The Day I Accomplished Nothing, and Everything At The Same Time (How's that for cryptic?)

Well, I accomplished nothing today.  That's not exactly true.  I did NOT accomplish what I set out to do today.  It's been hotter than all get out here, so I had planned to work in the classroom, then get my butt moving & hit Costco, walk the dog, (Millie; working to resocialize her,) to the dog park, & make dinner, all before it got too hot.  NONE of THAT, happened.  Ok, working in class happened.  It's the last week of school.  The other parent who works on Monday's w/me figured the teacher didn't need us, so he didn't show.  I still wanted to bring the teacher her Monday Sbux, so I went in, you know, just in case.  Holy Crap! Did she had LOTS for us to do?!  Instead of getting out in an hour, it took 3! It was 11:30 before I left.  Walking off campus, I checked FaceBook.  THAT was where my day went sideways.
  As with anyone, who doesn't live under a rock, I've been following the clusterf*ck that the Brock Turner, rape trial and sentencing has become.  I will henceforth be referring to him him as "The Rapist."  Calling him by name is giving him notoriety that he does NOT deserve.  For the same reasons, I'm not linking to any of the negative things about this case; his dad's letter, his friend's letter, etc.. you can find them very easily online on your own.  Once he's out of jail, I will then refer to  him as "Brock the sexual predator," because that's what he is & why he's on the sexual predator list for the rest of his life.  After reading that,  I think you're pretty much up to speed on my feelings about this whole thing.  Ok, so like most people, I had read the victim's letter this weekend.  It was devastating.  Seriously devastating.

 Let me say right now, that, how articulate this girl is; she is exactly what the movement against rape culture & victim blaming needed right now.  I wish there was a way she could stay private, while being able to capitalize on those writing skills, because she is AMAZING.  And she deserves ALL. THE. THINGS. But also, if there was a way to undo all this, so you didn't need to write that letter honey?  I'd do that for you too.  No one, should EVER have to go through the hell that you've lived through.  No one should have to be a victim in being a victim, but that is precisely what our society does & it's VERY, VERY WRONG. You should know this: I believe, that because of you;  Because you stood up time & time again.  Because you took the time to really, really put together how it all FELT from YOUR perspective.  (The only one that should matter in this case.)  Because of all of THAT, my daughters' have a much better chance of NOT having to go through something like this.  And I'm forever indebted to you for your courage.  So Thank You for that.  Your efforts were not in vain.  (Yes, I know my grammar & such, is all over the place, but I'm trying to get this out w/out getting too riled up so I can get SOME sleep tonight.  I have deadlines right now for all sorts of things & THIS is all that's been happening.  It's consumed me today.  So forgive me, my syntax & know it has to do w/how passionately I feel about all of this.  This was so important it beat out finishing teacher, father's day & b-day gifts.  I'm behind on all of those bc of soccer already, so yeah...)
Like I said, we were in the middle of soccer tournament hell, (in which Little's team took 1st in her division, so "yeah!"   But seriously,  I couldn't really allow myself to get mired in the debacle at the time.  I was fried & exhausted from managing kids in 100+ degree heat all day.  We fell into bed both nights & up early for more! go team. bah.  But today, ugh.  Today, I read the dad's letter, and my head about exploded.  OH. MY. GOD.  I've read about people like this, but I thought they were smart enough to keep these kinds of thoughts to themselves.  I ALMOST feel sorry for the rapist after reading that letter.  How much of a chance did he stand, when the whole time he's growing up being told how "preshus & speshul he is?  How none of ANYTHING is HIS fault. Not EVER!"  He's special after all. He's smart.  He's an Olympic hopeful! He's living the dream, so of course, let's all gather round & make sure he gets his dream, regardless of the cost to others.  I'm sure you've heard the "20 minutes of action line."  Or my husband's personal favorite, "he won't eat his favorites of mom's vittles; like steak. Hasn't he suffered enough already?" ChristonaCracker!  Normally, I'd go pull the actual quotes from the article, but I can't go read it again right now.  I'll get my panties all in a bunch & then I really WON'T sleep tonight.  We know how good I am at that, as it is.  So, trust me, my paraphrase isn't far off.   After reading that, via a link from Mir's FB page, I commented,"I hope someone goes all "Girl with the Dragon Tattoo"on him; Get him drunk & tattoo "rapist" on his forehead.  Then he'll know what being violated feels like."  Several people liked my comment quite a bit.  (I probably shouldn't be proud of that, but I am. I'm so clever when I'm pissed.  Hey, I can finally own up to something if I ever get around to going to confession. Yeah Me!) Around this time the letter from the rapist's friend, who is a girl, was linked to, as well.  This was the ever popular:

"Where do we draw the line and stop worrying about being politically correct every second of the day and see that rape on campuses isn’t always because people are rapist"
(Someone on another FB post did the copy/paste thing, so I didn't have to go find it.  Thanks for that!) 

