Not bad for someone whose modeling fee is an ice cream cone from Dairy Queen on the way home. She takes direction well, at least when she's well-rested and properly bribed. Thank god.
Sunday, August 31, 2008
Fun at the lake
Went up to Lake Erie today for a photo shoot for my newest etsy merchandise, the mermaid tail and tiara costume set. It was windy, but I think things turned out pretty well. What do you think?
Not bad for someone whose modeling fee is an ice cream cone from Dairy Queen on the way home. She takes direction well, at least when she's well-rested and properly bribed. Thank god.
Not bad for someone whose modeling fee is an ice cream cone from Dairy Queen on the way home. She takes direction well, at least when she's well-rested and properly bribed. Thank god.
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Sense memories
I just got back from a nighttime jog, for the first time in, oh, years. Don't ask me why - my body tells me to go jogging at 9:30, I'm going jogging, especially considering how snug my jeans have been getting.
Believe it or not, I used to jog all the time, and always in the evening. Of course, we lived in Japan at the time, and it was the only time I wasn't at work or commuting back and forth, and the crime rate in Nagoya was about 0, so jogging at night over there was a little different than doing it over here. It's funny, though, how the slap of shoes on concrete and the damp night air on my clammy legs brought back a bunch of memories of running in Japan.
My route over there was a large loop that started and ended at our apartment building. Our neighborhood was insanely hilly, and I purposely routed myself up and down the hills because the downhills gave me a (very brief) break. Don't get me wrong - I suck at running. I have bad knees, I get winded walking uphill, and I have the determination of a banana slug. But jogging in Japan was one of the few ways I could be by myself in a socially acceptable fashion, and after a few weeks of gradually running more and walking less, it became a lot less painful. There was even one or two nights when I ran the whole way, a much longer route than normal, because I finally got the fabled "runner's high." Okay, it wasn't a "high," more of a "not nearly so sucky," but it was fun all the same. After we moved back to Cleveland the weather was so bad - and my need for solitude was so reduced - that I gave it up pretty soon, managing to straggle through one 5K sponsored by my employer in spring of 2000 before hanging up my shoes for good.
I last jogged in Japan in November or December of 1999, and I can still picture virtually my entire route, one stride at a time. I carried a flashlight, but that was mostly so I could turn it on to warn cars I was there when they infrequently came by. Mostly I ran in the dark, the glow from the television sets shining through front windows and lighting my way on the sidewalks and streets. I knew where to shift left and right to avoid cracks and potholes, where the curb wasn't nearly as tall as it looked, and which neighbors cooked the best-smelling dinners. I saw another runner every couple weeks, usually the same guy running on the opposite side of the canal.
I'd start uphill from our apartment, walking to the corner before I started to jog. I'd jog uphill for a few blocks, then it leveled out, then it went up again before dropping off steeply on the back street where the VW bus used to park. When I took the longer route I'd swing past a few shops that I never went past when I wasn't running, past the izakayas where I'd have to dodge the drunk salarymen if I had waited too late to start running. Back down past the school, the grocery store/supermarket, the tennis courts where the bats flitted in and out of the streetlights. Stop running at our corner, walk up the block past the new construction on the street behind us, then circle around to the front of the building and stretch on the steps before buzzing myself in.
Where am I going with this? Heck if I know. I just had half an hour of mindless exercise, and it all came flooding back, and I thought I'd better write it down before I forgot.
Next time: Why stretching my quads makes me think of earthquakes :)
Note to self: I realized today that most of my sports bras and some of my spandex exercise shorts are the same ones I wore in Japan. Eyech. If I keep up the schedule for two weeks, I get to go to Target and buy some new duds. And if I keep up the schedule and can complete a 5K before my birthday, I'm buying the biggest freaking brownie sundae in the state and eating it all by myself.
****
Edited to add: I've been futzing around on Google Earth. If you want to see where our old apartment was, here are the coordinates:
Latitude: 35° 9'54.68"N
Longitude: 137° 0'15.73"E
If you search for Nagoya, Japan, then zoom in on Meito-ku, it will get you to the right area. We're just a little west of the highway and the canal which runs parallel to it, just north of the big dirt courtyard in the elementary school across the street from our building.
My god, it's a trip down memory lane. There's the temple with the dragon water spouts. The Denny's where I had my first Japanese curry. The McDonalds where we used to get pancakes. The park where we had a nice rural walk until we found the huge piles of condoms behind every shrub or large rock.
Good times, good times.
Speaking of which, I kinda miss this place: http://www.shooters-nagoya.com/index.asp . Oh, Fowl Balls, how I miss you!
Believe it or not, I used to jog all the time, and always in the evening. Of course, we lived in Japan at the time, and it was the only time I wasn't at work or commuting back and forth, and the crime rate in Nagoya was about 0, so jogging at night over there was a little different than doing it over here. It's funny, though, how the slap of shoes on concrete and the damp night air on my clammy legs brought back a bunch of memories of running in Japan.
My route over there was a large loop that started and ended at our apartment building. Our neighborhood was insanely hilly, and I purposely routed myself up and down the hills because the downhills gave me a (very brief) break. Don't get me wrong - I suck at running. I have bad knees, I get winded walking uphill, and I have the determination of a banana slug. But jogging in Japan was one of the few ways I could be by myself in a socially acceptable fashion, and after a few weeks of gradually running more and walking less, it became a lot less painful. There was even one or two nights when I ran the whole way, a much longer route than normal, because I finally got the fabled "runner's high." Okay, it wasn't a "high," more of a "not nearly so sucky," but it was fun all the same. After we moved back to Cleveland the weather was so bad - and my need for solitude was so reduced - that I gave it up pretty soon, managing to straggle through one 5K sponsored by my employer in spring of 2000 before hanging up my shoes for good.
I last jogged in Japan in November or December of 1999, and I can still picture virtually my entire route, one stride at a time. I carried a flashlight, but that was mostly so I could turn it on to warn cars I was there when they infrequently came by. Mostly I ran in the dark, the glow from the television sets shining through front windows and lighting my way on the sidewalks and streets. I knew where to shift left and right to avoid cracks and potholes, where the curb wasn't nearly as tall as it looked, and which neighbors cooked the best-smelling dinners. I saw another runner every couple weeks, usually the same guy running on the opposite side of the canal.
I'd start uphill from our apartment, walking to the corner before I started to jog. I'd jog uphill for a few blocks, then it leveled out, then it went up again before dropping off steeply on the back street where the VW bus used to park. When I took the longer route I'd swing past a few shops that I never went past when I wasn't running, past the izakayas where I'd have to dodge the drunk salarymen if I had waited too late to start running. Back down past the school, the grocery store/supermarket, the tennis courts where the bats flitted in and out of the streetlights. Stop running at our corner, walk up the block past the new construction on the street behind us, then circle around to the front of the building and stretch on the steps before buzzing myself in.
Where am I going with this? Heck if I know. I just had half an hour of mindless exercise, and it all came flooding back, and I thought I'd better write it down before I forgot.
Next time: Why stretching my quads makes me think of earthquakes :)
Note to self: I realized today that most of my sports bras and some of my spandex exercise shorts are the same ones I wore in Japan. Eyech. If I keep up the schedule for two weeks, I get to go to Target and buy some new duds. And if I keep up the schedule and can complete a 5K before my birthday, I'm buying the biggest freaking brownie sundae in the state and eating it all by myself.
****
Edited to add: I've been futzing around on Google Earth. If you want to see where our old apartment was, here are the coordinates:
Latitude: 35° 9'54.68"N
Longitude: 137° 0'15.73"E
If you search for Nagoya, Japan, then zoom in on Meito-ku, it will get you to the right area. We're just a little west of the highway and the canal which runs parallel to it, just north of the big dirt courtyard in the elementary school across the street from our building.
My god, it's a trip down memory lane. There's the temple with the dragon water spouts. The Denny's where I had my first Japanese curry. The McDonalds where we used to get pancakes. The park where we had a nice rural walk until we found the huge piles of condoms behind every shrub or large rock.
Good times, good times.
Speaking of which, I kinda miss this place: http://www.shooters-nagoya.com/index.asp . Oh, Fowl Balls, how I miss you!
Mermaid tail for dress-up
Okay, when Liza spends all morning playing with her new imaginary friend, Alice the Mermaid, you can't expect me to refrain from busting out the sequins during naptime to make a mermaid tail, can you? Didn't think so.
So, moms and dads - what would you pay for a reversible, custom-sized mermaid tail for dress-up play? I'm thinking of making them for my etsy shop, but I want to make sure there's a decent profit margin to be had. The sparkly stuff can be up to $15 a yard, so my materials cost will probably be higher on this than on most of my other merchandise. I'm thinking like $30 for a kid-sized one, and closer to $50 for an adult one. Would you pay that for a gift for your kid, grandkid, niece, kid of a friend? And what colors would you like to see available? I was planning to go with just green or blue to start, with others available if somebody specifically requests one (and it's available locally).
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
How cute is this?
New valance for my sewing room, whipped up this weekend with fabric that I've been hoarding since 2002-ish and trim I bought to use in the sewing room at the house in Kentucky.
Get it? Sewing room? Button trim? Oh, the cute factor is pretty high on this sucker. Makes me smirk with happiness every time I see it.
Thursday, August 21, 2008
Oh, the carnage
I had a flash of inspiration a few weeks ago, when I realized that I could stop Liza from whining about wanting to go on the rides at the mall if I just let her take some of the change from her bank and ride the damn things already. This works great, only she burned through all of her quarters really fast, and she hasn't yet figured out that she can exchange the other denominations for quarters, so we were trying to figure out a way she could get some more quarters (other than waiting for the inevitable package full of quarters and sugar from Grandma, thanks a lot, Mom).
