And a last one, this time from just under a decade ago

One more post from way back when - a recounting of my adventures getting (the first of three) lasik surgery to correct my hideously bad eyesight. The squeamish should bow out now, I think.

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Ok, so I'm back, have slept off the worst of the valium, and am ready to tell my tale, for those of you who have strong enough stomachs to read any further. Here's how my day went:

9:15 am - suffered power blackout at work; since I work in a lab where the loss of ventilation can be hazardous, all of us trooped over to the cafeteria to hang out. Nothing better than time to sit around with nothing to do right before surgery, so you can dwell on exactly how scared you are. Contemplated the possiblity that the power wouldn't come on in the next hour or so, which would cause the plant manager to send first shift home early for the day, which would mean that I could save 1/2 a vacation day. That was the bright spot of the morning.

10:55 am - power restored, first shift had to stay. Darn it!

11am - bid farewell to coworkers ("See you Monday . . . hopefully!). Felt sense of elation that in a few hours, I'll be able to stop worrying about the damn procedure. Thought about taking my safety glasses with me in the car so I could pitch them out the window on my way home after the surgery, but decided that littering wasn't the best idea.

11:15am - choked down a light lunch at Subway. Contemplated which toppings would look best if circumstances caused me to regurgitate them all over the laser technician. Fretted.

11:55am - arrived at doctor's office. There were only two cars in the parking lot, a parking lot that is usually full. Is the place closed? Has he been sued for malpractice? Or are they just slow because of the lunch hour? Remembered to bring inside the bag of pre-surgery stress reducers I've gathered (stone I use to keep my hands occupied instead of biting my fingernails; photos of loved ones; handkerchief from my grandmother who breezed through several cataract surgeries with no difficultes, and whose estate made the surgery financially possible for me; plastic baggie and napkins to use in case of nausea).

12pm - signed in. Signed disclaimer that boiled down to "anything that goes wrong ain't the doctor's fault." Took 10mg valium. Tried to read engaging book to keep my mind off of impending procedure (
i O is for Outlaw;
very good book so far). Held husband's hand. Fretted.

12:15 pm - young woman who just arrived is scheduled for the surgery slot after mine. She looked calm and ready to go. And skinny. Wished fervently that I was more like her, or at least looked that good in overalls.

12:30 pm - assistant came to prep me for surgery. "I'm supposed to be feeling less anxious, right, because that isn't happening yet." "We'll get you prepped and get you another pill."

12:40 pm - Began crying. Just a little. Reassured by assistant, who had laser surgery herself, that everything will be fine, but I don't have to continue if I don't want to. Gulped down another 1/2 a valium, preying for some dopiness to start soon. Eye area was swabbed with betadine solution, and I had to put on a little blue shower cap to keep my hair out of the way.

12:50 pm - Waited in small waiting room for doctor to arrive. Assistant stopped by every few minutes to make sure I was feeling ok, which interfered with my stress-reducing yoga breathing techniques. Panic was still there, but manageable.

1:10 pm - Doctor is here, ready to go.
* Sit in something like a dentist's chair, only it tilts so far back that you feel like you're going to slide off headfirst onto the floor. Head was positioned just so, then held in place with an inflatable donut-shaped pillow. They moved the laser in place over my eye, and the focusing ring around the outside was so bright I could barely look at it.
* They put a patch over my left eye. Had to stare at the light while they attached a suction ring to my right eye. This caused me to lose all vision in that eye, which was probably a blessing, but it was really uncomfortable - like someone pushing fairly hard on your eye with their knuckle. The keratome (translation - knife) attached to the suction ring, and after a few seconds of vibration, the flap was cut. They removed the suction ring, and I breathed for the first time in several minutes, or at least that's how it seemed. Probably would have been impossible at that time to pry the lucky stone out of my hand.
* Also luckily, with the flap cut I couldn't really see what was going on too well. First they attached a speculum to my eyelids to keep them open. Then they flipped back the flap, made sure everything was ready, and started up the laser. The trick to the laser is that you have to look right at that super-bright area (with a pulsing red light in the middle; that's the actual laser) without moving your eye, or it gets all screwed up. Unfortunately, to me it looked like the damn target light was moving, so I kept trying to follow it with my eye. Luckily the doctor has a view of the whole thing, and every time my eye started to wander, he'd flip off the laser. After the fourth or fifth time that happened, he was probably getting a little annoyed. Meanwhile, the laser technician was counting down how many seconds I had left to go. Longest 48 seconds ever recorded in the history of mankind.
* Once the laser was done, they flipped the flap back in place and used some sort of spatula or brush or something to smooth it back into place. Thanks to the negative pressure in your eye, there are no stitches necessary to hold the flap back in place. Then I had to sit there with the speculum holding open my right eye (so the flap could get nicely dried and stuck down before I blinked) while they started on my left eye.
* So the right eye was bad, but the left eye was even scarier, since I knew exactly what was coming. The suction hurt worse on that eye - was bordering on pain, instead of just being uncomfortable. I'm hoping that whimpering uncontrollably doesn't mean that I wasn't brave, since I made it through the whole procedure for that eye, too. Of course, I may be picking rock fragments out of my hands for a few days, but hey - at least there was not vomiting!
* After the left eye was done, they put some drops in my right eye, then took out the speculum. Then I had to wait for another few minutes with the speculum still attached to my left eye (and it pinched!) while the doctor and technicians made small talk. Then they put in the drops, took the appliances off, and damned if I couldn't see! Well, I could see pretty well until they taped some clear eyepatches over my eyes to keep me from scratching at them overnight - they blur things a little bit.

1:30 pm - All done, including the post-operative counseling to let me know what types of pain and/or problems are bad enough for me to call the doctor at home and drag him with me to the hospital. Arrived in the lobby, triumphant, and looking unbearably stupid with both eyes tremendously bloodshot from the suction

Another post from the way-back e-mail machine

Found this one still online at the cooking forum I used to haunt back in the day ("the day" being 1998 and 1999, while I was living in Japan and was using the forum as a substitute for actual friends).

Oh, one more thing. For those of you who are interested, here's a copy of the message I sent out to friends and family, to let them know what our last few weeks have been like. Hope you enjoy!

This week's topic: Sayonara!

