Our Normal

We have a new tradition in our house.

It's not necessarily about family in the broader sense like so many other people this time of year, but our family.  We live 800 miles away from the rest of our family and refuse to trek to Chicago for the week. It is ours, it is our girls.

It is a little bit maddening.

We've come to the realization that we need to do something, ANYTHING, to get us out house when the rest of America tucks away into itself. And so, we started a Christmas Eve trip tradition, and went to Hershey Park.  Bet you didn't know they were open in the middle of winter, huh? Let me tell you, they are and it is awesome.

Hershey's Christmas Candylane is a must on our holiday agenda now. At least until the girls out grow the type of ride that can function in the middle of winter.

But really, does anybody really outgrow Peanut Butter Cups?

Pine Trees and Coco Beans

It's tradition. Every year, the weekend after Thanksgiving, we go hunt for our White Pine.

It has to be a White Pine.

For some reason, it never goes smoothly though. Grace is five this year. This is the first year that she hasn't had some sort of fit during our Christmas tree expedition. Clare decided to pick up the reins though. So we tromped through the forest wooded lot, back to where our trees were hidden, to find a perfect one.

All a while Clare screamed while mist from her mouth from the frigid air, and snot ran down her face. We persevered though, and found the tree.

After the half mile hike back into civilization we wiped noses, dried tears and bought hot chocolates. And everyone was happy again, because chocolate makes everything better.

Pictures are Deceiving

By the pictures, we had a wonderful weekend away.

There were blue skies and a sparkling lake.

Matt was able to show the girls how daddy rode up the worst road known to man.

They touched his brick for the effort in last years Savageman.

BUT

What the pictures don't show is the fact that Clare was on another tear again this weekend. The three hour drive from Baltimore to Deep Creek alone had us rethinking our weekend plans. By the time early evening rolled around, I was using my phone to see if I could rent a car to drive back home with the girls that very night.

What there are no pictures of is the fact that I was walking, seething with rage over temper-tantrums, small town rental car hours and slow 3G connections on my iPhone, and playing with my phone instead of looking where I was going. Or that I am a clutz and I always look down while walking on uneven terrain.

There are no pictures of my fall down a few rustic, nature preserve stairs, when I insisted I was fine to finish the walk down to Matt's bike drop off, or when my vision went white and I was .this.close. to fainting so I made Matt move road blocks to come pick me up in the car.

There could be pictures of the fact that my right foot is still swollen to about double it's normal size and turning the most delightful shades of purple, black and blue, but it is so grotesque, I will spare you that visual.

There are no pictures of the fact that it meant that I couldn't attend the triathlon the we had driven 3 hours to watch and cheer at. That attitudes did not improve, adults included, in our 2.5 days away.

Honestly, the best part of the weekend? The drive home.

We are headed to Chicago tomorrow. Wish us luck, and maybe send a prayer or two our way.

Blue Skies and Green Fields

We always start off with good intent.

"Let's do something new this weekend! My friend does equestrian stuff, let's take the girls to go watch," Matt said.

The day was beautiful, the weather perfect.

What we fell a little short on though was behavior. Oh my goodness are we going through a phase. And apparently, horses don't like phases. Who knew? I thought we would be outside in a big grassy field with lots of sunshine and fresh air and space for the girls to exhaust themselves.

The folks who participate in these things though had other ideas. No loud noises, no sudden moves, nothing that might spook a tense horse and its owner...... Which, in hindsight makes sense, but at the time. Ugh. It was not quite the day we'd had in mind.

On the other hand, now we an say that we've been.
And in a few more years, it would be a lovely afternoon. 

Except for when the girls start asking about horse back riding lessons.

The Waiting

They were waiting for me when I exited the train station.
'Stop being a pansy and take the stairs,' Matt texted to me while I waited a solid 5 minutes for the elevator to creep it way back up to me.  No way dude, these are BlogHer bags. They weigh a ton.

Grace refused to nap, despite the fact that Matt had taken them on a three hour tour of Fort McHenry. She focused on her American flag trinkets, counting the moments until I emerged again. I was greeted with 'I Love You's,' 'I Missed You's' and the inevitable, 'Why did you go on vacation without me Mama?'.

I whispered stories of my walks all over NYC. I saw her statue. I touched a bull. I sat on a motorcycle.
She whispered back with stories of feeding cows, singing our anthem and eating cupcakes with friends.
We both had grand weekends.

Then she remembered the empty suitcase I left with, and it's promise to be full upon return.

