Attack of the giant bugs

Katydid in our garage this morning. We saw a tiny one in the garden this spring, but this is the first time I've seen a full-size one. The photo is pretty much life-sized ... my boy is biiiiiig. Don't believe me? Check out the 2x3 in the bottom picture for scale.
While checking to make sure this was actually a katydid, I found some neat YouTube videos on them. Particularly this one, which helped me identify the Official Sound of Trying To Sleep In The Summer At My Grandmother's House In Indiana.

Because I'm all artsy and shit

Score! You can't even tell that's a Disney princess pocket kite with a giant picture of Cinderella on it.

Liza and Jason brought home a whole mess of these snail shells. Bet you didn't think anything that pretty lived in the Great Lakes, did you? (insert "burning river" or "mistake by the lake" joke here)

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.

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!

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).

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.

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.

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?

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.

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.

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.

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?

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 ...

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).

I love, love, love the pink and blue combination. If only I could convince Jason to paint the house that color, I'm sure that would speed up the sale of the house next door. Because everyone wants to live next to a 70's split level painted to look like a fairytale cottage, right?

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.

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.

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.

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!

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 :)

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.

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.