9.25.2014

currently - link up


I have to admit I was crazy tempted this morning to skip this post. Loretta had gotten up at 2am last night demanding to go downstairs and play. I finally managed to talk her into snuggling me in bed and when my alarm went off at 4:30 this morning (it's so much easier for me to get up early than stay up  late) I found myself curled up with this little peanut of a girl who rarely will give more than a minute or two of cuddles. But "Currently" has been such a steady part of my life for so long now. I knew I'd regret skipping it. It's really the only blogging I do anymore and I know I'll look back on it and be so glad I have these time-lapse snapshots of our life.

The deal: Use our themes or use your own - just let us know what is 'currently' going on with you! Be sure to stop by and say hello to the other bloggers linking up - especially to my amazing co-host at Harvesting Kale.

This week's themes: watching, learning, considering, needing, changing

We have been Watching the rain come down and feeling cold night air on our faces as we sleep. Fall is so good. I do need to rescue my late-bloomer tomatoes from the garden this week. I'm afraid they'll have to ripen on the counter. Our cucumbers are micro-sized but there are loads of them... I suppose next year we'll need to plant those earlier too and in a sunnier spot. Hard to find in my yard! But it's exciting to know that if I do another garden next year, and just start it a month earlier, we'll be up to our ears in food plants by the end of summer.

Loretta has been Learning to piece by piece add 100 stalls to her bedtime routine. The newest one I want to remember forever. She has some art on her wall with loads of different animals on it and every night we do a little quiz on which animal is what. It took her a while but she can finally say, "hippopotamus!" So now, after she says, "hippopotamus!" she has to run and find Rob and say it again for him and we all go, "oh, you're saying hippopotamus, that's a big word, fantastic!" Last night after she got her rain of praise she launched into a recitation of counting 1 to 20, very slowly, a new stall tactic. She's darling and bedtime takes an actual hour, but it's such a good hour.

This week I am Considering the future. Rob is set to graduate in Spring 2016 and then what? We will almost certainly be moving to another state, the kids will be a bit older, and it will be an opportunity for me to reset a little bit. I've always wanted to own my own business. I remember writing a business plan for a macaroni & cheese themed restaurant - when I was about seven - that included monthly utilities and staff salaries and even the cost of napkins. I'm beginning to do more than dance with an idea I've had for a small business that's been percolating for about a year now. I'd really like to launch at the beginning of the year on a super super small scale so that I can build it up and iron out the kinks while we're here and then really "go for it" when we leave here. But it's scary to think about. Not failing, I'm not scared of that. But just being exhausted. I think for about three months now I've not been exhausted for the first time in years and it's like, do I want to take this on? But I think I do. I think I'd regret avoiding it. So we'll see if I rise to this.

Otto has been Needing a bit more independence lately and it's hard for mama. While Loretta has been testing boundaries since birth, Otto waited until he was nearly six. I think this explosion of testing out sarcasm on us, refusing to do chores, eye rolling (ulgh), etc. is stemming from his move to the K-2nd classroom and exposure to older, grander kids who are changing his view of what's "cool". And I mean, he's a doll, just a doll who now sometimes rolls his eyes and says, "Gosh" like Napoleon Dynamite.

I am excited to be Changing over to Fall clothes. Buffalo Exchange will be happening in my life soon, soon, soon! I could really go for some new-to-me additions to my wardrobe and the whole world looks better in layers. Cheers to that.

That was this week and here are next week's themes:
throwing, drinking, looking, loving, sharing 

9.18.2014

currently - link up


The deal: Use our themes or use your own - just let us know what is 'currently' going on with you! Be sure to stop by and say hello to the other bloggers linking up - especially to my amazing co-host at Harvesting Kale.

