Where I answer nearly all your questions and survive house guests

A couple of things:

I am not dead. I am blogging for Baby Center four times a week and getting ready to take a red-eye to the east coast for a little family vacation. And those two things, along with the twins, are about all I can handle. More than I can handle, actually, if today's parenting techniques (mostly yelling with the occasional vacant stare into space) are any indication.

Oh, plus we had house guests. I forgot about the house guests.

I promised I would link to my Baby Center posts and so here I go. You can gorge yourself. You can live vicariously through me for hundreds and hundreds of words. Or you can buy things. Every Friday I write about cute things on Etsy. Your choice.

Read about:

My kids being total jerks in public

Why I was a jerk to the Mister (hint: I had a good reason)

How I keep from turning into the Wicked Witch of the West

All the other stuff I write about is here.

Feel free to write comments over there. It makes me look good.

Oh, and wish me luck on that red-eye. Maggie has a cold and I have a bad attitude, so it's not looking good. But we will discuss later. At length.

If mom folds five loads of laundry, goes grocery shopping, washes dishes, and bathes the children and nobody is there to see it, did it really happen?

Before we get started you should know that the Mister is out of town for a week and I am not at my best. This was my bedtime conversation with Oliver, who is very upset, missing his dad, and having trouble falling asleep.

Oliver:

It's just hard because dad makes all the fun and you just do, like, some things in the house and like, you're kind of boring because you're writer and all you ever do it write books and stuff.

Me:

pretending to be very neutral participant in this conversation

I play sometimes. I just have a lot to do.

Oliver:

I guess sometimes you're not blogging. But dad plays games and plays, like, the matching game and builds towers. But its hard to have two kids because we're always like, "Mommy do this, mommy do this."

Me:

It is hard, but it's great too. I love having two kids.

Oliver:

Well, I just wish you weren't so boring. It's hard.

The conversation continued in this vein for quite a while until I sang one last song and insisted he go to sleep.

Obviously I am horrified in about 27 different ways, not the least of which is because I spend so much of that time when I am ignoring my kids and supposedly writing books lurking on Facebook and trying to find the perfect pair of pumps online (they have a square heel and a square toe).

I am bothered too because this is the beginning of that age-old pattern of fun dad/task-master mom. He plays airplane, I insist on hair-combing. He builds towers, I limit the cookie intake and remind them to say "thank you."

I am chagrined by the sudden knowledge that my kids have heard me bitch about motherhood. At some point Oliver learned that I think having two kids is hard and that is not something he should really have to take on at the moment.

Mostly I am bothered because he's right. I am not a great player. I am sort of grouchy and boring. I'm distracted. I put them off. When given the choice, I almost always choose making dinner over playing with the kids while the Mister makes dinner.

I am often exhausted by simply maintaining basic order and getting everyone out of the house on time (for the record I don't even care if the shoes are on the wrong feet or if the outfits make a bit of sense), but also, I find playing boring.

Go Fish, restaurant, family, pirates—these are all games I am often asked to participate in. Sometimes simultaneously. And I do. For about five minutes. Then I notice that the floor needs sweeping or I feel like checking my email or I just zone out and forget to call Oliver "matey." I adore my kids ferociously but in all honesty, I prefer the company of adults.

Which was all fine and good before my kids got smart and perceptive and developed the power of speech. Now I can't ignore them and pretend they don't notice. They tell me. They think I am boring. They've caught on.

Three things I know, like, almost for sure

This is how I know I'm raising city kids:

The other day Oliver brought me the empty cardboard oatmeal box he'd filled with sand and dirt and called a "shaker," and asked me to write "free" on the lid. He then put it out on the sidewalk. This is how he thinks you get rid of unwanted things. And it's true: We've unloaded everything from coffee tables to Styrofoam coolers to boxes of baby clothes by leaving them out on the sidewalk. So far, we haven't managed to entice anyone to take the free cardboard cylinder full of sand. San Francisco can be kind of a yuppie town like that.