Um, no honey.  If you rape someone, you ARE the very definition of a rapist. They don't wear a uniform so we can avoid them.  And part of the reason they get away with it is exactly because of the types of things you're saying.  It's called victim blaming. (This is the part of the subject that will get me good & wound up.)   THEN, someone linked to a FB page FOR the rapist.  (And my head pretty much exploded.  Note all of this happened in less than probably 15 minutes.)  This was the continuance of  a "It can't possibly get any worse, yet here's another" type of thread.  This page was called; (Ugh, I hate to use his name again,) "Brock Turner for 2016 Olympics."  It was so vial, so blatantly awful, that other people seriously thought it was some sick joke.  I don't know who hosted it.  It implied it was family, but I'd like to think they're a little smarter than to do something so brazenly awful.  I was so upset by it, I reported it to FaceBook for hate speech.  Then I went back to the thread on Mir's post & encouraged others to do the same.  One person indicated that she'd reported it for "inappropriate content" the other day, & they pulled down some of the photos.  (Incredibly inappropriate memes that implied that the victim was The Rapist, not the person who was raped.)  THAT, my friends, emboldened me.  They obviously didn't disagree with us.  (I wish I'd taken a screen shot in the middle of this, but I didn't think it would happen as fast as it did in the end.)  I posted this to my FB page.  I linked to his FB page & told my friends & followers we could do something about it.  You see, we live in Santa Clara County.  We can make sure this judge isn't allow to re-victimize anyone again by having him disbarred.  He's up for election tomorrow (well actually today, but it's late, so it's still MY tomorrow).  Usually, we're so frustrated because we feel helpless to do anything.  But this time, I believe we can, so I was on it.  The other thing we can do?  We can get this & any other similar FB pages we find, pulled down.  Luckily, I took screen shots of my posts.  (Below.)  I didn't get the comments included by friends & friends of friends.  Once FB did pull his page, (read the photos to see,) then they pull the comments section of my post.  Eventually, they pulled the whole post.  Luckily, I got a text from a friend asking me what was up, because she couldn't see my comments anymore, but his page was down.  I got on my phone, (was in the middle of "mom's taxi" duties) & checked.  I had just gotten home, so I pulled my laptop to see what was up.  My laptop couldn't bring up anything related to my posts.  FB had deleted them all!  I have to say that annoys the crap out of me.  There was good discussion happening on that post.  Several links to various petitions.  Discussion about bad decisions we all made in college & how lucky we were, that those drunk guys, were still "stand-up guys" when drunk.  But, I did manage to get photos of the start of it & an update.  I'm actually really proud to have been part of this.  I know I made a difference.  If I hadn't, they wouldn't have pulled my stuff down.  We were bugging the crap out of them w/out EVEN TRYING YET! (And to my friends who work at FB, my apologies for being a PITA.  But I know you must've agreed, you just needed to figure out how to do it legally.) I know, it's a drop in a bucket, but enough drops & our bucket will fill up. Maybe, just maybe, I need to get back to writing again.  Turns out, people might just be interested in what I have to say.  Who knew?  I guess you did. ;-)

So w/out further ado, I present,

How To Get A FaceBook Page Taken Down For Hate Speech (In 5 Parts):

How I know I'm done having kids

NSFSBV
Not Safe For Sue Bob Viewing

Two weeks ago a good friend asked if we'd watch her almost 3yo twins for the day. They were going away for 4 days & she had the rest of the time covered, but needed someone to watch them the first day, all day. I said, "No problem" The twins, especially Girl Twin, adores Big & Little. We play with them more or less once a week, so they know us well. Also, when I've been in a crunch, their mom has watched Little for me, more times than I probably know, so I owe her, if nothing else.

