last day of the year

Wishing everyone a happy, stress-free wind down to the holidays this new year's eve. May your 2010 be happy, healthy and may you not lose any teeth unless, of course, they're baby teeth.

dining room update

Currently battling my own personal dementors. Nothing like a little stress for the holiday season no? What December would be complete without it though, honestly? I don't want to elaborate on the soul sucking dementors just need to figure out my own personal patronus, a sea otter would be lovely.

My dining room ceilings have been denuded of stalactites and painted white. I painted the walls a soft fern (nice muted green) on Monday but soft fern looked more like mint chocolate chip ice cream and soft fern on the walls. So I trudged back to Home Depot, where all my money goes lately, and took waaay too many paint chips to looks at what looked best in the dining room light. This can be very difficult because the frontrunner in daylight can quickly lag to last place by evening light. I'm very on top of this since painting my living room a color that I love by daytime but that I abhor by night. I was thinking of sueding the walls, Ralph Lauren specialty finish, because I thought my 100 year old plaster walls could use the equivalent of, I don't know, mederma? fraxel? but none of the suede swatches looked good by evening. So I settled on a nice light beige/grey/with green tints called cotswold breeches or some godforsaken crazy angophilic name like that. Ralph Lauren and his wasp envy. Let me tell you Ralph Lauren's paint blows. Blows I tell you! How can a paint be simultaneously of skim milk like consistency yet get those skins of clotting paint in it. Lovely colors horrible horrible paint. You been forewarned never buy that crap. The only downside is you can't get them to use the Ralph Lauren color formula on Behr paint. They have to color match it and it never winds up matching completely (it's the photo retoucher in me I see the hint of blue that shouldn't be there that made my soft fern not so soft, nice or muted). So I sucked it up and spent 50% more to buy Ralph's beautifully colored crap ass paint. I still need to do the trim, clean the floors, put the furniture back in there and hang some pictures, oh and finally put up some curtains which I haven't had up since (gasp!) July. I'll do the big reveal in a week or two, to build up anticipation for the big day in blogland.

I've included that picture of me, which has nothing to do with the post aside from showing my exhaustion on repainting said dining room, because it's funny how large my lips look in the photo, Angelina Jolie eat your heart out. I think it's the lighting (which is obviously lacking) and the fact my lips are really chapped from the winter weather so probably a good half of my upper lip is really chapped red skin above the lip. It looks better than normal though, maybe I should consider restalyne or perpetually chapping my upper lip.

christmas eve

What am I doing blogging at this hour on Christmas eve? I'm waiting for Owen to go to sleep so I can bring down the presents from the third floor. Poor little Oona is sleeping in my bed, for the fourth night in a row. She's been sick with a cold that this afternoon kicked her butt, she lay on the sofa and at one point this evening just fell asleep on the living room rug. Now it seems her cold finally devolved into an ear infection. It just sucks to be sick when you're a child at Christmas. Well, here's a picture from earlier today when I filled them up on bagels and chocolate milk at Panera. The last picture, where Oona looks like she's been goosed, is what happened when I asked Oona to sit up and open her eyes. We couldn't stop laughing over that picture and she spent the rest of the day walking around with her eyes like large saucers of surprise.

No longer need to really and truly study for, which I was really and truly doing in a half-hearted, procrastinating, what else can I do with my precious free time type of way. I passed! It's all the Christmas present I need. That and for Hugh Laurie to leave his wife, hit show, and move out to Pittsburgh to be with me, hopefully he's handy around the house too.

Remember when I wrote this in my previous post

my mantra is 'it will get better' because, honestly, how much worse could it get?