This is how I know I may have dropped an F-bomb within earshot of my innocent children:

Maggie is an extremely helpful child. She can be a major piece of work at times, but when push comes to shove (and it nearly did today) the kid loves nothing more that to scurry around at the service of another. Need that table wiped off? Maggie's got it. Have a baby in need of a paci rinse? Maggie's your girl. Decide to put together the IKEA table and chairs that's been sitting in your garage for eight months? Maggie is by your side, handing you the unpronounceable screws.

The Mister is away for a few days and in his absence I decided to prove my capability by finally tackling the daunting Levsack. It is a universal truth that assembling IKEA furniture does not go well, and this, my friends, was no exception.

ME:

(grumbling under my breath)

This can't be right. Wait, is this right? Why won't it fit? This is supposed to fit.

Never again. NEVER AGAIN.

MAGGIE:

(pointing to the part that won't fit in the other part despite what the directions say)

Mom, is this the fuck part?

ME:

What?

MAGGIE:

The fuck part. Is this the fuck part?

ME:

Um, what do you mean by that?

MAGGIE:

(looking a little self-concious)

Just, you know, a really fragile part. It's just, um, nothing. Fuck.

ME:

(seeing no need to make a big deal out of it)

I think I've got it now. Thanks.

This is how I know the laser was on:

Yes. Those are burns. On my neck. It cost me $100. And it hurts.

Also, I'm HERE today, talking about reality TV and how the Biggest Loser makes me cry.

Icarus melts into a puddle of snot

*

So, one day you are bragging to the Mister about how lucky you are, and about how it's not just luck, but probably a form of super-humanness that has kept you from being sick all winter even though you spend two days a week working at your kids' preschool.

You muse about your superior cells and how you are being justly rewarded for living so well, for exercising so diligently, for simply being a really great addition to the human race. God is just sending you a personal little thank you note in the form of your virus-free season.

And then—BAM—the next day you are flat on your back, whimpering, ready to barter all future happiness for some medicine that will make the pain and the snot and the misery go away. You're thinking Oxycontin might be strong enough. You toss and moan through fever-dreams of Wurdle. You watch Papillon through blood-shot eyes and think solitary confinement, sure, but could Steve McQueen survive this cold? You fill trash can with your snotty tissues and miss your family trip to Tahoe.

You have this conversation with your three-year-old son:

OLIVER:

Mommy, I don't want you to die.

ME:

(looking up from my spot on the couch, crusty but somehow lovely)

Don't worry, I'm not going to die.

OLIVER:

Never?

ME:

No, never (no need to worry him now)

OLIVER:

Good. Because I think you are fantastic.

And then you emerge to blog another day. Your nose is scaly and your cough still gurgling, but you emerge from your cocoon of self pity. And thankfully, there are chai lattes and that weird kale and peanut butter soup the Mister made to ease your way.

Hello, world. It's nice to see you again.

* buy those pretty tissue box covers HERE.

Better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick

from HERE

First, let me just remind you of how much I love comments. Comments are better than brownies or endless fields of mustard in bloom. Better than airshows. Better than shoes you buy at Nordstrom Rack because they are so cheap. They are better than being stopped by a stranger and told you look like Kate Winslet. They are better than making every green light and better than those new 100 calorie York Peppermint candy bars.

They are not better than trips to Venice or the way the tummy skin of my kids feels. They are not better than renting a house in Stinson for the weekend and cooking dinner with a bunch of friends. They are not better than this conversation I had with Oliver on the way to school this morning. Still, keep 'em coming.

OLIVER

What school does Georgia go to?

ME

She goes to big kid school. She's a second grader.

OLIVER

What's a second grader?

ME

When you are six you are a first grader, when you are seven you are a second grader, when you are eight...

OLIVER

And I know another important one that is sharp! A cheese grater!

I blame the Mister for what is obviously a genetic trait toward puns.

Why hand washing is important

Here's a conversation I just had with Maggie:

Maggie

sniffing her hand and wrinkling her nose

Smell my hand

Me

P.U. Stinky. What is that?

Maggie

Shrugs

Me

Well, let's go wash your hands.