We came up with a list of five chores she would do every day, and if she did them for five days, she got two quarters, which is enough to ride one of the cheaper rides at the mall. So now she makes her bed twice a day, empties the trashcan in her room once a week, picks up all of her shoes before Jason gets home every day, puts away everything on the floor in her room before bed every night, and clears her dishes after every meal. And she loves doing it. And it costs me $0.50 a week. Bargain!
****
Today she was clearing off her lunch dishes when the Pyrex custard cup of uneaten corn that was sitting on her plastic plate obeyed the laws of inertia and gravity and hit the floor with a ringing SPANG!, sending a cascade of lethal glass pieces everywhere. EVERYWHERE. While we were both shoeless.
Luckily, we were both standing still when it happened, and Liza (for once) immediately obeyed me and stood still until I could get shoes for both of us and carry her out of the blast zone. Neither of us was cut (at least not then).
And that was the start of 45 minutes of continuous debris removal. I swept up with a broom, then used a wet paper towel to pick up what I thought were the last few microscopic bits. While on my hands and knees doing that, I looked under the table, where it was sparkling like freaking Las Vegas, and I resigned myself to vacuuming a day early this week. And then I picked a 1/4" long piece of glass out of the side of my thumb and tried to stop bleeding on the floor.
I hauled out the vacuum and swept the whole main floor of the house twice, finding daggers of glass an inch long as far as 12 feet away from the point of impact. There was one sitting on the carpet in the living room, for god's sake, a foot away from where I had put my daughter so she would be safe from the glass during cleanup. That's about 15 feet from the craft area where the initial impact occurred, in case you're keeping track.
So then I used the wet Swiffer to mop the whole wood floor, changing pads twice, each time being rewarded with extra daggers of glass and overall sparkliness that means we're going to be wearing shoes in the house for a very, very long time.
The glass splinters, of course, imbedded themselves in the soles of my sandals while I was cleaning, so not only do I get to wear shoes in the house, but I have to take them off before I can walk on the carpet on the other levels of the house, lest I spread the glass dust into the carpet.
Well, at least now it's not so convenient to nip down to the kitchen for a snack while I'm working in the office. Of course, it's not so easy to nip down to the laundry room to see if the sheets are dry yet, either, which is a bit of a pain.
Note to self: Do not allow preschooler to use Pyrex ever again.
We came up with a list of five chores she would do every day, and if she did them for five days, she got two quarters, which is enough to ride one of the cheaper rides at the mall. So now she makes her bed twice a day, empties the trashcan in her room once a week, picks up all of her shoes before Jason gets home every day, puts away everything on the floor in her room before bed every night, and clears her dishes after every meal. And she loves doing it. And it costs me $0.50 a week. Bargain!
****
Today she was clearing off her lunch dishes when the Pyrex custard cup of uneaten corn that was sitting on her plastic plate obeyed the laws of inertia and gravity and hit the floor with a ringing SPANG!, sending a cascade of lethal glass pieces everywhere. EVERYWHERE. While we were both shoeless.
Luckily, we were both standing still when it happened, and Liza (for once) immediately obeyed me and stood still until I could get shoes for both of us and carry her out of the blast zone. Neither of us was cut (at least not then).
And that was the start of 45 minutes of continuous debris removal. I swept up with a broom, then used a wet paper towel to pick up what I thought were the last few microscopic bits. While on my hands and knees doing that, I looked under the table, where it was sparkling like freaking Las Vegas, and I resigned myself to vacuuming a day early this week. And then I picked a 1/4" long piece of glass out of the side of my thumb and tried to stop bleeding on the floor.
I hauled out the vacuum and swept the whole main floor of the house twice, finding daggers of glass an inch long as far as 12 feet away from the point of impact. There was one sitting on the carpet in the living room, for god's sake, a foot away from where I had put my daughter so she would be safe from the glass during cleanup. That's about 15 feet from the craft area where the initial impact occurred, in case you're keeping track.
So then I used the wet Swiffer to mop the whole wood floor, changing pads twice, each time being rewarded with extra daggers of glass and overall sparkliness that means we're going to be wearing shoes in the house for a very, very long time.
The glass splinters, of course, imbedded themselves in the soles of my sandals while I was cleaning, so not only do I get to wear shoes in the house, but I have to take them off before I can walk on the carpet on the other levels of the house, lest I spread the glass dust into the carpet.
Well, at least now it's not so convenient to nip down to the kitchen for a snack while I'm working in the office. Of course, it's not so easy to nip down to the laundry room to see if the sheets are dry yet, either, which is a bit of a pain.
Note to self: Do not allow preschooler to use Pyrex ever again.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
You know you want one ... or two ... or four ...
Look, Mom! I finally found a use for the 400 zippers you gave me!Get 'em while they last, only $9 each at my etsy shop.
Oh, and having a kid who stands still and moves her arm the direction I tell her to when posing for a picture - priceless. The kid's got a bright future as a hand model, don't you think?
Oh, and having a kid who stands still and moves her arm the direction I tell her to when posing for a picture - priceless. The kid's got a bright future as a hand model, don't you think?
Ack! The cuteness! I can't take it anymore!
When Liza was a baby, the surest way to get her to smile during photo shoots was to pretend to sneeze. This was especially effective if Jason was doing it - he can really ham it up.
Fake sneezes are so 2006, though, and I've been working on a new way to get her to not grimace as though in pain (her version of a forced smile) every time she sees the camera. And today I think I stumbled on the answer.
Burps.
Let a good loud one (or even a pathetic breathy one) rip, and the kid giggles like mad while looking straight at you.
I knew some of the skills I learned in marching band* would come in handy someday.
*burping on command, pretending to play when my slide has frozen in place, marching backwards really fast while holding my upper body completely steady so I don't cut my lips to shreds on my mouthpiece, proper house-toilet-paper-rolling techniques, consuming four donuts without puking or getting the shakes, and looking dignified despite the huge feather mohawk on top of my helmet.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
The pee fairy
For the last few weeks, Liza has been going to bed later and later each night, using a series of increasingly long and ridiculous stalling techniques that have Jason and I contemplating spanking, alcoholism, and/or child abandonment. I need water! I need to go potty! I need more snuggles! My leg is hanging out! I need to go potty! I need another book! I need another song! I need Mommy! I lost my bunny! I need to go potty! Yeah, and we need some time to watch old X-Files episodes and steal from the stash of candy you collected at the parade last week, so get the hell in bed.
Our usual routine is that Jason puts Liza to bed, doing all the singing and snuggling and stories, since by that time of day I'm not only tired, I'm tired of the kid, and I'm much more prone to lose it than he is. We kind of alternate who gets stuck going back in to settle her down, based on who is less likely to kill her in the next 15 minutes. The stalling and stalling and stalling was getting really annoying, and even Jason was having a tough time keeping his patience when we had to go in 6 times on Thursday night and she didn't get to sleep until 10pm.
Friday night Jason went out for drinks with a friend, and I was in charge of bedtime. Things go much differently when I'm in charge by myself, as I generally am a LOT more willing to listen to screaming than he is, and I have no problem being Evil Parent. I told Liza very clearly that I was going to do her whole bedtime routine, including books and songs and a story and snuggles and a trip to the potty and a glass of water, but when I left and shut the door, that was it. Period. I was not going back in there unless the house caught on fire or a wolverine snuck in through her open window (I think I left that part out of the actual lecture).
So I left, and she started screaming. I need water! I need to go potty! I need more snuggles! My leg is hanging out! I need to go potty! I need another book! I need another song! I need Mommy! I lost my bunny! I need to go potty! And I went downstairs and knitted.
After 5 minutes I went up and told her that I was still here, I loved her, but I was not going in, and she needed to go to sleep. I watched her go to the potty (again), rinsed out the potty, said goodnight and shut the door. This got me incoherent raging and kicking of walls, which settled into just kicking of walls, and she was asleep 15 minutes later. Score one for Evil Mommy!
Saturday night Jason was home, and I gave Liza the same lecture. Blah blah, not coming in, Daddy's not coming in either, go to sleep.
"Daddy will come and get me." (with a smirk)
"No he won't."
"Yes, he will."
"No, he won't, because if he tries to, I will sit on him until he gives up and stops trying to get to your room."
"You can't sit on Daddy!"
"If it means getting you to sleep earlier, yes I can."
Fifteen minutes of screaming, and she was asleep.
***
Last night, after five minutes of screaming, I stuck my head in Liza's room. She said she had to got to the potty, which is always her first stage of stalling, and despite the fact that she JUST WENT FIVE MINUTES BEFORE, she usually manages to actually go again, so it's not like we can ignore it if we ever want her to be potty trained at night.
"You're a big girl. You use the potty by yourself every day. Get out of bed, use the potty, wipe your butt, and get back in bed. We'll clean out the potty in the morning."
She was quiet after that, and Jason and I got to watch a movie. A whole movie. Including trailers. Hallelujah!
Jason checked on her before we went to bed, and she had done just what I told her, getting her diaper back on and even getting the sheets over her and everything. All he had to do was rinse out the potty and we were good to go. Score!
When Jason called this morning, I told him that Liza's first concern when she woke up was that we had to clean out her potty. I told her that Daddy had done it in the middle of the night.
"You should have told her the Pee Fairy came and took it away." Ha, ha, very funny.
Tonight we had no problem getting her to bed - as Jason was leaving the room, she said she had to pee, so he told her to go and get back in bed by herself. He went in a few minutes ago, and she was curled up under her covers, bunny under her arm, potty full of pee. He carried out the potty and asked me, "Should the Pee Fairy leave a quarter in her potty?"
No, I don't think so, but thanks for the disturbing mental image of a urine-soaked sprite sneaking into my house every evening.