Well, that was like tempting fate because worse it got. They stuccoed my ceilings. A very sloppy but light application in the bathroom and kitchen. Heavy duty, messy cave-like stalactites in the dining room. I came home from cleaning a home this past friday and was this close to having a breakdown for Christmas. Instead I sent the kids off to my Mom, she's staying at a hotel due to the renovations here, and cleaned my house until one in the morning. I spent a good part of Saturday hopping around like I had ants in my pants, trying to convince myself it wasn't that bad (it was) and then trying to figure out a way to call and have the situation rectified (but they already had their check, they could just blow me off). I called the head drywall guy and left a message that I wanted to talk to him, that's all I said. He called me back and I explained the situation. He had been out most of the week (back issues, how we all collectively suffer from these back issues) and had an assistant do the work at my home. I had never discussed textured ceilings because I just assumed they'd be smooth but the assistant said the ceilings had to be stippled because there was too much bowing of the drywall due to the age of my home and joists that settled unevenly. I was very concerned when I even heard mention of texture on the ceilings. What? I don't want stuccoed ceilings I said I hate that look. Owen's karate teacher, who recommended these guys, told me they stippled his ceilings and it looked very subtle. I don't know I said, what about doing knock down, no the assistant said, that will just emphasize the bowing. I had a very bad feeling about this, especially since the drywall was already up on the ceiling. I didn't think I had time to see Owen's karate teacher's home but we managed to get there and back real quick and yes, his ceilings looked very subtle, not peak like or stucco at all, so I held my breath and said okay to the texture. And, oh boy, did I ever pay a price for it. But when I was on the phone with the head drywall man and explained the situation, he went above and beyond in terms of professionalism. He said he was very sorry that I wasn't pleased with my work and that they would be out Monday morning to correct the problem, sand down those peaks (yes I will have another late night of cleaning). I cannot tell you what a weight (the full weight of my heavily stuccoed dining room ceiling!) was lifted when he was so receptive to my concerns. No defensiveness, no hesitations, totally professional and quick to want to have a satisfied customer. We'll see how it turns out tomorrow. I'm not going to jinx myself by saying anything like this my mantra is 'it will get better' because, honestly, how much worse could it get? because do I really want to see what could be worse than this ceiling?

motivational forgetting

I learned in my Clep book for Human Growth and Development that sometimes repression is called motivational forgetting, which I just love. It seems happier, more active, self help groups could be dedicated towards it. God knows I'd like to channel some motivational fogetting towards erasing the month of December from my mind. And I had the worst dream last night, that I slapped Owen on the face (I've never slapped anyone ever) and it was so hard it left red marks, like a handprint and I wanted to hide it so I wouldn't get in trouble. It was so real and so awful, I woke up feeling spent. My word. Things are beyond panic producing right now, which might explain the dream, my guilt. I don't know that I've been this stressed before, aside from when I was pregnant with Oona and then I was crazy and stressed. Now I'm just normal (which probably qualifies as mildly crazy) and in full on panic mode. My downstairs is beyond disastrous - drywall is going up but Christmas is next week and my kitchen is essentially gutted and I, um, dropped the cabinet above my sink on the faucet and broke the spigot so even the sink is inoperable. Let's see... my Mom came out because my Grandma appeared to be dying once again but either I'm living Peter and the Wolf or my Grandma is a cat with nine lives because she's perking up? without antibiotics? when her breathing sounded like someone sucking on a bong just yesterday? What else, what else. Oh, I'm to take the CLEP next Tuesday, wish me luck because I haven't really and truly been studying that well admist this perfect storm of events all taking place in the holiday season. I could kick myself for being so dumb about the home renovations. But I don't like to do things half way so I kept picking apart at the kitchen, sort of the way you do at a scab when you're a curious, masochistic child, and now it's an angry pus filled wound. Needless to say, I don't have a tree up yet or presents wrapped. So... if you're into schadenfreude by all means enjoy the pictures below while singing it's the most wonderful time of the year to yourself. I do it, glutton for punishment that I am.

my mantra is 'it will get better' because, honestly, how much worse could it get?

you know how anthropologie and other catalogs will pose models next to decrepit plaster walls and it looks so pretty and arty? not so in real life.

dining room. my neighbor, the firefighter, helped fix a last minute leak on the roof over the box window, allowing the drywaller to finish hanging drywall in the room. i need to buy him something special, i'm thinking alcohol, to thank him.

beyond the plastic wrap is ground zero in the house, our living room.

can i recommend getting a man to help take out a toilet and put it by the curb if you have a nice strong man around? good thing i go to a chiropractor for trigger point therapy.

i plan on replacing the small window with one that will fit within the original, larger, frame. but i need to f*cking take a breath first.