Maggie

No, that's okay. It's just cream cheese that I got off my belly.

Me

What?

Maggie

It's just stinky cause it's old. I wiped it off my belly.

Me

What?

Maggie

shrugging like I'm out of my mind

It's just, you know, some old cream cheese.

I just want to add for the record that I have not given Maggie any cream cheese in days and that I know for a fact that her belly is cream cheese-free. The source of her stink-hand remains a mystery.

Quesadillas, the Solar System, and Michael Jackson

My dad and brother are in town and we are out in West Marin living the good life (there are oysters and wine and Cowgirl Creamery cheeses in our future so I am happy).

Whenever my dad is out, he tests my kids on their language skills. My kids go to Spanish immersion daycare and are getting quite good at their second language, something my dad is really into it. He's always asking me what they can say and understand and testing their comprehension. He likes to test kids. During the summers he used to make me do my times tables in Roman numerals and write essays about the solar system (mine explained in exquisite detail about how the sun circled the Earth). It sounds tortuous but I enjoyed it at the time. I've always been kind of sick about impressing my dad, hence deciding to do my junior years abroad in Hungary. Hungary? No one goes there.

Anyway, today in the minivan on the way to West Marin he was testing Maggie. And for the most part, she was doing pretty well.

Dad: Como se dice "cat" en Espanol?

Maggie: Gato.

Dad: Como se dice "rat" en Espanol?

Maggie: Raton!

Dad (entering a tunnel): Como se dice "tunnel en Espanol?

Maggie: Quesadilla!

It's the three-year-old version of the essay about the sun circling the Earth, I guess.

A thing I like

I leave with this, because, whatever else he was, he was the pop star of my generation. And this is a great song.

A few parenting miscalculations

I settled any car seat rebellion by telling my kids that it's the police, and not me, who insist on all the strapping in. It worked, but I fear I may have instilled in them an overblown sense of the police department's sphere of influence.

 

ME: Oliver, don't climb the cupboards.

OLIVER (using the kitchen drawers as steps): Why?

ME: Because they are going to break.

OLIVER: And then the police will have to come and fix them?

ME: No, a carpenter will have to come and fix them.  And carpenters are expensive.

OLIVER (weighing the legality issues): And then the police will be mad?

ME: Yep.  Really mad.

Also, I may have miscalculated trying to sell flossing as "fun."  Passing off weeding and putting toys away as competitions, however, has totally paid off.

A thing I like

via What Would Jane Austen Do? via Decorno

Kids who collect weird things

We were driving by a random antique and junk shop with old pieces of china and odd pink vases piled high in the window.  Threadbare knitting bags. Brass candle sticks. Handwritten sign on the door. Looked like it might be open 11-4, three days a week. We were stopped at a red light right next to it. Oliver was rapt.

Oliver: Mommy, that's my favorite store.

Me: Oh.  Really?

Oliver: Yes. It's my favorite.  Will you take me there someday, mommy?

Me: You want to go there?

Oliver: Yes, mommy. Take me to that beautiful store.

Me: Um, Okay.

I think he might be trying to complete his discontinued silver set or something.

A thing I like

Mark Fiore's new political cartoon.  Yes, I am that stunning female announcer voice.  But let's forget about my talent for a minute. Don't you think this is funny?  The starving monkey part?  I had a hard time with that line.  It's funny stuff. Here's the last one I did.  And here's Mark, in a documentary about him.  Cool, huh?

Santa's real identity

This is last Christmas

MY DAD:What do you call grandma? (his very ex-wife)

OLIVER & MAGGIE:  Old grandma!

ME: But what's grandma's real name?

OLIVER & MAGGIE: Caroline!

MY DAD: And what's my name?

MAGGIE: Cowboy!

OLIVER: Santa!

Note: It's actually Wayne, but the kids call him Yeh Yeh.  And Cowboy.  And Santa.

A thing I like

This recipe for Spaghetti Carbonara is really so delicious and it's by my friend Molly Watson of The Dinner Files and other things.  I add kale and use whole wheat pasta.  Try it, you'll like it. Be generous with the parm.