Well, it's been a long, hard road, but we've finally made it - our last day at the lab! Thank you, dear readers, for giving me a place to vent and explain our life abroad. It's so nice to share our thoughts with our friends, without having to tell the same anecdotes over and over again. I hope that you have learned a little, and laughed a little, and will miss the messages a little now that they're done. Better hold on to printouts of these little gems . . . you never know, maybe someday I'll become famous and they'll be worth something as records, rather than as kindling! Anyway, as a public service to you, I leave you with a step-by-step list of instructions for closing down your life in Japan, in case you ever need to do so.

** Allow two moving companies to bid on the move, as required by company policy. Explain to moving company representatives what will be sent by air, what will be sent by boat, and why your cat has its own bedroom in your apartment.

** Cram in day trips to all the places you meant to go see, but never got around to visiting. Shop for potential Christmas gifts and last-minute home decorations; add several more little paper weeble-wobble dolls to your now-extensive collection.

** Prepare cat for trip. Attempt to put cat into the carrying case he used on the trip to Japan; realize that he can't fit all four legs and his tail in at once. Visit hardware store to purchase crate large enough for a medium-sized dog, because "we want him to be comfortable." Sigh with relief when huge crate actually fits in the back seat of your car. Take cat to vet for pre-move checkup and updated shots. Watch as cat goes ballistic at the sight of other animals in the exam room; almost receive rabies shot instead of the cat because he squirms so much. Wish you had a tape recorder to capture the sounds coming out of the cat's throat, some of which could be marketed to the folks who make sound effects for horror movies. Vow that when you have to take the cat back to the vet again right before you leave the country, for another round of shots and the final certificate, you will either drug him into a stupor or wrap him up tightly in a towel.

** Purchase airline tickets, remembering to reserve a space in the cargo hold for the cat, and to get the animal-approved flight from Cincinnati to Cleveland (which involves a 3-hour layover in Cincy, rather than the standard 1-hour layover). Make hotel reservations at cat-friendly hotel. Reserve mini-van rental car to tote luggage and cat home from the airport.

** Begin disposing of Japanese appliances. Sell washer, dryer, and refrigerator at bargain-basement prices. Arrange to borrow company minivan to transport large appliances to their final destinations. Purchase large amounts of aspirin to alleviate hernia you anticipate will occur after you lug the refrigerator downstairs. Give away hair dryer, telephone, and light fixtures to strangers who make eye contact with you on the street.

** Begin sorting out what will actually be sent by air. Bring home boxes of work-related papers, and empty boxes to use for sorting. Watch in amusement as cat goes partially psycho when furniture is moved from one room to another . . . try to record the highest spontaneous vertical leap he performs when he hears a loud noise.

** Begin disposing of excess food. Offer American canned goods to fellow expats at reasonable prices. Devise delicious meals to use up foods that have already been opened ("Hmmm, a box of frosted flakes, a can of tuna, a bar of white chocolate, and two boxes of baking powder. Looks like we're ordering another pizza!").

** Ask secretaries to find a Japanese hotel which allows pets, for your last few nights once the apartment has been vacated. Determine that the closest one is two hours away from work, and three hours away from the airport. Decide to stay at a hotel in Nagoya and either smuggle in the cat, or leave him with a friend for a day or two.

** Deal with the movers for the air shipment. Explain, in a horrible mixture of English and Japanese and without the benefit of a map, how the movers should get to your apartment ("We're near the Meito Ward post office, and across the street from an elementary school. Does that help?"). Explain to the movers that the piteous noises coming from behind the closed door are not from a human sacrifice, just from a spoiled kitty. Try not to feel awkward as you sit on the couch watching a rerun of professional wrestling - it's the only English-language show on - while the movers grunt and strain in the next room. When movers ask if they may take a 10-minute break, consider the question carefully just to worry them, then say "yes." When movers ask if they may use the bathroom, consider the question carefully just to make them squirm, then say "yes."

** Deal with the aftermath of the air shipment packing. Let the cat out of his room, then watch as he actually does a double-take when you let him into the room the movers have emptied out. Notice how he jumps two feet straight into the air anytime you move or make a noise, for about 2 hours after the movers leave. Decide to get all the psychic cat damage done at once, and bring the dreaded suitcases out into view.

** Decide that to make things easier on the cat, you will leave the country one day earlier, thus eliminating the need to board him at your friends' house. Rebook airplane tickets, hotel, car rental. Notify everyone in the expat division of the changed date. Reschedule apartment inspection for the morning of the day you leave Japan. Schedule necessary maintenance on newly-purchased home (being certain to schedule the chimney cleaning BEFORE the carpet cleaning, and the cable tv installation AFTER the delivery of the television in the air shipment).

** Deal with Japan's farewell present to you, in the form of one last Unpleasant Seismic Event (we don't like to say the E-word). Think to yourself - and I'm suggesting based on experience here - "God, what are they doing downstairs? Ok, this one does feel like a truck hit the building - several times - and it's still going. I don't want to be trapped in the post-earthquake apocalyptic rubble wearing nothing but spandex tights and a sports bra - should I put my shoes on now and get crushed to death, or put them on later and risk having to run through broken glass barefoot to escape? Huh, the china cabinet sure is rattling - good thing we packed up all the photos and breakables earlier today. Maybe I'd better go stand by the door with the earthquake kit and see if this is going to stop soon. JASON!!!!!" Wait for 30-second temblor to finish, wait for a few seconds. Find husband, half-clothed and trying to pry the cat out of the box spring of the bed. Remind husband that in the case of a real emergency, it's better to have a dead cat than a crushed husband. When he disagrees, remind yourself that his life insurance policy is large enough to provide for a comfortable life for you. Remind yourself to check on whether he's covered in an earthquake, and if the "Accidental Death or Dismemberment" policy would apply in that situation.

** Say goodbye to coworkers. There should be plenty of opportunities for this, since you'll have a farewell staff meeting, farewell luncheon, night out with the secretaries, and official Soubetsukai on the evening of your last day of work. Begin thinking up excuses why you are unable to sing karaoke that night. Mentally review the useful Japanese phrase, "I cannot drink much tonight; I am on a diet." Lay in a supply of Tums, aspirin, and cool cloths for the next morning.

