Recycling

It used to be a fight to get the family to remember to recycle. Everyone is doing much better, now. I remarked to my husband that on trash day, we only had two trash bags to put out!

My daughter remarked that this might be because the baby eats out of the trash can now.

My glass is still half-full but I'm not thirsty, anymore!

It could have been worse.

Last Monday, my husband offered to drop my son off at his tennis lesson. He waited until my son saw someone with a cart of tennis balls. My son said that was his coach and hopped out of the car.
Hubbie returned at the end of the lesson to find that there had been no lesson. My son had been mistaken--saw the balls and was eager to go. His coach never showed. The coach sent someone to tell the class that the lesson was canceled but she was held up at work so no one knew for a while.
Luckily, a few other moms who had shown up know my son and waited with him. It could have been much worse!

Wednesday, the dermatologist called to say that one of the suspicious spots he'd removed from my thigh was, in fact, melanoma. He has already removed it and is fairly confident that he got it all, but will take another centimeter out of my thigh, just to be sure.
Scary word but the spot is gone, so it could have been much worse.

Friday, on the way to a make-up tennis lesson (being held to make up for the canceled class on Monday) we were in an accident. My bumper looks bad but everyone was unhurt. Even with gas prices, there are some days when it is good to be the one in the big SUV! The car behind me had much more damage but still, it could have been much worse.

For once, I am glad it is Monday! I am ready to begin a NEW week! My chest has been aching all weekend. I've been blaming brands of coffee and amounts of coffee until it occured to me last night that I've been holding my breath. While all outcomes were about the best they could have been, I usually wait for these things to happen in threes. I had forgotten about Monday's tennis incident but have decided now that these are my three and I can move on. We're done!

Have a wonderful and safe week!

A week, already?

Although it was not Monday yet, my last post seemed to start the following week on a theme!
Baby has been sick, we've had at least a few things scheduled every day...you know: life. Finally, today I have a little breathing time again--I just can't believe it's been a week already!

My daughter and husband traveled up to South Bend and stayed overnight after the Notre Dame football game last weekend. My son had a friend sleep over and the baby went to bed pretty well. So I actually had a little time to myself! I was going to curl up and read a little more of The Gargoyle but just could not get motivated to open it back up, so I went looking to see what was on my bookshelf that I have not yet read. I found Wickett's Remedy. This book sat on my wish list for a long time. It seemed intriguing but I kept buying other books. A while back, I wandered into Barnes and Noble and the book was on a bargain table and I could no longer pass it up. Yet it still sat on the shelf until last weekend. I do not know why. I am only half-way through (life tends to interrupt my reading time) but it is delightful.

I don't know if you can judge a book by its cover but the price certainly is no indication of the value contained within. On impulse, after reading a review online, I bought a hardcover copy of the bestselling book, The Gargoyle. I am not impressed. It reminds me of the DaVinci Code in the sense that the premise is intriguing but the writing is not good. This is the author's first book and I should be kind--I hope someone will read my first book one day--but he is trying too hard. I might finish it and let you know if I change my mind. On the other hand, Wickett's Remedy was bargain priced--I again bought a hardcover--for $5.95. This is certainly a bargain!

More than a bargain, this book has been a gift. I've been toying with the idea of including angels--or at least, an angel--in my WIP but am struggling with a way to do it that is not corny. The asides* in the margins of this book have reminded me that once in a while, it is literally OK to write outside of the box.
___________________________________
*The asides in the margins refers to the hardcover edition. I learned, while looking for a link to share with you here, that Myla Goldberg had the chance to make some revisions to the text for the paperback edition. She has included them online to download to replace certain pages of the hardcover edition but I have not yet done so. I don't know if the paperback edition is in the same format. Perhaps this explains the bargain price!

We're far from Monday

I don't work outside of the home but Mondays are still usually the craziest mornings here. Today was an exception.

Although we have as many bathrooms as people in this house, my one and only toothbrush is in the one bathroom that my husband was getting ready in when I got up. One son had crawled into bed with us an hour earlier and the other was screaming in his crib so I told one to get up and got the baby out and nursed him. I just wanted to brush my teeth and have a cup of coffee.

A little later, I took the baby back upstairs, told my older son again to get up and woke his sister. Hubbie was back in the bathroom so I helped older son find a red shirt for school (Spirit day--yay!) and took the baby back downstairs. Hubbie came downstairs --asking why I was making coffee after spending so much money on a pot that would do it for me. (My new, fabulous coffee pot that can be programmed to make my coffee for me works great--if all the parts are washed and reassembled the night before--but I had left them out to dry.)