in praise of the hula hoop

I never thought I would come across a form of exercise that is so damn enjoyable until I discovered the hula hoop. I bought one about a month ago and it sat in my closet because it is big, too big to do in my bedroom without the hoop hitting the wall, but one night last week I ventured upstairs to my cold, dark, empty 3rd floor and just rocked out with the hula hoop for a half hour. It's weighted which makes it easier to stay up, they say this contributes to an increase in calorie burning too. There's all these claims about the inches you can drop off your waist using the hula hoop for a half hour a few times a week. But you know what? I don't care. It's all about hooping and laughing, because hula hooping makes me laugh a lot. It's odd because it's rather sensual as far as exercises go and connects me to my body in a new way but it's so fun, I guess it changes my preconceived notions regarding sensuality, that it's something serious, because the hula hoop isn't, well it is seriously good fun. Last night I was feeling very antsy and went upstairs to hoop, just for ten minutes to get the steam out of me, well 45 minutes later my shuffle's battery died and that's when I finally stopped. I got my hoop from hoopgirl (I got the reasonably priced power hoop) but this place firegroove sells them too. I love looking at the websites, they're very playful and very west coast. Fire groove also has a bunch of youtube videos, both girls have some enviable taut bodies, by the comments from some of the men I think they're doing something else instead of envying them. So... if you're interested in a super fun cardiovascular exercise and have the room for a hoop I say go for it.

kitchen redo

I don't mean to toot my own horn but I think I should get special props for baking 4 batches of seven layer bars for the school's cookie walk given the current conditions of my kitchen, no?

Another view of the lovely, semi gutted kitchen. It is cold in there. I need to get insulation to put above the drywall ceiling, when it's installed. The drywall guy is supposed to stop by tomorrow morning to check things out and let me know how much this will cost, fingers crossed for a very reasonable price.

The room before Owen's karate teacher stopped by with his sawzall to take down the dropped ceiling frame. He made quick work of taking down that frame and god knows it probably would have taken me all day.

Before version of the kitchen. I'm really hoping it will look much much better once I'm done with everything. right now it looks pretty awful and I'm getting a wee bit discouraged. But just wait until you see my next post with the gutted ceiling dining room. Yes, the only working room on the first floor is currently the living room, taking the name living to a whole other level. I'm sort of having a prolonged panic attack about getting these other rooms as finished as I can by Christmas but I chose to make this mess so I can't really get too bent out of shape by my handiwork? hubris? hallucinatory delusions brought on by shelter magazines?

I feel like I should apologize for my blog turning into 'days of our scarves' because even i'm getting tired of seeing my neck and mouth, if only my cats would model these for me. The reddish stripy one is missoni mohair fabric that I bought in NYC at least fifteen years ago, I'm telling you I knew I'd knit one of these days just didn't know when. The heather grey one is another moss stitch, which I'm addicted to, I want to make a moss stitch hate but I don't know how to make a hat yet. My Grandmother has a cold and, for once, she's not being put on antibiotics so she is sounding horrible. There doesn't seem to be enough air in her lungs to even expel the congestion. But the care managers and hopsice nurses all remark on what a trooper she is and how she's so strong and it's miraculous the way she rallies and I'm not buying it anymore. She has been on this health roller coaster for over a year now and her mind has diminshed even more. It's a fucking tragedy! She is lacking the higher cognitive functioning to be able to make a decision and let go, how is that something to be praised? I think that people who are still mentally sound can make a decision, to some extent, in their death, in terms of knowing it's time; turning away from food and drink, unnecessary procedures. But where she is now they bring her to be fed, slip ensure drinks in her if she misses a meal and she spends the rest of her day asleep in bed; her color is remarkable, she still has a pink blush to her cheeks even if her skin is so thin it flakes off quite a bit. I never realized just how angry and sad I could feel simultaneously. Years ago I saw a bird suffering and picked it up from the train tracks then brought it to the grass and killed it with a stone (and this story wooed my husband, maybe that shows things were just destined to go south in our relationship, I don't know). I feel like I was more charitable to the bird than my Grandma right now, it's horrible to see her like this and I feel so incredibly helpless. I keep praying that she'll die before this week is over (that prayer wasn't answered) or before my birthday (which is wednesday) at the absolute very latest that she'll die before I start nursing school because then it will become much harder for me to go see her. It does make me feel evil in a way to wish someone I love would die, it's definitely selfish and terribly judgemental but it's also unbearable to see a vestige of my Grandmother linger so.