** Supervise packing of sea shipment. Stand around awkwardly while the movers do all the work, gradually taking away all the comfortable places to sit and interesting things to do. Remember to buy earplugs for yourself and all moving company employees, so that the noise from the cat - who will be locked into an empty room by himself - does not drive anyone insane. After movers leave for the day, watch as cat becomes completely psycho as he views the boxes and rearranged furniture one day, and the completely empty apartment the next day. Partially open doors between the connecting bedrooms, so that cat can run circular laps around the apartment. Feel really guilty when you leave him alone in the apartment and check into a hotel.

** Last day in Japan: 6am - wake up, check out of hotel. Travel to apartment; clean like maniacs. 9:30 - apartment inspection. When apartment owner and management company try to charge you for the tiny holes in the wall where you hung pictures, point out that they were going to have to re-wallpaper the whole apartment anyway, since there are so many 4-foot-long cracks in the walls. Remember to stand directly over the spot in the carpet where the cat tried to chew his way under a door (so that inspectors don't notice the frayed area). As inspectors make unreasonable demands for compensation, whisper hilariously menacing catch phrases you learned from the professional wrestling show under your breath ("He wants $500 because we didn't sanitize the oven? Yeah, right, I'd like to take that oven, shine it up real nice, turn it sideways, and stick it straight up his roody-poo candy a** "). 10:30 am - apartment inspection complete; turn apartment keys over to apartment owner. Turn company car keys over to secretary from work. Throw yourself on the mercy of your neighbors, whom you will visit until it's time to go to the airport around 4:30 pm. Check watch. Realize that you will smell like sweat and bleach all the way back to the US - that's another 20 to 24 hours. Check watch. Hope that the Business Class amenity pack contains refreshing moist towelettes, which you can use to give yourself a sponge bath in the airplane bathroom. Check watch. Cram yourself, 400 pounds of luggage, and the cat, into two taxis and head for the airport.

So long, farewell, sayonara, and good night!

Blast from the (way, way) past

We're going through some totes full of old mementos, and I found an e-mail correspondence I had with the owner of the company I worked for in July 1991. This is the first recorded instance of me using the computer to be funny, so I thought I'd share it here. Of course, the boss came up with much funnier material, but he'd had decades more practice than I had at the time (I was 17).

Backstory - Our company was on two floors of one building (five and six), and someone had recently sent around a message complaining that people were leaving the fridge door open in the break room near where I worked.

From me:

I found that the best way to make sure the fridge door closes (see Ley's e-mail) is by pressing on the lower lefthand side of the door with your foot as you close the door. This makes sure that the gasket around the door seals; if it doesn't, air leaks out and you may as well not close the door. Give it a try next time you use the fridge on six. Thanks!

From Andy:

FYI. Personally, I have found that getting a running start from the file cabinet and slamming my head into the lower right hand corner of the door seems to work just fine ... except for the one time that someone opened the door and I didn't notice ... it took me a half-hour to get that Tupperware container dislodged from my head.

From me:

Sometimes I go up to the seventh floor and do a Tarzan-type swing out their window and in through ours, kicking the door shut on the way. Of course, we usually don't have the windows open, so it's pretty painful and probably not as effective as your method.

From Andy:

Yes I have tried that method also and it is not nearly as effective as my first method, as you so correctly state. Another method that has also proven effective in the past has been to attach a come-along to one of the support beams in the ceiling (or actually, a portable engine-lift also works in a pinch) and then I have wrapped the fridge in a sling and pulled it up to the ceiling. Then comes the tricky part ... you need to position the refrigerator such that the door is facing down while suspended six feet above the floor. From here you simply cut the cable and let the fridge drop to the floor - slamming the door shut and safely sealing the contents for the next user. This method is a little tricky but it has never failed me yet. Give it a try and let me know how you like it.

Actual conversation from bedtime tonight

L: Mom, can two girls get married?

Me: Depends on where you live, sweetie.

L: What do you mean?

Me: Remember how we talked about how people believe different things sometimes? Well, some people believe that girls should only marry boys, and some people believe that two girls or two boys can get married. The government is in charge of saying whether people are allowed to get married, and each state has its own government. The government in each state figures out what the people who live there believe, and that's the law. So in some states, girls can marry girls, and in some states, girls can only marry boys.

L: What about here?

Me: Well, in our state, a lot of people believe that girls should only marry boys, so that's the law here.

L: So I have to move if I want to marry Leah when I grow up?

Me: Remember how we talked about how sometimes what people believe changes, and laws get changed? Like when we read that story about slaves last week? Well, maybe before you're grown up, people here will change their minds about who can get married. You never know.

L: So it's okay if I want to marry a girl?

Me: Honey, as long as you love the person very, very much, and they love you very, very much, I don't care who you marry. Now go to sleep.

(pause)

L: Can grandmas and grandpas have babies?

Me: Depends on how old they are. When women get older, the parts that make babies stop working, and then they wouldn't be able to have any more babies.

L: What about Grandma?

Me: Nope, she's not going to have any more babies.

L: When will you be a grandma?

Me: When you have babies ... but that's not until you're all grown up.

L: Will I have babies when I'm a grown up?

Me: You probably can, if you want to. And if your body can't make the babies, you could adopt one, if you wanted.

L: But what if I don't want any babies? Then you wouldn't be a grandma?

Me: That's right, I wouldn't be a grandma. But that's okay, too - it's your decision whether you want to have babies. I'm fine with just you - you're perfect as you are. Now go to sleep. We have a big day tomorrow - we're meeting Miss Judy at the coffee shop.

L: Miss Judy, the rocket scientist **?

Me: Yep, that's the one. Sleep well, little girl.

Add that to her earlier request for me to explain exactly what a tampon is and what it does and what the little string is for and what if you can't reach the string, and it's been a fuuuuuuun day. (That sound you hear is me banging my head on my desk repeatedly, in case you were wondering)

**That's how she differentiates Miss Judy, my knitting buddy who works at NASA, from Miss Judy, the mother of one of her friends from dance class last year.

Cue the triumphant music

It took about three months of frequent work, 1.5 kilometers of yarn, and about 3,000 beads, but the Shawl of Insanity is finished!

More pics in my flickr photostream. (If the link doesn't work, I'm LazyMamaDesigns on flickr ... it should be pretty obvious which ones are the shawl pics!)

