6710 Grand

 I saw an interview transcript with Michelle Williams where she said something akin to 'you can't be great at both being a mom and a career woman'.  She said when you're at work you're thinking about your kids and when you're home with your kids you're thinking about all the work that's not being done.  Some people commented that she was just making a statement about priorities and a LOT of people agreed with her completely. The whole thing just made me really mad.  Really mad .  For 2 reasons. But I'll get to that.  Perhaps being an actress where your job takes you away from your family for months at a time and you have what I can only assume is a grueling schedule, followed by interviews and talk shows to promote the movies you're in, and then bouncing back into home life where you can then focus only on your kids is hard.  I wouldn't know.  I have no doubt that's hard.  I would never presume to understand the life of a Hollywood actre...

May-cember.  It’s becoming more recognized among parents of school-aged children.  The month of May is so crammed with activities that it resembles December—but with none of the fun of Christmas.  Performances, end of year parties, tournaments, concerts, graduation, graduation parties, dentist appointments, annual physicals, standardized tests, due dates, Mother’s Day, birthdays, Cinco de Mayo, Endangered Species Day, World Day for Cultural Diversity… the list seems endless.  There’s so much to do for the kids and their insane schedules, not to mention all that I’m doing for work—grant deadlines, promote summer camp, spring appeal, grant reports, meetings, annual reviews, contract negotiations—and home—renew pest control, renew lawn maintenance, plant flowers, tend to flower beds, mow the lawn, oil change on the mower, figure out why the composter isn’t working, clean the carpets, balance the checkbook, pay the taxes, renew the Costco membership, plan the graduation ...

It’s 4:33 and the sunrise alarm clock that is supposed to wake me up naturally is blaring orange light into my bedroom.  I have no idea how to turn it off because the 946 page instruction manual remains unread in my “to read” folder.  But it doesn’t matter.  Ike is crying and it’s time to get up anyway.  I pry myself out of bed, throw on my gym clothes and head downstairs.  The coffee pot is brewing.   I debate having a cup before my run but as I diaper my baby and snuggle him back to bed I know it’s not a smart choice.   One cup leads to seven and that means my morning run won’t happen.   And it MUST happen. Baby is back down for at least another hour so I head to the basement where my office and gym are waiting for me.   I’m immediately reminded of the things I meant to finish last night but didn’t and am momentarily tempted to tackle them now.   No.   You MUST run.   I open the windows in the gym and turn on two fans. ...

I'm sad to say that this is possibly the last year that Iris will believe in Santa.  She's 10.  It's time.  But it's still sad.  Most of the time I think her head knows what her heart is hoping isn't true.  As an adult, there are certainly ways I know and fully believe in the magic of Santa.  Stories of selfless generosity and ordinary people doing extraordinary things.  Our own holiday giving to strangers and going out of our ways to make someone's day, all in the name of Christmas--these are the Santa Tracking ways Santa is kept real.  You never know who you might be playing Santa to in an everyday gesture or kindness. For us, that all goes back to Jesus.  And we don't need Christmas for that.  It's easier, sure.  It feels more natural.  People are more likely to just say thank you and accept a gift than at other times of the year.  It is these things for which I choose to believe in Santa--and I hope they are why...

Am I a bad person?  I don't know.  Maybe I am.  I'll let you decide...not that it changes anything.  I have a musical family.  My dad (the coolest dad ever) is a drummer.  My little brother Andrew plays piano (and so do I, though not very well).  Little sister sings and plays the guitar.  Come to think of it, Andrew plays the guitar too.  Music was a big deal growing up.  Dad always had CD's on his birthday/Christmas/father's day list.  We would listen to various things (usually in the car because he insisted my mom wouldn't let him listen in the house) and he'd ask me why I couldn't play like "that".  My own kids have taken a liking to various things as well.  Ivy plays the violin and the piano.  Iris plays the piano, the cello and a snare drum.  They come by it honestly--Nick's family is musical too.  Because the girls both play a string instrument through school they have practice both before and duri...