Our usual routine is that Jason puts Liza to bed, doing all the singing and snuggling and stories, since by that time of day I'm not only tired, I'm tired of the kid, and I'm much more prone to lose it than he is. We kind of alternate who gets stuck going back in to settle her down, based on who is less likely to kill her in the next 15 minutes. The stalling and stalling and stalling was getting really annoying, and even Jason was having a tough time keeping his patience when we had to go in 6 times on Thursday night and she didn't get to sleep until 10pm.
Friday night Jason went out for drinks with a friend, and I was in charge of bedtime. Things go much differently when I'm in charge by myself, as I generally am a LOT more willing to listen to screaming than he is, and I have no problem being Evil Parent. I told Liza very clearly that I was going to do her whole bedtime routine, including books and songs and a story and snuggles and a trip to the potty and a glass of water, but when I left and shut the door, that was it. Period. I was not going back in there unless the house caught on fire or a wolverine snuck in through her open window (I think I left that part out of the actual lecture).
So I left, and she started screaming. I need water! I need to go potty! I need more snuggles! My leg is hanging out! I need to go potty! I need another book! I need another song! I need Mommy! I lost my bunny! I need to go potty! And I went downstairs and knitted.
After 5 minutes I went up and told her that I was still here, I loved her, but I was not going in, and she needed to go to sleep. I watched her go to the potty (again), rinsed out the potty, said goodnight and shut the door. This got me incoherent raging and kicking of walls, which settled into just kicking of walls, and she was asleep 15 minutes later. Score one for Evil Mommy!
Saturday night Jason was home, and I gave Liza the same lecture. Blah blah, not coming in, Daddy's not coming in either, go to sleep.
"Daddy will come and get me." (with a smirk)
"No he won't."
"Yes, he will."
"No, he won't, because if he tries to, I will sit on him until he gives up and stops trying to get to your room."
"You can't sit on Daddy!"
"If it means getting you to sleep earlier, yes I can."
Fifteen minutes of screaming, and she was asleep.
***
Last night, after five minutes of screaming, I stuck my head in Liza's room. She said she had to got to the potty, which is always her first stage of stalling, and despite the fact that she JUST WENT FIVE MINUTES BEFORE, she usually manages to actually go again, so it's not like we can ignore it if we ever want her to be potty trained at night.
"You're a big girl. You use the potty by yourself every day. Get out of bed, use the potty, wipe your butt, and get back in bed. We'll clean out the potty in the morning."
She was quiet after that, and Jason and I got to watch a movie. A whole movie. Including trailers. Hallelujah!
Jason checked on her before we went to bed, and she had done just what I told her, getting her diaper back on and even getting the sheets over her and everything. All he had to do was rinse out the potty and we were good to go. Score!
When Jason called this morning, I told him that Liza's first concern when she woke up was that we had to clean out her potty. I told her that Daddy had done it in the middle of the night.
"You should have told her the Pee Fairy came and took it away." Ha, ha, very funny.
Tonight we had no problem getting her to bed - as Jason was leaving the room, she said she had to pee, so he told her to go and get back in bed by herself. He went in a few minutes ago, and she was curled up under her covers, bunny under her arm, potty full of pee. He carried out the potty and asked me, "Should the Pee Fairy leave a quarter in her potty?"
No, I don't think so, but thanks for the disturbing mental image of a urine-soaked sprite sneaking into my house every evening.
Sunday, August 17, 2008
No, really - she can read
A few words, at least.
Susie - this will take about 15 years to download, but you really ought to see it ... it will warm your ex-kindergarten-teacher's heart. If you can't get it to work, call me and I'll send it to you on CD.
Susie - this will take about 15 years to download, but you really ought to see it ... it will warm your ex-kindergarten-teacher's heart. If you can't get it to work, call me and I'll send it to you on CD.
Evidence
Just in case I ever need to prove to the child welfare people that it's not MY fault the kid is going to end up in the emergency room with two dislocated shoulders.
Nothing says "lazy Sunday afternoon" quite like a Linkin Park song, am I right?
Saturday, August 16, 2008
Oh. My. God.
You must go try this recipe:
http://www.bhg.com/recipe/appetizers-snacks/farmers-tomato-pie/
I made this for dinner tonight, using homemade pie dough and tomatoes and basil from my garden, and it was so good I thought I was going to pass out. Seriously. I mean, tomatoes and cheese are pretty hard to screw up, but my god, this was awesome.
Must not eat it cold out of the refrigerator for dessert ...
http://www.bhg.com/recipe/appetizers-snacks/farmers-tomato-pie/
I made this for dinner tonight, using homemade pie dough and tomatoes and basil from my garden, and it was so good I thought I was going to pass out. Seriously. I mean, tomatoes and cheese are pretty hard to screw up, but my god, this was awesome.
Must not eat it cold out of the refrigerator for dessert ...
Feeling mighty proud
Before (May)
During (July)
After (today)
The last phase of the renovation involved three cans of spraypaint, $40 in plants, and a half-dozen astoundingly ugly pots that got a makeover this morning. I got lucky with the plants, as the local garden center was having a great sale (and the lady behind the counter was sort of clueless, so I think I got some unmarked bargains ... like that gigantic Dragon Wing begonia in the back, which I think is the most awesome plant I've ever purchased - was 3 for $10).
At any rate, I'm so happy with the painted pots that I'm sort of kicking myself that we gave away a dozen of our old unused pots at our yard sale last summer. Just think of all the periwinkly goodness I could have put next to the playset! And the sandbox! And the garden! And anything else that stood still! On second thought, I'm not sure my lungs could stand that much spray paint overspray, so maybe it was for the best.
Thursday, August 14, 2008
It's possible we read to her too much
It's pretty much a daily occurrence that Liza will narrate what she's doing as if she is reading it out of a book. I'm not talking about a normal 3-year-old talking to herself, like "Now I need to find a piece to make a door." She's talking as if she were reading dialogue, complete with descriptions and speaker identifications. For example, I'll ask her if she wants milk or water with her snack, and she'll reply," 'Water, please,' Liza said, smiling at her mother."
Most of the time she just does this with her own conversations. It's a little bit disconcerting, but it hasn't crossed the line from "cute" to "disturbing and/or annoying" ... yet.
Then today she started doing the same with the toys she was playing with. When the princess fell into the dungeon of the Little People castle we found at a yard sale this morning, Liza had the other princess** say, "'Oh, are you okay?' Flower Girl asked." This went on for 5 or 10 minutes, each character providing the entire written dialogue from some script in Liza's head. It was a little freaky.
**Also freaky? After the princesses rescued each other from the dungeon half a dozen times (while the prince sat outside in the carriage), 'Her Highness' told 'Flower Girl' that it was time to go because they needed to get married because they were in love. So they booted the prince out of the carriage and rode off into the sunset, holding hands. It took every bit of my liberal Democratic willpower to not suggest that it might be better to have the prince and the princess fall in love and get married. I draw the line if the kid starts involving livestock, though ... although I did think it was pretty funny when she had the Little People baby Jesus repeatedly falling down into the dungeon and being rescued by the Wise Men and the camel from the toy nativity scene we found at the same sale.
I don't know what it is about baby Jesus figures ... Liza kept making off with the one that goes with our "official" nativity set last Christmas, and we'd find Him in the bathroom or on her chair in the dining room. The manger scene looks pretty strange without a baby ... sort of like a really bad party where everyone is just sort of standing around awkwardly. I seem to remember that my cousins used to do the same thing with their (much more expensive) baby Jesus figurine when we were kids. And some of Liza's friends have a Playmobil nativity set mixed in with all of their other Playmobil stuff ... and apparently the baby Jesus is a regular purchase at the Playmobil grocery store. Not a customer - a purchase. That totally cracks me up.
Most of the time she just does this with her own conversations. It's a little bit disconcerting, but it hasn't crossed the line from "cute" to "disturbing and/or annoying" ... yet.
Then today she started doing the same with the toys she was playing with. When the princess fell into the dungeon of the Little People castle we found at a yard sale this morning, Liza had the other princess** say, "'Oh, are you okay?' Flower Girl asked." This went on for 5 or 10 minutes, each character providing the entire written dialogue from some script in Liza's head. It was a little freaky.
**Also freaky? After the princesses rescued each other from the dungeon half a dozen times (while the prince sat outside in the carriage), 'Her Highness' told 'Flower Girl' that it was time to go because they needed to get married because they were in love. So they booted the prince out of the carriage and rode off into the sunset, holding hands. It took every bit of my liberal Democratic willpower to not suggest that it might be better to have the prince and the princess fall in love and get married. I draw the line if the kid starts involving livestock, though ... although I did think it was pretty funny when she had the Little People baby Jesus repeatedly falling down into the dungeon and being rescued by the Wise Men and the camel from the toy nativity scene we found at the same sale.
I don't know what it is about baby Jesus figures ... Liza kept making off with the one that goes with our "official" nativity set last Christmas, and we'd find Him in the bathroom or on her chair in the dining room. The manger scene looks pretty strange without a baby ... sort of like a really bad party where everyone is just sort of standing around awkwardly. I seem to remember that my cousins used to do the same thing with their (much more expensive) baby Jesus figurine when we were kids. And some of Liza's friends have a Playmobil nativity set mixed in with all of their other Playmobil stuff ... and apparently the baby Jesus is a regular purchase at the Playmobil grocery store. Not a customer - a purchase. That totally cracks me up.
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Blargh
After two days of editing, researching, re-editing, nail-biting, and market research, I am about to send out my first freelance writing submission since 2004.
I don't know whether this requires alcohol or the puke bucket.
Perhaps both, just to be certain.
I don't know whether this requires alcohol or the puke bucket.
Perhaps both, just to be certain.
Monday, August 11, 2008
Kylie-Ann!