Judging from the response at the yarn store when I went in for sock club today, I done good. One of my knitting friends borrowed it because the store was chilly today, and I thought I was going to have to hamstring her in order to make sure she didn't walk off with it at the end of the day. It's that cozy ... and pretty ... and sparkly ... and mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Now, off to crochet some mindless hats before I start on another mind-numbingly difficult project (which will probably be, oh, next week sometime).

The Bear and the Rabbit, by Liza Woods

(Liza drew the pictures, did the title page, and narrated the story; I wrote down what she told me so it didn't take 6 months to complete a book)

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Mmmm, bacon!

Also, I've discovered that having a laptop means I can do shockingly convenient things, like set it up on the kitchen counter and read blogs while I wait for the pasta water to boil. And since that's about the only time I seem to be able to string more than three words together coherently, I think the kitchen option is going to be used a lot this winter.

So if my blog posts smell like bacon, now you know why. Sorry, MLF!

She's ready for the Olympics

Today we practiced "skating really fast to go pick up a rubber ducky on the ice"

... and "skating backwards for the second time ever."


The girl is good.

Why sending Jason out to play with the kid is sometimes a bad idea

Leprous Staring Snow Baby says,

"Step closer so that I may suck the delicious brains from your puny head! Oh, and let me know if you've seen my legs, okay?"

Proof that the science nerds have a sense of humor, too

From today's trip to the natural history museum, I give you ...

Part of the display of "beetles"

Part of the display of nests and "eggs"

Part of the library in the education center

I believe that may be the best book title, ever.

10 things I've been doing instead of blogging

10. Reading other people's blogs.
9. Reading (and re-reading, and re-re-reading) the Twilight books.
8. Spending quality time with my family, trying to dig ourselves out of the cluttered shithole that is our basement.
7. Putting insulating Saran wrap over all the windows in the house, in hopes that it will help raise the temperature of our family room above 52F.
6. Buying a space heater, in hopes that it will help raise the temperature of our family room above 52F.
5. Putting a new damper and fireback in the fireplace, in hopes that it will ... yeah, that again.
4. Knitting my Shawl of Insanity. Fourteen rows to go now ... at only slightly more than an hour per row. And then a bind-off of 900+ stitches. Um, yay?
3. Reading more blogs. Lots more blogs.
2. Attempting not to eat anything until I fit back into my fat jeans again.
1. Snowblowing. Lots of snowblowing.

Liza says: Liza's first sledding day

We went sledding. It was a big hill. There were a few other people there. It was very, very cold. I wore snow pants, and a jacket, and an extra-fuzzy sweatshirt, and my new very new gloves. I had lots of trouble getting the gloves on.

Daddy went with me the first time. We had to walk to the top of the hill and Daddy pulled the sled. Then when we got to the top of the hill, we sledded down. We went fast! It was fun.

Mommy went, too. And then I went by myself! I went down half of the hill the first time, then I went to the top of the hill and slid down all by myself! And then I had to pull the sled by myself back to the top. And one time, when I was trying to pull the sled up, I accidentally let go and the sled started to slide down and then I started running and when I caught on to the sled I let it make me slide down!






Afterwards we went to Taco Bell, and then after we went to Taco Bell, we went to the ice skating rink. There were lots of people there, but I didn't mind. We saw Mrs. Craft, my teacher from last year at preschool. I skated very, very well. I did five swizzles in a row and then started skating again! Daddy and Mommy went skating, too. Daddy got to wear extra special skates - hockey skates! And I had to wear just brown and black skates, and Mommy got to wear her all-white skates.

Virtual Christmas, part 5: Ho!

And yea, verily, there was much rejoicing with new toys and old friends!

Virtual Christmas, part 4: Behind the scenes

Pirates - you can tell they're pirates because they yell things like "AHOY" and "MATEY" at random intervals - sing taunts to each other to the tune of carols, fire crackles in the hearth, and Playmobil people frolic in a Duplo zoo.

Liza is wearing the same outfit for the second day in a row, and the waistband is now so loose that she gets plumber's butt every time she stands up straight.

Nat King Cole might be playing on the radio while we eat dinner, but only because we've put a moratorium on the Bob Marley CD after hearing it for the 4,000th time this week.

Liza is actually helpful when she assists us with the preparation of the lasagna for dinner tomorrow night. That cottage cheese mixture didn't stir itself, you know.

For the first time ever, Santa's elves didn't assemble all the presents before they got here, so I had to lend some assistance in the late hours of the evening ... and then find a place to stash a trampoline until Christmas morning.

I breathe a sigh of relief when the kid is in bed and asleep, then cringe at the thought that I can no longer threaten her with, "Do you want me to call Santa on his cell phone and tell him that you're doing that? He can turn that sleigh right around and go home if you're bad, you know." Until next December, of course ...

Jason and I debate the merits of "eating all the carrots we left for the reindeer" vs. "nibbling pieces off of the carrots we left for the reindeer," because we know the kid will eventually parse the entire setup, detail by detail. We decide to eat all the carrots, because it's not like Santa was going to haul is soot-covered-fur-clad butt down the chimney again to drop the leftover carrot bits back on the plate once the reindeer were done.

All that's left is to sneak into her room to deposit a present under her tree, then knock myself unconscious so I have some chance of being awake when she storms into our room before the crack of dawn tomorrow. Ho, ho, ho.

Virtual Christmas, part 3: Making Merry

It wouldn't be Christmas without some serious baking going on around here.

This year I decided to use up some leftover Halloween candy to make stained glass cookies. Basically, you crush up hard candy (in our case, Dum-Dum lollipops) and sprinkle them in cut-out holes in whatever sugar cookie recipe you usually use.

In the oven they get all melty and gooey and bubbly, but once they come out and cool down, the sugar hardens into a pretty center.

Honestly, the pretty parts don't taste that great unless you're using expensive candies, but they sure look nice. We did some oversized ones like this to include with the cookies we're giving to neighbors and friends.

As you can see from the background in that picture, we got a bit of snow earlier this week. Not the 2 feet that are keeping my parents stuck on the east coast, but enough that we've had to go outside to play in it almost every day. There isn't enough for a proper snowman, and until recently it hasn't been the right consistency for snowballs, so we've been stuck with snow angels and tromping around aimlessly ... until now:

Of course, it's supposed to start raining soon, and continue through Christmas day, but it was nice to have snow on some days when we had nowhere we needed to go and nothing that had to be done.

