My grandmother crocheted me a bunny hat for Halloween when I was little. And I had a full costume sewn to go along with it, cotton tail and all. I loved that costume. I loved that hat. And a few years back my mother found the hat and brought it down for me. Since then it has lived comfortably along side Spiderman and various pirate accessories in our costume box.
But I found a recent use for my old bunny hat the other day. It seems that my four year old buys into eating his carrots when he makes believes he’s a bunny. Maybe its a variety of little boy method acting. Whatever it is, it works.
And so here he is. Convincing himself that carrots are a fabulous idea. For a bunny.
Of course he then insisted I be a silly mommy and try on my old bunny hat. Wonderful. So I suppose I have to eat my carrots now too.
I had no idea. I guess I had vaguely seen brightly colored kinked plastic bracelets on kids in passing at Little League, at the grocery store, just around. I thought they were just some new kind of jelly bracelet. And something girls were into. I have two boys who have zero preference about what they wear EVER. So bracelets just weren’t on my radar screen.
Plus my six year old is kind of a serious, by the book, I want to do my own thing kind of kid. Peer pressure has yet to sway him too much.
But recently he has been untethering his independence. And shrugging on the language of a grown up kid.
“Mom that is so awesome, did you see that play? So cool. Dude.”
And I’ve been seeing him goof off in the dug out and wrestle his friends to the ground at the park and yell out the open car window at friends: “Hey! Ryan! Matthew G.! Hey you guys!!! Over here!”
This is nothing like my timid, skirt clinger who hid under a table for his first two months of preschool.
And this is a good thing.
But the other day, my boy watched a pack of kinky braceleted kids walk by. He turned and looked up at me.
“Mom. You know those Silly Bands?”
“Those what?”
“Silly Bands. …They’re cool.”
“Oh yeah?”
He had grabbed my attention. Because in my mind, my sweet boy was perpetually hiding under the world’s table, yet to really peer out. His teachers describe him as very quiet. A good boy. Bright, straight As, certainly the least of their concerns. But my husband and I always worry about how it all goes down with his peers. We fret over his “cool” factor. And were we doing anything at all to encourage or maintain it?
So these Silly Bands. They are indeed a new version of jelly bracelets but apparently every one of his friends wear them at school. And when you take them off, they make shapes. And sometimes glow in the dark. They’re cool. I guess.
“Do you want some too?”
“Yeah.”
So after dropping him off at school yesterday, I pulled up to Walgreens. Their digital billboard outside blinked that they had just received a new shipment of Silly Bands. Huh. Am I the LAST person to know about these things?
I walked in. I couldn’t find them. I walked up to the twice my aged cashier, half dozing on his stool. “I’m looking for these… um…” and started touching my wrists. Before I could spit out the word “bracelet”, he pointed me to a bin at his right.
“Silly Bands. Oh I know all about those. Fastest selling things in the store.”
Even the guy two times my age at Walgreens was more current than I am. Ok then. I grabbed two packs.
And while the “letter” ones I had picked out apparently aren’t as cool as the animals or other shaped ones, my six year old carefully put each colored band on. He practiced walked around the house, staring down at his wrists. He kept stopping, taking them off, arranging them in rows, and putting them back on. We made a special ziploc bag for them. We talked about which ones the other kids had. And this morning, he put them all back on. Coolness checked and rechecked, he stomped out the door, backpack bouncing behind him. And I caught him glance down at his wrists one more time before he was gone.
I should know better. I remember jelly bracelets and slap bands and garbage pail kids and sticker albums. I remember how badly I wanted to be able to have some reference of cool in first grade. I remember wanting to “get it”.
So while I’m not rushing out buying every Wii game the other kids have or electronic whatever just so my kid maintains his cool, I think investing a few bucks in some strange little plastic bracelets so my kid feels like he can be part of something is absolutely worth it.
I have no idea where he got the idea. But my three year old decided he was jacked this morning. Ripped, cut and totally rocking it for me. Did this kid get muscle milk in his cereal this morning? And like any overly pumped far too stoked on himself dude, he started posing down – with newly sprouted muscles to boot.
And here sits the new Sports Illustrated Swimsuit edition.
She’s very pretty. No she is. Super cute. Good for her. I saw her on the Today Show this morning saying how getting this cover is like winning the Super Bowl of modeling. And how cool it is that they print her name on the cover too (because *shocker* models have names as well as bodies). She seemed very nice and I hope she has a very successful career.
But yo. He’s coming home and I’ve got a feeling he’s going to walk right past me and into the loving arms of … wait let me check… Brooklyn Decker and all her glossiness.
