Motherwise Cracks

Found this while rummaging through a drawer. It was from a simpler time when I didn’t need to know geometry or physics to help with homework. I had no excuse for not helping.

Now will be laminating this and a few other notes I found but I don’t know exactly why I do such things. Perhaps it’s so that when they bring them to me at the home I won’t drool on them and ruin them.

Then I had a brilliant idea. I will use them for drink coasters after I laminate them. My own personal crafts from the past.

Our 30th Anniversary is this weekend. I sure hope the kids didn’t get us a stay at a B& B. Ever since I walked in on the man on the toilet I just haven’t been able to enjoy my stays at such places.

Well, the smart folks at BlogHer chose my question for one of their postings right here and you can give your opinion and end up with an extra $100.

Take look and give your opinion and reinforce what a good choice they made by choosing my question for discussion. And by the way, I think women age better.

(Just go to any 20th high school reunion and see what I mean.)

This weekend saw the girls’ old doll house sitting a top of the burn pile ready for the next bonfire. I admit that I cried when I saw it in the burn pile and today, my eldest, on her dog walk, saw it and it brought her to tears as well. What the hell is the matter with this family? Must we all be full of good memories? Is there no dysfunction, or enough of it,  to move us along to our next stage of life without grasping at the past and crying over it’s passing? What did I do wrong?

Seriously, I wonder what it would be like to be happy to toss out the toys from the past and be happy to have some new room or extra storage space without seeing the ghosts of what used to be there. Will I ever get to such a place?Will the piles of memorabilia the kids have around my house that they won’t throw away so I have to, and then listen to them complain that I did, ever dwindle down to nothing? Perhaps that would be “the greatest miracle of all” , to have nothing left to remind us of the days gone by? I am not sure.

Then I took a gander over at the pile of photos from the past 30 years I started sorting during football season last year. Let’s just say it’s still a big job to tackle. Yeah. It’ll take a miracle.

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“Why shouldn’t I look at my dearest treasure? – at all the beauty that is mine, all my very own.” ~ Helmer from A Doll’s House

You may recall reading about my big summer purchase that was a big hit on the water. It lasted two years and was great fun but alas, the seams split (that’s a reoccurring theme of late) and it died.

Well, this past Christamas season, when summer items are on sale, I ventured out online and purchased this Coleman party island in hopes it would be as good as the original MegaStation that was so soundly enjoyed.

It is even better. It is awesome. And a good thing too as we are experiencing a nasty heat wave and the temps are over 90 degrees.

It can carry 2000 lbs. and seats 8, which is an upgrade from the former seats 4 and up to 1000 lbs. capacity (which may account for the split seams.)

And to think I got it for only $79 when it sells now for $129. That makes my float in it even sweeter. The only thing that is bad about this baby is that the kids seem to think that I bought it for them. If I wanted to do that, I wouldn’t have gotten the model with 4 cup holders and two snack trays.

But not to worry. All I have to do is swim in that general direction and talk about what is needed to get dinner on the table and they scatter like little fish.

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“The alternative to a vacation is to stay home and tip every third person you see.”   ~Author Unknown

I started out feeling a bit proud of my husband. He actually recognized that is winter coat was getting older and shabby looking, and donated it to a charity shop.

Sidebar – Some of you may not know that some (and I mean most) men aren’t always as perceptive about their clothing. “Some” of them might even have that cavalier “devil may care” attitude about their plaid shorts from 1973 or their hockey jersey from 8th grade that they plan to wear to your high school reunion kickoff picnic.

It’s similar to dressing a child. A wife might contemplate setting her husband’s clothing out for him the evening so as to fend off any bickering about the fact that brown shirts don’t go with black pants or that striped pants and plaid shirts clash in the early morning hours. On the other hand, it makes for a good laugh when your kids get a load of what their wearing and then chastise you for their outfit, like you aren’t providing adequate supervision.

But I digress. The real kicker about his winter coat came a couple of days later when he announced that he was going shopping for a new winter coat for next year – at the second hand store.

I was thinking about jumping in the dumpster and rooting around to retrieve his donation but decided he’ll never get around to buying his own coat anyway.

As I thought more about it, I decided he is a clever man. He just guaranteed himself a new coat that I will be buying. I hate to be outsmarted by a guy who can’t even match colors.

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“The finest clothing made is a person’s skin, but, of course, society demands something more than this.” ~Mark Twain

I Made pizza from hell for dinner. I had to because we we so short on groceries that it was that or peanut butter sandwiches on rye crackers. It suffered from one or two ingredient substitutions too many. I am the creative type and have a strong stomach.

I found out that if you use a whole glass jar of yeast from 2006 that it will make your emergency cake flour ground flax mix rise. To some extent. Of course the whole family was more regular than usual for the rest of the week thanks to the flax.

I used turkey sausage and had to make a parmesan mozarella cheddar mix as I was low on dairy too. It was a mess of a pie that any true blooded Italian would cry over. Luckily I am Irish so I didn’t waste any Kleenex as I’m am low on those too.

I ate the last of it today and went shopping to celebrate. I needed to get band aids for my son who sliced his finger in a blizzard making ice cream mixer. It slipped. And honest to God, he was making a Butterfinger one with extra finger.

God just may have as warped a sense of humor as I do.

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“if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.”

This post comes with a warning. Usually my posts are all G rated. I am taking a slight departure from my clean and wholesome self, and stepping out to share news about my new book club. I don’t think Oprah will be joining anytime soon, and we definitely cannot hold any meetings at a library.

The Steaming Cups Book Club will have its first meeting in July. If you’d like to read the invite to the inaugural meeting, click this, but I am warning you that this isn’ t “I Love Lucy” material, but it’s not ”Straight Outta Compton” either so don’t be too scared. But it makes me laugh. Pretty hard. Every time I see it.

I can’t wait to review my literary selection, which is a REAL book, by the way.

Go ahead, Google it – Happy Kitty Bunny Pony by Charles S. Anderson and text by Michael J. Nelson.

I hope my friend has a bathroom nearby as I think the ladies may need to use the powder room to “freshen up” after they hear some of the excerpts from this saccharine mouthful of super cute. It’s what I like to call “joyfully sarcastic”. I like that term because the other day, my former boss told me that’s what I am.

If this book club thing takes off, I am thinking of making T shirts with our logo, which will be (as soon as I make it) a bra with steam coming from it. If this club is a big hit, I may have to open chapters in other cities. At 3:55 AM, when you’re up because your son didn’t get home until late and you were worried, anything seems possible, even a book club based on sheer stupidity, birthed from the need to unload truckloads of frustration that comes from dealing with people, lovely as they are on the whole, but who have a tendency to be complainers (spelled with a “b”,  if you get my drift).

I even made a new post category for the Steaming Cups Book Club – now that is how much I can’t wait for our first meeting.  I do realize that I am looking forward to it because of the mandatory two glasses of wine required before the in depth discussion of the meeting’s featured work of literary art.

I hope you, sweet reader, aren’t offended by my Steaming Cups Book Club. And if you are, please refer to the header of the attached invitation.

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“Horses were an integral part in the taming of the American west. Whether it was drawing wagons across the Great Plains or helping to transport mail for the pony express – horses did it all. Not that they ever got paid for it. (They made several attempts to unionize, but never got things off the ground. Their lack of opposable thumbs made it difficult to sign the proper forms.) ”  ~ Happy Kitty Bunny Pony, page 84-85

Finding out I’d yeast dated 2006 will make pizza dough rise. It’s all I have at the moment. Dinner may be ammended.