red belt

This is going to be a short post because, well, I took down the ceiling in the dining room (yeah, I get to find even more knob and tube wiring - lucky me) but my computer is now on my bedroom floor and it is really hard to type sitting with my legs criss cross applesauce. I spent two hours last night trying to remove the sticky big gap filler from my hands (yes you are supposed to wear gloves). I got slimed when I cut into a piece of the foam, which I thought had dried. I basically flayed the flesh off my fingers with repeated bouts of goo gone, nail polish remover, baby oil and heavy duty hand cleanser all with a nail brush - my hands are still probably highly flammable from all that crap. I will never not wear gloves again, my lesson has been learned. Oh, but when will I learn my lesson about taking down ceilings...
So Owen got a red belt tonight, here he is breaking his board, he could have done it with his head but chose the more sedate elbow strike
Let's hear it for the boy! Oona clearly worships her brother and was cheering him on when she wasn't telling people that Owen was her big brother.
Owen gets his belt
Oona also found a new best friend in A-. When we left she was screaming her name like Stanley Kowalski screams 'Stella' inStreetcar Named Desire. Little A- is french and unbelieavably adorable, they played very well together during the belt testing - thank God!

lemongrass scarf

Here's the moss stitch scarf that I finished last night. I love the acidic green of this yarn, it's lion wool-ease thick & quick in lemongrass. Obviously I'm getting most of my yarn from Joann fabrics at this point. I'll read about all these exotic skeins that people write about on other craft blogs, it all sounds so lovely but with my newbie knitting skills and wee small portion of my income being disposable, I figure I'll stick to the cheap yarn until I feel skilled enough to branch out to the hard core, expensive knitting yarn. Although anything with wool seems to drive my neck crazy which is problematic in terms of me enjoying what I've knitted, oh dear. The moss stitch was easy enough to figure out how to do especially after viewing a couple different youtube videos, one was very helpful in recommending having an odd number cast on so you don't have to figure out whether to knit or purl for each row. I like knitting where the thinking is minimal. But my Mom would like a more lacey shawl type thing so I think I'm going to have to start counting stitches and paying more attention with the knitting, at least for whatever I make her for Christmas. Can anyone recommend a relatively easy lace stitch and/or shawl pattern? Hope everyone has an enjoyable weekend, I'll be panicking about how I'll manage Thanksgiving of me and the kids when I don't really enjoy cooking and the kids don't really enjoy eating. What to do what to do...

Here's a peek of scarf number 6 in my knitting madness of late. It's a boucle type yarn (by Bernat, courtesy of Joann fabrics) that is so so soft and itch free. The scarves I made with homespun yarn scratch me to much so I gave one to my therapist, she remarked on how lovely the color of the yarn was, hopefully she wasn't just being nice. God knows I owe her much more than a scarf worth of thanks, she's been super helpful in helping me adjust how I look at things, especially myself. Thanks to Kristi's envy inducing post I already learned the moss stitch, via youtube. I hope to have my moss stitch scarf completed by this evening, will post a pic when it's done.

In a venture I'm still questioning my sanity on... I signed myself up for match.com. Oh my. It's like high school all over again. It's a bit of a social experiment for me. I am pathologically shy and unflirtatious in the 'real world' so we'll see how I fare in this virtual circus. I'm not even sure that I'm ready to date at this point, it's more to see what is out there. It's scary, so far the person whose profile interested me the most was a girl who winked at me from Far Rockaway New York. She probably just winked as a joke but I winked back because she's one of the few who can spell and use grammar correctly, actually reads books (gasp!) and she looked cute, much cuter than 99% of the men who have winked at me. And let me tell you, some of the people on this site are downright sleazy here are three emails I received from one guy, I use the term loosely

1. hi can u text me a picture of your self? (sic)

2. are you real??? lol

3. hi what part of city you in?

my response

Hi,

I'm not texting pictures to people who won't put a picture of themselves up here, but there are photos of me online now so the point is probably moot. In reference to whether I'm for real? Um, I don't really know how to answer that, in what respect do you mean? If you write back with a photo and something of substance I'm more than happy to have a conversation but I've got to tell you the notes you've written so far are really close to demeaning.

And this asshole's response was 'some people just don't know how to have fun'. Yeah. So as I say, it's high school all over again.

sunshine

My daughter is trying to seduce me, and it's working. She turned a corner with her fourth birthday. She's much more even keeled and doesn't throw nearly as many temper tantrums. She'll still get upset about things and whine but it's a minor blip compared to the flare ups she used to have where she'd shriek in a way that must have instantly spiked my blood pressure to imminent stroke levels. But I road it out, miraculously enough, and she's still strong willed but so much more manageable. Now it's Owen that's throwing mouthy comments my way, sulking or stomping off when he feels I've wronged him, although he never gets far since he won't go upstairs without me or his sister also being up there. Of course it would work this way, when one's nice I'm on the other's shit list. Driving to karate this evening Owen was pouting because I said no tv for the night after he breathed on my sideview mirror and put yet another happy face on it. I sound like such a bitch, I know. But I've asked him not to do this at least half a dozen times, one of which was 45 minutes earlier when we were entering the gym. So he stared off in his back seat while Oona sang a song she made up, she's always making up songs.