I mean how can a scroungy mommy of two boys in an old college sweatshirt, ratty headband, and pink slippers even consider competing with the beautiful Ms. Brooklyn. Me with sidewalk chalk on my jeans and milk on my sleeve and a slight headache from trying to convince my six year old to write two fricking sentences about his favorite thing at school. Just two. Why the tears and the drama?! And I’ve only JUST got them to bed and finally ate a little dinner so screw tiny yellow bikinis and un muffin-topped bellies. I say YAY to headbands and sweatshirts and pink slippers. And sleeping children. Ahhhhh….
Oh he just got home! Well hello there husband! How was your day? Oh a few of your students didn’t show up for the test today? That’s not cool. He’s shaking his head, now grading papers in front of “Lost”, a beer cracked open at his side.
However. The magazine is lying face down right here next to me. He doesn’t know she’s here waiting.
Because there’s her… OR there’s me looking just fiiiine. A certain special kind of fine he sees – ohhhh – just about everyday.
Course he’d pick me. No insecurity here. None. Zero. Zilch.
No really. It’s cool.
I’m going to go give him his magazine. And a big ol’ smooch.
I’m thinking we need a little cheer around here. A little holiday cheer, in fact. And as the wonderful Buddy the Elf would say:
“The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear.”
And so, here are my boys singing loud for all to hear.
When they aren’t showing off, being silly and singing gibberish. Or saying their favorite word “stinky” or laughing about farts.
(Hey. Don’t judge me. When you throw two little boys in front of a camera, already frothed up on sugar cookies, candy canes and Christmas anticipation, you just never know what you’re going to get.)
I had the best intentions. In the spirit of the holidays, I decided to make Christmas cookies for all four of my sons teachers. I love cookies, I mean who doesn’t LOVE cookies, so I baked cookies. There’s nothing wrong with that.
Yeah, well I decided to get creative. Since my son has a peanut allergy, a lot of the Christmas cookie recipes must be ruled out. So sugar cookies can get a little, I don’t know… YAWN… after awhile.
What to do, what to do. Cookie recipes books? No. Of course not. I can handle this.
And then I eyed the candy canes hanging on my tree. Hmmmm. I could crush up candy cane and put it in the cookies. OH! Even better, I could roll them in it. Or how ’bout THIS! Maybe I could swirl a little red food dye in (…don’t look at me that way…) and maybe get that Christmas-ish, candy caney, red swirling effect. Yeah. It’ll be great.
So maybe I was distracted by my father on the phone. Cut me a break, he’s trying to figure out how he’ll get from his house to the train station in DC tomorrow. And feet upon feet of snow are coming down. “Get a ride to the metro Dad! And don’t shovel all of that, whatever you do, it’s not good for your heart!”
*Squirt*
I had the food coloring in hand. And. Maybe? I squirted too much in.
Oops. So I stirred the mix. When suddenly? I had Pepto Bismal colored cookie dough mix.
Yeah. Awesome. Well. To hell with it. I rolled it into balls and dipped each into the crushed candy cane. Into the oven they went.
Out came this.
EEEWWWWWWWWWW…..
And, to top it all off (so to speak) the candy cane melted and stuck to the pan. So, as I tried hacking them off the cookie sheet I busted my cheap ass spatula. Crack. Just like that. So, it was a free cake spatula from Publix but it was nice and thin so it didn’t mess with the cookie shape. Yeah well, cracking it sure messed with that particular cookie’s shape.
Merry Christmas to my son’s teachers. Truly, I had the best intentions. And I *think* they taste ok (if you shut your eyes and try reeeeally hard not to think that I just mixed in a tub of Bepto Bismal).
I’m linking to Craftastrophe too. If they want to feature this particularly unfortunate batch of cookies along with some choice words about my cookie skillz, it would be my honor.
I awoke this morning, hair tousled, with a far away gaze and a sly grin. What did I do last night you wonder? Well. Of course you know. I went and saw New Moon.
And before I get any crap for the post I am about to write I want to say two things. Whatever justification I have for my Twilight interest can be found here. Read it and perhaps it will gain me a couple inches of slack. And secondly, I know I know, all crap given is perfectly understood and probably deserved.
You see when I parked my car in front of the theater last Friday, with the kids strapped in the back, car hazards on, and ran up to the ticket counter, I fully realized that being so fired up for a Twilight movie was silly. I knew that.
I KNOW that.
But pride is no matter here.
Escape, reconnecting with the teen within, who the “F” cares, and no kids for a few hours does matter however.
So sue me, “Two tickets for next week’s Friday screening of New Moon, please.” I stuck them in my car visor and looked forward to last night all week.
My fellow Twi-crack-mom and I arrived at the theater early with tickets clutched and “Mom’s night out” lip gloss applied. Once in, we moved to the back of the line waiting for the theater to open. Yes, there were small clutches of tweens in their “Team Edward” t-shirts, but mostly? There were women my age, waiting patiently, hoping no one recognized them (which my friend’s son’s teacher admitted when she was, in fact, recognized.) We waited about 45 minutes until the doors opened, tickets were rechecked and all Twi-freaks present rushed the seats.
