Children... I can never eat a whole one.

Ah, Kids....

Seriously - first shout out to any and all single parents. How do you function? I've been in Iowa watching/babysitting/preventing injury and misfortune of my 3 little nieces and nephew. They are precocious children - and not in the fun Mary Poppins way. Okay, perhaps in the fun Mary Poppins way - but thank goodness that broad had magic - because she needed it!

Isabel has garnered the most Facebook posts because - well, I've spent every waking and non-waking hour with her since her lovely parents ditched the crappy, cold, cloudy weather of Iowa and beat cheeks to Cabo. Lucky them.

Unfortunately for Isabel a lovely case of the creeping crud has settled in her lungs. Also, unfortunate is the amount of liquid that she's refusing to drink - and likewise the "GROSS" medication that works the best for her cough. The 12-hour cough medicine apparently tastes like ant butts, because she hates it. Not to mention that every other medication that she's on, currently is running the table with Bubble Gum flavor which makes the "Orange" medicine even more particularly vile. We've managed to spit out as much as we've swallowed.

It reminds me of when my mother would put pills into a spoon full of peanut butter to get us to swallow them. All the while we would retch and gag and my father the man who has the patience of a flea (assuming that fleas are not really patient at all...) would be yelling at the retching, gagging child, "It's all in your head. Just swallow the damn pill. IT'S ALL IN YOUR GOD DAMN HEAD." Ah, Dad...thanks for the memories.

Of course, now, I wouldn't dream of yelling GD anything - and furthermore, it seems quite inappropriate to yell that at someone else's loin fruit. Instead, I acquiese...when she pouts because the crappy medicine is not "pink" - I pull out the red food coloring. Of course, I know full well that she's looking for something bubble gum flavored - it's kind of sad when I let her stir the orange medicine and red food coloring together. She's excited - see, Stacie, it *is* pink. She insists. Yep, Isabelly, it is pink - and in about 2 nanoseconds you are going to realize that "Pink" in your brain means "Bubble Gum flavored" - only you didn't say that - so I've prepared your "Pink" medication - and you'll start to realize that you must be specific in your requests.

Alas, Ariel the magical mermaid fared the worst in our evening med pass. While we downed about 7/8 of our bootleg Pink/Orange medication - 1/8 of it came hurling out of our lips while we squealed, "AUNT STACIE THAT IS NOT PINK MEDICINE!" - The spittle landed smack dab in the middle of Ariel's sea faring forehead. The spittle, much to my chagrin, was not pink - but rather blood red. It looks like Ariel has been hit by a sniper. Unlike our morning medication trial - which ended up in 2 outfit changes - we seemed rather unaffected by the bloody headed Ariel. Isabel has assured me that the stain will come out and, "Mom won't be mad."

Grace has been charming although she has been sad. She's been a big helper - I thanked her for bringing down her clothes for school tomorrow without being asked, reminded and hounded and she rolled her eyes and me and said, "Um, I do this all the time." Well, thanks anyway Super Trooper. She also seemed surprised when I thanked her for replacing the toilet paper roll. It's the little things. She's been great at reading time, and making sure that Isabel has a reading partner. She even took a bath with Isabel - and what started out as, "I'm just going to put my feet in for a few minutes, okay?" Turned into a full blown sibling bath. They poured enough water onto the bathroom floor to weaken the floorboards - hopefully that will dry out before Saturday and I can get back to Minnesota before the claw foot bathtub crashes into the bathroom below. Denise - I swear that stain on the downstairs bathroom ceiling was there when I arrived.

Henry - dear, sweet, Sass-Back Henry. He's having a tough week...filled with bright spots and life lessons. For example, When Aunt Stacie chooses her battles, she does not lose. Which means when you are constantly battling...you constantly lose. Two days into this gig, Henry's finally getting the hang of it. We've had 2 classic HR fits - the kind with the stomping, the sour grapes face, the ugly words and the screeching. He gets no response from me for this behavior. He doesn't even get reminded that he needs to calm down and apologize. Which it isn't surprising that tonight's tantrum lasted about 1/3 of the time of yesterdays. The first time, he had to get instructions about the apology, the post-fit time out, and the reparation. Oh, reparation - you Catholic life lesson...you're a wench. Again, Henry's been reminded that it's all about choices. Last night he missed a snack... And I'm not a horrible Aunt - I knew that he'd been told that he was foregoing his snack if he couldn't get it together - so it's not like I whipped out the treats that Denise had picked up for Grace & Henry and taunted him. Instead, Isabel had Oatmeal and Grace had Honey Toast. But when we were saying our prayers and Henry said something about not getting a snack I gently reminded him that it was a choice. And he ranted about how, "Yeah, it was YOUR choice" And I said, "No, it was my consequence, which I gave to you. You're decision to not stop the tantrum was your choice. Therefore you decided that you didn't want a snack."

