Knees are scraped.....but I'll get back up....again......

So, the last few months have been tough for me, for a variety of reason, none of which I will go into right now as either (a) they will bore you to tears (b) things could be worse (c) I have no ability to make a long story "short" or (d) none/all of the above.....

I guess I feel like every few days, my legs get kicked out from under me and I am down on the ground......then, I am back to that place where I can remember sitting up on my kitchen counter after I had fallen off my bike...my knees were scraped (I'm crying - big surprise) and my mom was spraying Bactine on them (while gently blowing on them as well to help ease the sting).......then I snap back into reality and realize, I'm the Mom now and no one is going to hoist me up on the counter and tell me it's going to be all right and ask me if I want a warm chocolate chip cookie.....

This winter totally "stank" - yep that's right - IT STANK! If you ask most New Englanders they will tell you it was a "mild one", "it wasn't that cold" or "the snow wasn't that bad".....well, all I remember are months of me and My Snuggie becoming BFF's and counting down the weeks until I was in a warmer place. I also am dealing with health issues for the first time in my life that I thought only "other people" got......it's scary...I keep telling myself I am "too young" or my kids are "too little" but that still doesn't change things.....

I am also dealing with some personal issues that everyone faces from time to time (mostly remember these particular issues occuring in Junior High, but, oh well....) which makes things harder.

Anyway, if I was reading a good motivational book right now, I'm sure Chapter One would be titled "Get Up, Dust Yourself Off, Stop Whining, and Deal With It"....so, I will.....just not sure where to start......

For now, I think I sit her in the dark with my parents cat (who makes me sneeze and cries incessantly), and make a plan, because if I sit here and feel sorry for myself, nothing will change...I'll wake up tomorrow and it will just be one more day I haven't dealt with the things I need to address.

I started this blog as a joke or to be funny (even if it was only for my own therapy) but I have found writing is something that is indeed, very therapeutic.....so I will most likely keep documenting my "trudge" uphill........and you jump on my back and come along for the ride if you'd like......

Don't even spell it....!

That's what I have been saying to my kids lately, now that they are older and I can proudly say they are learning to "spell" bad words........but bad words in my house include more than the traditional street list.....you know the ones I mean. We also have included "shut up" on our list along with the "i" word (idiot) and the "j" word (jerk)...I actually think I could write an alphabet book for my kids on what words they CAN'T say......

So anyway, I can't stand this word (shut up) when it is used to quiet another person...unless I'm watching "Knots Landing" reruns and Crystal and Alexis get in a slapping fight afterward....

It also isn't a bad word when you use it to cleverly name your new blog (just my opinion).....and so here it is....a blog that might interest many of you...fashion tips, where to score a deal...and maybe a little teaser of "did you know.....?"

http://hesaidshutup.blogspot.com/

Check it out........

Just not funny anymore.....

So, I haven't posted in a long time....I guess I have had nothing to write about that could seem humorous to others? (Besides the fact that my neighbor caught me in my robe this morning for the 5th day in a row?)

Other than that, I just don't have the "material" I felt I once had...I think I have settled into a somewhat normal pattern like all the other families in my town.......too many sports, activities, commitments for each child - CHECK! feeling like the bus driver, the maid, the short order cook - CHECK! and...not to be left out - swine flu - CHECK! (This is where I wish I was writing....."Being whisked away for a week in the Caribbean - PRICELESS")

Anyway, I found this great website through an awesome mom blog that I found last night and I wanted to share it......yep, that's what I do now, I read blogs about being a stay at home mom, blogs on raising kids that will hopefully be stable adults and blogger tips on being the most frugal mom on the planet......I know, I should slow down, people will NOT be able to keep up with me...

So, this website gives you the ability to download your favorite photo and make it into a FREE 8 x 10 canvas, that's right - it is absolutely free - minus the shipping, but who cares - the canvas is free! Yay! These are the things that make the Stay at Home Moms run around the house with a toilet brush in one hand and a mop in the other exclaiming "I'M WORTH IT!!!!!!!!"

http://www.canvaspeople.com/

Props to http://www.moneysavingmom.com/ for finding this awesome deal and for having a great blog!