The twins have started pre-school and are more or less potty trained. (I know, they aren't even three yet!) She gave us the heads up on the potty situation (Girl had gone, Boy had not, neither had pooped yet.) Kids started playing & everything was more or less fine. After about an hour, I remembered that they should probably try to go. At the mere mention of the word bathroom (or anything remotely related to it,) Girl Twin would curl into the fetal position and start crying. She wouldn't say anything. She'd just lay down in a fetal position and cry. Um, yeah. "Okay, you let us know when you need to go honey." Boy twin said he didn't have to go yet. "Well then, let's all go play outside!" About 10 min later Boy twin decides he has to go. So DaddySpeak and I both escort him to the bathroom. I'm suddenly stymied. Does he stand up or sit down? I look at DS, "How would I know?"
"I don't know, you're a guy, you have more experience with this than me, what do you think?"
He looks at me blankly.
I make the executive call and determine, he's "just" potty trained, he's not even three, so he MUST sit down. Right? Right? (He's not tall enough to pee standing up, right?) I plop him on the toilet seat, (of course, we don't have a smaller seat that goes over it, or a potty chair anymore, that would be too easy). I "tuck his junk" and sort of step back. I don't really step back, so much as straiten up. You know, big seat, small bum, could be pretty traumatic if he fell in, so I wanted to be there to grab him, just in case. Next thing I know, he's pulled it out and is peeing. Not in the toilet. Noooooo. He's peeing all over the wall across from the toilet. "But how?" you ask, since I was standing in front of him. Well, luckily I had my legs spread apart, so yes, he was peeing on the wall, shooting it between! my! legs! (Dude, I can't make this shit up!) Just to complete the visual for you, Boy twin, he was laughing while he was doing it too. I yelp, but can't move, because I'll get peed on. I look to the door where DS was standing and HE'S GONE! I yell for him, because I don't know what to do at this point. In the meantime, Boy twin is going, going, going... (and laughing, laughing, laughing,) remember he'd been holding it for a couple hours before this. DS shows up and is yelling and laughing. Pee's running down the wall, all over the floor (THANK BABY JEBUS I had on shoes for a change!) and it's running down the heating vent on the floor next to me. Special, I know. So, not a drop in the toilet, not a drop on Boy twin, but all over bathroom wall and floor. DS got the wet vac and went to town after. Luckily, we hadn't cleaned out the vents yet from summer (heater's been turned off). There was a thin layer of lint & pet hair that "caught" most of what went in the vent. So, no, the bathroom did NOT smell of nastiness when the heater did get turned on.

Twins 1 - Speaks 0

After we finished that adventure, I had some errands I had to run. DS said they would all be fine. All the kids were playing in the backyard. We'd tried to get Girl twin to use the potty again with similar results. Yes, we did try to get Big & Little Speak to coax her, she wasn't having it. Fetal position, ground & tears. While I was gone, DS noticed Girl twin suddenly beeline for the corner of the yard. He realized she couldn't hold it any longer, but she was too fast for him. When he got to her she had already peed herself. When I came home, both of the twins were on their second set of clothes, and it wasn't even lunch time yet.

Twins 2 - Speaks 0

It was around this time, I realized, I am done having kids. I love babies. I mean I LOVE babies. I want another baby. When I smell new baby smell my ovaries ache. I mean it, they ache. I swear I spontaneously ovulate right then and there. But I do NOT and can NOT handle a toddler again. No way. It'll be the death of me I'm sure.

Sunday

Here's an example of why I don't seem to have time to blog.
Today I got up at 7, got Big ready & off to CCD (Sunday school) at 8:30. Came home, clean up kitchen, switched laundry and went back to get Big. Took both girls to Starbucks on way home. DaddySpeak was up when we got back, now 10. Decided I was tired and went and laid down for a bit. Woke up at noon. No one was home, and was still tired so laid on couch while I read emails on my phone. Family came back from grocery store and started making pies. I FELL BACK ASLEEP for two more hours!

Either I'm coming down with something or I'm a complete sloth! No wonder I can't sleep at night half the time, nor can I get anything done during the day!

The Post that Became a Drinking Game

"The Proverbial Chicken" was supposed to be the title of this post. But as you can see it evolved a bit. Read on:

That would be me. The proverbial chicken, running around w/my head cut off. I know you've gotten the gist of my moaning and groaning this week. But along w/the general aches, pains, coughs, stomach- & head-aches, life has not stopped to accommodate me. Quite the contrary, it's just starting to get moving. I feel a lot like I'm barely keeping my head above water these days. Stick w/me here, I'm pretty sure I'll manage to get in several more cliches before this is done. Perhaps we could make it a drinking game, that should keep you reading. (Take two swigs!)

We are at the end of soccer season, which means this weekend is the big tournament. All soccer, all the weekend. At least 4 games, perhaps 5, I think. And, in case you've been living under a rock, (drink!) the holidays are upon us. I'm still feeling a bit floored by this, as if they've managed to sneak up on me somehow. At the end of next week we fly to Kansas for a week. (Insert obligatory "We're not in Kansas anymore" joke here. I think that one deserves a shot, it's cliche-ish, so drink!) This means I need to get to packing a weeks worth of winter clothes for all of us this week. If you're a mom, you are thinking, "that means getting all the laundry done,"aren't you? And you'd be right. Just to keep us on our toes, (drink!) the school has scheduled parent/teacher conferences this week. Parent/Teacher conferences means half days at school. All Week. I'm sure this will help greatly w/my time management. Wonder how Big feels about laundry & packing? Guess we'll find out. Don't forget the end of year soccer banquet is this weekend! I will be missing it, as I'm starting off to the Holiday Party Season by attending the SVMoms Group Holiday Party. (You will be very jealous when you see all the cool sponsors. I'm one of the mom's driving a Chevy to the party and all this week. If you follow my Tweets I'm sure you're well aware of this. I'm driving the Equinox & will be providing my review soon.)
When we get back from Kansas, it will be the first week of December, which includes my Dad & I's birthdays. (I don't want to talk about it, I'm about to be in my 40s. Not just 40, but in my 40s, and this is bothering me greatly.) Being December, everything will suddenly rocket into full speed; (drink!) there will be Christmas programs at church & both girls' schools. My family has scheduled to take the girls to see the Nutcracker one afternoon (I think we're going to go to tea too!) We have a day of baking in the schedule, a night of Caroling, several neighborhood parties and just for fun, Big will be bridging in Girl Scouts ("bridging up from a Daisy Scout to a Brownie). Somewhere in there we will get a tree. If the weather agrees, we'll make a day of it & go to the mountains to cut it down. If not, we'll have the annual Christmas trek to Home Depot. We Speak's, we're all about traditions.