Well - tonight was a battle of wills and also a battle of "Choices" - see, Henry, like my youthful former self - understood that you can't punish someone that doesn't acknowledge the power of the punishment. If you tell a kid, "FINE! That's it! NO MORE LIMA BEANS FOR YOU!!!" - Really? No more Lima Beans? Well, by all means, then I'll keep playing with the matches and I'll be *SO* heart broken when the Lima Beans are taken away. So I upped the ante tonight. If you don't care about not helping assemble Pizza Balls for dinner - and therefore you do not want to write out an apology - that's fine, but if you don't help out with dinner - you won't be able to fly your helicopter either. See how that works? Ouch! Okay, fine, I'll write the apology. Amazing.

And the thing of it is - I "catch" him doing nice things as much it's just him being a 6 year old boy that has listening problems. I don't have as many issues with the mischieviousness as much as I have a problem with the back talk and the "I'm smarter than you" b.s. I'm surprised, actually, given how much I was the kid that these kids are today - that my parents still remember my birthday. And the fact that I haven't thrown them into an early grave.

Okay - I'm rambling - a sign that I have "kid" brain. I still have laundry to do - and a kitchen to clean. I am quite content that Isabel hasn't coughed in almost an hour - so perhaps the apple juice chugging and "Pink" medicine is taking effect after all.

The Calm

It's Friday, March 5, as evidenced by the date stamp somewhere on this post. It's the calm before the storm. In just a few short hours I'll be jumping into the not-so-shiny red tracker and heading down to Iowa to play Mary Poppins for the week.

Little Old Ladies...

I wish I had a grandma in a retirement community in Florida. I'd make sure that I'd go and visit her every February. She'd ask me how things are in Minnesota and tell me that I can move into her home whenever I get tired of being cold like she did a few years back. She'd be tan and leather skinned and smell like talcum powder and Avon. But none of my Grandmas ever moved to Florida and they have both been gone for a while. Still, when I see pictures of little old ladies with bright white hair and bronze faces I wish I had one to visit in Boca.

There should be an adoption agency for little old ladies to adopt grandmotherless adults.

Boy Scout Cookies

Just think about that for two little seconds. Since girl scout cookies stir up this crazy longing to eat copious amounts of dark chocolate minty goodness at the very mention. When I try to wrap my head around a Boy Scout cookie, I always imagine some sort of Burnt Oatmeal Packet and leftover marshmallow goo stuck to a cast iron skillet in the middle of a dying fire. I'd like to think that a Boy Scout Cookie is something that chubby scouts try to make at the end of their camp with a packet of Cinnamon Raisin Instant Oatmeal, and discovered marshmallows that were flung flaming brightly off the end of a whittled sticks from the night before. And I'm not sure that boy scouts even cook from cast iron skillets anymore - so maybe the whole concoction is laid out on a crumply piece of aluminum foil and suspended over ashy coals. Either way, the mention of a Boy Scout cookie doesn't conjure up brightly colored cookie boxes and freezing pre-teens sitting outside the local Wal-Mart asking kindly, "Ma'am, were you ever a Girl Scout?" - Yeah, yeah, I was. I never got to camp but I did make a crappy situpon out of leftover wallpaper samples and crumpled newspaper - which just reminds me that I never got to go to the damn camp. Sure, I'll squelch that bitter childhood recollection with a box of Carmel Delites*, thanks for the memories.



*Caramel Delites, not to be confused with their twisted sister cookie, the Samoa.

C'mon Eileen

A Blog Post for the rest of you...

