A brief sports interlude...

I need to talk NFL Draft. It's the closest thing I can get to college football in April, so I was way psyched for it. Turns out I shouldn't have been. It's not like I stayed home glued to my TV or anything, but I followed the coverage every now and then on tv and online. Here's what I have to say:

1. What the hell, Cleveland? And all you dumbasses who had picks 4 through 21? Brady Quinn? You passed on Brady Quinn? Y'all suck.

2. Baltimore, what the hell? Troy Smith? Are ya kiddin me? Sure he won the flipping Heisman trophy and he team only lost one game. But, well, I don't like him. And I won't cheer you on if he's your QB. If he's on the bench, I am willing to overlook him.

3. I would like to commend Detroit on the selection of Drew Stanton, who I think it going to end up being the best NFL QB out of this year's draft. (Sorry, Brady - but you're definitely be the hottest).

That's really all I have. Unless I start all over on number 1. I mean, seriously, Cleveland, Miami, etc. What were you all thinking? No one needs a quarterback? No one needs their team's hot factor to instantly quadruple? Really?

My first craft show...

Let's just say the fact that I forgot to take pictures of the purses I made beforehand turned out not to be a problem. I still have them all. But it's okay. It was free and there was free food. No big loss. And I had a nice afternoon out without the kids for a change. I'm not complaining.

So on Tuesday I finished knitting and felting my fifth or sixth purse. I realized that there was no way I would get anything done in time to sell on Sunday. So I looked into sewing purses. I went downstairs to my fabric stash, pulled out some cute fabrics and started sewing. I only put out about $15 in interfacing, so I didn't even have many expenses.

Will I do another craft show? Probably not anytime soon, but eventually. After I've had some time to knit some more and get better at sewing purses. And only with someone fun (like my sister, who I was with today).

Mommy guilt...

I try not to feel guilty, but sometimes I just do. Intellectually, I can tell myself that moms are allowed to be in bad moods since everyone has bad days. That's just how it is. But my emotional side saw my bad mood and won't stop hounding me about it. I had next to no patience with the kids and was just sort of detached yesterday. I didn't yell or scream, I was just sort of distant. I hate feeling like that, especially since there really wasn't a reason for it.

But the really stupid part of the guilt comes in when Tom got home. I let him take over and I just sort of zoned. And felt immensely guilty for taking twenty minutes while the kids were still awake to just be inside myself. Like I can't turn the reigns over without feeling guilty. How stupid is that? He's their father - I didn't hand responsibility over to some stranger off the street.

And I'm going to face this again this weekend when I go out. I have a baby shower for an old friend on Saturday and a craft show (whole other post there) on Sunday. Tom is going to be gone the following weekend all weekend, so it will actually be nice for me to get out while I can, but I'm already feeling guilty for leaving him alone with the kids.

Moms are weird. Maybe not all moms. At any rate, I'm weird.

Shoe Shopping: A Gender War

Shoe shopping with a (four year old) girl:

Girl: Hmm, that shoe is pretty, but the bow is blue and I like pink. That shoe is beautiful. Mom, can I have it?
Mom: No way. You can't have platform flip-flops when you can barely walk in sneakers. How about these? They have princesses on them.
Girl: Um, I don't think so. I like these sparkly pink ones.
Mom: But they're three sizes too small.
Girl: But I like them!
Mom: Then go ahead, try them on.

Girl proceeds to try on six or seven different pairs of shoes. Including ones that aren't her size but are "bee-yootiful" like the sparkly pink ones. After much debating, she ends up saying let's get these (princess shoes that Mom had pointed out).

Shoe shopping with a (six year old) boy:

Boy: Hey those look just like the shoes I have on my feet. And they have my size.

Boy tries on shoes. They fit. We're done.

One of these kids is going to give me fits when she's a teenager.

Deep thoughts...

I've been thinking some deep thoughts today - nothing monumental or earth-shattering, just absorbing the enormity of the shootings at Virginia Tech, trying to take in the far-reaching effects of something like this and just process it in my head.