This one's for you, Percy

http://www.dorktower.com/2009/12/23/dork-tower-wednesday-december-23-a-very-classic-musky-christmas-ii/

Virtual Christmas, part 2: Caroling

We're full service around here - we bring the Christmas carols right to you, and don't even ask for wassail in return!

Virtual Christmas, part 1

Since some (well, actually ALL) of our extended family is unable to join us for Christmas this year, I'm doing the next best thing and bringing our Christmas to them ... online. It's like real Christmas, only with all the really boring parts edited out! Also, virtual cookies are calorie-free, and nobody has to suffer through traveling the entire length of the Pennsylvania Turnpike in order to participate.

Without further ado, I bring you ...

Virtual Christmas, Part 1: Liza's Pre-school Christmas Concert

Best buddies, trying not to look nervous before the show:

The concert, with all the non-Liza parts edited out:

And no, the irony of having my daughter be a "wise man" was not lost on me.

Dang, now why didn't I think of that?

http://www.buzzfeed.com/awesomer/nerd-tivity-scenes/

I still think the funniest thing is that some of our friends' kids used to use the Playmobil baby Jesus as a purchase at the Playmobil grocery store. I wonder how much a savior costs?

I guarantee this will make you smile

Liza's newest obsession: Boogie Woogie Hedgehog, which she acts out with the hedgehog figure from one of her Playmobil sets. Here's her inspiration:


Once our hedgehog has "got his head stuck in the Pharaoh's hat," Liza performs Boogie Woogie Badger, and Raccoon, and Kitten, and whatever else she can manage to get stuck in something else. I knew the advent calendar would come in handy for something ...

Good times, good times.

My child is a Speshul Snowflake**

Remember last year's winter dance recital, with the cute hairdo and the almost complete lack of dancing by my daughter?

This year we almost didn't get that much, as we spent all day listening to "I don't want to go. I don't want to go. I don't want to go." Listen to that for half a day, and I'm inclined to either shoot her or pull her out of dance classes entirely. After a great deal of bargaining, reasoning, and chocolate-coated bribery, we got her there, and she was doing okay-ish ...

"Blah blah JUMPING ON DADDY'S CHAIR!!!"

... right up until it was time for the show to start, and she started blubbering like a bad soap opera actress. I was in the audience, she was sitting with the rest of her class in front of the stage, and I was very close to just calling the whole thing off ... but she pulled herself together.

"If I look interested enough in this dot-to-dot, maybe they won't make me go on stage."

At least, she did until it was time for her to perform with her class, at which point the waterworks started again, and she had to be carried on stage (not by me). After a 10-second pep talk by her dance teacher, we got to see her dance, on stage, in public, for realz, for the first time ever.

And she was fine the whole time, doing way more of her dance than I expected, managing to not freak out when the entire class managed to blank out during the whole "switch lines front to back" part at the end, and even sort of smiling for the pictures at the end.

And then she sat and watched the rest of the acts, and was all set to go sing in the big finale ... until she somehow managed to pinch her finger while she was waiting to go onstage, and she completely lost it, and I got to stand off to the side with my irritable crying child. Yes, out of seventeen acts and probably 70 kids, mine was the only one that cried. At all. The entire night. She didn't even want to go up and get her goody bag from her teacher, and usually the promise of candy canes is enough to get the kid to walk through walls of flames.

Turns out, she was just holding out for the floral tribute, courtesy of Daddy.

"Why yes, I was perfect - why do you ask?"

I swear, every time we do something like this, it takes six months off of my life expectancy, and it exponentially raises the amount we need to contribute to the kid's Future Therapy Fund. I so very much want to pull her out of dance classes, but she claims she loves dance with a passion that burns like a thousand suns. Never mind that I have to coax her into dressing for class, drag her to class, and she never is excited about anything at class other than whether she got a good sticker and/or got to turn on the lights in the room. At the very least I think I'm going to have her skip the spring recital, because I am just not up to having to pay $100 for costumes and tickets so that I can deal with this two years in a row.

** Speshul Snowflake, definition 3.

Oh, hai. Are you still here? Here, have a cookie recipe, it will make you feel better.

Here's a new cookie recipe, courtesy of Liza pointing to a picture of a cookie and my tweaking of a recipe in my first edition copy of the Betty Crocker Cooky Book (published in 1963 and laboriously hunted down in an antique shop in Avon, Ohio, in 2000). Best. Cookbook. Ever.

And these cookies are pretty darn good - light, crispy, buttery, lots of orange flavor that's not overpowering, crunchy sugar on the outside, festive but still appropriate when it's not Christmas ... are you drooling yet? You should be.

adapted from Petticoat Tails/Kaleidoscope Cookies (makes 5 dozen)

1 cup butter

1 cup sifted confectioners' sugar

1 tsp orange extract

2 1/4 cups Gold Medal Flour

1/4 tsp salt

1 tsp finely grated orange rind

food coloring

decorator sugar

red cinnamon candies

Mix butter, sugar, and extract thoroughly. Mix flour, salt, and orange rind; stir in. Mix with hands. Add food coloring to tint to desired color. Mold in rolls about 2" across. Wrap in waxed paper; chill several hours or overnight.

Heat oven to 400 F. Cut roll into slices about 1/8" thick. Roll the edge of each slice in decorator sugar. Place a little apart on ungreased baking sheet and press a red cinnamon candy into the center of each cookie. Bake 8 to 10 min., or until barely browned.

The original recipe was double this size, and it specified you could use vanilla, rose, wintergreen, or almond extract. The orange was my idea, as was the addition of the rind, which I got from two little tangerines I had in the fridge. The cinnamon candies were my idea, too, mainly because I know the rest of my family won't eat them, so the half of the recipe I baked with candies is safe from predation.

Guess who bought a printer/scanner on Black Friday?

... and finally figured out how to use the scanner after the fifth failed installation attempt?

"Best Piece of Art Liza Ever Made," by Liza Woods, 2009

Holy crap, how cool is that?

There's a great horned owl calling from the backyard of one of our neighbors. It's only hooting every few minutes, so I can't exactly record it to share ... but just imagine it's like this, only without the snow:

Want a cool closeup of how the owls hoot without even opening their mouths? Check out this video.