I hate extracurricular after-school activities.  HATE them.  They're going to KILL me.  Why oh why do my children need to play multiple instruments and sports?  WHY is there such a thing as an after school art club?  I don't understand. It was not like this when I was a child.  Sure I did Girl Scouts (mostly for the camping), but we met right after school and the meetings were AT the school so I could just walk home (we did that back then).  I played softball for a couple of seasons--and walked--and practice was once per week with only ONE game a month.  I really wanted to do gymnastics so I went (walked!) to the YWCA on Saturdays.  I was driven to piano lessons but would have happily given those up if mom and dad were too busy. Not now--oh no.  Now, we must be driven to all things and none of them are right after school...which is probably better because if they were my kids wouldn't be able to do that anyway.  Now they're all ...

The girls and I have a new hobby--we started watching cooking competition shows and especially love Worst Cooks in America.  The girls and I bake a lot so they have learned a thing or two about cooking.  Ivy has been baking cookies with me since she could hold her head up.  I would literally put her in the Bumbo on the kitchen counter when she was about 6 months old.  She even managed to sneak an entire cookie worth of raw dough once when I wasn't looking (bad mom, I know). It's something we started doing on nights when Nick is gone.  We eat dinner in front of the TV, watch an episode and have fun laughing at the bizarre kitchen antics of horrible cooks.  It's fun, it's silly and it's something they'll remember when they have families of their own.  These are the memories we're making. Well. On all of these shows we watch, contestants inevitably are asked to make a signature dish.  Whenever this happens, the conversation always turns to what...

We've been watching old home movies--the girls call them the Ivy and Iris movies.  It's been fun seeing them when they were babies and thinking how we'll get to do all of this again.  We've found absolute treasures mixed in with the holiday and vacation memories. "Dad, do you want to play throw the catch?"--Ivy "Oh WAH TAH!" --Iris  Don't ask me what that means, but she used to say it all the time. An adorable exchange between Ivy and Nick about Great Grandma Olson's trip to Heaven. We look at them when they were 1 and 2 and 4 and think how it feels like yesterday that they did these cute things.  And yet still it seems like long ago... Just this morning, Iris saw my bottle of Tums (a.k.a. pregnant candy for those of you who know) and asked if I had "heart broken".  t was a moment for the camera certainly and reminded me that we really need to take more Ivy and Iris movies...and watch them much more often before these days...

Yesterday Nick and I were talking about feeling guilty for not spending more time with our kids—particularly the fact that neither of us stay home and Ivy and Iris have gone to daycare more or less since infancy.  Nick and I both had brief stints at being a stay-at-home parent when Ivy was young and we both knew without a doubt that it wasn't the life for either of us.  I think he feels the guilt more than I do since he’s gone for days at a time and I’m home every night (more or less), but the girls have a hand in that as well.  They’re VERY good at giving him the puppy eyes and sulking around when he’d rather do something for himself or (GASP!) spend time with me than play with them.  I've had the occasional snide remark sent my way about how selfish I am for working or even how unfortunate I am for not being able to financially manage staying home with my kids.  I do my best not to engage or simply state that I am a better mom when I can go to work every ...

Some men (and women) secretly sneak peaks at porn. Additcted or not, they might try to hide it--scoping out time in their day when they know no one is around and no one can see what they're looking at. My husband does not do this...at least not with naked people. He looks at pictures of airplanes. We affectionatly call it pilot porn. Sometimes, he'll be at his computer and I'll walk by and notice that he's rapidly closed a window. "What are you looking at?" I'll ask, already knowing the answer. "Nothing!" as if it's a secret. I think pilots are born, not made. You either love planes or know little about them. You can learn the aerodynamics or the mechanics but pilots are born with an innate awe and wonder about planes. Nick's dad is a pilot too. His mom once told me that she knew exactly how she was going to die. She'd be riding in the car with his dad who would hear a plane overhead. He'd be craning his neck to watch it...