As the coffee started brewing, I got breakfast ready for the kids. I'd tried to make it easier by buying lower fat, pre-made croissant sandwiches yesterday but they were very chewy so it just took longer to heat those and then make another breakfast. At least, I remembered vitamins! I took two out for my daughter, and put them in my hand while talking to my husband. I was holding the baby in my other arm, so he took one vitamin and had it in his mouth before I'd realized that the 11-month-old had the gummi vitamin, rather than the 10-year-old girl!

Hubbie, who was standing directly across from me, watching me try to fish the vitamin out of the baby's mouth simply asked, "how did he get a hold of it?"

At that point, I still had not brushed my teeth, nor had a sip of coffee and am in the habit of holding vitamins out for children so I realized too late that the one that can't have it is the one who got it. I explain this--though I'm quite sure that it should be obvious. My husband optimistically points out that at least the baby does have a cold, so maybe the vitamin will help!
(Yes, the one with 5 teeth took care of that gummi vitamin before I could get a hold of it!)

So I go set the baby down in the living room, in front of the tv. (I may have already poisoned him--why not fry his little brain with a little Fox News?) The baby pulls himself up, stares at the tv, looks directly at Senator Joe Biden, and yells, "Mama! Mama!"

Still here

I am still here.

I was, and had nothing urgent to share.
Then, I wasn't here. The hubbie and I got a chance to go to Chicago for a conference (his) without the kids! My parents came and watched all three kids! I found so much inspiration in Chicago and was ready to write but had no time and did not bring the laptop. (I know--it wasn't my conference--so I should have had time but we got to meet up with great friends that we had not seen in two years, so, there you go.)

I have not forgotten my few, loyal readers! I have funny comments about the election, worrisome thoughts about the bailout, funny mass emails about both that I could share but I'll wait until I have something new to say.

How are you?

Unfinished business

Yesterday, the kids and I were talking about when my daughter was in preschool. I made the comment that it was nice--during the time she was in preschool, my son would nap and I would write.

"You have been working on your book that long?" my son asks.
"Well, I've started a few things along the way, and I've rewritten it a few times now but...yes."
"Mom! That's six years! That's almost my whole life!"

Chastened, I left the breakfast dishes in the sink and sat down with the computer while they played games downstairs. The last six years have slipped by rather quickly. I actually have made much progress but it never feels "done." I've got too many other stories in my head to keep wasting time with this one, however. I'm going to work on it NOW.

Well, after one more comment. I included Infinite Jest in a previous post as a book I feel guilty about not finishing. Much like the book I'm writing, I made it most of the way through but never finished. The author, David Foster Wallace, passed away recently. I wonder what he left unfinished.

Take a hike, Ike!

Pick a place a hurricane can strike and I probably have relatives, friends or both living nearby. A week ago, I was worried that Ike would slam into my parents. It is going far away from them now--right towards my husband's family and my friends in Houston.

My daughter has, up to now, been relieved that hurricanes don't hit Indiana! We received some thunderstorms left over from Gustav however, and Ike looks like he's trying to swing on up here, as best as he can!

It looks like a good weekend to visit Kansas. Or Canada.

I don't know if many of my friends in Houston read this blog but B ~ I know you do. Post a comment when it's all over and you have power to let me know y'all are OK, please!

The Girl Who Stopped Swimming

Joshilyn Jackson's latest book takes place in Florida. 

Her first two novels put you in the South.  I grew up in Florida and went to college in New Orleans and her books captured much of the essence of what I like to remember as "home."  I was excited to learn that her latest book took place in Florida but I did not get as nostalgic with this one.  

While she included some references to the sandy soil (which differs, apparently, from the actual dirt next door in Alabama) much of this novel takes place in Anywhere, USA.  Which is actually closer to where I really grew up--and where I live, now.  

Ms. Jackson has a talent for creating memorable characters and locales.  Her details put you right into the story.   I was sure I had the "whodunit" part figured out this time--and was wrong again!  It was worth the read--I just didn't feel like to I got to escape to the South this time.  I felt like it could have taken place here--in my current home.  (Although I do not have a pool, nor a dead girl floating in one.)

