When Life Gives You Lemons.....

Last week I was in a car accident. The kind you can't anticipate and the kind that is completely not your fault. I was at a red light, a car turning got hit, spun out of control and into my car. It was a freak thing I could not do anything about and certainly could not change the outcome of, no matter what my quick reaction might have been. A shakin' up Froggy was with me in the car and I had an ambulance take him to the hospital to get checked out. All being fine, we had our amazing Uncle Kramer handle the car battles of towing our car to the auto body shop and helping us get a rental car. All I can recall is when Uncle Kramer said, " Do you need anything out of your car BEFORE I send it to the body shop, I said.... Yes, the gallon of milk I just bought at Target, can you make sure it gets into the fridge."

Uncle Kramer, baffled and confused at this being the BIG REQUEST, obliged and made sure my milk stayed cold until I could get it home hours later. Hey, milk is important in a house with kids who need cereal and milk for morning breakfast. It's priceless.

Needless to say, the hassles of the week have been exploding with insanity. The calm that made me think..... this damn inconvenience might be okay because...... the guy who hit me had a reputable insurance company for his auto insurance. State Farm Insurance I must say has been ROCKING it out of the park.....

I don't have State Farm, but think after the ease and swiftness that they have handled this all, I might actually switch. The agent was calming, understanding and nice throughout and even offered to replace my car seat from Froggy to help alleviate any issue that it might be a "bad" car seat now or "unusable".

So all in all.... crappy week aside..... Froggy might be getting some new comfortable seating and I have a nice rental car in the meantime...... Thanks Uncle Kramer, I guess having a car dealer for a brother isn't such a bad thing.

Scotch and a Cigarette

Well, with summertime craziness, no school, kids home.... it's been, well..... Crazy! Now that camp has begun I've decided in my infinite insanity to begin the stages of "Paci Rehab". Yes, this is the time when my little now 2-year-old Froggy will have to give up his paci in the daytime and keep it just for bedtime. Even though he's so freakin' cute looking like Maggie Simpson with his binky moving in and out all the time. He's a big boy, understands and knows that it's okay to leave his paci for a while.
So far I'm on day #8 of our "28 day" program and we've gone from complete tantrums to him casually asking for a quick paci break. So I think that's progress.

I was telling my husband about it and although I'm sure he thinks I'm nuts, I'm guessing men can relate knowing that the Toddler's "Paci & Duckie" combo can be related to the equivalent to a Man's "Scotch & Cigarette". The two belong together and when one is missing.....it's just not the same.

Be strong Froggy! Only 20 days to go.....

Because of You

Froggy,
When you were born,
there was a new person
for the family to love and care for

And Because of You
there is one more person
who can love and care
for others...................

Because of You,
there is one more person
who will grow and learn
and one more person
who can teach others.

Our lives are more complete,
you add love, smiles, laughter and joy.
You are so loved, so cherished,
so much an essential part of our hearts.
Our days are more bright, our hearts more full and all of that is...................

BECAUSE OF YOU

Happy 2nd Birthday Froggy!
I love you.............

(Disclaimer: Some lines are quoted from  the book "Because of You")

So I Walked Into A Pole.........

The other day Monkey had a play date with one of his favorite girlfriends. I took them to the park and they had a blast running around for a while. They outdid each other on the monkey bars and decided to race and see who could pump higher and harder on the swings. It was super cute and I dreamed of how it probably was when I was a kindergartner. My long-term memory doesn't reach that far back, but I can imagine it was full of days of parks, swinging and lots of fun.

As Monkey and I went to walk his friend home and as we were walking past a local community center Monkey saw this HOT actress walk past him. She was in animal print spandex and a red fishnet top. She had beautiful red hair that would make men and women alike stare. While staring at her and turning his head Monkey missed the large metal pole that was quickly approaching. He smashed right into it and began screaming, in pain and I think in embarrassment.