ETA: 10 minutes, still calling. Wookin' pa nub, in all da wong paces ...

Conflicted

This is the time of year when I look at all the catalogs and commercials enviously, thinking how nice it would be to have this or that. Wouldn't it be fun to shop for new Christmas ornaments and decorations, find just the right festive handmade gift on etsy, or buy cute holiday clothing before the actual holiday?

I visit my friends' houses and see their holiday decorations tastefully sprinkled throughout. Their decorations seem to have a home - they fit with the rooms, with their lives. I doubt any of them have to scrub the cat hair off of the baseboards before they put up their trees. And we seem to be the only ones who have a ton of Christmas decorations but no flat surfaces to put them on ... our everyday stuff expands instantaneously to fill every available open space, so a table can be clean at noon and full to overflowing by dinnertime.

And then I read "my" blogs, the ones I subscribe to, written (mostly) by crafty ladies I admire. Their families celebrate simply, bypassing the mall for the handmade, trading the tinsel for a warm fire and good friends. The decorations their children make are adorable, and take center stage in their holiday scenes. Their photos of their holiday preparations practically glow with love and warmth and intention, making the commercial holiday onslaught seem that much more tacky.

They make advent calendars from toilet paper tubes and used security-printed envelopes, and they look adorable. Some skip Christmas and celebrate Solstice instead. They hand-make each and every gift they give, and they never report anyone complaining and asking for a gift card next year.

And each year, I have to decide who I'm going to be this year. Mall rat? Decorator? Crunchy granola matriarch? Part of me wants to do each. I want the thrill of the hunt, and the chance to be the one who finds the perfect, over-the-top gift for each person. I want to have the cozy, glowing home with tasteful decorations that photograph well. I want to skip the craziness, make hot cocoa, and tell stories by the fire.

When we moved to this house almost three years ago, I had to face up to the fact that the decorating strategies I had used at the house in Kentucky just weren't going to work here. Our house is 1,000 square feet smaller than the one in Kentucky, for one thing, and it's a totally different style. A brass hunting horn on the wall in Kentucky looks festive - but on the wall of a 1970s split level in Cleveland, it looks ridiculous. So we've been weeding through the decorations each year, sending some on their way to Goodwill and keeping the ones that fit best. Wreaths that used to hang in every front window of our house with a candle burning every night of the holiday season? Gone, because we have a total of 1 window on the front of this house. Icicle lights we used to hang along the straight front roof of the house? Gone, because they inexplicably have burned out at both ends but shine in the middle 1/3, so even if I wanted to use the tangly little bastards, they'd look dumb.

I think this year we'll be paring down the candle selection, seeing as how many of them date to before we were married, and they just sort of sit randomly around the house not looking particularly decorative for a month before we put them back in the box in the attic. I've got to do something about the Advent Calendar Situation, as well, since I've got several paper ones that I had when I was a kid, plus the Pooh one I bought in college, plus the one I cross-stitched, plus a new Playmobil one for this year. And the kid is only interested in them for the first four or five days, anyway.

I'm going to try to continue the handmade gift thing. We made it through the gift exchange with the in-laws already, which is half the battle. And I did manage to find some pretty kick-ass gifts for the kids we buy for who I know won't appreciate a quirky handmade anything. But I honestly don't know what I can make for Liza that she'd actually appreciate as much as she would a new set of Tinkertoys or a dress-up skirt that plays the Nutcracker music. I'm even coming up blank on etsy ... but maybe something will turn up.

So tell me, what do you do to celebrate the holidays? Are you a decorator? A mall rat? A crunchy granola parent? We want details!

For K-A

http://www.dianaskitchen.com/page/favorite/pretzel.htm

Try it - it's strangely compelling. Also, if you put enough of it on your plate at Thanksgiving, nobody notices that you didn't try the turnip greens.

Downsides to the laptop

Very difficult to write a blog post while watching Elf and fending off the 4-year-old's full-body cuddles.

So instead, I'm letting Liza write it for me. I'm just taking dictation.

I just want to go to work with Daddy. And I also want to go and do gardening. And I also want to play outside at night. And I also want to go outside when it is too dark for anyone to see.

Must be

There's turkey on the table, football on the television, a foot-tall stack of advertisements in the newspaper, and a 4-year-old on the 4-wheeler ... must be Thanksgiving!

Whew.

Today I helped cook:

- the roasted vegetables for a salad

- a pumpkin/apple pie

- the stuffing

- pretzel salad

I'm a little bit pooped ... and the complicated cooking doesn't start until tomorrow. Gah ....

Is there some sort of bonus point system in effect?

Because I just had to put all my clothes back on, reboot the computer, convince it to find a signal, and come here to post, just so I can participate in NaBloPoMo. Now THAT'S dedication!

Also, if I kill the kid before Christmas, do I get to keep any presents that were purchased for her before her untimely death? Because if she bites me on my arm hard enough to leave a mark - again - I swear, those toys are mine.

See this?

This is me posting from the Pennsylvania Turnpike, just because I can. Thank you, cellular internet connection!

Yes, I'm in the passenger seat. I'm not that reckless. Usually.

Two things that made me laugh

1. When we were in the car yesterday, Liza and her friend were pretending that they had buttons that would turn the car into a roller coaster or an airplane. As we were going up an on-ramp onto the highway, the friend yelled out, "We're on a roller coaster! Hold on to your underpants!"

2. Apparently, it was cold enough where Jason was in China to make this hat seem like a good idea:

Joking around with Liza this morning, I threw the hat to her, and I realized what this thing reminds me of: the panda heads that come flying at you when you're playing the soccer game on Wii Fit. I think I'll just start randomly throwing it at her when she's practicing (real) soccer in the yard, just to entertain myself.

Yet another experience I don't want to repeat

This morning I woke up in a pool of urine ... and then realized it wasn't mine. Thanks, kid.

Yep, it's wild and crazy around here when Jason's on a business trip. Lucky for him (and the laundry, and my sanity) that he's due home any minute.

I guess Naked Knit Night will have to wait until his next trip ...

One-upmanship

"Goodnight, Liza. I love you a bushel and a peck."

"I love you a bushel and a peck, a barrel and a heap, a hug around the neck, a barrel to infinity and beyond beyond beyond beyond beyond ... and back!"

Daaaaaaaamn, I got served by a four-year-old.