I love you Mom
I love you Mom
You're my best friend
I love you Mom

I turned around to thank her for singing such a sweet song to me and then she started to sing You Are My Sunshine but put Mommy in for Sunshine. I told her I was going to cry that was such a sweet thing of her to do and then I had to explain what I meant because she couldn't get how I'd be happy and want to cry. Once we got to karate she did act up a bit; little fits, trying to get things out of my purse, she caught my neck zipping up my jacket, it's hard not to act upsitting for 45 minutes while her brother practices. But after her bath I read her a story and snuggle bunny (our term for cuddling) with her for a few minutes, and she falls asleep within five minutes. I know I can't get my hopes up too high, she's yet to hit her teen years but she's so so nice to be with right now. I'm just enjoying this sweet stage she's in.

sidelined

Well my career of cleaning houses has hit a rough patch. I seem to have a pinched nerve in my neck, at least that's the only explanation I've got for the pain from my ear to wrist along with the various aches along the right side of my back and the fact that my hands go numb at night. I saw a doctor yesterday, with the kids since they were off for Veteran's Day, what fun. And I got an X-ray of my cervical spine. So I'm supposed to take it easy and pop 800mg of ibuprofen and if I don't improve by next week I can start physical therapy - yeah! Nothing like squelching my source of additional income with an injury that will probably negate any money I made after the co-pays for all the doctors visits are paid for.

One thing I omitted on the previous post was that the woman who gave me the massage last week apologized for it taking a while to schedule an appointment with her. Apparently she had had three clients die within the past week. When she told me this my initial thought was, do I really want hands that seem to be a harbinger of death on my body? But then I swatted that superstitious thought away, I was just being silly. Now I'm not so sure. My entire right side, above my hips, is in pain. I've been dealing with some other pain too though. My Dad came to visit me last week and, though it was wonderful to see him, I think Jabba the hut is more active. Okay, that might not be fair, I picked him up from the bus stop and he was easily winded, he's having problems with his left lung and was supposed to get a chest cat scan this week.

But he stayed for five days and at this point in my life, which is more than a little stressful, if you can't help me out at all when you visit (okay he did do a few loads of laundry but that includes his own stuff) I can't handle the additional stress. I had driven to Home Depot for 15 minutes and in that space of time Oona took my knitting off the needles (I make it a point of impaling them into my ball of yarn), dumped the contents of my purse and drew cat whiskers on her face with my lipstick. When I came in my Dad was oblivious to this, which happened in the living room where he was sitting not 5 feet away from her. He would go up the street every morning to the Rite Aid where he'd pick up couple papers and spend the day on the crossword puzzles, followed by suduko and then he would read while I did my daily beheaded chicken dance of the beleaguered mom. I asked my Dad if he could leave a day early so I could gut my kitchen ceiling, yes I am insane. He did and we had a lovely last night out for dinner where he paid. I was going to treat him for his birthday but he insisted on paying, he'd come into money since winning in fantasy baseball - woohoo!

What am I doing up so late, again?! I've got to pop some mega ibuprofen, get to bed and hope I don't wake up feeling like elves have pummeled my back and torso during the night.

