Blended

Awkward...

I just bought $30 worth of stuff that I don’t need from a fundraiser.

 

I bought the stuff because I was in the middle of a super-awkward situation.

 

It was awkward because I answered the door in my jammies…and found two of my students standing there.

 

I was in my jammies at 8:30 because I had to beat the kids to the shower if I wanted any hot water.

 

The kids were racing to the shower because they were sweaty and disgusting.

 

They were sweaty and disgusting because they had been running around like crazy lunatics all day.

 

I was sweaty and disgusting because I had been running around like a crazy lunatic with them (or at least FOR them).

 

Right before I got in the shower, I’d been at the mall.

 

We were at the mall at 8:00pm on a school night because my 12-Year-Old had just announced that his football cleats were too small and he needed new ones for practice…tomorrow.

 

He told me this at 7:30pm because we were just picking his sister up from soccer and the cleats reminded him.

 

We were picking her up from soccer at 7:30 because we were late.

 

We were late because we went out to dinner.

 

We went out to dinner because I raced around like a crazy lunatic all afternoon and I didn’t have four seconds to pee, forget about make dinner.

 

We were late to dinner because the soccer coach was late so I spent 20 minutes in the soccer field parking lot with Bill’s ex wife.

 

I was with Bill’s ex-wife because our kids play on the same soccer team.

 

They play on the same team because otherwise this would be insane.  Oh wait.  It already is.

 

Before soccer, I was all the way on the other side of town waiting to pick up Sam from football. 

 

I was waiting because he forgot to text me and tell me the right time and I was worried about being that-mom-who-always-picks-her-kid-up-late.

 

He forgot to text me because ADD is hereditary.

 

Before racing to the football field so I could wait for 30 minutes, I was zooming through the McDonald’s Drive-Through.

 

I was zooming through the McDonald’s drive through because I realized I had only 10 minutes to feed Hannah before picking up her brother and then taking Hannah to soccer practice.

 

I only had 10 minutes because we had to run home and get her cleats and soccer shorts from the house and while we were there the stupid dogs got out and we had to chase them and put them back in.

 

The dogs got out because we were hurrying.

 

We were hurrying because I had been late to pick her up from her friends’ house so we needed to get her soccer stuff quickly.

 

I was late to pick her up from her friend’s house because my doctor’s appointment ran over.

 

My doctor’s appointment ran over because the doctor was punishing me for being late to his office in the first place.

 

I was late to his office in the first place because…. Need I really go on?

 

This is ridiculous.  Work is like a vacation on a tropical island compared to the 6 hours between the last bell and when the kids go to bed.

 

Copyright © Jody Hoffman 2011

 

 

I Miss Them (and my first Blog Hop!)

My children have been at their father’s house for 22 days.  I had to take out the calendar to count that up.  I originally wrote down 39 days.  It feels like they have been gone for a million years.  This is the longest I’ve ever been away from them.  Bill’s kids have a wonderful new summer plan that involves a week here, and then a week at their mom’s house.  They are all doing great, but there is an awful lot of time with no kids around.

I miss them.

When I don’t need 2-dozen eggs to make breakfast in the morning, I miss them.

When there’s no one to tuck into bed, I miss them.

When I walk in the door and don’t trip over their sneakers, I miss them.

When we go out on the boat, and no one is shrieking, I miss them.

When I can watch any channel of TV I want and spend an entire day without ever hearing the Phinneaus and Pherb theme song, I (still hear it in my head, and) I miss them. 

When Bill and I sit alone at our humoungous dining room table, I miss them.  (Who am I kidding?  I barely cook even when the kids ARE here!  We go out…or occasionally eat cereal at midnight…)

When it is 9am on a Saturday morning and I am still in bed because no one woke me up yet yelling about their brother smacking them or how their sister stole their gameboy… Okay, I don’t miss them ALL the time.

I deal with missing them by shopping (occasionally even for them), scrapbooking photos from the past year and by calling them.  I don’t know if you have ever tried to carry-on daily phone conversations with your preteens, but it has roughly the same entertainment value as watching paint dry.  Beige paint.  Here is a sample conversation:

Sam: Hello?

Me:  Hi!

Sam: Who is this?

Me: It’s your mother.

Sam: Oh. [pause] Hi mom.

Me: What are you doing?

Sam: Watching TV.

Me: Oh, what are you watching?

Sam:…………

Me:  Do you think maybe you could turn off the TV and talk to me for a minute?

Sam:…………

Me: SAM!

Sam: What?!

Me:  Turn off the TV.

Sam: [pretends to turn off the TV, but knows I can’t see him] Ok

Me: So, what did you do today?

Sam:  Watched TV/Watched a movie/Played video games

Me: Oh! That sounds fun, what are you doing tomorrow?