After emptying the suitcase, she looked at me and said, 'Mama, I like it when you go on vacation.'

Summer Thrills

Our town has a carnival that comes this time every year.

It is a week long extravaganza hosted by the fire department, with a firework conclusion. And really, how do you refuse that? Knowing that some portion of the vast amount of money you just bled into the summer night goes to help support the neighbors that protect you. How do you not to drop an extra $5 into the boot at the hot dog stand?
(I may or may not be a little biased on this one.)

So we marched into the sweltering heat to meet with the family of one of Gracie's besties, and bought the all-you-can-ride wrist band. Grace rode with abandon: carousel, train, dragon roller coaster, tilt-a-whirl.

Clare watched with eager eyes, but didn't get to join in on the fun. Until we got to the ferris wheel.
Me go? Mine Mama? Mine, me?

And we went. She and I tucked neatly into a capsule.
It was the beginning of the end.
Now she knew she was allowed to go to, and so she went on her first carnival  ride with Grace.

Quickly followed by a ride all by herself.

I don't think I've seen her that happy in quite awhile.
Well, except for when I make popcorn.

Days to Remember

We adventured today.
We tromped.
We smiled.
We laughed.
We hugged.
We had fun.

It was the first day in a long time that the yelling was limited and the melt downs were non-existent.

Happy Father's Day Matt. I'm glad you got the afternoon that you deserve.

Girls Night Out

So I told her we got a present* in the mail. Something just for her and me. Something special.

She was so excited, we went in the rain. Part of me wanted to cancel, but the allure of time alone with me, combined with the magic of baseball was too much for her. We have to go Mama, she told me, the Bird will be sooo sad not to see us.

And it was true.

The O's hosted a wonderful tour of the park, with behind the scenes perks that I had never dreamed of. Our tour guide showed us the playground, touting its child friendliness. But none of that mattered, because we were already fans. Already in love with the ballpark.

What we got that night that I will always keep with me is this.

Time alone with my girl, made possible by the love of baseball.

*Our tickets, tour and snacks were provided to us free of cost from the Baltimore Orioles, but my words and opinions are 100% my own.

Touring

So. Sometimes, I get a little carried away by ideas and the big picture. I forget a little bit about the reality of a situation.

Last week, I wrote about figurative sunshine and roses. How many times do you get to go stomp around the White House grounds, right? Shouldn't I push the memories of stress related sweat trickling down my spine out of my head?

It seems I did a little bit to good of a job with the mental cleanse of that one, because when Matt received another email announcing free unscheduled access to the grounds for Garden Tours, I jumped at the chance. Of course I want to go! I want to write about real sunshine and roses!

We started off with a good plan. Brunch at Founding Farmers followed by a stroll through the White House gardens! How could we go wrong? Well, for one we didn't realize the IMF World Bank Meetings were going on. Right next door to Founding Farmers. Blocking streets and sidewalks galore. And we seemed to forget about the fact that Clare won't sit longer than 5 minutes to eat. The out-of-this-world beignets did hold her in her seat for a solid 7 minutes, but after that she spent the hour dancing in her chair and receiving glares from the wait staff.

Inside the White House gates we faced another entirely new problem. A week ago they had free access to run across the luscious grass. Today, there were heavy chains and Secret Service protecting the blades. My children, Clare in particular, did not care of this. At all.

I think it became a game with her. After a few rounds of "How far can I get onto the green?" I was done. And the worst part? I pictured formal gardens squirreled away in some secret part of the lawn. Nope, the garden tour was mile markers with pictures of presidents planting trees.

Any pictures I have of the event I deleted from my phone. My children were pissed off the entire time. I was drenched in sweat. The one upside? We were within a stones throw of  of access to the front portico.

And we seemed to amuse the guards.

Rolling

One of the perks to Matt's fancy detail job is his ready proximity to the White House.

For years, like many American's, we've tried in vain to get tickets to the White House Easter Egg Roll. This year was no different. We tried. In vain. Several times. And was once again shut out.

But, the upside to being one of the few late-thirty-somethings in an office of work-a-holic Washingtonians is the is one of the 'few old guys with kids'.  And he was plied with sympathy. All of his co-workers entered their name into a lottery with the intent to pass on their tickets to us.

We hit the jackpot.

It was a beautiful day.

The girls were dressed in their White House appropriate finery, and I had a plan. We stopped to have lunch near our house to fill bellies before heading into DC. The problem was food never really make it into bellies. At the end of lunch, I saw Clare give me the look. A half second later, that look ended up all over herself and Grace as my carefully laid plan crumbled before my eyes.