Wrinkles & Roots....

So, I'm not sure if I should hug my sister or slap her....I mean, if I slap her, it will be in a "sisterly love" kind of way...

She just got a new computer and she has these really cool features on it...I'm not going to go into detail here....if you want more on these features, tune into any Primetime show and wait for the commercial that starts out "Hi, I'm a Mac...Hi, I'm a PC"....

Anyway, she was just making some fun videos of the kids (which they loved...especially the "chipmunk" voice feature) and then off to bed they went, without a hitch, just brushed their teeth, tucked themselves in and they were off to Dreamland.....(nah, not really, but let's pretend it happened that way...)

My sister, being the extremely hilarious person that she is, decided it would be really funny to leave the camera running (kind of like a Big Brother/Supernanny episode) and captured some really stimulating video of my husband and I fighting over the correct way to do our child's homework and me carrying a bunch of dirty laundry around the house while complaining that all I do are dishes and laundry all day...it was thrilling. If anyone would like to see it, just send me an email.....it will also be on YouTube momentarily....

I guess the whole point of this is that two things happened here tonight..the first is that I came up with the title for my new book 'Wrinkles & Roots" and second, I verified one of my biggest fears: YES, I LOOK OLDER. YES, THIS LAST BIRTHDAY HURT A LITTLE...ACTUALLY QUITE A LOT. YES, I WOULD GO BACK TO HIGH SCHOOL OR COLLEGE GIVEN THE OPPORTUNITY.

I remember the days where I could just throw on a baseball hat with no makeup and go out to breakfast and I still looked just as good as I did the night before (well, at least I thought that). These days, if I leave the house with a baseball hat on and no makeup I am usually greeted with "What's wrong?", "Are you sick?" or "Have you given up totally?"

I guess, part of getting older, having another birthday and feeling like you just completed your millionth load of laundry is that sometimes you don't feel too glamorous. Sometimes, you wonder why you have more wrinkles (let's call them laugh lines - it sounds "prettier"), dark roots (my daughter always asks me why I have so many different colors in my hair) and a few extra lbs. on the ol' frame. Do I embrace it? Do I scream? Or do I relocate to SoCal and get my lips plumped and my thighs sucked out?

I guess I'm not sure of the answer to this one. When I do decide to finally pen my memoir, 'Wrinkles & Roots", please be sure to all buy a copy and I might let you slap my sister for free.

Rockin' Out in the Mumu......

So, it's Friday....and 2 out of my 3 kids are at home with me today. There is a possibility of rain in the forecast which means for me that I hide out in the house all day and when my 5 & 1 year old sons start to jump off the furniture for entertainment...I act surprised.

I decided that today is a perfect "mumu" day. If I had a mumu I would rock it out today..I might add a necklace or some fuzzy slippers to make it a little more appealing but I would be wearing it all day. Am I embarrassed that someone might come to my door and find me in this get up? Not at all.....

As a good old friend once said to me (a few months back), when I "acted" embarrassed that he had "caught me" unshowered that day and still in my pajamas at 4:00 p.m., "Don't worry Meagan, I have known you a long time and I have seen you look a lot worse." Well, thank you kind friend, I think........

I guess I just have a problem with trying to fit my mom butt & cankles in to some overpriced Juicy sweatsuit only to have all the fun "surprises" that I find on a daily basis ruin my $200 terry cloth number in one fell swoop.....

For example, I just opened my freezer this morning and encountered one of my child's "experiments" (as she lovingly refers to them). Within seconds of opening the door, I met an avalanche of "heart shaped half frozen ice cubes made out of yogurt, water and some other liquid" that apparently hadn't froze all of the way yet. I guess that's my bad. I probably should just stay out of there and hope for the best.