Please be rest assured. My friend and I were absolutely laughing at ourselves. We saw humor in our anticipation. We joked that if we were going to do this, we were doing it right. We were committing to this Twilight thing that night, why be half assed? We giggled at the Twilight souvenir cups and promised ourselves some as soon as we were seated.
And honestly? We didn’t expect much. We didn’t. The first movie was just ok. The books were what they were. As addicting as it was, New Moon was my least favorite of all the books. But we were getting a rare Moms night out, with children and daily responsibilities left back in our deed-restricted communities. We’ll make this good even if its wall to wall cheese, teeming with eye rolling teenage angst and super over the top cartoonish CGI. It was all good. Go Twilight. Whatever.
So we scored seats middle center. We scored our souvenir cups. We took pictures. We chatted and wished for wine in our cups instead of Diet Coke.
Not that it mattered. My souvenir cup contained about a gallon of diet coke so I found myself under the influence never the less. I don’t do caffeine all that well. And by the time the lights dimmed, I was jacked the frock UP. That’s me below: wide awake, not blinking, humming with werewolf anticipation and twitching for some Edward action.
“It’s starting. I’m so TOOOTALLY excited and I don’t care. No for real. I’m soooooo into this. Woo hoooooo! Are you excited, I’m excited. I think its starting. Is it starting? Go go go go go New Moon! Wheeeeeee!!!!!!!”
Well. When we walked out of that theater I could not stop smiling. Maybe the Diet Coke was still working its magic but… I wanted to turn around and go right back into the next showing.
Yes. I loved it.
I was lost in the vampire, werewolf, love triangle, teen-aged drama for 2 blissful hours. I can’t remember the last time I was so lost in a movie. (Titanic?)
Sure, I was determined to love this movie. It could have been a steaming pile of over acted crap and I would have probably found a way to like it somehow. I was perfectly aware that I went in using the “kind of average but that’s ok” first Twilight movie as the yard stick by which I measured my evening. My expectations were hardly soaring.
But honestly? New Moon kind of pulled an Empire Strikes Back.
It was so much better than I expected. I loved it. I want to see it again. My fellow Twi-crack-mom thought it was even better than the book. I felt like I just saw the book come to life. I wanted to go back and re-experience it all and lose myself again. Really. I am going again, somehow. And then I want the DVD. And I want the soundtrack. More more more…
Shit. This Twi-crack-mom stuff just notched itself up to the next level.
But when Eclipse is released I don’t think I will be laughing at myself waiting in line an hour before it begins. OMG. I CANNOT WAIT.
Ok. ok.
I’m waiting for it.
Go ahead. Laugh away. Yes, I know. My street cred is in serious peril over this dribble. I know.
And to be fair, MSNBC was far from impressed. Maybe you might consider them as cooler heads prevailing and me simply just a mom that needs to get out more. Maybe my expectations are set so permanently low for fun and excitement that anything escape-ish in nature is a mind blowing experience.
Ugh, well that’s kind of depressing to consider.
Whatever.
Still, I sit here. In a satisfied after-movie glow hoping I can go again with New Moon. Somehow, somewhere… soon. It sure as hell was good for me. Was it good for you?
So I had a moms night out a week ago. We were all getting gifted pedicures – a special occasion indeed. Anyhoo. The folks at the salon said we could bring wine if we’d like – but nothing could be in glass containers. So what to do? Somehow, impossibly, I retrieved a fuzzy memory from the depths of my brain, probably in a box at the back labeled “cool idea, don’t forget this one”. Maybe I read about them in a magazine or heard of them on Twitter, or something. No idea how I knew about them – but I knew. And after some hunting around, we found them at our local Publix. The most brilliant mommy invention ever. What are they?
Mommy “juice” boxes.
No, they don’t come with straws but each box offers a mom at her wits end a healthy glass and a half worth of wine. And no it’s nothing high end but its in my budget. And it can slip right into any cooler bag along side the Capri Suns. Because nothing spells responsible parenting on the go like wine in a juice box.
Love it. Sign me up. I’ll get the Sam’s Club value pack. For real. Viva the Mommy “Juice” Box.
So sue me, “Two tickets for next week’s Friday screening of New Moon, please.” I stuck them in my car visor and looked forward to last night all week.
Please be rest assured. My friend and I were absolutely laughing at ourselves. We saw humor in our anticipation. We joked that if we were going to do this, we were doing it right. We were committing to this Twilight thing that night, why be half assed? We giggled at the Twilight souvenir cups and promised ourselves some as soon as we were seated.
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