Although physically fine it took him a few moments to regain his composure. He tried to shrug it off, but I could tell his ego was bruised. I tried to cheer him up and I thought I'd share a personal story with him to ease his embarrassment. I told him and of course his little friend about a time I fell on the stairs at work, landed on my butt and slid down the stairs all the while people saw this happen to me and I was mortified. In hindsight, pretty damn funny, at the time.... I wasn't laughing.

Monkey cheered up immediately and I was glad to see him back to his own self in a quick second. I told him and his little friend to please NOT repeat the story because it was super embarrassing and I didn't want people to know.

So we go to drop off his little friend at her house and as we are about to leave, Monkey goes.... "Hey Mrs Little Friend's Mom, wanna hear an embarrassing story my Mom just told me."
He repeated my entire story and I laughed if off, but really didn't want to share my embarrassment. I couldn't believe he didn't keep my secret.......... guess I know who NOT to share surprises with......  MONKEY!

iTalk

I grew up in a different generation. I grew up in the letter-writing, telephone, read-a- book generation. I grew up in a house with limited television watching, lots of "You must read for 30 minutes" and chore charts. (Good Job MashugaBubbie) It was a time when I recall my Parents debating between a trip for the family or an Apple IIgs computer for the house. (we got the computer, joystick and all!) Yes it was a different time, one where when I came home from school and my Mom asked me how my day was and I told her.
Today when I picked Monkey up from school, not a usual occurrence since he takes the bus pretty much daily, he said, "Mom, can I play a game on your phone, I'm bored."

All I could think was, Are you kidding me, you just got into the car..... how bored can you be?

I said, " Nope, I'd love to hear about your day though."
Monkey, "Huh."
I repeated, "YOUR DAY, I'd love to hear what you did in school today."
Monkey, "Well that's boring."
In trying to think like a man, I left all emotion out as I logically answered, "Yes, it is boring, it's not an iPod, iPad or iPhone, we are just gonna do something called iTalk."

Monkey got a bit interested and responded,"What's iTalk?"
Laughing to myself, "It's when I ask you a question and you answer it."
Monkey, picking up quickly that this wasn't anything electronic and just basic talking, clung to his negotiating super powers and said, "Okay, you can ask me 2 questions and then can I play a game on your phone?"

Ugh, conceding defeat, I agreed.

"Okay, tell me the best and worst thing that happened to you today." I said.
Monkey, "The worst thing was my friend kept asking me to make her a picture at home on my computer and she was sooo annoying. Mom, are all girls annoying?"

Ignoring the last question I continued, "Well, what was the BEST thing that happened to you today?"

Monkey, smart little thing, "Playing games on your iPhone, can I have it now?"

I retorted, "No, I meant the best thing that happened AT SCHOOL!"

Monkey the Lawyer (please G-d don't tell my husband about his skills) responded, "Uh, that's not what you asked and that would make it 3 questions, so I think we are done here."

Prosecution rests..... ruling in favor of the Defense....... Monkey won this one hands down. Damn it.

Before you were my Mommy......

Last week I was talking to a colleague at work, we were discussing one of her sons that was ill and his symptoms. She was concerned he might have strep throat or maybe a virus. She put a call in to her pediatrician and was trying to figure out based on his symptoms what might be wrong. We ran through a list in our heads of possible diagnoses and what treatments might be best. After about 10 minutes of consulting with one another we bid each other well and continued about our day at work.
We bumped into each other later in the day and she said that she FINALLY got in touch with the pediatrician and our original diagnoses was correct and the treatment we discussed was the course the doctor was going to go. It was a typical Dr Mom moment. The one where you know what's wrong with your own kid and can probably write your own kid the prescription for antibiotics. Ahh, if only they gave Moms a prescription pad. Not a bad idea since you have that Mom intuition about what's wrong and what will make it better.