Example #2 would be when my youngest son likes to use me as his "human tissue". I don't think I have to go into much detail here. Apparently, if you don't have a tissue handy...I'm your go-to-girl. He especially likes to come up to me and spit out anything that he has put in his mouth and then deems unsuitable for his palette.

Another reason why a mumu would be perfect for me is because of some of the scarier "items" I come across in my house from time to time. Obviously, if I had a cleaning person, I wouldn't be subjected to these things, but my husband wasn't swayed by this argument so here I am.

Yesterday I was walking past the doorway and thought we had adopted some sort of new furry creature, which wouldn't be that weird around here as we are animal lovers. Just last month I came home to find some frogs and a snail on my kitchen counter with a note that said "Dear Meag, Here are the perfect pets for the kids! Love, Mom" Thanks Mom......I'll be sure to repay the favor at a later date........Anyway, back to the furry creature......it turned out that it was not in fact alive, just a ball that had been created, much like the tumbleweeds you see in the desert. The recipe? Some dog hair, a daughter that brushes her locks more than Marcia Brady and construction at your neighbor's house, and you have a perfect and unique dust bunny. If I was wearing the mumu when I found that little gem, I could have begun my spring cleaning (so what that it's fall....some of us have been busy, OK?). So, instead of cleaning, I threw some water on "it" to see if it would multiply and when that didn't work I set him up with the frogs and the snail, they seemed lonely.

So, if anyone knows where I can get a mumu (please don't tell me to go to some smelly army/navy story...I can't take those places), let me know. Until then, I'll just keep avoiding doing all the things a "housewife" should be doing during the day, because after all, you need the proper clothes to do your job well and I obviously need to go shopping. Maybe I'll open up a mumu store......I think more people would wear them if they were readily available.....don't you? And thank you Mrs. Roper (and her stylist), I never knew that all those years that I invested into Three's Company would come back to help me at some point later on in life...

Oh, the lazy days of summer......

It's official, Julie McCoy has left the building......she up and packed her bags, got a drink with Gopher and took the first train out of here........all that's left after this whirl wind of a summer is an exhausted, pickled liver attached to a slightly heavier & squishier version of me. It's not that I didn't have a fun summer, I did. It's not that there weren't plenty of vacations, pool days, beach trips and whatnot.....I am just done. I am done being the cruise director....the go-to-girl for your day's itinerary. I want the teachers, the instructors and the coaches back. I want other adults to be responsible for my kids, their activities & their daily needs (well at least from about 8 - 3).

I have run out of ideas for sunny days, I am fresh out of creative thoughts during rainy days and for those days that are in between, I find myself encouraging multiple hours of TV and inappropriate movies (only PG of course) for my children to watch.

Today is a prime example of what I am talking about...it was about 100 degrees out and the kids and I had enough sun from the last few days that we just needed a break. We are 110% Irish and I don't think my son has any room left on his nose for another freckle and my husband keeps telling me that my neck/chest region is starting to look like Magda's (please refer to "Something About Mary" for details....) So......we were trapped inside and I was completely at a loss. I decided that I was going to arrange "playdates" for my older kids and then the rest of the day they would have to be creative on their own....thus, the Ginley Ghetto Games were born......Triple G's for short......

GGG#1:

Give your kids a box of markers (preferably the "washable" kind but we all know that is false advertising...shame on you Crayola...) When you come upstairs after folding 50 lbs. of laundry and you see that your son's body looks like and episode of L.A. Ink, you can thank your daughter. When she then exclaims that she is "not going back to school and is moving to Venice and opening a tattoo parlor" you can only blame yourself.

GGG #2:

Use the rain water that has collected in your $9 plastic pool and tell your kids to take a dip to cool off. Never mind those floating bug bodies or the mosquito larvae, as my dad used to say, "It puts hair on your chest!" Now, if your kids tell you the water is too hot, throw a box of freezer burned Popsicles in the water to cool it down. If they act bored or complain tell them enthusiastically it is time to "bob for Popsicles" or act like the multi-colored water is really fascinating.

