The Bill of Rights

I, a Mother, in order to form a more harmonious family, have hereby issued this decree of rights and privileges endowed by Our Creator for mothers everywhere. This is by no means a proclamation of war with our spouses and children, merely a structured reminder that mothers are human beings and women, and thereby allowed these listed (but not limited to this list) items. They are in order of importance, and therefore the most important items are listed first, however, they should be condsidered collectively important.
1. Devotion. First and foremost, give glory to God. Without Him, we would not even be in the privileged position to be mothers, so therefore, we should be allowed ample opportunity for praise, prayer and devotion to God. This is the first right, and unless you have this one, nothing else can be completed.
2. Nourishment. Let’s face it—eating your child’s leftovers hardly makes a square meal, yet we all do it, either out of desire not to waste the food, or simply, we are too tired, hungry or busy to even try to sit down. Consider this the proclamation that at least once a day, a mother should be able to actually eat food from her own plate while (get this!) sitting down at the table. And I don’t mean scraping the food from your child’s plate to your own, I mean taking a portion to your very own plate to eat without the vultures (read "children") circling. One cannot live on half-eaten bananas and crackers alone.
3. Elimination. Okay, I can’t even believe this has to be stated in printed form, but "when you gotta go, you gotta go." Notice I am not even mentioning whether the door is open or shut. Your personal family situation is going to shape this one. As for me, at least once a day, the door will be shut.
4. Cleanliness. I have written about this one before, as it is near and dear to my heart. So, you have cleaned house all day, ended the evening by giving the kids a bath, you’re sweaty from working around the house and your hair smells like bacon and dust from sweeping under the table. What do you do? You’re too tired to shower now, right? You’ll get up early tomorrow and grab a quick shower before the kids get up? Think again—by then you’ll be throwing pancakes at the crew while your husband slinks in and out of the shower, leaving the house smelling fresh and clean while you’ve now got ten minutes to get dressed to get the kids to school. NO! Take the time and make the time with your husband or mother-in-law or trusted babysitting friend to get a good shower. You’ll feel better.
5."R and R". The old Army saying rings true: Rest and Relaxation. OSHA requires that for most jobs, after working a four hour shift, one is entitled to a 15 minute break. After 6 hours, one may be able to take a 30 minute break. Hmmmm. As a mother, you’re "on the job" for literally 24 hours, 7 days a week. So when compiled together, over the course of a year, you’re entitled to about 30 days off! No, I do not recommend you take all your time off at once (that would be dessertion in military terms) and you do need to make sure your children are carefully cared for, so I do recommend a ten-minute period of time when you are not in demand by anyone. This may be combined with other items on this list. When you actually take the time to yourself is up to you, but everyone, especially mothers, need decompression time and too frequently we put it off until "later."
6. Pursuit of Conversation. Not a hard one to understand at all. After 8-12 hours of singing "row, row, row your boat," pretending you’re a puppy to please the preschooler, and listening to Elmo, most moms find themselves in need of casual conversation. This is a misunderstood need, and it is also one that is abused by many women, so it needs to be monitored closely, otherwise you will lose ground on your demands for numbers 1-5 on the Bill of Rights. The need for this is two-fold: one, an acknowledgement that you are not the only mother in the world doing what you are doing (pretending you’re a puppy to please the preschooler), and two, to prove that you can use proper English ("Yes, Mommy can talk like a big girl! Yes she can!"). Be careful about abusing this—for one, you might lose track of the toddler, and two, you’ll never get anything done. Pursuit of conversation also applies to email, Facebook, IM, whatever. Be sure to include the husband in this, but don’t overdo it—they are very sensitive to conversation overexposure.
7. Being a woman. Now, don’t go crazy with this. I can’t stand it when someone takes this as an immediate invitation to listen to Shania sing "I Feel Like a Woman" and sass around in an impractical outfit. This is truly being appreciated. This is the combination of many of the above freedoms. It is being clean, in clothes that make you comfortable and look good. It is perhaps a meal on your own plate with someone else taking care of the prep and clean-up. It is conversation with a grown-up. It may even include some close-up time with the person that helped you get to motherhood (remember him? You always thought he was so cute, and he looks kind of cute tonite, too.) This could also include a hair cut that did not take place in front of your bathroom mirror, and it could also involve girlfriends getting together for more of the Pursuit of Conversation, because when there are no kids and husbands, we can gab all we want about them.
8. Freedom to shop. This is a delicate one. This absolutely does not mean bankrupting your family for that great purse or shoes. It means getting out of the house on family business (say, grocery shopping or all those tedious 2-minute trips to Walgreen’s, Michael’s, and the cake decorating store without dragging 3 kids along with you. )Imagine going through the aisles of Target with no one asking you for stickers! Think of the possibilities! We should be able to do this once in a while—I certainly don’t expect it every single time.
9. Pursuit of the weather forecast. How do the kids know the weatherman is coming on? How is it that that is the precise moment when child #1 takes the toy from child #2, and child #3 comes in with a bloody nose that he got doing who-knows-what? Just once, I’d kind of like to see that 3 minutes of the news. My kids think I always watch the news, but really, it’s on because I’m always trying to watch the weather.
10. Good friends. They can understand what you’re going through, and still love you anyway. Even if you haven’t showered in a few days.