I'm kinda tired just writing it all down. Seriously.

Right now, I'm still trying to catch up from my outlaws visit. You could say I'm getting wiser in my old age. Instead of stressing while they're here, I just live w/the piles while they're here and tackle them once they leave. I've learned it doesn't do me much good to try and pick up too much while they're visiting. Once I clear a space someone will start a new pile there (I wish I were joking). I figure I'm cleaning up the same amount of stuff, just all at once. But like I said, I'm still trying to wrap my head around it. (drink!) And because we work well under pressure, (drink!) we must, why else would be keep doing this to ourselves? We decided to refinance our mortgage right now. Pick up your chin off the floor, it's unbecoming. We talked about this earlier in the year, but just now have the rates gotten to the point where it's worth our while to do it. It will be worth it in the long run. (drink!) If I keep saying that, at some point I'll believe it, right? No, really, it will be worth it. We're going to pull money out to redo ALL the windows, get a new front door & add French doors in our dinning room. It will soooo be worth it. AND we're going to have a lower monthly payment. So yeah, very worth it. Though I do admit, giving up those ill-fitting, rattling windows does mean giving up some blog fodder, but I've decided I'm willing to make that sacrifice. I'm sure I'll manage to schedule the window install right in the middle of all the crazy holiday activities. That should make up for any posts I'll lose to the rattling windows, dontcha think? Today, I spent my day stressing because I COULD NOT locate 2007's tax return. The mess of the house was a lot of my stress. (This is the mess that is still here from the outlaws.) The return was missing from the file, and everything else was there, so it was misfiled. That meant it wasn't going to be anywhere logical. I also could not find it on our computer (remember my laptop crashed on me two weeks ago?) We back up our files in triplicate, (that means on 3 separate back up drives, not carbon copies) so I couldn't understand how it could be that I couldn't find it. Having Little home all day, I couldn't take the time till tonight to really delve into trying to locate it. So I was freaking out inside my head all day. Woot! I was lots of fun to be around, trust me. I did finally find it. I also found several other missing things, so I guess it wasn't a total loss. I guess.
Ok, insert appropriate pun laden cliche here, drink! and I'm headed to bed. I do have an early soccer game to get to after all. Drink!

A Day in the Life of a SAHM...grumble, grumble

Wow am I having a day! Not a go buy I bought a lottery ticket kind of day. More like a, the lottery (for the whole state) would some how break if I bought a ticket. THAT kind of a day.

Started last night, Little woke up w/a really, really bad dream. Neither of my girls will ever talk about bad dreams, is this normal? Anyway, when this happens I usually hug her & put her back in bed. Sometimes, I will lay w/her for a few minutes. Last night was bad, so she wanted me to lay w/her. After 10 minutes I said I was going to go, and that was fine. Ten minutes after that, I hear her in her room screaming again (she's got a potential future in horror films w/this scream). Go through the same drill. Three's a charm! Only this time, she's not letting me leave. She's had it w/this nightmare crap & apparently a parent in her bed is the only thing that will help. After a good hour of me thinking she's fallen asleep, only to have her freak as I'm trying to sneak out, I allow her to come to our bed. Didn't have to ask her twice. She jumped into our bed & snuggled right up to daddy, who has managed to sleep through the entire episode!

Three a.m. I wake to:
Little: "Daddy! Daddy! I peed my panties."
Daddy: SH**!! Yup. OK, go take off your panties & put on a pull up.
Me: "She wet the bed?" (She has NEVER had an accident, of course her first is in our bed.)
Daddy: "Just a really small amount. I'm putting a towel over it.
In other words, he wasn't getting up to change the sheets. I let him get away w/it (because it was in his side, and) it really was a pretty small amount. So I'm washing sheets right now, and will be remaking our King sized bed when he gets home. (Something I avoid due to my back.)