Hey, Miss I'm On Maternity Leave, can you mail me from your home account so I've got your most recent email address? And promise to tell me when the baby arrives? Because I've got a quilt that's burning a hole in my pocket, but I'm not sending it until I know what the baby's got in its diaper, if you know what I mean.
Isn't this great? All of my subscribers now know you're knocked up. Hee!
Isn't this great? All of my subscribers now know you're knocked up. Hee!
New free pattern available
The hat pattern is now up on my blog for Lazy Mama Designs. You can find it here:
http://lazymamadesigns.blogspot.com/2008/08/free-pattern-lazy-lids.html
Go forth and make many, many hats. Just because YOU live in Texas doesn't mean that all of your relatives do, after all :)
http://lazymamadesigns.blogspot.com/2008/08/free-pattern-lazy-lids.html
Go forth and make many, many hats. Just because YOU live in Texas doesn't mean that all of your relatives do, after all :)
Corny!
Saturday's weather was beautiful - 70 degrees and sunny - so I didn't have much of a problem convincing Jason to take us to the North Ridgeville Corn Festival, a local fair-type-thing that we've never actually made it to in the past.
It was much larger than I was expecting, with tons of food vendors, plus a full complement of carnival rides and games. Liza seemed interested in the rides, but we weren't sure she was actually going to make it through any without losing it, so we bought $10 worth of tickets instead of a $14 ride-all-day wristband. Good thing, too, or we never would have gotten her out of there.
Eventually we ran out of tickets and declared a break for dinner ... after riding the pony, of course.
What was for dinner at the corn festival? Guess ...
After dinner we walked over to the nearby playground to try to run off some of the corn dog, and Liza wanted to do nothing other than swing and go down the twisty slide over and over again.
Then we stopped for ice cream on the way home, and poured the kid into bed early. A good time was had by all, in other words.
Think I staged the photos somehow? I offer in my defense a relatively nausea-inducing video of Liza on the rides, titled "Operation: Make Grandpa Puke." Poor Dad has issues with things that go around and around ... better have a trashcan ready if you watch this one, dude.
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Movin' on up
Update: My tomato soup recipe is at #3 ... you've only got to get me two higher to get that check sent to the ASPCA.
It was that sort of day
(the time stamp on this posting is probably wrong - I'm actually posting it at 11pm Sunday night)
By 9:30am,
I had burned myself badly removing breakfast from the oven, simultaneously spilling a boiling hot mixture of sugar, melted butter and orange juice all over my stovetop and floor.
The usually-careful Liza had spilled two cups of milk on the (clean) floor in the kitchen and dining room, breaking a mug I bought in college to give to my kid someday.
Jason had managed to catch the edge of the dining room table with his kidney when he was standing up after cleaning up one of the milk spills. I forgot to ask tonight if he's peeing blood ... isn't that what always happens to boxers when they get punched in the kidneys?
The bread that burned me and took 15 minutes and half a roll of paper towels to clean up ... wasn't cooked all the way through. So we put it back in the oven upside down on a baking sheet to try to get the bottom part a little less doughy ... only we forgot to grease the pan, so I had to chip the bread off with a metal knife when it was finally cooked. It wasn't that good, either.
And the knitting project I started this morning got twisted when I worked on it, making the four hundred stitches I had completed irrelevant since I had to completely rip it out and start again.
By 4pm,
I learned that part of one of my favorite national parks had collapsed, and Bernie Mac had died.
By 6pm,
My usually-steady daughter managed to plunge head-first down the stairs to the family room, knocking pictures off the wall and hitting something with her face that has given her an interesting bruise that is precisely rectangular. There's nothing more reassuring after the thumpity-thumpity-bumpity-thud than the primal scream that comes out of the fallen kid's mouth that assures you that no, she's not dead yet.
And she spilled a third cup of milk on the floor of the kitchen. By then, I was out of Swiffer refills.
I found out that Isaac Hayes was dead.
By 11pm,
I found that the knitting project I had restarted this afternoon was about twice as large as it was supposed to be, despite using the needles and yarn weight called for in the directions. I appear to be knitting a gaiter for a polar bear, not my mother. She's going to have to really bulk up for this to fit.
Add to this the 14 crises that were narrowly averted (the sugar syrup narrowly missed landing in the frying bacon grease and spattering all over the front of me; Liza kept trying to play with her magic wands - two foot-long wooden sticks - right next to the bouquet of flowers in the vase K's mom gave us for our wedding; I lost my balance while Liza was hugging me goodnight and almost knocked over the ironing board with the hot iron on top of it, etc.) and you'll understand why I'll be going to bed, pulling the covers over my head, and hoping a sinkhole doesn't open in the backyard and swallow my family sometime in the middle of the night. If you don't hear from me for a few days, you might want to send in spelunkers.
By 9:30am,
I had burned myself badly removing breakfast from the oven, simultaneously spilling a boiling hot mixture of sugar, melted butter and orange juice all over my stovetop and floor.
The usually-careful Liza had spilled two cups of milk on the (clean) floor in the kitchen and dining room, breaking a mug I bought in college to give to my kid someday.
Jason had managed to catch the edge of the dining room table with his kidney when he was standing up after cleaning up one of the milk spills. I forgot to ask tonight if he's peeing blood ... isn't that what always happens to boxers when they get punched in the kidneys?
The bread that burned me and took 15 minutes and half a roll of paper towels to clean up ... wasn't cooked all the way through. So we put it back in the oven upside down on a baking sheet to try to get the bottom part a little less doughy ... only we forgot to grease the pan, so I had to chip the bread off with a metal knife when it was finally cooked. It wasn't that good, either.
And the knitting project I started this morning got twisted when I worked on it, making the four hundred stitches I had completed irrelevant since I had to completely rip it out and start again.
By 4pm,
I learned that part of one of my favorite national parks had collapsed, and Bernie Mac had died.
By 6pm,
My usually-steady daughter managed to plunge head-first down the stairs to the family room, knocking pictures off the wall and hitting something with her face that has given her an interesting bruise that is precisely rectangular. There's nothing more reassuring after the thumpity-thumpity-bumpity-thud than the primal scream that comes out of the fallen kid's mouth that assures you that no, she's not dead yet.
And she spilled a third cup of milk on the floor of the kitchen. By then, I was out of Swiffer refills.
I found out that Isaac Hayes was dead.
By 11pm,
I found that the knitting project I had restarted this afternoon was about twice as large as it was supposed to be, despite using the needles and yarn weight called for in the directions. I appear to be knitting a gaiter for a polar bear, not my mother. She's going to have to really bulk up for this to fit.
Add to this the 14 crises that were narrowly averted (the sugar syrup narrowly missed landing in the frying bacon grease and spattering all over the front of me; Liza kept trying to play with her magic wands - two foot-long wooden sticks - right next to the bouquet of flowers in the vase K's mom gave us for our wedding; I lost my balance while Liza was hugging me goodnight and almost knocked over the ironing board with the hot iron on top of it, etc.) and you'll understand why I'll be going to bed, pulling the covers over my head, and hoping a sinkhole doesn't open in the backyard and swallow my family sometime in the middle of the night. If you don't hear from me for a few days, you might want to send in spelunkers.
Look! Another thing that sucks!
Luckily, the arch that collapsed wasn't the one Jason and I hiked to during our trip to Utah in 2001. I'm sorta fond of Delicate Arch, aka "the one on the license plate."
Looking back through our Utah trip photos, I came across this buried treasure, taken in Goblin Valley State Park:
I call it "Jason the Goblin Proctologist," and the total craposity of the photo is because it's a photo of a photo, since the digital file is on a CD in our safety deposit box and therefore not readily accessible on a Sunday.
Oh, and in other suckage, here's the first of our carrot crop from the waterlogged garden plot:
That's a teaspoon (and cherry pit) for scale. Looks like we don't have to worry about getting hypercarotenemia, at least from our harvest. Split three ways, we each got a piece of carrot about half the size of a pencil eraser. Mmmmm, filling.
Friday, August 08, 2008
Yes.
http://www.sweet-juniper.com/2008/08/nemo-risum-praebuit-qui-ex-se-cepit.html
I was going to post the best bits, but I couldn't decide between about 15 of them, so just go read the thing already, especially the last half.
Oh, hell - here's one of my favorites anyway:
My daughter is now fully aware that not all clothing starts out smelling like mildew and chain-smoking pubic lice, and this vexes me. "That nice smell," I tell her. "It's all chemicals. If they didn't cover them in chemicals, new clothes would smell like the tears of work-weary Honduran widows."
and
This is where the story turns from Jim-the-annoying-elitist-hipster buying his kid whatever she wants so long as it's not adorned with one of those beast-loving Mexican preschoolers to the story of a 31-year-old man trying to convince his 3-year-old daughter that she wants an entire army of 4-inch plastic Roman legionnaries to wage war on those uppity bog farmers in transapline Gaul.
I was going to post the best bits, but I couldn't decide between about 15 of them, so just go read the thing already, especially the last half.
Oh, hell - here's one of my favorites anyway:
My daughter is now fully aware that not all clothing starts out smelling like mildew and chain-smoking pubic lice, and this vexes me. "That nice smell," I tell her. "It's all chemicals. If they didn't cover them in chemicals, new clothes would smell like the tears of work-weary Honduran widows."
and
This is where the story turns from Jim-the-annoying-elitist-hipster buying his kid whatever she wants so long as it's not adorned with one of those beast-loving Mexican preschoolers to the story of a 31-year-old man trying to convince his 3-year-old daughter that she wants an entire army of 4-inch plastic Roman legionnaries to wage war on those uppity bog farmers in transapline Gaul.
Thursday, August 07, 2008
Thank you, Electric Company
Scene: I just finished writing the "Fuzzy Wuzzy" poem on the blackboard in Liza's room.