Lettuce Eat!

Lettuce Wraps with Spicy Peanut Sauce



I know it's the end of the summer, but I have still been enjoying the fruits of the labors of many a grower in Missouri. My own garden has given me green beans, basil, some tomatoes (they are still coming in--very late, I might add), carrots and a few small ears of corn which I left for the squirrels and rabbits. But, this dinner is so good, that I make it year round, because many ingredients are available.
I just realized that plate has a chip in it. Nice. Good one, Jenny.

Cicadas in Stereo

I have been marveling at the sounds all around my yard. One starts, another answers, and another answers. Let's see if this works. Turn up the volume.

Time to move on?

For months, no, years, I had been bugging my parents to get a new doctor. It's not like their doctor was up for some crazy malpractice, or that he was into voodoo, but, let's face it, he's getting older, they're getting older, how long can we keep this up?
A few months back, I thought I had them convinced. Especially when Dad told me that the doctor had hearing aids and was using them under the stethoscope. !!!!!???!!! Uh, get the net--time to hit the road, change horses, high-tail it out of there. I think that was a sign.
Now, to the good doctor's credit, he had some things totally right: when the patient has a question and calls the doctor's office, guess what? The patient actually talks to THE DOCTOR. Strange, but true. He also had a casual wit and dry sense of humor that made him personable to many. He obviously kept Mom and Dad chugging for this long, so he must have something right.
Well, I think Mom and Dad are finally convinced. The good doctor passed away at age 82 last week. God rest his soul, and rest mine assured that M&D will find that new doctor.

Updates, stuff

The party went well--no real injuries or illnesses. In fact, once the slingshot broke, we let them have a free-for-all with the remaining water balloons. It took us a good hour to get through all the water balloons with the slingshot, so it was $20 well spent.

We are now back in school, and I am reconsidering the purpose of blogging. I have talked to a few people, just venting what I want out of this and what I want to do. I think I need to just get back to writing and then the rest will come. So one thing I talked to my sister about is that I'm not really good at one, thing. I have lots of interests, so I'd say I'm pretty good at a bunch of things, but not fabulous at any one thing, and sometimes that depresses me. Some would say that I will never be limited in life, and some would say I'll never perfect anything in life. Both are decidedly true. Blogging, though, seems an awful lot like "hey look at me!" and wouldn't I be better off journaling my life with a Mead notebook and a great pen, however, I wouldn't be able to use pictures as easily (haven't actually developed any in about a year). It is also nice to be able to link things with the computer for faster referencing.