I'm tired of my house feeling cold. I know, I know, I could crank up the heat. But seriously? I've had my house between 50-55 degrees all winter - what would be the point of being warm now? This summer - a plan for the attic. Like new windows - maybe a plan for the floor and making it a "retreat" of some sort. We'll see how those plans come to fruition.

I've accepted the lot of only having 2 days of "work" at Together Dating as well. I'm okay with it now - it is what it is. I know that I'll be happy for the time at home during the spring/summer - but I also liked having the "extra" 400 buck-a-roos each month too. I'm not so keen on picking another PTJ up just to have one. We'll see how things play out. Once again, perhaps it's roommate time???

This, bt dubs, isn't IT. :)

Mom visits Mi Casa

So my Mom was up this weekend from South Dakota. She had a quilting class in Sioux Falls which by Girl Math(tm) she technically only had 4 hours to drive to get to me instead of the original 8. We had absolutely NOTHING planned. Not one little thing. Which is rare for a group that traditionally has WAY too much planned.

Dinner with Tim & Eddy was fun. I got to watch Mom laugh perhaps too much at Betty Butterfield. Sometimes I just never know how those things are going to go over. It went over fabulously...so bonus on all accounts.

We shopped for fabric, went to Stillwater, ate Sushi, finished a lap quilt, sewed a valance for the bathroom and a door knob cozy. I still had to yell* at her to get her to leave. It's okay. She's used to it.

I stayed home to pre-clean and do laundry even though my Mom is the *last* person in the world that would care if my house was disorganized. I did like a bazillion loads of laundry. It's nice to not have piles around (don't let any of my family or co-workers know that I've made the above statement)!!

This morning, I hop in the tub thinking - it's Tuesday, I'm up early, I decide I'm going to soak. I haul my little space heater into the bathroom, turn on the heater and the hot water. The heater is cranking it's little heart out, and the hot water, after a minute or two well, it's not so hot. "Damn," I think, "I know I didn't turn the hot water heater down while my Mom was here." So I truck down the stairs and look at the hot water heater. The dial is on Warm. The water was no where near warm. So I crank it to hot and wait the prescribed 2 seconds it usually takes for the full flame of propane to kick in and start heating the 19 year old beast. Nothing. Deep breath in through the nose...no detectable smell of gas although I had thought that I smelled gas when I was down in the basement when Mom and I were up late on Saturday night. But today is Tuesday, and that was a few days ago... I sense trouble in Casa de Gringa.

So up the stairs I go to grab my favorite red flashlight and a box of matches and a lighter. It's at this point that you start thinking things like...if the basement was full of natural gas, the house would have blown off the foundation when I flipped the light switch, right? That's how it happens in movies and in those horrible Channel 4 stories. I flipped the switch before I headed down the steps and I'm still here, so that's fine, I'm fine. I read the 1950s instructions on the water heater. Remove door, remove door, turn knob, hold down button, insert lit match, hold down button, count to 60, let button go, turn knob, hope that between removal of first door and lighting match that face does not burn up and melt off whilst house is burning around me. The pilot light stayed lit upon button release, I cranked it back on to Warm, heard the familiar WHOOSH of natural gas igniting and thought, "Okay for now."

I felt accomplished. I still stood at the top of the basement stairs and did the kind of sniffing that a police dog does around the Amsterdam arrival gates at the MSP. The kind where you say, "Okay, I smell gas but am I smelling it because my face was just in the base of the water heater and I was lighting a pilot light or is my house slowly filling with natural gas?" More importantly...is this a sign of the end times for my beloved 19 year old water heater.

The water was still cold for a brief soap off and rinse this morning. The kind where you are more concerned about the fact that you might make yourself hyperventilate by intense breathing more so than any resulting trauma from freezing your nachos off.

Thank goodness nothing like that happened while Mom was here. I would have been embarrassed and potentially nerve wracked. More so if the damn thing hasn't stayed lit. Time to re-look at the ol' budget and start socking away the money for a water heater.

All in all, it'll be a good day if I come home, slide my key into the lock and don't smell gas or feel trepidation when flipping on the first light switch. Yippee for home ownership.







*Okay, it's a common occurrence, I know I shouldn't do it, she's my Mom. But she's also a dawdler & dinker type that would leave for home at Midnight if you let her. Love you! It only makes me angry because I know I do the same thing...so it shouldn't make me angry, I should be sympathetic.