Juice and Parenting

The kids were sick and out of school for three days last week, tag that onto the weekend, and they were home, sick, for five days. J was camped out for the following three days in the living room with a more horrid flu than I have ever seen (more horrid than what the kids went through), didn’t help.

I was the only healthy one and not sure if I preferred that or not.

I’m still healthy, as the kids and J are as well, finally.

What got us heathy and what keeps me healthy?

J has a juicer and we started juicing vegetables three times a day while he was sick. It’s a pain in the butt to clean the juicer, but worthwhile, sucking down a glass of juiced kale, (which makes the juice caca–green) carrots, tomatoes, cucumber, parsley and spinach made me feel better than I have in years. Kind of like I am finally getting the vitamins I lack in the winter, or with the craziness of living on cereal as a single mother because I was too tired to fix myself a proper meal at the end of the day.

With J living with us, I actually menu plan, grocery shop, and cook. I love it and love the fact that he will eat anything I make, even if it’s a flop.

I love that I am healthier and it’s a miracle I didn’t a) get sick first this week and b) get sick at all.

Yesterday, we went to our second session of family counseling, without the kids. It’s a preemptive strike, asking questions about our parenting skills, as a team (because we are generally on the same page with how to do it, and back each other). There is a book she suggested that we’ve started reading, “1-2-3 Magic” and it it certainly helpful, if not for some new information and tactics, but also as confirmation that we aren’t doing so badly since alot of it’s tools are ones we already use.

Importantly, she reminds us the importance of knowing how our kids are feeling and making sure they feel they can communicate what they are feeling through words and not just actions (screaming, fighting, hitting).

You should see the look on Blue’s face, who just turned 7, when she says to us, “Red just looked at me funny! I don’t want her to look at me!” And then J and I say, “Really? How does that make you feeeeeeel?”

She thinks we’re wacked.

There is also the reminder that the girls are only 7 and 9, they are still children and don’t think like we do, and therefore, although we should have great expectations from our children, realize we can’t expect the world because they are still growing into it.

Recently a great comment from Blue, who turned seven last Saturday, she said, “You know Mommy, grandma told me seven was a good age, that it’s the age of reason.”

And I said, “Oh yeah? And what exactly do you think that means?”

She thought for a minute and then says, “I think it means more will make sense to me.”

and then after a pause, she goes, “But I’m still not so sure why you drink that green juice.”

 

 

Best conversation of the day

Blue, while sitting on the toilet, talking to herself:

“Someone’s eye lash is on the toilet seat!”

“How’d it get there?”

Calling out:  ”Mommy, how did an eyelash just DROP OFF of someone’s eyelid and land on the toilet seat?”

Red pipes up:

“It’s probably one of J’s back hairs!”

(or something)

Random Ending with Falafel

I can’t possibly create piles as well as J does. Seriously, he throws away stuff and files and all that and then the next day, he has another pile of “stuff”.

Guys.

At any rate, I do love his skill for extension cords and setting up my wireless effectively, along with networking all three of our printers, getting my fax machine to receive and send faxes (something I have never ever been able to do).

He also got my scanner to work with my Mac. It was one thing, when I switched over to my Mac, that didn’t keep working as a peripheral.

But he got it done.

He set up the dubber so we can transfer every VHS tape we have to DVD.

I have about four VHS tapes to transfer.

And he has a PILE of about 56 of them.

Guys.

The fact that he has taken over the trash duties has me swooning. Never in my life has a guy ever taken out the trash on a regular basis. I love that I don’t have to deal with it and when it’s twenty below in the winter, I will love it even more.

I definitely appreciate the fact that J got creative the other morning when he made the girls french toast and told me to sleep an extra half hour before I had to get up for a meeting. He was creative when he saw the syrup was almost gone and discreetly added honey to it.

The girls didn’t even notice.

Ah, but I did.

And the fact that I keep forgetting to go to the liquor store to stock up on wine, because he was the last one to stock up on wine for the house, well, he came home today with a bundle under his arm, having re-stocked us.

He gave me points for picking up a 12 pack of Michelob Ultra for Sunday’s game.