This week's themes: calling, loving, eating, riding, wishing

I am going to start by Calling out Mother Nature, of Father Biology, or whatever. OTTO IS NOT ALLOWED TO HAVE HIS TEETH ALL FALLING OUT OF HIS HEAD AT THE SAME TIME. I DO NOT HAVE LOADS OF DOLLARS SITTING AROUND IN MY WALLET FOR THIS AND ALSO IT IS FREAKING ME THE EFF OUT. Go, sit down and figure out how to evolve me like the Electric Grandmother so that coffee comes out of my fingertips and we'll be square. Dismissed.

Loretta has been Loving puzzles, games, and board games. The other night Rob took Otto to Taekwondo and I stayed home with Loretta and we took care of babies the whole time. Nearly an hour of giving babies bottles, feeding them play chicken drumsticks and cans of soup, burping them, laying them down, shaking them awake and yelling, "wake up! wake up!" We were good mothers. And then last night I took Toothless Magoo to Taekwondo and we came home to find Rob and Etta engrossed in a game of Hi Ho Cherry O. Rob said they played it about fifteen times in a row. I remember doing the same thing with Otto not too long ago. Oh my goodness.

This week we were Eating our first pan of green bean casserole of "the season". GBC season, just another reason to remember how much I love fall! Even though I'm scared of winter! But fall! GBC Fall 2014!

I have been Riding my awesome ass Honda Odyssey around town (we are a 1 car family) and it needs an oil change. I'm so excited that this van will be paid off by December 2015 and then we won't have a car payment. The plan is to keep it in great shape so it lasts another five years after that. Therefore, I think this weekend we'll be grabbing an oil change and here's something really awesome about me: I love getting oil changes. I go without the kids, it's like a guaranteed ten minutes of just sitting in the car in peaceful solitude, and the place we go to gives a free carwash and bottomless vaccuum tokens which is like SOUL CLEANSING to just clean the van out. Van vacuuming is so satisfying I have no words for how much I love it.

Lately I have found myself Wishing the next two years would fly by. Rob will get his degree, find gainful employment, and we'll get on with things and not be struggling so much financially and able to put roots down somewhere, finally. But then things like baby milestones and lost teeth happen and I realize I don't want to wish this time away. So I'll switch to wishing for a winning lottery ticket to get caught up in a gust of wind and land at my feet.

That was this week and here are next week's themes:
watching, learning, considering, needing, changing 

9.11.2014

currently - link up


The deal: Use our themes or use your own - just let us know what is 'currently' going on with you! Be sure to stop by and say hello to the other bloggers linking up - especially to my amazing co-host at Harvesting Kale.

This week's themes: falling, wearing, making, smiling, learning

Yesterday Otto's teeth started Falling out. He gave us no grace period to cope with this emotionally or formulate a Tooth Fairy plan. At 4:45 he announced a loose tooth. We had dinner, went to Taekwondo, came home, and at bedtime he brushed that tiny little baby tooth right out of its socket. Less than three hours for the whole adventure. He announced, "In Japan, when you lose a tooth you get two dollars and a baseball!" On the fly I suggested that there are quite a few tooth fairies, each assigned to different houses, and so we'd have to see what kinds of things our tooth fairy would bring. So, we decided the going rate for teeth at our house would be two bucks, but no baseball. Is that pretty on par with the norm?

Loretta has been going to school for a week now and Wearing underpants all day while she's there. I'm so proud of my girl for adapting to her new schedule so well, we hear she's very social and just "a doll" to have in class. Also, only 1 accident in 2 days! That's pretty amazing considering her potty training didn't really take off until August.

I have been Making plans for a beautifully dull weekend and cannot wait for it. Football on tv on Saturday. The kickoff of PBS' 7 part documentary on the Roosevelts starts Sunday (when I heard about this on NPR I was alone in the car and spontaneously shouted out, "I'm so excited!") Other than that, I will be attempting to not brush my hair or otherwise do anything of value beyond playing with the kids in the yard and drinking coffee.