At least I know there is no "beyond" when it comes to infinity, unless you're Buzz Lightyear, sucka.

I appear to have lost my sock mojo

Third time casting on for a pair of socks with really great yarn (thanks for the birthday gift, Susie! Wait til you see this stuff in person!), and the suckers are STILL too large. Fixable problem, but boy, is this starting to irk me. Irk, I tell you! Irk! Irk!

I can't tell if I'm just mojo-less this week, or if the Great Craft Goddess is trying to convince me I should be working on something different right now, but, gahhh, the irk!

I'll be over in the corner, taking deep breaths and looking at a pretty picture of the yarn, okay?

And maybe trying to find a pattern that doesn't rely on gauge (and doesn't end up looking like a [really beautiful] gay pride flag ... not that there's anything wrong with that ...)

Keeping the kid busy

With the holidays approaching, we're going to be in the car more and more often, sometimes for, oh, say, nine hours at a stretch. But now that the kid can read, I've got a really cheap way to keep her entertained:

Free holiday printables.

You can find them all over on the internet, free resources for teachers or homeschoolers to use to add a little variety to their lessons this time of year. Coloring pages, mazes, word searches, dot-to-dots, jokes, math puzzles, games, etc - it's a wonderland of stuff I can print to keep the kid busy in the backseat while we cruise the lovely and scenic Pennsylvania Turnpike.

A couple of the resources I'm using right now:
http://www.printactivities.com/index.html

http://holidays.kaboose.com/thanks-printables.html

http://www.abcteach.com/directory/seasonalholidays/thanksgiving/

http://www.edhelper.com/Thanksgiving.htm

http://www.activityvillage.co.uk/thanksgiving_jokes.htm

All of these have at least some content available without any registration or payment. All it costs is some printer ink and a few minutes to pick which pages you want, and you've bought yourself at least an hour of blessed silence from the backseat. At least until they find the page of jokes, which you may want to hide until you're less than an hour from your destination, because seriously, who wants to hear the same 20 jokes over and over again for the better part of a day? Every four-year-old in the country, that's who, so just save yourself the headache and keep that sucker under wraps until you're desperate

Third time on the ice

Sorry for the crap video, but I was recording this with my phone while skating on rental skates, so I get bonus points for managing to capture anything at all.

Whew - less than two weeks late!

"Alternative Energy" (get it? windmills?) is on its way to its new home, where hopefully it will be hugged and loved and puked on by cats. Pattern will be available in my etsy shop soon, assuming I don't go completely insane this week.

DID YOU KNOW THAT ... *

If you painstakingly scrape all of the mildewed caulk out of your bathtub, clean the tile with alcohol, apply new caulk, smooth the new caulk, let the new caulk cure overnight, and then decide to hit the remaining stains in the grout above the new caulk with some Tilex ...

... the new caulk turns to pudding everywhere the Tilex touches, and has to be squeegeed out, rescraped, recleaned, and recaulked?

NOW YOU KNOW!

sigh

* That's a shout out to your favorite television scientist and mine, Bill Nye, whose shows frequently had a segment that began with a voice shouting DID YOU KNOW THAT? and ended with the voice shouting NOW YOU KNOW!

Say what?

I may have the only child on the planet who, when expecting and dreading a vaccination, freaks out at the idea of getting the inhaled version instead. The nurse at the county board of health H1N1 clinic that was in town today had no idea how to handle that one. How did I handle it?

"Look, I can't be the line leader today, I'm not in the high-risk group. Oooh, a lady with a bag of lollipops! I'll let you eat one even though it's 9am if you just shut up, sit still and sniff when the nurse tells you to."

She got grape.

Parenting skillz - I haz 'em.

Also ... every time she reads any flu literature, Liza calls it a "vacation" instead of a vaccination or a vaccine. Understandable mistake, but it's pretty funny when you're following the "vacation" route signs to get to the clinic.

The secret lair

Yet another thing I never thought I'd say

"Look, you can balance much better on skates if you bend your knees a little. I can even shake my buttocks at you! And I didn't even fall over!"

This, this is why we will only go to open skates that happen during weekday afternoons, because I don't want there to be dozens of witnesses to any similar exchanges that are required for motivational purposes.

On the positive side of things, at her request, Liza spent a whole hour on the ice today, and I had to drag her off when open skating was finished. She can now get back up off the ice without using her hands for balance, tiptoe around in a circle on the ice while balancing on her toepicks (don't ask), march-march-march-march-glide-on-two-skates, and march/glide all the way across the width of the rink without falling down (sometimes). And whenever she starts to lose her balance, I tell her "bend for balance," and darned if she doesn't bend her knees and (usually) avoid a wipeout.

If only I had settled on "buttocks!" as the cue to bend her knees, all this standing around waiting for her to get a move on would be much more interesting. As it is, I have to entertain myself by etching rude words into the ice with my skate tracks while I circle her as she stomps along. You'd be amazed what you can spell out in cursive if you've got decent balance and are really bored ...

Guess what I did today?

Opened a new etsy shop for my photographs, that's what. I'm still in the process of deciding how to present my work to stock the shop, which means it's empty right now, so there's not point to bothering to share the url right now.

Eventually I plan to offer images on notecards, plus prints that are mounted and ready to hang, among other things. It may take a while to get this set up - I'm aiming for a "soft open" in December, with it officially up and running and heavily promoted in January. I'm running a bit late for the holiday season for this year, which is a shame, but I really don't want to list things until I know they look good and are something I'm proud to sell.

In the meantime, if there are any of my images that you thing really should be in the shop, I'm happy to take requests. And if anybody is willing to be a guinea pig and wants to place an early order, give me a yell. You can contact me at lazymamadesigns (stick an a.t. sign here) yahoo (stick a d.o.t. here) com.

I'll let everyone know when the actual shop is up and running. Should be fun!

This.

Displaying her ridiculously awesome balance skills

Okay, so we know Liza was pretty good on roller skates, but how is she on ice?

Keep in mind that the kid's total experience with ice skates before today was to clomp around on them for five minutes last year before refusing to come onto the ice with me. I think this year she was ready, although I'm starting to question the wisdom of watching the ice dancing videos on YouTube right before we went to the first class ...

Ouch.

Seasonal flu vaccine down, H1N1 vaccine not yet located.