bite your tongue

I was all set to write a post about this woman I got a massage from yesterday, who is a little out there but her massages are incredible, truly. And she'll offer little plums of wisdom while working on knots, like the huge one lodged in my right tmj area (I can't wear my bite guard anymore because I've ground it into a serrated knife that hurts my tongue when I wear it, in seven months time) You're holding back on saying things tell me about it I managed to say. Oh. My. God. I'm a flipping people pleaser, I've held my tongue so many times I think it's why The Namesake appealed to me so much as a book because I could understand the characters so well, especially Moushumi Mazoomdar when she described her obedient, bookish, desperately lonely years in college. She had harbored lengthy infatuations, with students with whom she never spoke, with professors and TAs. In her mind she would have relationships with these men, structuring her days around chance meetings in the library, or a conversation during office hours, or the one class she and a fellow student shared, so that even now she associated a particular year of college with the man or boy she had silently, faithfully, absurdly, desired. I'm like that now but my imaginary conversations can be much more pedestrian, like just talking to people instead of being this mute dork who panics around men. I don't even need to be romantically interested, although that ups the dork factor exponentially, I just am a complete silent spaz around the opposite sex from ages 18 to 55. But I digress, I wanted to sing the praises of the masseuse but dropping the kids off at school today I bent over to help Oona out of her seatbelt and whacked my head against the car. I don't know how I managed this, it was like I suddenly was half a foot taller or unable to negotiate my body space with a coffee mug in my hand. I think I might have gotten a small concussion, I definitely have a bump (fortunately just where the hairline starts) but the worst was I wrenched my neck backward and any residual body yumminess from the massage just blew away with that blow to the head. Ugh. Oona is such a dear though, when she saw that I hurt myself she got all worried, making little whimpering sounds as she wrapped her arms around my legs hugging me. She can't bear to see those close to her in any pain, physical or otherwise.

So the bump might have affected me more than I know because this post isn't really following a coherent thought. As long as I don't wake up to find what I've typed to be illegible though I figure I'm okay. Here is documentation, as if you needed any, of my compulsive nature. Two weeks into knitting five scarves down.
Scarf prototype. I had this yarn for twelve years, it's a good colored scarf for the fall/halloween season.
I made this one for Oona, although she doesn't seem particularly interested in wearing it, which is okay because I remember some John Cheever short story about a girl wearing a scarf who is killed when it gets caught in the t-bar skiing, I think that's how it goes I read that story in college, gulp, probably twenty years ago!

I've had enough of my face. I like this green but I think I'm going to have to start making cashmere scarves, my skin is so sensitive my neck is getting really itchy from these soft wool blends. No real surprise, when I exercise after having gone a few days without my skin will itch (I can't believe some people can get anaphylaxis from this, yikes)

And here's a blue blend, double strand, chunky yarn and fat needles are the way to go for knitting newbies. This scarf was done in three hours.

This orange blend is just like the blue one above it (and you can see it hanging out as a skien in the loden picture). Lion brand homespun yarn from Joann, no frills. This photo doesn't do the many beautiful color variations in the scarf justice. I got some beautiful pale blue alpaca and another super soft (hopefully not itch inducing) wool in this lovely heathered wine color,This Christmas will be the year of the scarf, and I got a crochet hook because I really really want to be able to make afghans, Christmas 2010 might be the year of the afghan. Pittsburgh winters are cold and I'd rather have a bunch of pretty afghans than a bunch of snuggies for all. Okay now I really need to stop procrastinating and start studying for this Clep test. The academic monkey on my back, I need this done before my birthday (5 weeks give or take).

happy halloween

Oona was a kitty once again but instead of being bad princess kitty (what she deemed last year's cat costume which had a shredded Stevie Nicks type gauze skirt) she was pretty kitty, the costume was a bit racy for a 2 - 4 year old with a pink collar that had a heart shaped tag with Meow in script, but Oona doesn't do collars. She doesn't usually do barrettes, headbands or masks of any type, the kitty ears stayed on for about a half hour which is very good for Oona.

Unfortunately this was shot at a party we went to on Friday. It was a great party; my friend went all out with the food, decor, everything. But Oona still seemed rundown by her flu. She wasn't the perkiest cat & kept asking to go home (when she wasn't taking her hands out of her underwear to grab apple slices. My hygenic daughter, coughs in her elbow when she doesn't have her hands on her butt) so we were one of the first to leave, at 7. And she was still not feeling well for Halloween. Toby took her to a few houses but she just wanted to come home and lie on the couch. Her eyes get very glassy and sort of hangdog looking when she's sick, poor thing. Oona likes to snuggle when she's healthy, she's very huggy and kissy, but when she's sick she snuggles even more. She acts like my cat, Sam, trying to get on my lap whenever I sit down. Thank God my kids are affectionate snugglers. I love that I can hug and kiss them with abandon. But Toby called me earlier this evening to tell me that Oona is running a fever again, I hate when my kids are not well.