I am appreciative that he doesn’t complain when I, say, feed him falafel two days in a row.

Yeah.

That’s a big one, ain’t it?

Hormones Suck

It was Friday and I spent four hours with 48 third graders at the maritime museum in our town. We built fans. We looked at phytoplankton and “shrimps” under the microscope.

We dissected squid.

Yes. We did.

Do you have any idea what that smells like?

I arrived home and drove immediately to the bank to sign on our financing and then ran up the road to pick the girls up from school.

My head pounded all day. Advil didn’t help. Soup didn’t help. Not even chocolate.

I was excited to curl up with the kids on the couch and watch the original Black Stallion. I lived for those movies when I was a kid and secretly loved the boy. Most girls I knew loved the horse, but I hated horses, have always been scared of them…but I loved the boy.

The guy I love now, I am so blessed.

Tonight, I told him two of my pet peeves. One being that when he cracks eggs, he puts the used shells back in the carton and then BACK in the fridge with the unused eggs still in the carton.

Pet-Peeve.

And then when I sliced my finger and he said, “Nice Going Wendy.”

He picked that up from my mom who told him I was clumsy like my Aunt Wendy. So he teases me.

Unfortunately, when hormones strike at this time of the month, being associated that way with Aunt Wendy is worse than usual.

And I  might add that Aunt Wendy is as sweet as all get out but not the brightest pin in the cushion.

In fact, she is not bright….AT ALL.

She thinks that bottled water is legitimate bottled water if she refills it from the tap.

So I let him know, “stop calling me Wendy” and I cried.

GAWD that sucks.

At any rate, he still fell asleep with me, letting me get all up against him even though the heat was on and it was sweaty and I was all emotional-girly-like. He managed to sleep through it, so I thought….in the morning I said, “you slept really well last night, didn’t you?”

And he goes, “Like hell I did!”

Apparently, my tossing and turning and clutching to him kept him up a bit.

Whoops.

Hormones.

They totally suck.

On a funny note, when I boldly asked him to “spoon me” that night in bed (yes, people, I did….I know, weak of me…) he goes, “What’s in it for me?”

And I answered, “You get a happy girlfriend.”

It was enough for him at that point.

Drinking stress

We’ve been a bit under stress lately. Turns out as we wait for our dream piano bar location to come to fruition (final negotiations and finality of a loan we really really need to make it happen), another property came up for sale about a mile from our home.

So we made an offer.

J had to drive south of Boston (over an hour away) to make the offer and found himself in the office of some very sleazy salesmen/brokers who told him he had to make an offer before receiving the profit and loss statements of the restaurant we were investigating. This is after we decided, based on the numbers we already saw and a tour of the business, that it would be a prime spot for our business. It’s like it fell into our lap.

So we were going to just lowball the offer in order to get the papers because we couldn’t make an accurate offer without knowing how the business is really doing and seeing what is it likely worth.

But the brokers refused a lowball offer.

We offered low but higher than we thought we wanted to offer.

The next day, they accepted our offer but by that point, we had gone over all the numbers and saw that the business that exists now is losing ten grand a month.  And it was definitely not worth what we had offered.

We withdrew our offer in order to make another offer, which I am sure was offensive to them, but still.

At any rate, Friday night was one of our first real “date nights” in a long long time. Mainly because J was working every weekend until the summer season ended at the local piano bar.

We started out with wine in the bathtub. (to drink, not to bathe in)

Then we had some amazing Italian food at a really cute place in town. (and had more wine)

It was when J started talking kind of loud that I realized I should lay off on the wine and let him keep drinking if he’d like.

He liked.

We went to another local place where live music was playing.

I drank ginger ale while J drank more wine.

We left the bar to go to the car and drive up the road to another live music haunt to meet some friends.

“I’ll drive,” I said to J.

“WHAAAAAAT? YOU MUST BE DRUNK!” he said.

I pointed to the passenger side and belted out, “GET IN.”

And he got in.

He looked at me and smiled and goes, “are you sure you’re okay to drive?”

It made me laugh and glad he could let loose once in a while.

