Thursday, I started to panic.  What if there was a rule against large, distracting side buns?  What if the teacher got annoyed that I'd done it - since they weren't supposed to don costumes until after lunch and maybe the other kids couldn't concentrate because of her hair and then the teacher doesn't say anything to me about it but just gives me this look that says "nuuuuu uhhhhh"??

When I go to drop the Dude off for afternoon 4K, she has recess so she'll run up tot he car and we'll chat as I walk into the school.  I couldn't wait to see her and find out if I'd ruined her life.  She came running up to me with a big grin and told me about the stuff she'd done in class that morning.  And how no teacher had given her hair a second look.  PHEW.

But as I walked away a bit and turned to go into the school, I saw a girl run up to WG and ask loudly who she was trying to look like.  My stomach sank.  This girl was in her class last year and I'd gone in to help every week, and knew this girl was a Mean Girl.  She pushed people out of the way, bragged incessantly and always looked for a way to make sure people knew she was better than them.  She'd started the year out by excluding WG and I was glad WG had moved up a grade so she wouldn't be in the same one as this girl.  I was also glad WG was getting a better education, connecting with peers and was happy, but hey -  that was a side perk.  

Anywho, when I saw this girl run up to WG, I almost ran over to deflect her and shoo her off.  We'd talked a lot about how to handle mean girls, but that doesn't mean a mom wants to see her kid go through it, right?  But I held back for a second and watched as WG smiled, posed and asked her confidently who she thought she was supposed to be.  I couldn't stand there to see what happened next, but I spent the rest of the afternoon in knots, wondering how things turned out, but heartened by WG's confidence.

When I picked her up, I tried to act nonchalant when I asked her what had happened next. "Oh, I had to give her some clues but she figured it out."

"And then..?"

She shrugged.  "I walked away.  I knew the next thing she'd say would probably be not-so-nice and I don't need to be around that."

I fist pumped internally.  And then a little again today when I saw this girl and a small group of followers pushing another kid around, while mine was playing in another part of the playground, not needing to put anyone else down.

I really dig my kids.

see you soon. maybe.

3 days until November and NaBloPoMo, which after 7 years, has started to become the month I make up for being a cruddy blogger.  In my defense, I haven't just dropped the ball on blogging, but just about everything else too.  My house is in complete ruins all the time, my meals have actually gotten worse and I look like a crazy cat lady.  But dagnablt, the kids are on time to school every day, read far above their age level and both play violin and piano - and the baby is a giggling, vomit-covered mess.  In one piece, even!  It should feel really good that I'm taking care of the important things but the constant chaos is makes me a bipolar mess.  YAY I'M A GOOD MOM!  ugh everything is a mess I'm the worst human being ever. YAY THE DUDE CAN DRAW A QUARTER NOTE!  I want to burn this house down because I can't figure out where to put this sack of wires and electrical switches.  It's a little exhausting.

Anywho, so WonderGirl is now a 2nd grader.  Her previous 1st grade spelling words came home and the 4 year old Dude was able to do her homework.  The words included AT, WHAT, HERE.  Yeah.  So she came home with her 2nd grade list this week and the words included INTERESTED, EXERCISE, PROLONG and COMPREHEND.  You'd better believe I was panicking.  I know she's up to it, but I didn't realize there would be such a steep upgrade and I can't spell exercise.  I had to have spell check fix that BOTH times I typed it.  

Her teacher calmed me down and informed me this was not average 2nd grader words, but words that are just right for WG. PHEW.  I genuinely hope she's as smart as the test scores say because there is no way I'll be able to help her with her homework by next month.  Maybe week.