H- made a headstone for Owen and a couple other lucky friends. He had an awesome wolfman costume on. My friend's got a rope swing in her backyard, that was the hit of the party for the kids, you should have seen the line for it. But that swing can make my anxiety go into overdrive, what doesn't really? I went on it over the summer and the combination of the swing with the slope of the backyard, you can get some major height on that thing and I'm always holding my breath when I see Owen fiercely clutching the rope with both hands, saying 'woohoo' in a tight voice, like he's as adventurous as H- when clearly the kid got my anxiety genes.

Candy please. Let me tell you when I found Owen and told him we had to leave the party early because his sister wasn't feeling well he was not a happy camper. He had a mini moody tantrum but I stood firm. I've got to be on him with his recent hissy fits. I don't yell but I'm not backing down and I'm making it clear that the behavior is unacceptable, hopefully drilling this into him will be a good preventative from any teenage moodiness - I can hope. Fortunately, after his bath he was happy to have me lie next to him in bed while we read My Father's Dragon.

Hope everyones Halloween was happy & healthy!

catastrophic thinking: pencil impalement

Oona got this in a gift bag from a birthday party awhile ago. I was holding off on letting her use it because I was thinking it looked like the graphite equivalent of a syringe. Okay, now I realize it's not as long as a typical syringe but that pencil tip looks pretty darn pointy to me, maybe the pencil equivalent of the epipen? And with the way my children fight in my presence, which is especially difficult for me since I'm an only child and have trouble knowing what's typical and what's not, I don't want to make a trip to the ER with the pencil tip impaled in some body part.

sick

My Mom came out to visit last week and she wound up rearranging her flight back because Owen & Oona both got struck down by the swine flu. I was so grateful I could have cried, yeah Mom! I had 3 houses to clean this week but the one lined up for tomorrow has been rescheduled since the woman is pregnant, I emailed her about my sick kids because I didn't want to be the swine version of typhoid Mary, so we're on for next Tuesday unless I suddenly get sick. Cleaning these house I realize that if I was to describe myself in one word it would probably be fixer. I love to fix things, try to make things better, it probably explains why I'm going into nursing and my compulsion to learn things, so I can know how to fix it myself. I cleaned for this older Mother and son on Tuesday, the son smokes A LOT, when I walk in I feel like I'm entering a bar. But they are so nice and the Mom is so darn grateful for the work I do, she said I was a superb cleaner and worth every darn penny. She was about to hug me when I left but just squeezed my shoulder instead. I would have hugged her but she has fibromyalgia and I didn't want to hurt her. Oh, my heart swelled. I think how genuinely grateful I am for when I get positive feedback from the people I clean for. Yeah, I'm not changing the world but I'm happy that they're happy and it's much better than being in some corporate job where professional relations can make getting positive feedback so, well, weird and stressful and bureaucratic -ugh!

Owen has been back in school since Wednesday (he was putting his books away in his locker and a classmate ran over and gave him a hug, awww) and I think Oona can go back tomorrow but even with my Mom's help those two have sucked the life out of me. They're over their illness but still sort of tired and whiny and add to it my Mom being here, does anyone else's children act up when extended family is visiting? Last night Toby stopped over while we carved Funkins (I had such high expectations but the funkins aren't so fun) Owen flippped out over having to finish his homework; he ran into a corner and said he was going to strangle himself as he placed the back of a chair against his throat. I was like, is he being overdramatic? or genuinely experiencing suicidal ideation at 7? or is he really that fed up with grammar homework? I feel so ill equipped to handle their meltdowns, and they act up so much with me. Everyone will say they're fine until I walk into the room. I don't know you here the palaver about how kids let loose with those they can trust the most but then I often wonder if I have some bizarre malevolent force the unleashes the inner Chucky in my children. When I picked him up at school today he was great, until we walked in the front door; then he was alternately railing at me for being the worst Mom ever, whining for my help and bawling over the slightest provocation. I took an hour nap just to recover.

hooked

Or maybe I should say needled? I guess the hooked title might be more appropriate if I'd just learned to crochet, which I would love to know how to do. As it is I invited some friends over for beer, cheese and knitting on Sunday and learned the basics of how to knit. Monday I went online and found a youtube video to figure out how to cast on and this is what I've managed to do since Monday. I have had this yarn lying around forever, seriously it has a price tag with a date stamp that says 05/97. It wouldn't be my first choice in colors for a scarf but I figured this is my scarf protoype and once I feel good with my newbie knitting skills I can graduate to the prettier yarn that I just purchased. I should not have started knitting when there's so many half finished projects in my house but, oh well, it's too late now, I've succumbed to the addiction that is knitting.