My favorite part - the look on the nurse's face when I told him that some people on the internet are calling H1N1 "hamthrax." I think I made his day. Not hard, considering his day consists of being locked in a supply closet with a bunch of vaccine and potentially contagious people, but I still feel like my good deed for the day is complete.

Q&A

Q: What's worse than trying to find the perfect outfit to wear to a special event?

A: Finding the perfect outfit to wear to a special event that you don't end up going to, then having to return it, even though you look hot in it. No, there will not be pictures.

gasp pant

"Mom, when we get back to our house, will you please take the training wheels off my bike so I can learn to ride a two-wheeler?"

Since I lack the necessary skills to simultaneously run beside the kid and take video, I wasn't able to record her first attempts on the bike. Instead, you get to see Jason's first attempt at helping her ride.

I believe tomorrow I'll be going to Target to get the handle for the back axle of the bike, because leaning over and supporting a 40-pound kid who's used to leaning at a 10-degree angle on her bike is no fun at all.

Welcome to fall!

Nothing says "change in seasons" at our house quite like the annual tally of bags of leaves, wouldn't you say?

Bookmark this post and come back often, as we're gonna be raking for another couple of weeks, so the totals are going to climb to the stratosphere ...

Week 1: 40 bags

Week 2: 15 bags so far, but trash day isn't until Thursday

Productive but unfulfilling

I hate spending two hours paying bills, filing papers, making phone calls, scheduling appointments, and doing other busywork. At the end of the time I have a clear desk and a lot of little scribbles on my calendar. That's it. Making things is so much more fun - at least then I have something I can brandish while talking about how soul-sucking the activity is.

At least while I was on hold I could watch the chickadee that's searching for bugs on the branches of the tree outside my window. Cute little bugger.

So basically, my afternoon consisted of soul-sucking boredom punctuated with an occasional, "Awwwww!" What have you been up to?

Why have I never seen these before?

Did you know there's a whole subculture devoted to writing funny product reviews on Amazon? Seriously. Check it out:

http://www.amazon.com/Mountain-Mens-Three-Short-Sleeve/dp/B002HJ377A

Check out the comments for the shirt, then check out some of the other suggested items. I love the milk that can be used for self defense ... and the second comment down on the Zubaz pants.

Oh, dear. I think I may have found yet another place to waste time on the internet ...

Halloween

You know, if you take your four-year-old to a kids' orchestra concert on the morning of Halloween, you may end up with a kid who decides to go trick-or-treating dressed as "orchestra girl."

Apparently Orchestra Girl wears a polarfleece shirt, an adult-sized purple sequined mardi gras dress, silver slippers, and grey yoga pants. Light-up wand from Sea World is optional, and just gets in the way when you try to carry 48 pounds of candy in a little plastic pumpkin.

At least her partners in crime (her best buddies from the neighborhood, who were super nice and asked her to go with them to trick-or-treat on our street) were properly outfitted in recognizable costumes, somewhat mitigating the "WTF are you supposed to be?" response Liza might have gotten otherwise.

Add to this the flower-girl-dress princess outfit she came up with for the party at Jason's friend's house the previous weekend, and the Sleeping Beauty Fairy Princess With A Wand Made From a Silky And A Tinkertoy from preschool, and the kid came up with four Halloween costumes.

And not a one made any sense to anyone but her. Sigh. And all I wanted was to make her a pirate costume ...

When did I get to be such a crabby old lady?

Kids these days, with their fancy-schmancy weddings that require fancy-schmancy quilts as gifts! The nerve, giving me only six months to procrastinate until I started the thing two weeks before the wedding! Picking out hard-to-find colors, like "blue" and "green," and "whatever you think looks nice."

Now I have to go rub some liniment on my ancient arthritic hands and get back to quilting The 15-Pound Wonder Quilt. Bah! Oooh, my aching back!

The Pirates Who Do Aarrrrr-ithmatic

Liza really, really wants to learn addition, but she doesn't quite understand that you basically have to memorize the answers so that you don't have to count on your fingers every time you're asked what 3+4 is. She doesn't want to do the flashcards if we just sit down with them, and she can't do the addition worksheets if she's wearing mittens, so I had to come up with another approach.

That's where the pirates come in. A few weeks ago Liza decided she wanted to play pirates, complete with a boat (sofa), Jolly Roger (silkies tied to a yardstick) and both swords (pvc pipe) and bandannas. I put together a treasure map, hauled Jason's chest-shaped toybox out of the basement closet, and we were in business. We searched for hidden treasure, fought off sea monsters, ate goldfish-shaped sea rations, and tried not to whack each other too frequently with the pipe.

So yesterday I made up a new treasure map. It's a key of which rooms various numbers are in. She gets a flashcard "clue" to start, and she has to figure out the answer, go to that room, and check under the number to see if she's right. If she is, she finds the next flashcard, which leads her to another room, and another, with the final clue sending her down to the toybox in the basement.

You would not believe how fast the kid is catching on to the +3s when there are pirates involved.

Also, she refuses to practice her handwriting ... unless I write out some of the words from a "science experiment" we did this morning, and then she's happy to copy them until they look right. Which is why we've got a sheet of paper that says in very decent preschool handwriting, "rub balloon salt pepper oatmeal electricity." We've also got a journal page with a drawing of me blowing up a balloon, and thanks to the wonders of really crappy preschool drawing perspective, my lips are coming out of my ears. That would be a pretty good trick if I could pull it off, though, wouldn't it?

NaBloPoMo for the third year in a row

Good thing I got some serious knitting done last week while Jason was out of town ... otherwise I'd be trying to type blog posts with one hand while knitting Very Intricate Lace, and that's just all kinds of a bad idea.

Look! Pretty colors, and all I had to do was keep knitting 10-stitch rows while the yarn changed colors for me. Score!

Anybody want a shawl that looks like this?

This is just the edging, the main body of the shawl looks like the topmost part. It's very nicely finished, and I love the pattern, but the colors just are NOT doing it for me. Should have stopped when I first decided I was only meh about the combo, but I was too far along to quit at that point. Plus, it's alpaca, and therefore sheds like a mofo all over my clothes when I wear it. Nice and warm, but I look like the cats exploded all over me.

Off to do some - gasp! - quilting. Silly friends and their silly weddings requiring silly presents ...