GGG #3:

People who have been to my house can attest to the fun of this game as it "kills two birds with one stone"......If you have one of those inflatable water slides blow it up and get the water going. Fill the bottom part (a.k.a. the pool) with shampoo or body wash (tear free is best but if you are out just throw some Salon Selectives in there and tell them to keep their eyes shut tight) - See! Now the kids are having fun and you don't have to worry about bath time tonight.......

I tend to find that doing two things at once is really very economical and a huge time saver (i.e. using the sprinkler to water the lawn and also having the kids run through it to get sand off their bodies, I'm also a huge fan of eating outside and finishing it off with something sticky so then I have an excuse to hose them off and I don't look like the crazy mom my neighbors have made me out to be.......)

So, you see, my kids are better off back in school, where they belong. It is starting to get dangerous around here and it's only a matter of time before someone picks up the phone and calls some government agency on me. Let's get back to the schedules, back to the grind, back to a time where I can nap quietly and no one is prying my eyelids open "claiming" there is some sort of "emergency".......

Better Late Than Never......?

I just decided to take a break from writing my son's "thank you" notes from his birthday...my hand was cramping up and I was running out of creative adjectives........

Before you all start thinking about how amazing I am for fitting this into my jam packed schedule of summer activities....consider this.....my son's birthday was back in April.....and his party was in the beginning of May.....that's right folks - it has taken me 3 months to write up the thank you's and start getting them into the mail! I guess I got confused along the way and thought that you had a year to thank people after occasions - or is that just for weddings? Or is that just for "giving" a gift to the happily married couple? Are there rules for how long is TOO long? Would you rather receive a thank you note in the mail really, really late or really, really never?

In my defense (sort of) I lost the "thank you" list as I had written it down in a really poor place (on the back of a well-intentioned "What's for Dinner This Week" notepad) and it was misplaced for a while. Every few nights, after the kids were asleep, I would shuffle some papers around and try and locate it, but to no avail. To comfort myself, I would make myself a cocktail and as I sipped it through my fancy straw and twirled my cute little drink umbrella, I would think up a new strategy.

The bigger issue is that I seem to have this problem all the time. I continually find myself being late on sending pretty much everything to where it is supposed to be....

- School papers & permission slips....bad when the teacher has to email you repeatedly.

- Subscription renewals & birthday cards......I always seem to at least "buy' the cards on time, it's just the sending that's hard for me......

- RSVP's & "Will you be having the chicken or fish?" cards....I can't tell you how many calls I have received from "Bridezilla" or her mom......

- Signing the kids up for dance class or Sunday school....bless me Father for I have sinned (again..)

- Following up on mostly everything in life.....priceless?

I'm not sure when this happened exactly - I think that with the birth of each child it just got gradually worse. Not that it's their fault or anything like that.....I guess I just find myself spending my time differently now and my free time (when I should be writing thank you notes etc. is spent rejuvenating my body with a cold beverage...or two.....or three.......)

I feel really terrible that people obviously think I am ungrateful for their gifts, their time and/or their generosity - the truth is that I AM grateful but I am unable to put that into words, place it in an envelope and lick a stamp (too many steps....they have got to come up with something easier than this). Something that, in theory, should only take a few minutes seems like such a daunting task, one that is pushed to "tomorrow" and then, the next thing you know, it is months later and most people forgot they even gave your child something for their birthday (or they think you are a big jackass.....one of the two....)

Perhaps, I should think about having another baby because then everyone in town would refer to me as the "crazy mom with four kids, who never thanks people for anything and really should be put in a padded cell" - THEN maybe people wouldn't expect anything from me....hmmm.....maybe I'll give this idea some more thought.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I think I'll treat myself to a nice beverage and mull this one over........and then get back to trying to thank people the proper way (my mom would be so proud)......