In the rush to go home and change the girls, a key part of Clare's wardrobe was left behind.

Once we got past the chaos of actually getting on the grounds, the girls hunted and dyed eggs. They met their heroes: Dora, Diego and Curious George. And we procured a much sought after family photo on the south lawn of the White House.

All sans-shoes.

History Revised

Grace often can't tell me what she liked about her day beyond the fact that she bullies her way into eating Nutella sandwiches for lunch everyday and gets to play outside with her friends. She is only 4.5 years old and it is like pulling teeth to get her to talk to me about school. Sixteen isn't going to be a pleasant age in our house.

When she does grasp onto a subject she likes though, look out. Want to talk about Star Wars Episodes IV-VI with a pre-schooler? She is all yours- (but you can only discuss 4-6 because my husband has banned 1-3 until "she is old enough to make up her own mind about the new movies". Whatever that means.)

Oh, and President's Day. How the girl LOVED President's Day and the two weeks of discussions about great American presidents that proceeded it at her Montessori school. We've made trips to Gettysburg so she can stand where Lincoln stood. We've gotten her into the White House to stand steps away from her president's Oval Office. (Yes, she totally claims ownership of Obama and the first dog Bo.)

This past week we took her to Mount Vernon, not to walk to halls of the mansion (which, for the record we did do), but to placate her obsession of seeing where George Washington chopped down the cherry tree. Forget the fact that George Washington probably didn't really chop down a cherry tree. Or the fact that he didn't grow up at Mount Vernon. Or the fact that this ISN'T EVEN A CHERRY TREE.

She was staunch in the notion of the cherry tree, and was convinced this is the cherry tree George Washington cut down. You got a problem with that? Because I think the may be willing to fight you over the provenance of this tree, and she's a kicker.

GPS (less)

I'm solidly suburban, born and raised. OK, technically I was born in Chicago, but the residence only lasted until my hospital release. SUV's with GPS devices are my friend.

Don't get me wrong, I love cities. The crazy fast pace of city walkers is right up my alley. Gloriously tall buildings pressing against the sky encourage me to stand taller in greeting. Restaurants with Michelin ratings sing to my heart. One of the best moments of my life? Being mistaken for a New Yorker by a city native.

BUT

I have absolutely NO internal sense of direction. (Hence my love of GPS.) I pour over street maps before exiting buildings, praying I turn the right direction. The District is my foe in this respect. Straight lines, I need straight lines please!

And, apparently, my confusion isn't limited to street level. Today, *sigh*, I went the wrong way on the Metro. For 3 stops. The only plus to that ride is that the parking lot attendant must have seen the defeated look on my face and comped my $4.25 lot fee. I was ecstatic to be back in the suburbs.

White (House) Christmas

Matt is always one for new adventures.

His latest started at the end of October. It was an ego boost of an adventure, for he was recruited. Was explicitly told that his name was one on a very short list of people that have their sought after skill set. It would be a commute heavy detail of six months, but would yield experience (and prestige) that would be unattainable any other way in his current position.

Plus, there seems to be other seasonal perks they forgot to mention.

You know, like making the list to receive a White House Christmas card.

Chicken Feed

Grace has been at her new school for two and a half months now, and its been..... fantastic.
We love the school. We love the curriculum, the teachers and the families. We knew it would be a great fit from the first week.

I was worried though. I was worried about the change and how it would effect her, which was silly because I was the one who cried on her last day of school at her old daycare, not Grace. I tried writing about a fantastic party the school held in honor of the end of summer West African Yam Festival, but Clare threw up all over me after eating about 1lb of rice, and I didn't feel much like talking about it.

So one of the things that we love about the school is that they spend A LOT of time outdoors. The kids eat lunch outdoors whenever possible, they do yard work (raking leaves, pine needles and gathering branches), they garden (planting, watering, harvesting and spreading hay), they being afternoon recess at 3pm and stay outdoors until pickup and they care for their chickens.

Yeah, you heard me, they have chickens. Some of the (even more liberal than us) parents seem to raised concerns that the chickens being kept in the coop over weekends was cruel, so beginning last weekend families were asked to sign up for a weekend day to care for the birds.

We, of course, were the first family to enroll.

The coop, will there be eggs?
Of course not.

Release of the birds. I only stayed in the pen for 30 seconds after that.

If your on chicken duty you have to feed them, right?
Luckily we'd been saving egg shells and strawberry tops for a week.