You know what I can't get past? French class. So many of those kids were just sitting in French class Monday morning, conjugating irregular verbs or discussing the finer points of the subjunctive and then they were shot. killed. I can't stop thinking about this part. Because this? This I get. I have crystal clear memories of sitting in French class on Monday mornings. French was my favorite class - the one where I felt like I belonged, like I truly was learning something and knew what I was doing. French class was peace for me for four (eight including high school) years. It was my (mainly useless to my life) major. Several of the students killed were also French majors. One was a professor. I had aspirations of becoming a French professor at one time.

And why does everyone in our society immediately leap to blame? Can we not just learn all we can before leaping to our conclusions that someone didn't do enough? And can't we just blame the only one who deserves it? What good does criticizing the reaction do now except obscure the greater need? Don't assign blame for what's happened. Take what happened and learn from it. Put plans in place in the horrible event that this happens again. Reach out to troubled students and don't let them get to this point. Act to prevent this, don't talk about who did what wrong in things that can't be changed. You can't change the past - you can learn from it to change the future. This is where our energies should be focused, if they need to be anywhere other than grieving alongside the families and friends who lost loved ones.

Excuse the serious nature of my thoughts tonight. I can't exactly discuss this with my five year old, so it comes out here.

In lighter news, adios Sanjaya. It's about freaking time, America.

Idol does country...

Yeah, I skipped last week. I don't know. I just didn't feel like it. I don't know. The show wasn't interesting, I was bored and out of it.

So on to country.

Phil - Keith Urban "Where the Blacktop Ends". I liked him tonight. I don't always, but tonight he was pretty good. He'll probably go home, right?

Jordin - Martina McBride "Broken Wing." What balls does it take to sing Martina (the Celine/Whitney/etc. of country) right to Martina's face? Luckily for Jordin, she's got it. Damn. I had chills.

LaKisha - Jesus Take the Wheel. Ooh, not her best. Just kind of shrieky at the high parts and drowned out at the low parts. I'm worried for her.

Sanjaya - Something to Talk about. What can I say? Nice bandana? Um, yeah, that's about it.

Chris - Mayberry. I don't know this song and I don't like him singing it. Is that because he doesn't do it well or I just don't like him? Can't tell. Probably at least partly that second one.

Melinda - Trouble is a Woman. This is the Melinda that everyone loves. Girl was on fire tonight.

Blake - When the stars go blue. Nice song choice, but to be honest, it was kind of boring. Of course, following such an energetic performance from Melinda, it could just be in comparison.

So let's rank them for tonight:
Jordin/Melinda (honestly, I can't decide which one was better tonight)
Phil
Blake
LaKisha/Chris
Sanjaya

I'd love to say that this is the week we say goodbye to Sanjaya, but my gut says LaKisha. I'd love to be surprised.

Tradition...

 

See that green plastic egg in the bend of that tree? There has been an egg hidden in that very spot - a tree in my grandparents' backyard - for every single Easter I can remember - probably longer than that, really. My aunts and uncles hid an egg there for me and my sister and brother and our cousins when we were little. Then we grew up and hid eggs there for our younger cousins. Now they've grown up and are hiding an egg there for my kids. Among my fondest hopes is that my kids will hide an egg there for the children of my younger cousins. I love that my kids are able to have some of the same things to remember as I do, just as I love that they remember the same things that Tom knew as a child and they also have completely unique experiences all their own.

This picture will always make me smile and think about my childhood and my grandparents' house and years and years of holidays spent there. I hope that it also makes me think about the memories we're making every day - that every moment is potentially the one that my children will remember and tell their own children about. I hope this calms me on hard days and makes me take a deep breath before I scold. I hope this makes me spend a little more time playing and a little less time worrying about little things.

Things happen for a reason...