Liza: "Why did you put a question mark at the end?"
Me: "Why do you think I did?"
Liza: "Oh, because it's asking a question, isn't it?"
Yeah, that's thanks to one segment on an episode of Electric Company that she watched once. Oh, look - here it is now!
Now I won't be the only one singing that blasted song under my breath for the rest of the month. On a happier note, I think I need to find the Victor Borge punctuation routine on YouTube now that she knows the names of them. Oh, look - here it is now!
Liza: "Why did you put a question mark at the end?"
Me: "Why do you think I did?"
Liza: "Oh, because it's asking a question, isn't it?"
Yeah, that's thanks to one segment on an episode of Electric Company that she watched once. Oh, look - here it is now!
Now I won't be the only one singing that blasted song under my breath for the rest of the month. On a happier note, I think I need to find the Victor Borge punctuation routine on YouTube now that she knows the names of them. Oh, look - here it is now!
Starting to feel like Bartholemew Cubbins**
First, Liza stayed dry all night, so she got to open the "lipstick" I've been dangling in front of her for months. She decided it was necessary to freshen up right before our hat photo shoot. Honest to god, she said, "Don't take my picture! I didn't put on my lipstick yet! Mo---omm!"
Speaking of hats, I don't think I'll be using this shot to publicize the pattern ...
I think I might go with the "ladies of mystery" pose, although I probably will just break down and have Jason retake the photos. I don't think my muscles are up to holding the camera out at arm's length that long again any time soon.
**No, not the Oobleck - the hats. Poor schmo couldn't catch a break, could he?
Hah!
He looks like he just emerged from the Severus Snape's Magical Hair Shack, the very first recipient of the Defense Against the Dark Arts Super Shag. And needless to say, that look could use some work.
from Go Fug Yourself, if you hadn't guessed already ;)
from Go Fug Yourself, if you hadn't guessed already ;)
Wednesday, August 06, 2008
I love being on the first page of google search results
"tomato gorgonzola soup"
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&rlz=1T4GGIH_enUS260US261&q=tomato+gorgonzola+soup
#10 and rising, folks ... anybody want to go and click through a couple times to see if it raises me up a few notches? I will personally donate $100 to the ASPCA if we can get me to #1 by the end of the month. Who's with me on this?
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&rlz=1T4GGIH_enUS260US261&q=tomato+gorgonzola+soup
#10 and rising, folks ... anybody want to go and click through a couple times to see if it raises me up a few notches? I will personally donate $100 to the ASPCA if we can get me to #1 by the end of the month. Who's with me on this?
Words my daughter can read
Words my daughter can read, regardless of context, font, capitalization, etc.:
Liza
Stop
Words my daughter can match to the appropriate numeral in a little matching game I made for her, but hasn't shown me she can identify in other contexts:
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Boy, does she love that matching game, especially first thing in the morning when she's chock full of patience and really receptive to new things. She got all six numbers down cold this morning, and she kept wanting to add the other four she saw on the table, but I wanted to go slow so I was sure she wasn't getting overloaded.
Hey, when the kid tells me that what she wants to do this summer is learn to swim underwater and learn to read, I sign her up for swim classes and make flashcards. And so far she can paddle around with swimmies, put her face in the water, not freak out when she goes under accidentally, and sorta read eight words.
Have I mentioned recently that she's brilliant? Still can't wipe her own butt, but brilliant nonetheless.
****
Jason and I have a running joke that whenever my mother or I confront a new problem or challenge, the first thing we do is go read a book about it. I guess that explains why I've been scouring the homeschooling web sites for teaching tips, and I ordered a library book about how to teach your kid to read (by the folks who make Between the Lions, which Liza loves on the Chick-Fil-A kids' meal CDs she's got, but is only moderately interested in watching). The book is moderately useful, if only to sort of prepare me for how complicated the whole mess is. I'm glad I'm not responsible for teaching her all of it, just trying to get her started, because jeez, who made all these rules?
I don't remember learning to read, but I swear I didn't learn 90% of these rules, except as "Well of course c-e-i-l-i-n-g has a soft C at the beginning, that's just the way it is." How come nobody ever told me that the C is only soft if it's followed by E, I, or Y? Did I really have to learn that from a cheesy fake country song? "Certainly enough to make me cry," indeed.
The book is actually quite helpful for the analytical side of me, the part who wants to know what the heck is going on inside the kid's head while she's trying to figure all this out. And it gives a lot of benchmarks to measure her against, things she needs to learn to do before she'll be reading fluently. Plus, it's got me thinking about things like the fact that the same 100 words make up 50% of everything we read (somebody else's 100 words list here, in case you're skeptical). That sort of list would have been helpful when I was, I don't know, trying to learn Japanese in 6 weeks before we moved there, maybe?
Anyhow, the reading thing is something we're trying when she's interested, and if she loses interest I'll return the library book (and the phonics CD, and the Electric Company DVDs) and go help her learn about bugs or clay or cooking or dance or whatever she's interested in next. After all, they've got books about those at the library too, right?
Liza
Stop
Words my daughter can match to the appropriate numeral in a little matching game I made for her, but hasn't shown me she can identify in other contexts:
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Boy, does she love that matching game, especially first thing in the morning when she's chock full of patience and really receptive to new things. She got all six numbers down cold this morning, and she kept wanting to add the other four she saw on the table, but I wanted to go slow so I was sure she wasn't getting overloaded.
Hey, when the kid tells me that what she wants to do this summer is learn to swim underwater and learn to read, I sign her up for swim classes and make flashcards. And so far she can paddle around with swimmies, put her face in the water, not freak out when she goes under accidentally, and sorta read eight words.
Have I mentioned recently that she's brilliant? Still can't wipe her own butt, but brilliant nonetheless.
****
Jason and I have a running joke that whenever my mother or I confront a new problem or challenge, the first thing we do is go read a book about it. I guess that explains why I've been scouring the homeschooling web sites for teaching tips, and I ordered a library book about how to teach your kid to read (by the folks who make Between the Lions, which Liza loves on the Chick-Fil-A kids' meal CDs she's got, but is only moderately interested in watching). The book is moderately useful, if only to sort of prepare me for how complicated the whole mess is. I'm glad I'm not responsible for teaching her all of it, just trying to get her started, because jeez, who made all these rules?
I don't remember learning to read, but I swear I didn't learn 90% of these rules, except as "Well of course c-e-i-l-i-n-g has a soft C at the beginning, that's just the way it is." How come nobody ever told me that the C is only soft if it's followed by E, I, or Y? Did I really have to learn that from a cheesy fake country song? "Certainly enough to make me cry," indeed.
The book is actually quite helpful for the analytical side of me, the part who wants to know what the heck is going on inside the kid's head while she's trying to figure all this out. And it gives a lot of benchmarks to measure her against, things she needs to learn to do before she'll be reading fluently. Plus, it's got me thinking about things like the fact that the same 100 words make up 50% of everything we read (somebody else's 100 words list here, in case you're skeptical). That sort of list would have been helpful when I was, I don't know, trying to learn Japanese in 6 weeks before we moved there, maybe?
Anyhow, the reading thing is something we're trying when she's interested, and if she loses interest I'll return the library book (and the phonics CD, and the Electric Company DVDs) and go help her learn about bugs or clay or cooking or dance or whatever she's interested in next. After all, they've got books about those at the library too, right?
Why doesn't it surprise me ...
... that today's headline about Paris Hilton had the words "tart" and "butt" in it?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080806/ap_on_el_pr/mccain_paris_hilton
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080806/ap_on_el_pr/mccain_paris_hilton
Sunday, August 03, 2008
Small mercies
1. When we arrived at our friends' house yesterday and found that their neighbors' kids and their friends were all playing at the house, Liza didn't dissolve into a puddle of weepiness OR demand that they all go home. She pretty much ignored them, actually, and admitted that one of the assorted strangers was pretty cool because he volunteered to help turn the handle on the ice cream maker.
2. When we babysat Liza's best friend this afternoon, both she and Liza went down for naps at the same time, virtually without comment from either of them. We expect this from Little Miss Angel Child the friend, but recent naptimes have been more off than on as far as Liza's concerned. So instead of having to deal with one or two tired, cranky preschoolers all afternoon, I had an extra 90 minutes to get ready for the dinner we were hosting tonight.
3. Tonight when Liza's 8-year-old friend hit a line drive with the plastic t-ball softball straight into Liza's thigh from less than 10 feet away, it was nothing that couldn't be fixed with a frozen pea ice pack and an apology. Technicolor bruise photos to follow later this week, I'm sure.
See that? Not only is she not sitting on my lap, she's not even holding my hand, and she's not attempting to strangle the lady or bite off her hand. Liza was completely calm the whole time, and she really liked the hygenist, so I think we'll go ahead and try to schedule her for a real cleaning as soon as we can. Strike while the iron is hot, or rather, while the kid has good memories of the dentist's office (and the stickers and prizes she got to take home when she left).
2. When we babysat Liza's best friend this afternoon, both she and Liza went down for naps at the same time, virtually without comment from either of them. We expect this from Little Miss Angel Child the friend, but recent naptimes have been more off than on as far as Liza's concerned. So instead of having to deal with one or two tired, cranky preschoolers all afternoon, I had an extra 90 minutes to get ready for the dinner we were hosting tonight.
3. Tonight when Liza's 8-year-old friend hit a line drive with the plastic t-ball softball straight into Liza's thigh from less than 10 feet away, it was nothing that couldn't be fixed with a frozen pea ice pack and an apology. Technicolor bruise photos to follow later this week, I'm sure.