Clare under the impression that the little beasties wanted to play with her instead of peck her.
Thank goodness for the upgrade of two layers of chicken wire.

We all escaped the good deed unscathed, next up, the Thanksgiving Picnic.

A Little Bit of Disney

Robin has become my fairy blogmother. She raises her wand (or hits forward, whatever) and adds my name to the list. Yes, Shannon from Make Time For Love would be interested.

Do you recognize this face?

Not Grace's, because, you know, I try not to actually show her face on the blog. But the ears in front of here should be a giveaway of where we were.

The fine folks in Orlando, brought a little bit of Disney world to Baltimore yesterday.

I made them mistake of not doing by bloggey research on the Disney Summer Social, and billed it as a princess party to Grace. While it was in no way princesses-ey, it still was filled with enough Mickey Mouse and princess paraphernalia to satisfy her. Particularly when I declared that Grace was the princess at the party.

Hurray Princess Crown!

There was food and toys abound, along with an artist decorating the kids with their favorite Disney characters.

But what I thought was the best thing about this event?

It really wasn't about the kids. It was about the moms. I seemed to be one of the few people in the room that wasn't already connected to the rest of the crowd, but it was still nice. It was a safe, comfortable, environment to let you kid play while you talked to other moms. Disney, you got the Summer Social right.

Grace and I both went home happy. I can't wait until the girls are old enough for our first trip to Disney World!

Eyes Wide Open

I like my natural disasters to be straight forward. To give some sort of warning.

I grew up in a Chicagoland tornado alley, so honestly, those whipping columns of wind hardly even phase me. I'm like a human radar. I look at the sky patterns and color, sniff the wind and then head back inside.
       Meh, it's fine. Let's finish dinner.
Most of the time it's a false alarm. Either way, you've had plenty of warning if something is going down.

Hurricane's too. While I do not claim to be an expert on this weather phenom, you can see them coming. There have been days and days of incessant news stories and time to prep. And you'd better prep early because everyone now has the fear of Katrina in them. I never see the downside of buying extra milk and canned goods though. There is never any such thing as too much milk in our house. In fact, I think we will be stocking up for Irene this Friday.

Earthquakes though, those are tricky things. No warning. No odd goings-on in the sky or newscasters instilling panic in us. Just BAM: Shooka-shooka-shooka.

Yesterday's earthquake only lasted 36 seconds. It was 36 seconds of quiet panic though. In the metro DC area a person's mind tends to wander towards man-made causes of a shaking building, not Random Acts of God.

It was 36 seconds of panic and then a few minutes of:
Where are my babies? What do I need to grab to leave? Do I have time to tweet this? Does Matt feel this too? Is this an earthquake? Yes, it is an earthquake. No, I don't know what magnitude it is, I am using my phone to tweet. Make sure you grab your stuff, who knows if we'll be let back in. What if the parking garage collapses? What if this building collapses; lowest bidder you know. No, I don't know the magnitude yet, I'm texting.

After an hour of sitting outside with Clare (relatively) in my arms, solidified with confirmation that we did indeed part of the East Coast earthquake and feeding a miraculously found sleeve of Ritz crackers that were in my purse to hungry children, we were sent home so building assessments could be preformed.

While there has been reports of damage to buildings, including the disheartening indefinite closure of the Washington Monument, our house remained unscathed.

Unless you find shifted books and photographs upsetting.

Me. My. Mine.

I’ve been thinking about this post a lot. I know what I want to say, I just don’t want it to be misconstrued. So let me start off with this:

I LOVED BlogHer. (As a whole), I had a fantastic time. I would will do it again in a heartbeat.

I read a lot of posts from other bloggers before I left denouncing it as a ‘girls weekend’ before I left last week though. For me, that is exactly what it was though. I am completely unapologetic for that. I was there for the sunshine and parties. Contrary to what I felt was a common theme at BlogHer, blogging is not my Business. I was there for four days of being child-free. I registered on a whim and didn’t even look at the session agendas until a few days before. I went into the conference promising that my enjoyment was paramount as was being true to myself.

What does that mean?

It means I had every intention of walking out of seminars that I found lack-luster.

It means that my idea of good times at the parties was an abundance of free drinks and swag.

It means that I wasn’t going to put pressure on myself to network when all I wanted to do was look at palm trees.

So that is what I did. And I had a wonderful time being true to myself.

Come Talk to Me @ BlogHer

So I’m about to go on an adventure.

All by myself.