Sam: Same answer

Me: Anything else you want to tell me?

Sam: Nope

Me: Nothing?

Sam: Oh!  Well…Daddy bought us a cat!/Let me dye my hair!/Saved me when I almost drowned waterskiing!/Had to come get me when I wiped out my bike and was bleeding everywhere!/Is taking us to a waterpark!/Showed me how to light fireworks!

Me:  [Thinks: Oh Crap./Is it permanent?/Glad I’m hearing this after!/Were you wearing your helmet?/Be safe!/WHAT?!?!]  Says: Wow!  That sounds fun/interesting/scary/painful/exciting/WHAT?!?

Sam:…….

Me: Watching TV again?

Sam:……..

Me:  Okay, Bud, Love you! Miss you!  Can I talk to your sisters?

Sam: Uh…yeah, Mom…you too….Here you go.

And then, I have the esteemed pleasure of having the Exact.Same.Conversation again.  Two more times.  I love to hear their voices, and the neurotic mommy in me just needs to make sure they’re okay once a day, but the actual phone conversations leave a bit to be desired. 

This makes me pause for a moment to consider my own telephone conversations with my parents, who are also 2,000 miles away.  Do I give them my full attention?  Do I listen and respond to each piece of advice and information they offer?  What is that shiny object over there on the counter?  Is that the theme song for Big Brother I hear on the TV?  Hmm…Perhaps this is all genetic.

So how in the world am I going to survive another four more weeks of this?  I’m working on a list of possible activities to distract me from the fact that my kids are still gone.  And we’re not even half done.  Here’s the list so far.  I’m accepting suggestions…

1. Redecorate the kitchen, bedroom, living room…

2. Write a book.

3. Learn how to cook 75 gourmet meals that the kids will actually eat.

4. Learn how to cook 75 gourmet meals that Bill will eat and buy a lot of chicken nuggets.

5.  Just buy chicken nuggets.

6. Organize all the closets and get rid of stuff that doesn’t fit the kids anymore.

7.  Buy new stuff to replace it!

8. Catch up on scrapbooking, reading, sleeping, exercising.

9. Learn to knit.

10. Learn how to remove tags from purchased items so it looks like I knit them.

11. Convince Bill we should have another baby.

12.  Research cars that seat 9.

13.  Peel Bill off the ceiling.

14.  Apply for my Phd.

15. Write lesson plans for the first month of school.

16. Give the dogs a bath.

17. Clean the oven so it doesn’t set off the fire alarm every time I use it.

18.  Or: Come up with dinner plans that don’t necessitate using the oven.

19. Become increasingly obsessed with TV’s Big Brother.  Talk to Bill about the players as if they are my friends.

20. Harass people to go vote for the blog at Top Mommy Blogs until everyone hates me and/or I am number 1.

21.  Consider whether the new individually sized frozen drink pouches, Daily’s, are so named because that is their creator’s last name, or because you are supposed to drink them every day.

22.  Go with the second – they are delicious.

23.  Learn how to use Linky to make a blog hop - DONE!  Give me your suggestion as to what should be on my Distraction To-Do List for the summer, and link up your blog! 

 

The Blended Distraction To-Do List Blog Hop

RULES:  Please follow Blended, and leave me a comment.  Then add your answer and blog link to the Linky.  Follow as many of the other blogs as you can and don't forget to leave a comment.  Let them know you are a follower from the Blended Distraction Blog Hop!

 

 

Whose Kids Are These?

* Facebook 4/8/11 – There are 9 backpacks in the living room.  I’m not really sure whose kids are here right now or how long they’re staying, but I’m making extra dinner rolls just in case.

*Facebook 4/8/11 – P.S. One of the teachers just found my own kid’s backpack in the school parking lot next to where my car had been and brought it over to our house.  #thatmeansthereare10kidshere  #mymomsaysIhaveADD

When I yell “Dinner” out the back door a variety of children tumble in.  You can tell if they belong here by their shoe placement upon entering.  New kids leave them by the door.  Kids who visit often put them in the “shoe drawer” where they go.  My own kids stomp through the house and get mud on everything. 

Sometimes I feel like when we moved to South Dakota we actually moved back in time to 1950.  My kids play outside all the time.  They ride their bikes around the neighborhood and I don’t worry (much).  They can go to the playground, the roller skating rink, the movie theater, all by themselves, or with their friends.  This, in case you were wondering, was not true when we lived in Boston.  In our past life, my job, the kids’ school and, therefore all the kids’ friends, were 45 minutes away from our house. By the time we got home it was dark, there was no one we knew to play with and well, let’s just say I wasn’t ready to let them out of my sight for even one minute. 