4. One I keep forgetting to post ... Last week Jason had to go to the dentist for his regular cleaning appointment, and we took Liza along so she could watch and see what visiting the dentist is like so hopefully she won't totally lose it the first time she goes for real. She watched Jason get his teeth cleaned ("Is he done yet? This is boring."), then she got to ride in the chair ...
She was so excited about being in the chair, the hygenist went ahead and counted her teeth and did a quick check to make sure there were no massive issues we need to take care of.
Thursday, July 31, 2008
A couple things that suck about parenting
1. When you try to be a good parent, and you save some of your kid's art that you especially like, and after leaving it sit on the kitchen counter for weeks you finally put it on your desk so you can hang it on the wall in your office later that day, and then your kid chooses that night to spit water all over your desk, so not only do you have to spend 10 minutes sucking water out of your keyboard, but the painting titled "a kid and her mommy holding hands and walking in the river" is completely ruined. Damn you, watercolors!
3. When your kid discovers the "big kid" Disney books on the high shelf and wants to hear them over and over and over again, and you have to spend an hour explaining "Why are there mean sisters who rip up Cinderella's dress? Why is Cinderella crying? Why can't she go to the ball in that dress?" Bonus parenting points if you manage to read parts of Bambi SO FAST and with so little inflection that the separation-anxiety-plagued kid doesn't understand that Bambi's mom ends up D-E-A-D as a doornail, shot by someone who looks suspiciously like her grandfather.
4. "Why did they put the chain on Dumbo's mom's leg?" "Because she got angry, and they didn't want her to hurt anyone." "She got angry? Like you do sometimes?" "(sigh) Yes, like I do sometimes, only usually I don't pick people up and shake them and incite stampedes." (pause) "Why did they put the chain on Dumbo's mom's leg?"
5. "Why is the mother being not nice, mommy?" Twenty-minute-long discussion with a 3-year-old about how people aren't always nice = why Jason owes me a mom's night out sometime very soon. And alcohol. And chocolate. And very, very nice yarn.
2. Listening to your kid talking to herself and realizing that her imaginary friends don't want to play with her because she's wearing the wrong kind of dress. And that's before she even finds the Cinderella book, mind you.
4. "Why did they put the chain on Dumbo's mom's leg?" "Because she got angry, and they didn't want her to hurt anyone." "She got angry? Like you do sometimes?" "(sigh) Yes, like I do sometimes, only usually I don't pick people up and shake them and incite stampedes." (pause) "Why did they put the chain on Dumbo's mom's leg?"
5. "Why is the mother being not nice, mommy?" Twenty-minute-long discussion with a 3-year-old about how people aren't always nice = why Jason owes me a mom's night out sometime very soon. And alcohol. And chocolate. And very, very nice yarn.
Dear god, now we're not even safe in Canada
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080801/ap_on_re_ca/canada_bus_stabbing
Understatement of the Year
Understatement of the Year
"You're sitting there enjoying your trip and then all of a sudden somebody gets stabbed. I imagine it would be pretty traumatic," Colwell said.
Yeah, I think witnessing a random death and beheading could be considered "pretty traumatic." Sheesh.
Growing
Sight for sore eyes
Slightly less disgusting than last year's mushrooms, but still unidentifiable*
Last year I had phallic cucumbers and mutant zucchini ... this year I've got a phallic mutant tomato.
Bet that description is going to give me some google searchers who are REALLY disappointed when they end up here ;)*stop the presses, I may have found it:
Found growing on front lawn. Virginia Beach, Virginia. 13 October, 2006
This mushroom is Armillariella tabescens (aka: Clitocybe tabescens) and is edible with caution. (first time eaters be sure to cook it well and eat only a small portion as some people report a gastrointestinal disturbance after eating this mushroom). It is odd to see it fruit in the middle of what is apparently a lawn. the remains of a tree root system must be below the spot these mushrooms fruit from (or are near a tree that cannot be seen in the picture). the Honey Mushroom (Armillariella mellea) is similar but has a ring on the stem. A bright orange cluster of mushrooms that fruits like this (and from wood, buried or otherwise) is probably Omphalotus illudens (the Jack'o'lantern) and is poisonous
From a site that is dedicated to 'shroom enthusiasts ... but not the kind who grow them for cooking, if you know what I mean, so I'm not convinced it's correct. Then again, who says the trippers don't know their own product?
Shall we take bets?
Before we went on vacation I noticed that one of the two inflatable rings on Liza's kiddie pool had deflated. Given how often it has been moved, that wasn't surprising, and I figured the next time I used it I'd just patch it up with one of the 146 patch kits we have floating around in the garage.
I hauled the pool out yesterday, cleaned it off, and inflated both of the rings so that I could locate the source of the problem. I never did find the leak, although I did determine that it's large enough that a fully inflated ring loses half its air in less than an hour. The remaining ring was enough to keep the sides of the pool (mostly) upright, though, so I filled the pool and let Liza splash around for an hour yesterday evening.
This morning I was surprised to see that not only were both of the pool rings deflated, the pool was completely empty and the innertube was flat as a pancake, too. Whaaaa?
* Ohio State's main sports rival is University of Michigan, whose mascot is the wolverine
I hauled the pool out yesterday, cleaned it off, and inflated both of the rings so that I could locate the source of the problem. I never did find the leak, although I did determine that it's large enough that a fully inflated ring loses half its air in less than an hour. The remaining ring was enough to keep the sides of the pool (mostly) upright, though, so I filled the pool and let Liza splash around for an hour yesterday evening.
This morning I was surprised to see that not only were both of the pool rings deflated, the pool was completely empty and the innertube was flat as a pancake, too. Whaaaa?
Half a dozen holes, some the size of my hand, in the bottom of the pool. The drain plug pulled out and ripped off of its tether. A (never found) hole in the bottom ring so large that part of the pool water drained into the ring and is stuck inside.
I'm guessing that the recent lack of rain has something desperate for water, and maybe it got stuck inside once it jumped in to have a drink. Now, the only question is: Woodchuck? Skunk? Cat? Falcon? Owl? Deer? Raccoon? Nocturnal squirrel? Evil redneck neighbor? Wolverine*?
* Ohio State's main sports rival is University of Michigan, whose mascot is the wolverine
Monday, July 28, 2008
Liza of the Dance
The freakiest thing about this video is that the only thing that could have inspired it is the penguin dance scene from Mary Poppins, which features Dick Van Dyke doing some softshoe. How she got from that (and my mother doing The Twist at the wedding reception earlier this month) to Irish step dancing, I will never know.
Needless to say, the Lord of the Dance videos I dug up on YouTube tonight were well received. Gotta go request the full video of that and Stomp from the library.
Needless to say, the Lord of the Dance videos I dug up on YouTube tonight were well received. Gotta go request the full video of that and Stomp from the library.
Quick pricing question
Okay, Internetz, I need help with an etsy decision. I'm trying to get some ideas and supply built up before the weather turns cold ;)
How much would you be willing to pay for a hand-knit hat that looked like this (in an adult size, or in a kid size - give two prices if you'd like):
How much would you be willing to pay for a hand-knit hat that looked like this (in an adult size, or in a kid size - give two prices if you'd like):
How much extra would you be willing to pay to get one that is a custom size and color combination? And how much for a matching hat/mittens set that had a similar design?
Thanks for your input!
Friday, July 25, 2008
teehee
http://www.chucknorrisfacts.com/
"When Chuck Norris does a pushup, he isn’t lifting himself up, he’s pushing the Earth down."
"When Chuck Norris does a pushup, he isn’t lifting himself up, he’s pushing the Earth down."
Thursday, July 24, 2008
Most expensive family entertainment I've ever purchased
For $1300 and six hours of being housebound, all I saw of my daughter was this ...
All I saw of my cat was this ...
And all I saw of my father was this ...
After all that, I have about a billion fewer dead branches threatening to impale our house during each storm, non-leaking bathtub and patio faucets, and a new faucet in my bathroom sink.
My favorite part of the day? When the tree guys flagged down the neighborhood ice cream truck.
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Because Sonia never tells me anything anymore ...
I had to find out about this from ... my mother.
That's just wrong, dude - I mean, I know we moved away like a year and a half ago, but still ... your husband's got a freakin' miniseries on SpikeTV and you don't even mention it? Not cool.
That's just wrong, dude - I mean, I know we moved away like a year and a half ago, but still ... your husband's got a freakin' miniseries on SpikeTV and you don't even mention it? Not cool.
And were you going to mention that "Invincible" is on MTV?
Congrats, guys - no wonder he was holed up in his studio so much.
Monday, July 21, 2008
Won't you be my neighbor?
The foreclosure house next to ours is for sale. For $50K less than we paid for our mirror-image house a little over a year ago.
True, the sale house has a couple inches of water in the basement, plus kitchen and bathrooms from the dark ages, but still. Gah.
Good thing we're not planning to move anytime soon.
True, the sale house has a couple inches of water in the basement, plus kitchen and bathrooms from the dark ages, but still. Gah.
Good thing we're not planning to move anytime soon.
Wedding shots
Liza, Susan and Chloe pose before the ceremony. Yes, my daughter is jovial, and no, she's not drunk, all evidence to the contrary. Notice that Chloe has learned the hard way that it's best to keep an eye on Ms. Unpredictable, lest she run up and smack you for no reason while giggling maniacally. Notice also: Susan, Most Beautiful Bride On The Planet.
Action shot! I was on the outside end of the very front pew, so it was hard to get a good angle, but at least you can tell Liza had the right idea. Both girls made it down the aisle at a reasonable pace, sprinkling as they went, and not even stopping when they spotted grandparents and other relatives in the congregation. Again, Chloe's keeping an eye on the wild animal next to her.
Video is ready, only YouTube is being all wonky and won't let me open the page, so you'll have to wait for that. Three-year-old line-dancing at the reception? Well worth the wait.