Thank you, Blogger

Today's "blog of note" from Blogger is Nathan Bransford, Literary Agent. I popped over to take a look and was glad to have done so. I've found yet one more site to look at while I pretend to be writing.  It's great and he has plenty of interesting information. What I'm sharing with you today however, is a link --and a question--that he shared from the Washington Post book blog: Short Stack.

What book(s) are you embarrassed not to have read?

I have read parts of--but never the entire--Bible. I don't know if that counts. (Actually, books I've started, read parts of or are still theoretically reading could be an entirely different category! Infinite Jest and Les Miserables would top that list...)

(Unlike other members of my family, I have not read one Harry Potter book--but I'm not embarrassed by that.)  

Books that I'm embarrassed to say I haven't read yet would include:

Moby Dick - Melville 

The Divine Comedy (The Inferno, The Purgatorio, The Paradiso) - Dante 

A Room of One's Own - Virginia Woolf (I keep saying I'd be a better writer if I had one but I    still haven't read the book!)

Catcher in the Rye - J.D. Salinger (I'm pretty sure everyone has read this but me)

Uncle Tom's Cabin - Harriet Beecher Stowe (I've read so many other Civil War books and even have a WIP based during the War so it's particularly shameful that I have not read this one!)

Seven years ago

It took a while to get our furniture--we slept in new sofa beds for a month.  Once our goods arrived, it took a while to get the boxes unpacked.  We finally got things put away, had the children settled into their new rooms and were finally adjusting to the new house.

I had been telling my family we'd have time and would likely be ready for a visit by September.  In normal fashion, I waited until September to get online and book a ticket.  It was around 6 or 6:30am.  The kids were playing nicely; I logged on to the computer but when I tried to price a flight, I saw the message informing me that, in light of recent events, all flights were suspended until further notice.  I remember looking out the window, up at the clear, Alaska sky and wondering what could have happened.  My imagination took off and I pictured a few horrible scenarios.

I turned on the television.  Nothing I had imagined came close to what I saw.

I am thankful for my gift of procrastination.  In  August, 2007, I looked at the calendar, checked our schedules and thought that we would be ready to travel by September 11.  While it took a bit longer to actually get on a plane and visit my family, I am glad that I waited until that fateful day to attempt to book our flight.

May God be with the families who lost loved ones seven years ago today.

Focus on what's important

The title of this post is a reminder to myself.

My daughter picks on her brother more each day. The more I chastise her for it, the more she does it. (Life is a bit busier with three kids and now that the baby is mobile, I guess any attention she gets--even if it is negative attention--is welcome.)

It was a wonderful treat to open my email earlier this week to find an email from N's teacher. She wanted to take the time to tell me that N had impressed her by stepping up and helping a fellow student at school. Another girl was feeling left out and the teacher asked N to move to a new desk--away from her best friend--to help this other girl feel more included. The teacher went on to tell me how my daughter did not hesitate and displayed Christian behavior.

While I want my daughter to receive a good education, the note was an affirmation that we are doing the right thing for our children in sending them to a school where Christian values are stressed just as much as math facts and spelling words.

(Here is where I have to remind myself again to focus on what is truly important. The note from my daughter's teacher was loaded with misspelled words and grammatical errors. Realizing that this person is also my daughter's English teacher makes me cringe but I am choosing to believe that she is a person that believes that spelling and grammar rules do not apply to hasty email messages.)

The note was also a reminder to me that encouraging her is probably a better way to get N to be nice rather than yelling at her when she picks on her brother. I am fully aware that much of her pestering would stop if I simply ignore it--but it's hard when my son is right there--I don't want him to think I won't stand up for him. Having said that, he keeps telling me "from now on, I will stand up for myself with N." I should give him a chance.

Whether she pesters him or plays with him, C will do anything that N says. He loves her and wants her attention--negative or otherwise. We looked at some photos last night and found one of her snuggling with C when he was a baby. He smiled, looked up at her and said, "I guess you do love me."

I tried to use that as a reminder this morning when she was picking on him. I didn't catch on to just how much she is looking for the same thing from me until after I finished yelling this morning. I still haven't folded the laundry or unloaded the dishwasher but at least I can say I've learned something today.

(Now I am going to look for a coffee pot with a timer so I can spend the rest of my mornings smiling and being nice, rather than yelling at my kids for not helping out when Mommy hasn't even had a chance to make a pot of coffee!)

Getting the idea

Yesterday, my son got dressed for school before coming downstairs but as he took a bite of his breakfast, he whined that his throat hurt.