So lately I've had this pain in my upper right side, right under my ribcage. Sometimes it extends into my back. Mainly it's annoying, but at times it's very painful. And this coming from someone who's definition of pain was forever altered by a very severe ankle fracture. So I took myself to the doctor to see what she thought (in itself a sign that I was in pain - I'm kind of a "no doctor" type). She says "gallbladder." Nope. Don't have one anymore. Therefore she decided to send me off to see a gastroenterologist. He says it's probably scarring. More tests to verify this, but it's probably what is it is and it's more annoying than a huge problem for now.

The point of my medical drama? While my doctor was writing the referral request, I asked her to look at a mole on my thigh. She didn't like it and immediately scheduled a removal and biopsy. The results came in this afternoon. It wasn't cancerous, but it would have been eventually.

I told my sister this and she thinks it's crazy, but I think my gallbladder pain was intended to get me to the doctor to have this mole removed. Maybe I'm crazy. Maybe I'm more spiritual than I think I am because I think someone, a higher someone, was looking out for me. Tonight I'm relieved. And thankful.

Tony Bennett Night on Idol...

First, allow me to begin by saying I LOVE Tony Bennett and that whole crooner style of music. Love it. So I have high hopes for the evening (Melinda, honey, please don't disappoint)...

Blake - Mack the Knife. Meh. A bit of a boring selection, honestly. But digging the house band. Okay, I'm loving this. He's not trying to make it something it's not and he's really singing it well. Awesome.

Phil - Night and Day. Love the outfit - very appropriate. I wasn't sure at first - a little boring, maybe, but he definitely worked it out and really finished strong. Second week in a row that I've liked him.

Melinda - I've Got Rhythm. Her hair's a little younger looking this week. Great song choice - upbeat and slow to show off her personality and her voice. One of my favorite Melinda performances to date (That W-O-M-A-N one is my fave).

Chris R. - Don't Get Around Much Anymore. I love this song. And without changing it all except for him singing it and not someone older, he's almost making this swing classic seem current. And while I don't generally like him, I like this. And not just because I would love to see this music hit the mainstream again.

Jordin - Cute, well sung, but a little old sounding. Randy was right that she didn't bring the young to it like Chris did. And Randy had it right when he told Melinda that she's teaching the others to sing. Jordin was totally working M's moves. Melinda better watch out.

Gina - another subdued performance that really shows off how she can sing. I didn't LOVE it, but it was good.

Haley - really not her best, IMO. She's weak in parts and just kind of flat. I don't know if it's the song choice, which is kind of boring.

LaKisha - shaky start, but that girl can sing. And she is also learning from Melinda with the hand motions, but she still doesn't seem to connect the way M does. I think Jordin is learning faster.

Man, tough to rank tonight. I think I'll skip that. My bottom two is Haley and Sanjaya. But I bet the actual bottom two is Haley and Phil. And this is probably Haley's week to go.

The completed pair of socks...

The color seems a little off. They're really a very light pink.

A mother's confessions...

I have some things to get off my chest.

1. I refuse to eat the slimy, chewed on food my toddler offers me. I just can't.

2. While I think of myself as laid back about messes and things, it really bugs me if the kids don't put toys back in their appropriate bin. I have to go through and re-sort the toys at least once a month.

3. I sometimes drink Kool-Aid in a glass that matches the color of the Kool-Aid and tell the kids it's water.

4. I lose my temper and yell. I hate that. Yes, they probably did something wrong, but I hate losing it anyway.

5. My kids talked late (26 months and 30 months respectively for the first two. The third is 20 months and has only a smattering of words) and I think it's my fault for not talking enough to them.

6. I actually used the phrase "Because I said so." This morning.

7. I've been known to turn two pages of a very long book together just to get it over with. Of course, now that Mr. T reads, that doesn't fly anymore.

8. I sometimes disagree with my husband about how to discipline, but I never say this in front of our kids. And I don't usually argue with Tom about it after they've gone to bed and I have to remind myself not to question his lectures because I would never want him to question my methods.

9. Some days I count the minutes until bedtime and curse daylight savings time for it being light later.

10. Sometimes I think one of my kids is cuter than the others or one is my special favorite. Then I change my mind to another one. Then the other one. They're all cute and special and my favorite for different reasons.