Love to stop right there and say my night sucked and I'm tired, but my morning continued this direction. I hit my exhaustion point around 4: 30 yesterday, so I didn't eat dinner (unless Oreos count). When I woke up, (and ate my dinner of Oreos and Diet Dr. Pepper) I watched Glee (new favorite guilty pleasure!) and I went to bed. Daddy unloaded the dishwasher & did dishes (or so I thought). When I got up this morning I realized he unloaded the dishwasher onto the counters & piled half of the dishes in the sink. Not a deal breaker for our morning routine or anything, but it is a pet peeve to have dirty dishes around the clean ones. Grumble, grumble...
Got girls off to school w/little incident, but did notice that my clean shirt has a stain on it. Grumble, grumble....
Got my Starbucks mocha, only to realize their chocolate syrup must be close to being out. (Tasted more like a sweet Latte) I even went back & asked for an extra pump. Added another when I got home. But you know, it wasn't perfect. (For $4 a day it ought to be perfect.) Grumble, grumble...
Have a bunch of important emails to send/answer, so I sat down to get to it, and my laptop locked up on me. Grumble, grumble....

After that I decided to cut my losses, nap (on the couch, cause my bed has no sheets!) and see if I can't start this day over w/less Grumble, grumble...

Electronically Addicted

Hello, my name is Mama (No last names here).
Crowd: Hello Mama
And I'm an iphone-ic (like an alcoholic, get it?)

The first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem. And I am addicted to my iphone. There is no doubt about that one. My family has declared that the thing has become merged into my left hand. And it's true, I pretty much go nowhere w/out it now. I even sleep w/it next to me at night. I know I have a problem, I just admitted it to you. But if you think about it, is it my iphone I'm addicted to or is it my ability to be connected 24/7? It's a gray area in my book. Part of my addiction has it's ties in Twitter. I'm also addicted to that and Facebook. (Of course, I am) So, which is it? Twitter or iphone? And I do love being able to check my email at any given time. Not to mention my web access, Facebook, and real time traffic updates....You're getting the scope of my problem here now aren't you. I love that I can snap a quick pix of something cute the girls are doing, add the caption and upload it right then to my Facebook page. Then I shoot it off via email to the grandparents. It's so much less involved than doing that w/my regular camera (although, nothing replaces my DSLR, but that's another addiction to post about). When we're waiting in line somewhere I have downloaded free games for Little (and Big) to play, so it's become a bit of a babysitter for me (what's not to love about that?). And I've loaded some big kid games too, I like to play solitaire in bed to put myself to sleep. (What? That's pathetic? Oh, hey anything that gets me to sleep is good in my book.) We've avoided numerous traffic jams because of it; not only do I see the traffic on a Google map, but I can see a way around the traffic because it's a Google map! And I have the most awesome music app, Pandora. You type in an artist & it creates a radio station w/music based on that. And it's been spot on for me. I love it. Trust me, I could go on and on and on (obviously!)

I pink puffy heart my iphone there is no doubt about it. It is worth every penny we pay for it. And while I agree I do probably have an addiction, I'm not giving it up. (Wish I knew how to quit you. Not really.) Nope, I might have a problem, but I'm no quitter! I'm sticking w/my iphone.

This One at Band Camp....

Mir over at Woulda, Coulda, Shoulda, just wrote a post about her first of many car camping trips. It reminded me of a specific adventure when I was a kid. I figured w/summer looming a camping story was appropriate, so here's the Reader's Digest version:

One time when I was 14 or so, my girl scout troop went to Disneyland & stayed at the campsites there, Vacationland! (You can't make this stuff up.) The "campsite" consisted of a field of grass. Our immediate neighbors where of the "white trash" variety. I know this because "Dad" walked around half the night cussing (loudly, of course) in his cowboy hat, tighty whiteys and (wait for it...) yes, his cowboy boots. Quite an education for us 14YOs. Finally, some poor traveler from the UK couldn't take it anymore & told him to shut up (in a very important sounding English accent). When we laughed loudly from our tents and other camper cheered & applauded, I guess he figured he was outnumbered & drank quietly after that.

Now THAT's a camping w/the public story!

Email to my daughter's kindergarden class

You know, I live in Silicon Valley. So, of course, it goes without saying that my daughter's kindergarten class has a groups site to coorispond w/each other and the teacher. Below is an email I shot off yesterday to her teacher and the other parents in her class. I work in the classroom & know the teacher pretty well, so thus the tone of it being a little less then formal. I thought you might enjoy it as well. If you have younger kids you can think of it as my personal PSA to you.

---------------------------------
Mrs. B,

I was wondering if anything was happening in regard to the inauguration in class on Tuesday. While our kids may not really get the importance of this event. I'm trying to do a few small things personally in hopes that they may have some memories in it's regard;i.e.--"I didn't really get that it was that big of a deal, but I do remember my parents talking about it and watching it on TV, etc..."kind of thing. If it weren't such a historic event I wouldn't be asking, but considering it is such a historic time I thought it might be covered to some degree. I will duck now from the shoe you are throwing at me for suggesting additional stuff to your day. Bye!