Today Monkey spent a bit too much time outside on a rarely hot day for Chicago.
He came inside after a long time in the heat and was very crispy to the touch. A mild sunburn and some sun poisoning, I diagnosed. Crap. He was complaining how hot he was and how everything hurt. Double Crap.
In order to ease his discomfort I started him on cool liquids, a cool towel for his body and rubbed him gently with aloe so his hot skin would cool down. After several hours of tending to him, he was all better, felt cool and was well-hydrated. Ahh, hospital visit averted-hooray!
Monkey came over to me after his cool bath and said, "Mom, before you were my Mommy, were you a Doctor or Nurse or something?"
I looked at him quizzically and asked, "No, why do you ask?"
He looked at me and said, "Are you sure, because you knew how to fix me up and make everything feel all better."
I looked at him seriously and said, "No honey, that's just a special kind of power that is given to Mommies, they can make everything all better."

He looked at me and asked, "Do Daddies have this special power, too."

Ha, I looked at him trying hard not to laugh and said, " No sweetheart, only Mommies have special powers."

Look, one day he'll grow up and realize I'm not a SuperHero, I'm just his Mom, but while the two are intertwined for this short period in his life..... Man am I gonna enjoy the spotlight. No way am I sharing it...... this is my 15 minutes of fame.
MY 15 MINUTES!  SuperMom to the rescue!

Keeping up with the Joneses

Monkey has spent his kindergarten year in private school. He has friends who are different than his previous friends from Preschool. He's gone from families with dual incomes and two super-hardworking Parents who work inside the home and at paying jobs outside the home to a school with kids who have Moms that only have one job, CEO of Household.

These Moms are able to do things like manage a home with 3-4 children, take care of running the household, cook nightly and make amazing Shabbat meals. These Moms make fancy desserts with swirls of chocolate on the plate and drizzles of syrups and all sorts of beautiful creations that take time and patience. These Moms drive carpools, run their kids to extra curricular activities, head to the gym daily and I found out this past Shabbat, READ BOOKS from start to finish in one day. Who has that kind of time?!  It's nerve-wracking starting as a Mom at this type of school. I didn't know how nervous I would be starting kindergarten in such a school and as the year progressed, it's only gotten worse for me.

This past Shabbat we had two such families over for lunch. I wanted to make a really nice lunch so I worked hard, marinated meat, got recipes for a new amazing trifle dish, made new salads. It took lots of trips to the vegetable store, lots of planning and lots of preparation. I even thought of dessert that would be fun for the kids. On Friday afternoon I get home and there was an amazing new cookbook (I love cookbooks, by the way) waiting for me with a note from one of the families coming the next day for lunch, pre-thanking me for having them over. About an hour before Shabbat a knock at my door was the other family I invited over with yet another gift. Oh my goodness, I have never been showered with more gifts for hosting a meal. I was beyond impressed and realized first grade might be more than I bargained for, for me... not Monkey. I need a class, "Keeping Up with the Joneses", do they offer that for Moms new to private school? If not, they should.

Oy Vey, I'm in trouble..............

To Facebook or Not?

I've heard about it from EVERYONE. I've gotten "friend" requests and photo updates.... I'm not sure what all the hoopla is, but people I know call it Facebook. I'm guessing it's a virtual chat room type thing and a way to keep in touch with friends, family and colleagues. The question really isn't what IS Facebook exactly.... it's should I be doing it?

I love the idea of keeping in touch with friends, people I never get to see because I have to work, because they work, because our lives don't run parallel to each other. It's challenging and sometimes I feel disconnected from it all.
I do NOT have enough hours in my day..... HELLO, who does......I need more time to sleep, more time to exercise, more time to work, more time to enjoy life and most importantly, more time to be with, enjoy and raise my own kids.
Argh! There is never a good answer. Do I start something new? Something that I know will be more consuming that I have time for, but might yield me the socialization that runs appropriately to my crazy life schedule right now or do I say fuck it, I barely have time to bake cookies, make lunches and take a hot bath.

Who's done it? Who likes it? Who can tell me if it's WORTH it?

HELP.............