Action shot! I was on the outside end of the very front pew, so it was hard to get a good angle, but at least you can tell Liza had the right idea. Both girls made it down the aisle at a reasonable pace, sprinkling as they went, and not even stopping when they spotted grandparents and other relatives in the congregation. Again, Chloe's keeping an eye on the wild animal next to her.
Susan's father was too ill to attend the wedding, so Jason took his place for the second dance. Liza was not amused. You can't tell, but we had to duct tape her feet to the floor to keep her from joining them.
Most touching moment of the night? Susan managed to drag her stepfather out onto the dance floor during "Wind Beneath My Wings." Mr. I'm Too Baptist To Dance got served ;)
I think I'll blow this up to poster-size and send it to him - what do you think?
Video is ready, only YouTube is being all wonky and won't let me open the page, so you'll have to wait for that. Three-year-old line-dancing at the reception? Well worth the wait.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
Status report
Back from the wedding, will write more and post photos when I've got the laundry pile lower than my waist, but in the meantime ...
Liza made it down the aisle (and back at the end of the service)!
Liza made it down the aisle (and back at the end of the service)!
Ack! Hurry! Watch before midnight tonight!
http://www.drhorrible.com/
Or else you'll have to pay for it when Joss Whedon finds someplace else to distribute it.
*****
Is it just me, or is Nathan looking a bit paunchy? I mean, still rogue-ishly handsome, but in a pudgy sort of way. And Doogie is looking a little old ... he can sing his ass off, but still.
Or else you'll have to pay for it when Joss Whedon finds someplace else to distribute it.
*****
Is it just me, or is Nathan looking a bit paunchy? I mean, still rogue-ishly handsome, but in a pudgy sort of way. And Doogie is looking a little old ... he can sing his ass off, but still.
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Emergency Shawl
When it's one week before the wedding, I'm leaving for the east coast the next day, and I realize that my shoulders look like pizza and I don't want to gross everyone out by exposing them in my halter-style dress, there's only one thing to do: go stash-diving and knit a shawl. Fast. Like, in less than 8 hours of total working time.Look how well the teal in the yarn matches the awesome sandals I'm going to be wearing. Now THAT'S some good stash-diving!
(I get bonus points for posting this from Dial-Up Land, where it took me damn near as long to upload the photos and post here as it did to make the shawl. Seriously, we have got to do something about my MIL's internet access.)
Friday, July 11, 2008
Off my butt Friday
1. The grill that covers the vent fan in our bathroom was visibly dusty, and has been since, ahem, we moved in. You know how there are some tasks that you know won't be that hard, but you still never get around to them because, let's be honest, you're the only one who will notice if it doesn't get done? Yeah, the vent fan is that sort of thing.
Today I took the grill down, and not only was it dusty, the damn thing looked like a wool blanket had been glued to the insides of it. Ten minutes of high-pressure hosing down later, some scrubbing with a (retired) toothbrush, and some cursing while reinstalling it in the jerry-rigged contraption in the ceiling, and we now have a chance that the air capacity of the fan will be measured in cubic feet per minute instead of per hour. Huzzah.
2. The outside faucet at the back of our house leaks, and it has been dripping since, ahem, we moved in. Last year we didn't notice it much because of how we had the hose hooked up, but it definitely contributed to the swampiness I spent all this week combatting. Anyhow, the faucet is so drippy that it can be measured in gallons per day, so we have been using the shutoff valve in the basement to keep it off except for when we actively need to be using it. Yeah, that's convenient, to have to traipse through the kitchen, family room, basement, and laundry room in order to turn it on or off.
I avoid plumbing repairs, mainly because if it gets screwed up there's a chance it can do major damage to the house, but a leaky faucet shouldn't be too hard to fix, right? I researched it in all of my handyman books, and it looked like you unscrew a couple things, replace some washers and O-rings, and put it back together. No problem. Only, I can't get the damn thing unscrewed. Liberal amounts of WD-40 have been applied, and it's going nowhere. I'm not completely sure which direction it's supposed to turn (sometimes the screws on things that are supposed to rotate go the wrong way so they don't unscrew themselves during normal use), and the slot for the screwdriver is stripping, so I've given up for now. I can't decide if this is a "wait for Dad" or a "just call the damn plumber already" situation. And someone needs to shoot whoever came up with flathead screws, or at least whoever continues to use them now that there are less strippy options.
3. The faucet in our tub/shower has been leaking for the past few months, getting worse virtually daily. You can reduce it to a drip if you really crank the handles down hard, but if Jason is in a fog in the morning and forgets, I find a thin stream of water going down the drain when I get in there. Not good. Add to that the fact that the handles are the ugly chrome-and-clear-plastic variety that have enough mold on the inside to repopulate a small planet, and Something needed to be done.
I succeeded in shutting off the water to the tub (Yay for shutoff valves behind little doors in the closet behind the bathroom!) and getting the handles and escutcheons off, but I can't get the guts of the handles to move at all. I went over to Home Depot in hopes that there would be a magical device for doing what I'm trying to do with a pair of channel lock pliers, but no dice. There are specialized implements for every other plumbing repair job, but apparently not this one. And there are so many different replacement "guts" that there's no way I can figure out what I need without removing the current setup.
Again, I'm not completely sure of what I'm doing, and if I bust something we're going to be showering in the guest bathroom until we get it fixed, so I've given up for now. I'm in the process of bleaching the living crap out of the handles (literally) and escutcheons, and I have to recaulk the area around our sink anyway so I can take care of fixing the funk there, too, but otherwise I'm stymied.
I have definitively decided that this, combined with the drippy immoveable outside faucet, is a "call the plumber already" situation, which takes the burden off of my shoulders. And if we're going to pay to have the plumber come out, I'm not repairing the ugly thing, I'm getting one that doesn't look like the 1980s attacked my bathroom. Now I just have to find somewhere that stocks a three-handle shower/tub faucet combo in an antique bronze finish, get it ordered and get it here, and find a plumber. Oh, and find some cash to pay for this whole party ... sigh.
Today I took the grill down, and not only was it dusty, the damn thing looked like a wool blanket had been glued to the insides of it. Ten minutes of high-pressure hosing down later, some scrubbing with a (retired) toothbrush, and some cursing while reinstalling it in the jerry-rigged contraption in the ceiling, and we now have a chance that the air capacity of the fan will be measured in cubic feet per minute instead of per hour. Huzzah.
2. The outside faucet at the back of our house leaks, and it has been dripping since, ahem, we moved in. Last year we didn't notice it much because of how we had the hose hooked up, but it definitely contributed to the swampiness I spent all this week combatting. Anyhow, the faucet is so drippy that it can be measured in gallons per day, so we have been using the shutoff valve in the basement to keep it off except for when we actively need to be using it. Yeah, that's convenient, to have to traipse through the kitchen, family room, basement, and laundry room in order to turn it on or off.
I avoid plumbing repairs, mainly because if it gets screwed up there's a chance it can do major damage to the house, but a leaky faucet shouldn't be too hard to fix, right? I researched it in all of my handyman books, and it looked like you unscrew a couple things, replace some washers and O-rings, and put it back together. No problem. Only, I can't get the damn thing unscrewed. Liberal amounts of WD-40 have been applied, and it's going nowhere. I'm not completely sure which direction it's supposed to turn (sometimes the screws on things that are supposed to rotate go the wrong way so they don't unscrew themselves during normal use), and the slot for the screwdriver is stripping, so I've given up for now. I can't decide if this is a "wait for Dad" or a "just call the damn plumber already" situation. And someone needs to shoot whoever came up with flathead screws, or at least whoever continues to use them now that there are less strippy options.
3. The faucet in our tub/shower has been leaking for the past few months, getting worse virtually daily. You can reduce it to a drip if you really crank the handles down hard, but if Jason is in a fog in the morning and forgets, I find a thin stream of water going down the drain when I get in there. Not good. Add to that the fact that the handles are the ugly chrome-and-clear-plastic variety that have enough mold on the inside to repopulate a small planet, and Something needed to be done.
I succeeded in shutting off the water to the tub (Yay for shutoff valves behind little doors in the closet behind the bathroom!) and getting the handles and escutcheons off, but I can't get the guts of the handles to move at all. I went over to Home Depot in hopes that there would be a magical device for doing what I'm trying to do with a pair of channel lock pliers, but no dice. There are specialized implements for every other plumbing repair job, but apparently not this one. And there are so many different replacement "guts" that there's no way I can figure out what I need without removing the current setup.
Again, I'm not completely sure of what I'm doing, and if I bust something we're going to be showering in the guest bathroom until we get it fixed, so I've given up for now. I'm in the process of bleaching the living crap out of the handles (literally) and escutcheons, and I have to recaulk the area around our sink anyway so I can take care of fixing the funk there, too, but otherwise I'm stymied.
I have definitively decided that this, combined with the drippy immoveable outside faucet, is a "call the plumber already" situation, which takes the burden off of my shoulders. And if we're going to pay to have the plumber come out, I'm not repairing the ugly thing, I'm getting one that doesn't look like the 1980s attacked my bathroom. Now I just have to find somewhere that stocks a three-handle shower/tub faucet combo in an antique bronze finish, get it ordered and get it here, and find a plumber. Oh, and find some cash to pay for this whole party ... sigh.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
Last week's recipes
After weeks of "I don't know, pick whatever you want to eat," Jason inexplicably requested that I cook Thai food last week, and I obliged by hauling out Step-By-Step Thai and cooking all of our meals from it. The winners:
Chicken and Noodle One-Pot, which is sort of a coconut/curry/lime soupy noodle dish. Yummmmmm!