MamaSpeak

FYI--Other Parents, so that you don't end up in the same situation I did let me give you a warning:

I tried explain to BigSpeak why it was a really, really big deal who our new president was going to be, in an effort to try and give her some memories of this event I've bought both my girls t-shirts (we're Obama girls ;-) and we talk about him and his family. (Even if you don't
like/didn't vote for him, this is a pretty historic event.) Since BigSpeak hasn't seemed to encounter racial biases yet, she didn't understand what the heck her Mama was saying.

That's nice to know.

However, what I did do, was open a huge jar of worms about racial (and gender) bias; and that not everyone is treated equally everywhere, so my warning to any other parents who haven't dealt w/this subject and have a question asker..."Be Prepared!" It's not that it won't come up
for you at some point, if you have a question asker, like mine, you may want to think hard about how to answer the questions so that you don't end up in a 3 hour conversation about it or so that you do, but have the answers that are appropriate for a 5/6YO.

If you have a question asker, you know exactly what I mean and are laughing at me for opening my mouth in the first place.

I can hardly wait for the conversation when she figures out what being "gay" means and realizes she has a close relative who is.

Good Times is all I'm saying...

On Barbie......and self-image

Mike wrote a smackdown article over at Babble. Which is very, good and I apparently had something to say about. While writing my comment, I realized it was really more of a blog post. Rather than hijack his comments, I copied what I posted there and finished my them here:

You know, my philosophy on all of this kind of stuff is; "they covet what they can't have, so anything in moderation."
We'll see how I feel about "moderation in all things" when my girls want to do drugs or underage drinking. But I think a lot has to do with how big of a deal you make of things. If you make a big deal about it (either way/good or bad) your kid will pick up on it & then go from there..some will try to please you & some will do the exact opposite of what you want, cause that's human nature.

In regard to self-image;

Typically, the biggest influence in a girls' life is her mother, not the measurements of their Barbie doll. Kids don't miss much so if you put yourself down, even if you don't think they know, they pick up on it. Our neighbors daughter, 6, informed her the other week that she wanted to go on a diet cause she was looking fat. If we women could get over the idealizations that the media is selling us, then our kids might be able to too. Until we do, it's probably unrealistic to think they will. Sure, I wish I had my 20YO body back, I certainly didn't appreciate it then. I thought I was fat. I'm 5' 7" and I felt myself at a size 6 was FAT. Yeah, I know, but you couldn't have told me different then.

Here's the kicker, my most comfortable time in my life, body image wise, was when I was pregnant. I think that is very telling.

When I weighed the most and wore my largest dress size I was the absolute happiest with my body. To say I LOVED my pregnant self doesn't begin to convey how much I loved the way I looked at that time. Given a choice, I would be pregnant 100% of the time. Ok, I'd like to take holidays and weekends off (so I could drink lots of mulled wine & sangrias, not that I do, but I like to think I could if wanted to.) I happily wore a bikini in the summer and form fitting t-shirts and blouses. If it showed off my "bump" I wanted it. I realized when I was pregnant my body was doing exactly what it was made to do and I loved every minute of it. Talk about confident! I understood the irony of this situation. Normally I'd be wearing a bathing suit that covered much more and would be pulling in all the areas I thought I probably needed more coverage. Now a much larger me was all don the bikkini: "Check me out, I am woman (with child) hear me roar." Well, see me roar.

It was during this time that I decided that I was going to do my best to try and love my body what ever the shape and size even after I was pregnant. It became clear to me that my body image had too much to do with others not myself. My husband has always declared that he loved the way I looked and had never done or said anything for me to doubt him. Then why did I want to "have a flatter stomach, or lose 10 lbs" all the time? Because I was constantly bombarded w/images that told me I should, that's why.

I want more for my daughters. I want them to feel the way I did when I was pregnant, all the time. The only way they would learn is by example. Right now, as young children they are not self-concious at all. After bath time we often have trouble getting them to don pjs. They love to run around the house "nekkid and when we catch up with them, they shake thier booties at us." Guess I should stop encouraging that one, huh? They like it cause it gets a reaction from us. How to you bottle that self-confidence? I wish I knew. But I do think I know how to help prevent it from slipping away entirely, by example.