Well, not really all by myself. Robin and Denise are coming with me.

But right now, I feel all by myself.

I tried packing my bag all weekend long. I put things in, I took things out. Grace put things in and took things out. I’ve analyzed if I have enough room to bring my own pillow like a child because I just don’t sleep right without it.

And now? My stomach is churning. The calendar has flipped and it is officially August and I am officially leaving in 2 days for San Diego.

Posts like this have really been helping, but still…. I get it is OK to be awkward. In my mind though, it is fine for other people to be awkward, but aren’t I supposed to have my shit together and fully embrace the idea of freedom and adventure for five very long days. Part of me relishes the idea of seeing this computer based life in person, but another part of me feels like such a fraud.

You know, you read me. You’ve noticed that my posts have dropped off significantly in the last year or so. Am I a blogger, just because I have a url? Well, I guess I did have business cards made to that effect.

Once I get on the plane I know I will be fine. We have invites to parties galore, and lot of free booze will make all my worries go away, right?

So really, come talk to me. Because I think I will really need it.

Have I mentioned that my stomach is churning?

Capitol Fourth

When we do something, we do it big time.
(Sometimes I wonder if it is a fundamental fault of ours.)

Day trips turn into overnights with us all the time.

We live close enough to Washington, DC, to take advantage of the city semi-regularly. However, we live just far enough away from it to make it a pain in the ass to get to. When my work put out an all call memo a few weeks ago asking for volunteers to walk with our float in the DC Forth of July parade, I submitted my name. I never expected to be selected.

When I was, it turned into an all out adventure.

This was our day:



9:30 am: Start the trek to Washington, DC

9:45 am: Get a flat tire

9:50 am: Fix flat tire (*totally wanted to take pictures, but I knew that was a bad idea)

9:57 am: Drive to gas station to put air in the spare tire

10:15 am: Leave gas station, but realize that there is no way get there by 11am

10:50 am: Call parade organizer and announce late arrival

  

What says "America" more than an

inflatable Uncle Sam?

11:20 am: Arrive at parade

11:45 am: Walk in parade

12:00 pm: Wave at family as I pass by

 

I love the Where's Waldo quality of the picture.
Can you find my family?



12:30 pm: Find family in crowd 

 

Watching the parade march past.
My favorite? The gay cowboys.

1:15 pm: Load hungry, tired, pissed off children into the car

1:45 pm: Arrive at hotel

2:15 pm: Try to make tired, pissed off children take a nap

2:45 pm: Abandon the nap and go swimming instead

3:30 pm: Give the nap one more try

3:50 pm: Clare falls asleep, Grace goes with Matt to buy much needed wine

4:45 pm: Matt returns with wine and we drink ½ the bottle in 10 minutes

5:15 pm: We head to dinner

6:00 pm: We settle on 4th of July sushi and shumai

6:15 pm: Our children start fighting over chop sticks in a fairly not-child-friendly atmosphere

7:00 pm: We leave the restaurant leaving a wake of dumpling scraps and melting ice cubes

7:05 pm: It starts to drizzle

7:30 pm: We decide we’ve made it this far- if we get wet, we get wet- but we are going to watch the fireworks damn-it

9:00 pm: It never does rain more than a pleasant drizzle and over-tired meltdowns are kept to a minimum with a constant stream of ice cream, angel food cake and strawberries

9:15 pm: The fireworks start and the world comes to a standstill



The spectacular view from our hillside perch

9:35 pm: We load the girls back into the stroller

9:40 pm: They are both sound asleep

10:00 pm: We are all sound asleep

Shooting Stars

Gracie’s birthday – or the party on Sunday anyway – passed with a blur.

Literally.

We rented one of the carpet covered warehouse spaces filled with moon-bounces and assorted inflatable’s. Children flew from every corner and off every surface. Which is why, sometimes, they failed to bounce again without a brief interlude of tears.

See. Flying!

There is not a single picture that the party that is in focus.


OK - so this one is in focus- and it's climbing, not flying - but there was death defying tumbles (or belly slides) from the top rungs back to the base.

Even the birthday cake pictures are out of focus. Well, not the picture of the birthday cake itself. That is quite clear.

(Obviously)
And my Curious George efforts were very well received- only to be outdone by the birthday cupcakes that I made for school on Tuesday.

Never before has my baking received so many complements. I’m more of a savories chef due to my lack of belief in pesky things like measuring spoons / cups / and directions in general. Thank you Martha Stewart for the chocolate chip cupcakes with chocolate chip frosting recipe.