Sesame Hot Noodles, which I served as a side dish to go along with the Roast Red Pork and some stir-fried snow peas. All of them were good on their own, but they were much better when we mixed them all together and called it Thai Lo Mein. The pork wasn't quite the same as the red pork you get in Chinese wonton soup or fried rice, but it was good - the allspice made it almost sweet, and while it didn't smell too appetizing, the taste was really good and it was really hard to stop nibbling pieces off while I carved the loin into slices.
Carrot and Cilantro Salad, which I served as a side dish with Sesame Skewered Chicken with Ginger Baste. I really liked the salad and couldn't stop snitching from it while we were waiting for the chicken to cook on the grill. Jason was less enthused, but I think I can convince him to eat it again. We both agreed that the chicken was excellent, and regretted having to share it with the friends we were cooking with that night (just kidding, guys! sort of...). I used some of the red Sriracha chile sauce (the stuff in the squirt bottles on the tables at Thai restaurants) as a dip for the chicken, and it perked things up nicely.
Since I've been working on the patio all this week, I've fallen back on my tried and true recipes, including an asparagus frittata, the horribly named Zippy Beef Mac and Cheese, and Tomato Corn Chowder. Nothing inspiring, but I know how long the recipes take to fix, I know they turn out edible, and I know the leftovers freeze well (except the frittata ... but there's never any leftovers of that, anyway). Not exactly a glowing endoresement, I know, but hey, we can't cook gourmet every week, can we?
Chicken and Noodle One-Pot, which is sort of a coconut/curry/lime soupy noodle dish. Yummmmmm!
Sesame Hot Noodles, which I served as a side dish to go along with the Roast Red Pork and some stir-fried snow peas. All of them were good on their own, but they were much better when we mixed them all together and called it Thai Lo Mein. The pork wasn't quite the same as the red pork you get in Chinese wonton soup or fried rice, but it was good - the allspice made it almost sweet, and while it didn't smell too appetizing, the taste was really good and it was really hard to stop nibbling pieces off while I carved the loin into slices.
Carrot and Cilantro Salad, which I served as a side dish with Sesame Skewered Chicken with Ginger Baste. I really liked the salad and couldn't stop snitching from it while we were waiting for the chicken to cook on the grill. Jason was less enthused, but I think I can convince him to eat it again. We both agreed that the chicken was excellent, and regretted having to share it with the friends we were cooking with that night (just kidding, guys! sort of...). I used some of the red Sriracha chile sauce (the stuff in the squirt bottles on the tables at Thai restaurants) as a dip for the chicken, and it perked things up nicely.
Since I've been working on the patio all this week, I've fallen back on my tried and true recipes, including an asparagus frittata, the horribly named Zippy Beef Mac and Cheese, and Tomato Corn Chowder. Nothing inspiring, but I know how long the recipes take to fix, I know they turn out edible, and I know the leftovers freeze well (except the frittata ... but there's never any leftovers of that, anyway). Not exactly a glowing endoresement, I know, but hey, we can't cook gourmet every week, can we?
Why I'm getting nothing done inside this week
The landing for the steps down from our deck has always been a swampy mess, thanks to compacted soil, poor drainage, and lighting that precludes the possibility of lush grass growth. I haven't had the energy to do anything about it ... which is why it looked like this last Thursday:
Next step: Painting some old plastic planters in funky colors and sticking some herbs in them, in hopes that they will (survive and) disguise the vents that stick out the back of the house onto my new super-mega-awesomely-incredible patio. And sticking out some grass seed when we get back from the wedding and there's a chance I'll remember to water it everyday (ha!).
Thanks to two days of excavation, a truckload of bricks, and me spending every freakin' afternoon this week hunched over and sweating, today it looks like this:
I'm taking total credit for this. I designed it, figured out how much stuff we'd need, ordered it, dug it, tamped it, installed it, sanded it, cut it, redid the part that looked like a sinkhole had opened up under it, and backfilled around it. Jason's involvement was pretty much limited to paying for it, distracting the kid while I worked during the weekend, running a few wheelbarrows full of soil to the pit in the backyard, and watching to make sure I didn't cut off my arm when I was using the masonry saw last night.
Note to self: Masonry saw requires eye protection, ear protection, AND A DUST MASK OR YOU WILL BE SNEEZING BLACK FOR A DAY AND A HALF.
Next step: Painting some old plastic planters in funky colors and sticking some herbs in them, in hopes that they will (survive and) disguise the vents that stick out the back of the house onto my new super-mega-awesomely-incredible patio. And sticking out some grass seed when we get back from the wedding and there's a chance I'll remember to water it everyday (ha!).
Wednesday, July 09, 2008
Another great career possibility
When she outgrows the adult entertainment industry, she can fall back on her rollerskating skills and join a derby team:
I bet you think that just because she's so uncoordinated she still falls over for no reason while standing still and she still can't ride a tricycle, I staged these photos and she's just standing there, possibly with some sort of rope holding her up. Nope, this is the real deal.
That's my girl - skating all by herself on her second time out. Burning River Roller Girls, here we come!
I bet you think that just because she's so uncoordinated she still falls over for no reason while standing still and she still can't ride a tricycle, I staged these photos and she's just standing there, possibly with some sort of rope holding her up. Nope, this is the real deal.That's my girl - skating all by herself on her second time out. Burning River Roller Girls, here we come!
FIRST!!!!!
Actually, the first was the cherry tomato Jason and I split after doing some yardwork tonight ... it was sweeeeeet. But this is the first "real" tomato, brought inside a little early lest some nasty form of nature swoop in and destroy it before I got to take a photo. Should be ripe by this weekend, and I've got a couple strips of bacon and a mess o' mayonnaise waiting for it.Sunday, July 06, 2008
Insomnia strikes again
I finally got around to signing the blog up with Feedburner, which is handy for all of you regular readers - now you don't have to keep checking back to see if there's new content, you can subscribe and it will tell you whenever there's an update.
Best of all for the only-barely-computer-handy: you can skip all this "feed" crap and easily set it up so a message is sent directly to your e-mail whenever I post something new.
Convenient for you, but since a lot of my views seem to be "nope, nothing new yet" visits from regular readers, I suspect my number of hits per day is going to tank. Oh, well - I'm willing to suffer for you guys, so I'll take the hit ;)
Just click on one of the Feedburner widgets on the lefthand side of the screen if you want to subscribe - it would make my day, and possibly my week, too, if I get a lot of subscriptions right away :)
Best of all for the only-barely-computer-handy: you can skip all this "feed" crap and easily set it up so a message is sent directly to your e-mail whenever I post something new.
Convenient for you, but since a lot of my views seem to be "nope, nothing new yet" visits from regular readers, I suspect my number of hits per day is going to tank. Oh, well - I'm willing to suffer for you guys, so I'll take the hit ;)
Just click on one of the Feedburner widgets on the lefthand side of the screen if you want to subscribe - it would make my day, and possibly my week, too, if I get a lot of subscriptions right away :)
Friday, July 04, 2008
Who needs pyrotechnicians ...
... when you've got shirtless, trash-talking, car-on-blocks-in-the-front-yard redneck neighbors three doors down who apparently have money to burn buying the entire contents of a Phantom Fireworks showroom? Or neighbors on the street south of you who are in a fireworks showdown with your street? Or people on a street somewhere north and east who are trying (and failing) to keep up?
I have never seen amateurs pull off shows this big in my life. Sure, sometimes somebody pulls out the stops and buys one or two really impressive armaments, but this is on a whole different scale. I mean, there are towns that have smaller displays than the one that's happening so close the china cabinet rattles from the concussions from the boomers.
After 10 or 15 minutes of the neighbors hauling packages of fireworks the size of milk crates out into the middle of our street and setting them off two, three, or seven (!) at a time, I finally ran inside to grab my camera. I've (poorly) edited together some of the better clips, where you can see the size of the fireworks that were literally 50 yards from our driveway, as well as some of the ones on the street north of us. Keep in mind that this is the slower, more leisurely pace ... I missed filming the really good parts, of course.
While I was filming, Jason held Liza, who was bundled up with a coat and sweatpants over her jammies, hands clamped over her ears, chanting "I think I want to go inside now - tell them to stop exploding now, please." She never started screaming, and she was really excited about seeing them and telling us which ones she liked best, but she was done with it after about 2 minutes. Good thing we didn't shell out $20 a piece to go see the orchestra and fireworks at Blossom tonight.
The neighbors finally ran out of ammo (or flares to light it with) about 10 minutes ago, more than an hour and a half after they started. Let's hope they don't restock for tomorrow ... the kid needs to get to sleep before 10:30 once in a while.
I have never seen amateurs pull off shows this big in my life. Sure, sometimes somebody pulls out the stops and buys one or two really impressive armaments, but this is on a whole different scale. I mean, there are towns that have smaller displays than the one that's happening so close the china cabinet rattles from the concussions from the boomers.
After 10 or 15 minutes of the neighbors hauling packages of fireworks the size of milk crates out into the middle of our street and setting them off two, three, or seven (!) at a time, I finally ran inside to grab my camera. I've (poorly) edited together some of the better clips, where you can see the size of the fireworks that were literally 50 yards from our driveway, as well as some of the ones on the street north of us. Keep in mind that this is the slower, more leisurely pace ... I missed filming the really good parts, of course.
While I was filming, Jason held Liza, who was bundled up with a coat and sweatpants over her jammies, hands clamped over her ears, chanting "I think I want to go inside now - tell them to stop exploding now, please." She never started screaming, and she was really excited about seeing them and telling us which ones she liked best, but she was done with it after about 2 minutes. Good thing we didn't shell out $20 a piece to go see the orchestra and fireworks at Blossom tonight.
The neighbors finally ran out of ammo (or flares to light it with) about 10 minutes ago, more than an hour and a half after they started. Let's hope they don't restock for tomorrow ... the kid needs to get to sleep before 10:30 once in a while.
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