So now that I've had a couple of kids, and turned 40 (OMG! I'm still reeling from that number a bit, it's only been a month after all,) my body has changed even more. Yes, I do still long for the 20-something days when everything fit, my stomach was flat and gravity hadn't started to have an effect. When I had the body that gravity and time hadn't taken it's toll on and that I never appreciated until it did. But I don't dwell on it. I don't stand in front of the mirror checking out my nekkid self (I said I'm trying I didn't say I was 100% successful yet,) but I don't critisize myself either any more. (I was pretty notorious for this before.) I've been watching some shows like, "How to Look Good Naked", and how I should dress to draw your eye to my "best features" and I've gotten rid of clothes that are to "hide" my flaws. Irronically, I lost 17 lbs this summer. I wasn't trying it just came off. Am I thrilled w/the result? I like that a whole bunch of old clothes (pre-pregnancy) are fitting again, but otherwise, I'm too busy to really care too much.

After all, my daughter will only want to play Barbies with me for so long. Playing Barbies doesn't matter if you're a size 6 or a size 16, just that you can sit on the floor and pull the doll clothes on and off. I've got that part down.

Avast Me Harties!

I'm sure I totally misspelled that, but it's Pirate Speak, I'm not sure pirate were really known for their spelling abilities.
Anywho, Happy Talk Like A Pirate Day! My favorite holiday; drink rum, sing, talk funny, wear cool hats. What more could you want in a holiday?

Now go out there and annoy the crap out of everyone.

Milestones….and yes, we’ve melted

I’m better! Yeah! I was better and eating again as of last Friday (July 3). Hopefully it’ll hold. We had an amazing, relaxing, crazy, fun weekend at the beach. I have pix & if the stars all line up you may even get to see a few before Labor Day. ;-) But you know me, so don’t like bet on it or anything.
Big News! LittleSpeak hit TWO milestones today!
1. Used the potty on purpose today!!! Wahooooooo!!! It’s a step in the right direction. Now to get her to stop taking her damn diaper off all the time.
2. LittleSpeak climbed out of her crib today. I know, we’re so screwed. BigSpeak NEVER did anything like that at all. Shoot, I had her mobile up until close to her 2nd b-day. She was just a mellow, follow the rules kind of kid. (That’s over.) Little Speak , we knew was just a matter of time. We’ll see if falling out has curbed her from it, or if I’ll be making an emergency trip to Ikea soon.
Got to go to bed!! More soon. I promise.

Hot Gift

I know a week or two ago I was complaining about how it’s supposed to almost be summer & we are freezing over here! But this week the temperature has been creeping up and today we were about 95° . Not having AC we’re feeling a bit warm in the Speak household (the kids’ rooms are about 80° at 7:30 this evening). In this case the heat wave does have an upside?; my folks gave us a margarita maker last weekend. It was a late anniversary gift. Coincidently my folks are spending the night here; they’re having their house tented for termites, so we broke out the margarita machine (actually the thing is so freakn’ huge it has it’s own spot permanently on the counter!) No margaritas though, mudslides! Yeah Baby! YUM! Not low carb, but yummy.

Typical Night at Home

DaddySpeak and I are having a typical evening at home.

Girls are asleep upstairs.
TV is on; watching Dirty Jobs.
He’s sitting on the love seat and I’m on the couch, we each like to stretch out and have a blanket (cause we're true romantics). AND...

We each have a laptop going; I’m digi-scrapping, he’s cruising the Internet.

Romantics at heart, that's us!

No, we are not emailing each other!

Do you think they're sinc'd w/goggle maps too?

When we eat LittleSpeak now sits in a booster seat on a regular chair. This seat has an attachable tray but she’s really too big for it to fit on the seat anymore. Tonight at dinner she wanted it and DaddySpeak put it on for her then she got upset because it was too tight. Being upset she asked for her “ba”. I told her no, and asked her if she was a baby. As usual, she smiled hugely and shook her head no. The following conversation ensued:

BigSpeak: LittleSpeak are you going to send your binks to the babies soon?
LittleSpeaks nods and then shakes her head no. She’s understandably a bit torn about the whole concept still.

BigSpeak: The bink fairy is going to come get the binks and bring you a present! (Turns to me) Does the Bink Fairy come after you go to bed?

MommySpeak: Yup.

BigSpeak: Do you know what she looks like?

MommySpeak: No, she won’t come unless everyone’s in bed so we’ve never seen her.

BigSpeak: But she has wings cause she's a fairy.

MommySpeak: That's correct.

BigSpeak: All fairy's have wings. Angels have wings. They have halos too!

MommySpeak: Yes they do.

DaddySpeak: Angels can float you know.

BigSpeak: They can? Like in the water?

MommySpeak: No in the air.

DaddySpeak: Angels can pretty much go anywhere. They can even float through walls.

BigSpeak: Their halos let them float. I hope they don't get lost, what if they get lost?

MommySpeak & DaddySpeak: (in unison) The halo works as a GPS too.
Dude, I can’t make this stuff up.

One if by Land, Two if by Sea! (What if they use email?)