I have been rambling. Again. Here's the deal, and this is what I have been thinking about today:
1. I love food. Yesterday, I made a yummy corn chowder and served it with fresh tomatoes and basil on garlic bread. So good, I'm still thinking about the leftovers at 10pm.
2. Sometimes, I don't like my husband. Sometimes, he doesn't like me. That's that. We'll both get over it, but you know, these are things they don't talk about in pre-cana counseling.
3. I am a children's book junkie. Gotta do some clean-up.
4. Chowder is calling me.
5. My prayer life stinks right now. God knows it--I'm tossing up these 5-second prayers lately, and he knows what I'm thinking about and all, but it still stinks. I need to get back on track.
6. Thinking about Shannon's trivia night--sounds like it could be fun, with the right group. May even win (again). Might not (again).
7. Going to start sending myself emails, so I don't forget to do things like buy the stupid Scotchguard that could've helped my microsuede chair. Also buy toothpaste and toothbrushes. Poor Bear's looks like he's been using it to scrub the pots and pans.

That's about it for now. Good night!

It's party time!

Getting close to the big bash for Buzz! I've got the following items lined up:
2 cases of soda
1 case water
3 big bags chips
40 chipwich cookie thingys
3 coolers
10 goody bags with:
a balsa wood airplane
M&Ms
a parachute guy
300 water balloons
1 giant 400-ft slingshot
40 rocket balloons
trac-ball set
various paper products and sunscreen

Still left to get are:
ice
more ice
dry ice

Party time!

Long time, no speak

Yes, I am back. It has been......what.......3 months? Okay, so that's not so bad. It has been kind of wild, and I can honestly say that I wasn't sure that I would ever come back, and I'm not sure that I'm even staying with this. It has been good to vent a few things and write fun anecdotes, but I am not sure of the purpose of the blog anymore. A diary, free for all to read, with my feelings out there flying around the internet. Not that it would get much attention, it's just something I'm thinking about.

However, this is the list of things I can recall happening in the past 3 months, and perhaps I'll eventually get back to writing about each one of these in kind:

1. Kids got GI flu, lasted 2 weeks, what with the vomiting AND diarrhea. We even ended up with an ER visit out of it.

2. Speaking of ER visits, our insurance changed. Aggravation is now our current coverage level.

3. I went to Philadelphia to see my sister. Great time, yummy food, beautiful countryside and great history tours.

4. School's out! Kids are excited, and so am I. So far at this time, only one child (the youngest) is sleeping in.

5. Cub camp catastrophe. Yes, I will probably write about that. How incredibly frustrating that week was.

6. VBS, part I. Very good week--kids loved it.

7. Refinancing the house--ongoing, starting to get really ticked off at our lender.

8. VBS, part II. Very good week, too! Kids really loved it!

9. Library programs. Kids, again, loved all we've done with that: Babaloo, trains, whip guy, stories, etc.

10. Bear's birthday. What a sweet guy. Just when I feel guilty about not throwing a party, he's just happy to have a yummy dinner with his family.

11. River day: Scary, but turned out fun. That river was high and fast, and we nearly lost 3 of us.

12. Six Flags day: Totally fun day!

13. New furniture: More of a "have to" kind of thing. I love my furniture, but am not loving to pay for it.

14. Work: What should I do? Lots of circulating questions in my brain.

15. Sunday school--ongoing. Going fine, really, despite the divisions among a few of my fellow church members and myself. Maybe it's perceived, but I feel the tension mounting.

16. Dog--hospital visit for the dog. Ugh--this sort of adds to the whole "why did we get a dog" issues we all have at heart. $370 lighter in the pocket.

17. Vacation--will we take one? Will we not? The shadow knows....

18. Kung Fu and Piano: What do you spend the money on? The kids like them both.

19. Reunion, followed by reunion, followed by another reunion, and another one to come. This is my 20th, husband's 25th, and just general "reuniting" of friends.

20. Should I enter the short story contest? I have an idea, but little time to pursue it.

And finally, the issue on everybody's mind:

21. Should I keep the blog?