"It really hurts, Mommy. And I'm not lying this time."

This time.


(Perhaps his worries about Purgatory aren't as sinister as I'd feared.)

Tidying up

Thank you for the kind responses to my last post.  I am happy to have an ending!

I went for a run on Monday, hoping the fresh air would blow the cobwebs out of my head and I could figure out how to sort out all of these scenes, words, chapters...

I did come up with an answer and I think it will make a better book.  But I have to dump over 30,000 words.

I really hate that.

Sitting in the middle with my thumb in my mouth

Finally, I have an ending for the WIP I've been trying to finish up.  I have most of the major details and many more minor ones typed up in separate files but now I have to put it all back together.  

This part is more overwhelming than coming up with an ending!  I have all the pieces but they're scattered--like the toys and clothes in my son's room.  I have to sort through and decide what to throw out, what to keep and where to place the pieces I'm keeping.  I just to have to figure out where to start!

Not exactly clouds in my coffee

I try not to waste food or drinks in my house, so when my son left an almost full glass of milk on the table after breakfast, I decided to pour that into my coffee cup.   Milk however, should not go "plop!"

(My kids are currently enjoying "Vita Worm" vitamins.  My daughter tried to toss one onto her brother's plate in the morning but missed--it landed in his cup.  She gave him another one and he never knew--nor did I, until I almost had vitamin-enriched coffee!)

I don't want to know

My son was asking if it was possible for him to go to Hell before he'd made his First Reconciliation. Now that he only has two months before making that First confession, he has moved on. Now he wants to know how much time people spend in Purgatory.
Hopefully attending Catholic school will be good for him--he certainly knows Someone is watching him--but I'm a little worried about what he has been up to!

and round and round we go....

I was thinking that school starting would bring some sense of routine and calm back into our lives. I forgot how much I was looking forward to the end of school in May! Whew! We're back...the baby and I are back volunteering at school and magazine sales have already started, along with volleyball (for the girl) and tennis lessons (for the boy).

We just returned from a family reunion in Michigan this weekend and as I was emailing photos and going through my mental checklist for tomorrow, I checked the forecast/Fay update for Florida.

That was all it took to remind me that I can't complain. Sure, just when I thought dinner was almost ready, I spilled frozen corn all over the floor--and I have a crawling baby that eats ANYTHING in his path--but Fay is literally circling my baby brother's home and headed for my parents. A lot of dirty dishes and some spilled corn just ain't that big of a deal! It was a beautiful day here and I can see the moon tonight. I may not be able to predict how much sleep I'll get each night but living on the edge of the cornfields, I know that tropical storms and hurricanes are not going to make it this far!

I hope you are warm and dry!

Quiet time for mom?

My sister and her family went back home to Florida for a visit and took my daughter with them for a week!  My son spent the night with a friend last night and both the baby and husband are sleeping.

I have my coffee and quiet time at the computer.  Thus I am sitting here, hoping my son slept OK and hoping he behaves today while I dash to Ohio to retrieve my daughter.  Hopefully she'll handle the additional 4-hour drive back home well after her journey.  The baby should sleep most of the way there and back--he does well in the car--but maybe I should go ahead and wake him up.

I don't know why

Watch what you ask for--and what you post on your blog.

The baby has not actually eaten any live creatures--at least, not that I am aware of.  He has not actually tried eating a spider--but I have seen him try to catch an ant.  (It was a tiny, fast ant trying to escape a big, clumsy baby--no real danger for either of them).

The day after my last post however, a fly was hitching a ride with us in the car.  Everyone else can shoo him away but the baby is still learning.  My older son kept yelling things like "the fly is on his nose!"  Then he really started shouting--"J is going to eat the fly!"

Luckily, the baby's reflexes are not that fast.  Otherwise the fly could have been in danger.  

I know an old lady who swallowed a fly

I don't know why she swallowed the fly.

Once upon a time, I was worried about spiders biting my unsuspecting children. How foolish of me. The older kids can spot a hairy invader from 20 yards away--no unsuspecting victims, here!
The baby, of course, senses no danger but is curious about everything. He has perfected his pincer grasp and he's on the move. I was once worried about spider venom being poisonous but now I wonder what will happen if a child ingests the entire creature.

I justify smashing the critters with my shoe not just as a means of protecting my children but also as a type of mercy killing for the unsuspecting bug. If I were a spider, I'd rather go quickly than have to wriggle and jiggle and tickle inside of anyone.