We arrived at the final destination and we listened to a great band and were the only ones not dressed up for Halloween.

I got my butt pinched by a woman dressed like a man. (I think)

J kept his hand on my butt after that and every time I turned around, he had this smile on his face like he was already scoring with me, but hadn’t realized he wasn’t.

The woman dressed like a man came up to us and goes, “I’m really a woman, SEE!????” And she stuck her chest out so we could see she had boobs through her tshirt.

And J drawls, “Well, see this!” and lifts up his shirt (for really no pertinent reason, seeing that he is a man, other than the fact that he was slightly shnookered)

The next morning J said to me, “I don’t remember much about the end of the night…”

Which was funny.

I’m glad he didn’t remember leaning over to hug our friends goodbye and kissing our male friend, on the lips.

 

Funny

Funny is….

….spending three days and up until two am working on documents and forms for a very important banker, showing up to a very nerve wracking meeting, and holding the meeting while the banker was dressed in a toga for Halloween.

A Walk in the Forest

So, we went walking in the woods yesterday, it was gorgeous, the leaves had fallen, the air was crisp but warm.

Here’s me.

Here’s Blue.

Here’s Red.

Here’s the man of the house, fishing, um, manly style.

mingling our stuff

I was fortunate that when J moved in, he didn’t bring a bunch of bachelor pad furniture and junk that the stereotypical bachelor man might be carting around. Fortunately for me, it was alot of manly tools that can hang out in the basement and some really cool music and computer equipment, keyboards and guitars and drum machines.

He also brought a hell of alot of clothes. Much more than I own.

But I reaped the benefits of his big comfy man bathrobes, similar to the coveted ones in nice hotels. He’s got a few of them and they have been hanging on our door for the last six months, enough for us each to have one and similar enough that it doesn’t matter which one we grab to put on.

I was thinking about what we each bring to the table here in our house. We each bring patience at different times when the girls are behaving crazy. If I am not being patient, it is likely he is, and vice versa. It enables us to each have a break when we need it.

Last week I was moving slow, we’ve been working daily to finish up negotiating for our piano bar. We’re still unsure of this one will happen in the end, but we’re taking it one step at a time. We’re in FINAL negotiations tomorrow with the sellers and then are finishing up the rest of our financing.

Talk about a literal pain in my neck.

Apparently, I carry the stress right there and I’m moving around very slowly.

At any rate, on Thursday, at 7am, the girls were up for school, and J woke me up briefly and told me to stay in bed and he would take care of things.

When I re-awoke at nine, they had been fed, their lunches had been packed and they’d been delivered to school.

I realized how this is a first in my life, to have a partner willing to and available to take over when I need it. And it’s the first time I have trusted it.

So I sit here in one of the robes that he brought when he moved in and he’s sitting across the room in the big easy chair drinking the cappuccino I make for him every morning. The kids are watching Sunday morning television and eating cream of wheat, (something he taught them to love).

And I can’t believe he’s been home for six months and we are where we are.

On this being a Tuesday

I partially love that I get ignored when J is around with the girls. Yesterday, the girls came home from school, forgetting he had driven north for his Monday night gig, shouting his name, looking for him.

It made me weepy, because I wanted him to be there too.

Being a mom is partially about cleaning up silly putty from the carpet, yet mostly about how it feels by the end of the day when they are in bed and I feel like I spent quality time and handled every up and down graciously throughout the day.

It’s amazing how they come home from school at 3 and by 7, I am wiped already and I wonder “how on earth did I do it without killing someone, or myself, when they were 2 and 4 and I was a new single mom and the only relief was when they both actually slept?

I hardly remember those days.

Yesterday, I looked at my kids, who were tired from their weekend with their dad, who admitted that the Circus scared them, after years of him taking them, and thought about how much I love them and how proud I am of who they are.

And I told them so.

You know what they said?

“Does that mean we can watch some tv tonight?”

Why yes, yes…I am so frickin’ tired, and so proud of you, you get to watch tv for the first time in a month!

And so, they did.

At any rate, I am sitting here watching YouTube videos while eating a lunch of butternut squash soup and ritz crackers, hardly a substitute for the icecream sundae I would much rather be eating.