And so now, my children get to participate in the neighborhood experience.  This means that sometimes I look outside and see no one at all…and don’t worry.  (Who am I kidding? I do worry.  I was raised in Boston and lived there for the better part of 32 years.  I can’t completely stop worrying, - my dad calls this East Coast Paranoia - but I’m learning.) Sometimes, though, I look outside and see anywhere from 7 to 15 children playing on our tennis court – riding bikes, jumping rope, teasing my dogs.  Usually I can pick out which ones are mine and which ones aren’t…if I have my glasses on.  I love that my house is where they want to be.  I love that they feel comfortable coming inside for a glass of water or taking toys out of my garage.  I do sometimes wish they’d bring the glasses back inside or put the toys away…

Some kids are regulars.  My friends and I subscribe to the “it takes a village” approach.  As parents and friends, we run errands for each other, let each other’s dogs out, drive carpools, assist with overwhelming baking tasks…at times my friends have been known to make dinner at my house and once one of them even cleaned my kitchen in an emergency. Obviously, we also share the job of caring for and entertaining all the kids.  Their children feel right at home here.  One has a job on the job chart, one even has a bed here.  The other day I was driving one of “the regulars” to French class with my girls and she asked whether it was her turn to set the table! 

*Facebook 4/14/11 - Thank goodness for good friends who come over when you're freaking out and, you know, make dinner.

 So I don’t mind putting away extra shoes, setting a few more places at dinner or storing an extra mattress under Gabby’s bed for surprise sleepovers.  I’ll happily introduce new kids to my husband at dinner.  I like to drive carpools and organize parties. But most of all, having these extra kids all the time serves a very important purpose.  When they go home, six suddenly seems like a totally manageable number of children.

*Facebook 4/11/11 - For those of you following the backpack saga, we left the house this morning after 5 attempts, with an extra backpack that was left over last Friday. Then Sam had to go all the way home because he left his on the living room floor...

 © Jody Hoffman 2011

I See Bunnies

 

*Facebook 4/15/11 - Brady smelled a bunny outside and ran away. He came back though. I guess he forgot what he was doing. #mydoghasaddtoo #darnbunnies

 

I was diagnosed with ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) in High School.  Never medicated, I instead learned coping strategies that work…most of the time.

This is what ADD looks like in an un-medicated adult:

-Occasional spouts of insane multi-tasking

-Occasional inability to walk and chew gum simultaneously.

-External organization caused by complete lack of internal organization

        -Color-coded excel documents everywhere

        -Planners as large as a small encyclopedia

        -Google calendars for each family member and every activity

        -Sticky notes. Lots of sticky notes

 

A few years ago, my mom gave me a tee shirt that said:

“My mom says I have ADD. 

I don’t know what she’s talking ab---

Oh Look! A bunny!” 

 

From then on, every time I forgot something, became distracted or said something that seemed completely disconnected from the conversation I was having, my mom would yell, “Look! A Bunny!”  Everyone else was more than happy to join in.  During the first weekend that Bill spent with my parents, we were supposed to meet them at their house.  Distracted in the car on the way home from the mall, I accidentally drove to MY house instead of theirs.  Then I took a wrong turn (even though I had driven this path a million times) and we ended up arriving 30 minutes late. Upon entering their house, Bill said to my mom, “Sorry we’re late…there were just soooo many bunnies.” 

Bill is accepting of this personality trait and puts up with my obsessive organization, need to plan ahead, and frustration when things seem out of control (said the girl with 6 kids and 2 dogs). He finds humor in my distractibility.

 

*Facebook 3/11/11 –

Me: (telling a story, gets distracted and loses train of thought)

Mom: (After reminding me where I was) "I'm a bunny catcher."

Me: (Laughs… and forgets again)

*Facebook 3/21/11 - "Attention Target Shoppers there is a Honda Pilot license plate ICBUNYS in the parking lot...you left your door open." Yeah, but I remembered all the kids...

*Facebook 3/17/11 - My fortune cookie said: "you are what you think about all day." Have spent a great deal of time thinking about that today. Does that, then, make me a cookie?

 In October of 2009 when Bill and I were looking for the perfect house for the Bunch, I knew we were in the perfect place from the moment we pulled into the driveway. Bill, however, wasn’t sure until he heard me exclaim from an upstairs window, “Look!  Bunnies!”  We had a forest full of rabbits in our backyard. 

We bought the house.

 *Facebook 4/5/11 - I think blog posts, texts and Facebook updates are so appealing to me for the same reason I liked Sesame Street - my attention span requires that the activity changes approximately every 30 seconds.

 *Facebook 4/16/11 - The difference between Brady and me: today he caught the bunny.

 

© Jody Hoffman 2011