Classic! Looks like it’s going to get taken onto the Bay itself; perfect! Maybe Jeff Probst could deliver it Survivor style (by helicopter) from the boat into Justin Herman Plaza.

Torch Watch 2008

I’m watching/listening to the coverage of the torch relay on the web right now. They’re showing a bus that was stopped by the crowd who believe the torch is located on the bus. I doubt it. There’s no cops anywhere near the bus, so I’m thinking it’s a ploy to try to drive them away from where it really is. It’s actually kind of funny, most of the media can’t find the torch right now. (update: they just located it on Van Ness!) They’ll probably announce the end of the run and then tell everyone the where they ran it. Maybe down in San Jose. LOL.

I have mixed feelings about the whole thing. I totally think that the protesters have the right to protest. I also think that China has major human rights violations, and therefore should not have been considered an appropriate venue for this event, unless they were to make concessions in that regard. In many ways the torch run has become a spectacle, it’s “torch watch” not “flame watch” cause they keep extinguishing the darn thing. And it’s not fair to the athletes or the torch bearers. It’s considered an honor to get to carry the torch, and to be accepted to compete in the games; aren’t the protests are taking that away from those people. I agree that human life is worth so much more than a torch run, But this is the Olympics; we’re all supposed to come together and ignore our political differences, right? When the difference is basic human rights, which, I agree, shouldn’t be ignored, then why the heck were they awarded the games in the first place? I know; Politics. Bah. The IOC can’t follow the directive to stay away from politics, why would you expect that anyone else would try to play along.
At the same time, one could argue that the IOC has done this cause a huge favor. In awarding the games to China, they’ve given this cause the world’s stage. In what other venue could you get this kind of coverage? The attention being given to the human rights issues related to China is unmatched right now. There are so many people who might have become so aware of these issues had it not been for the Olympics being awarded to China in the first place.

In the meantime, we’ll be entertained by watching the media do their dance trying to locate the thing.

Starbucks Closed!!!

Did you know that Starbucks closed tonight for 3 hours????

Every single Starbucks in the Nation was closed.

WTF???? Just Wrong People.

Luckily, I was forward thinking and headed over to my local Barnes & Nobel café.
I’m nothing if not resourceful.

At The Very Least She Could Do Spoken Word

So this afternoon I was playing with the girls in the playroom and they pulled out their musical instruments. I belted out “On Top of Spaghetti”. DD1 stopped what she was doing to listen & requested an encore. After that she says, “Want to hear my song?” Sure!

My poor meatball turned into a guy. He rolled out the window & wouldn’t come
back till the sun laid down.

The airplane dumped into the trash can & wouldn’t come back until the 4th of July.

He turned into the sun and wouldn’t come back until the clouds waited up.

But at the end of the day he turned back into a meatball.

Who knew she was so deep?

I’m signing her up to work coffee houses starting next weekend.

Driving in the car….

We are sitting in DaddySpeak’s new Nissan Altima Hybrid at a stop light and notice that the truck in front of us has cheesy cover on the hitch.

DaddySpeak: I’m gonna git me a hitch on this car just so I can get a cover on it.

MommySpeak: Why don’t you just get the car slamed w/neon lights lining the bottom?

DaddySpeak: Nope, I think a hitch w/a cover would trick this car out.

MommySpeak: Ohh! I know, get some truck nutz on it!

DaddySpeak: You think if they made those for motorcycles you’d only get one ball?

MommySpeak: I am SO blogging this…

Ok, prior to posting this I did not know that biker ballz existed. Now I do. No, DS you still get the standard issue 2, but since there's no picture I'm not positive where they would go on a bike. They come in many colors too; flesh, brass and camo to name a few. Of course they do.

The post in which I float away…..

I live in CA, have you seen us on the national weather map? We are under the big green blob the West. The one indicating heavy rain. It has been raining since last weekend. In California. Usually we don’t get that much water for any length of time. I ordered wellies during the big storms we had a few weeks ago, cause they were cute & I was jealous of the kids with all their cute shoes. My husband & mother laughed at me, cause you know, we get so much rain here.

Suddenly I don’t feel so foolish, or wet.

We were supposed to go back up to Tahoe this weekend, but being the wussies that we are, we bailed. We were supposed to go with some friends this time & they were not impressed that we backed out, but they didn’t just sit in the car with toddlers during a storm. Dude, the thought of 8+ hours in the car w/DD2 who just lurves riding in her car seat and communicates that through screaming at the top of her lungs, (for HOURS) made us rethink the whole deal. As I sit here listening to it get worse and worse, I’m glad we did. So instead of sitting the car listening to the screams & whines of toddlers, I’m sitting here listening to Sesame Street the gurgling of the gutters as they’re overloaded with water.
It’s weird to have an unscheduled weekend for a change. Guess I should take advantage of it and start working on those resolutions related to the house.