The whole house is Smiling at Loretta's first joke. The other day when we were saying goodbyes Loretta said to Rob, "Bye, hot dog!" I don't even think she said it on purpose, it probably just kind of came out randomly because she's two and her synapses are all misfiring and growing and she's a weird little human. Anyways, Rob said, "Bye, hot dog?" And Loretta laughed! Then we all laughed! And now she started saying it on purpose and we're all saying, "Bye, hot dog," and "Goodnight, hot dog," and "I love you, hot dog," to each other and the whole house is filled with laughter at Loretta's first joke.

For me, this past week was a really tough one and I found myself Learning that you can only do so much and then you have to rely on others to do their parts. I suppose I'm starting to embrace some leadership roles I find myself in, in my life. It's not my most comfortable position to be in, but I'm learning to get better at it.

That was this week and here are next week's themes:
calling, loving, eating, riding, wishing 

9.03.2014

currently - link up


The deal: Use our themes or use your own - just let us know what is 'currently' going on with you! Be sure to stop by and say hello to the other bloggers linking up - especially to my amazing co-host at Harvesting Kale.

This week's themes: loving, craving, demanding, questioning, worrying

Right this minute I am Loving the idea of getting back into a groove. The kids are starting school this week (someone please hand me a pudding cup and hold me, they are so big you guys) and we just came off a many-week bender of events and visitors, including Rob being away for 8 days and me taking the kids on an overnight road trip to Portland. All of it was the best. But also, some of it was stressssssful (Rob being away for a week was pretty stressful. I hardly slept at all, just sat up worrying, ugh). Don't get me wrong, family, friends, road trips, weddings, Rob networking and learning math fancy stuff in foreign countries, sunshine, summer! All good things. But having our schedule blowing in the wind for so many weeks on end has been kind of crazy-making. I don't go with the flow too well. We were like out of fruit. How does that even happen? Mama needs some dull ass weeks and thirty minutes in the bath with a cup of coffee while she meal plans (because THAT is the current fantasy, omg).

Loretta has been Craving fizzy water (sparkling mineral water) and when she drinks it she says, "Oh, mmmm, that's good." Love.

You know you are turning into Crazy Garden Lady when you find yourself Demanding a squirrel, "Get out of here, squirrel!" to the squirrel's face. My tomato plants that I started from seed are officially about a month behind everyone else's. We finally had one good tomato ripen last week. Well one morning just before that I was looking out the back window, admiring my little garden, when I saw a squirrel sitting by my plants with a big, orangey green something in its mouth. In that moment, the part of my brain that exists solely to protect tomatoes went batshit. I flew out of the house in my jammies and the squirrel, shocked, froze in fright. I grabbed a stick and started waving it in his direction yelling, "Get out of here, squirrel!" He bolted past me and ran halfway up a tree, then froze with this big fruit thing in his mouth. Just a few feet away from me, frozen on the tree, we were eye to eye and I realized it was not my tomato (like a weird cucumber, not from my garden) but I was still in a frenzy. I yelled, "Don't eat in my yard, squirrel!" and threw a stick at the tree, not at him but by his feet. He made this crazy throaty sound and like menacingly chittered at me. He looked so weird with that mystery fruit in his mouth, staring me down, chittering, and I swore he was going to leap at me and we were going to have to fight. I was ready to fight a squirrel. But then he was gone, like a rocket the rest of the way up the tree. Off to tell his buddies to stay the eff out of this yard, I hoped. Well, I picked my tomato a few days later and it was amazing. So I am officially a farmer and a scarecrow, bam!

Otto is Questioning everything. All he wants is what he has coming to him. All he wants is his fair share ;) Anyways, he is questioning everything. Can he have ice cream before breakfast? Can he play iPad 24 hours a day? Can he not take a bath? Can he ride his scooter without his helmet? And then the follow-up question, of course. "Awwww, why not?" Good times.

Oh you know me, the day I stop Worrying about everything I can and can't control will be the day I am murdered by a squirrel.

That was this week and here are next week's themes:
falling, wearing, making, smiling, learning