J was up north for the night, playing piano.

I am considering sitting on my ass and updating my website (with my paintings) but can’t decide if I should do that or actually PAINT.

I picked up J Sunday night from the airport, drove an hour to Logan in the snow and sleet and wind and rejoiced in something I have never experienced….The Cell Phone Lot.

How cool is that?

The one drawback is that there was no bathroom and MAN did I have to pee. Thankfully, he landed right as I was pulling in and only had to wait fifteen minutes for a McDonalds bathroom stop on the way home. Three days without him was nice in a way, to get stuff done, watch my own television stuff, eat Luna bars and drink lots of coffee in the morning. I even bought a loaf of monkey bread.

I-love-monkey-bread.

Upon returning home from our drive from Logan, in the storm, it was midnight before we went to sleep. He fast forwarded through a very uninteresting football game and when the alarm rang at 5:45 in the morning for me to get out of bed to drive back down to Boston to pick up the girls from their dad’s and bring them to school, I could hardly move.

My man, who usually keeps sleeping, got up with me and drove me to Boston to get them.

I love him.

Today is a half day of school, which means I had three hours exactly to get a few things done, take a walk and finish a few paintings.

As other mothers roll their eyes at the half day and question of “what to do with my kids today?”, I am psyched to just hang out with them, get out some paint, order lunch in, clean their room up and then get on to their tennis class later this afternoon.

J will be home soon.

I was thinking last night, as I slept with a turtleneck, sweatshirt, wool socks, and sweatpants AND a heated pillow (one of those microwavable things), how much it sucked last year to not have him here. One night a week isn’t so bad now, in retrospect, but I still prefer going to sleep with him beside me.

I’ll never take it for granted.

Funniest line ever at midnight

This has nothing to do with this post, but here is a painting I just finished. I’m in the process of framing it now. Framing=pain in the ass.

Yesterday J flew to Orlando to play in a dueling piano gig this weekend. It vaguely reminded me how last year at this time he was flying out for six months to play for the winter. This time it’s just a few days and I am using the time to get ready for some art shows (ie: paint) do some shopping and cleaning and catch up on some tv on the DVR he doesn’t care about. (ie: The Good Wife, The Forgotten, Drop Dead Diva, Castle)

Last week some folks asked where he was headed for the winter and he goes, “Well, nowhere so far, I want to stick around here.”

Considering we’re still lovin” each other, that’s a good thing.

We used the good old Skype last night, something we depended on last year so much, for our daily chats, watching the inauguration together, having breakfast together, or flashing boobs and all that good stuff. (See “history” section on the left sidebar for “Movin’ Down the Road” to read more about that)

He’s in Florida at the moment for a private party, a dueling piano gig. This means he and another piano player play two pianos, and it turns not into a wonderful music extravaganza, but more of a comedy show with some fast fingers. It’s a riot, I have been to a gig with him and it’s generally about making fun of the audience and each other.

He and the other other piano player went out to dinner and to a piano bar that is over near Disney last night.

J called me from outside of the bar and goes, “I hate piano bars”.

This is funny seeing that playing in piano bars is not only his specialty, but it’s his favorite venue.

But being on the “other side” of the piano, he hated.

We came to the conclusion that he would not be the kind of guy who would frequent piano bars, ever.

This morning, he called when he woke up.

The first thing I heard when I answered the phone was, “Orlando sucks”.

Apparently, his hotel is on a busy drag and he listened to cars and trucks driving by all night. (note: he did admit that he could be anywhere but when he woke up after a bad night’s sleep, he decided he wasn’t loving Orlando)

Last night when he was in bed, he Skyped me. I answered Skype and he appeared on the screen buck naked eating chicken wings on the bed.

SEXY.

We chatted some more.

I flashed him.

We talked about masturbation (come on, you’ve talked about it before, you know you’ve done it….) and out of the blue, the funniest thing ever said by J on Skype…. “You know, I learned years ago, not to masturbate with soap.”

And looking at his face while we both laughed hysterically, I thought to myself, THIS IS WHY I LOVE HIM.