Face Book Reject

So as I mentioned last week, I am addicted to Facebook. I have 142 friends. My hubby has 248. We competed for a time, but he obviously won. I update my status once or twice or ten times a day. I post photos, I look at other people's photos and leave comments. You get the idea, I'm hooked.

So yesterday, I was paging through my list of friends and I noticed something - a "friend", a boy I dated in 9th grade. Well, wait, let me correct that: he asked me to "go out with him" we talked on the phone and walked to a couple of classes together. I never knew what to say to him, we had long awkward silences then about 2 weeks into the relationship (ahem) I had my friend break up with him. He then went on to become a tough boy punk rock kind of dude and was forever rude to me, until like 12th grade when he started speaking to me again. And no, I'm not saying that my breakup from our intense relationship caused all that, I'm just saying that's what he was like. So he ended up living and working in some big city and being single and leading some kind of interesting life that I really wouldn't want to lead. Anyways, I'm talking in circles, aren't I? Are you wondering where this is going? Yeah, so am I. Ok, back to my point. This "friend" had de-friended me! He was no longer on my list! So I searched his name. He still had a profile and he still had 209 friends. 209 of his closest, dearest friends, so close that he obviously didn't have room for little ol' me to be his 210th. What a blow to the ego! I mean do I care about him? Of course not. Do I need to know anything more about him? Nope. But still, I was rejected on Facebook! Was it my lame suburban housewife comments that got to him? Was it my incessant droning on about my crazy kids? Was he only keeping cool city hipsters on his list? What could it have been? Am I not one of the cool kids? Did he hold with him my pathetic rejection for the past 20 years, and finally had his moment to get back at me? Was it the stupid tests I kept taking that annoyed him - could he no longer read what kind of fairy I was or what name I should have been named? Or did he look through my photos and get some satisfaction in the knowledge that I gained more weight than he since school, and now he could move on? What was it?! Why would he defriend me?!

And yes, this is what went through my head as I prepared dinner last night. Facebook has reverted me back to a socially insecure highschooler. The horror.

A list

So I'm totally addicted to Face Book. Completely. I am an addict. So is most of the United States, it would appear, so I don't feel all that bad about it. Perhaps it's the reason the Economy has tanked - no one is actually doing their jobs, they are just looking up old loves on FB all day.

If you are on FB, you know that it is being polluted by lists. Lists on everything you can think of, really. Fav movies, books, songs, hottest serial killers, ugliest flowers, blah, blah, blah. So the list thing has infected my head. For weeks now I've been walking around making lists in my head. Here's the one I made today:

My Favorite Things about Spring/Summer

1. Bare Feet
2. Gin N Tonics
3. My annual beach vacation with the Fam
4. Margaritas
5. Backyard BBQ's
6. The smell of lilacs
7. Strawberries, blueberries and raspberries
8. The Emmaus Farmers Market - going there every Sunday for some shopping and bonding with my little D1.
9. Hanging out on my adirondack chair in the backyard listening to Bob Marley
10. Street Fairs and carnivals
11. Ice Cream

I got to 11. Probably would look nicer if I had stayed at 10, but who can leave out ice cream? I mean really.

Checking In

So, I have to be honest with you. I've been feeling a little uncertain about this blog lately. It started out being a place to talk about myself, but as so many Stay at Home Mom's can attest to, talking about myself doesn't have a whole lot of content these days, and so it became telling a whole lot of stories about D1 and D2. But I've been having some concerns about that lately. You see, a lot of people who actually know me in real life read this blog. This was by my own design, so I have only myself to blame. But, I've been concerned lately that maybe I'm not being fair to my little girls. D1 especially. Am I giving her a bad reputation? I dwell on the more, errr, negative aspects because well, for two reasons, I suppose. One is because this gives me a place to vent, and usually feel better about things. And two, because, come on, they are pretty hilarious! Well, that is if you aren't the one cleaning up the egg shells or running after the naked little angels.

My D1 (and D2, too!) are spirited, creative, self reliant and curious. But is that what people think after reading my blog? Or do they think destructive and wild? Do they know that D1 trys to take care of her Mommy and Daddy when they are sick? Bringing them water to drink and a blanket to snuggle with? Do they know that she loves to help Momma bake? Or that she always sticks up for her little sister at the playground? Do they know that she willingly gave up her pacifier to the paci fairy so that little babies who needed their own paci's could have them? Or that the sound of the wind drives her out of her own bed into the safety of Mommy and Daddy's room? I guess I assume everyone knows D1's other side. The way she likes to snuggle up to her Daddy and watch a flyers game, or how she likes to make up stories with her Mama about Princess D1 and Princess D2 and their Queen Mommy. How excited she gets to see her older cousins - you'd think they were rock stars the way she acts!

So I've been holding back a little. Not sure what to write about. Writing about me and my adventures has to include my girls, but to what extent? And is focusing on the negative good for them, or for my parenting for that matter?

I'm just not sure, I guess.

Easter

As a little laugh before Easter, I thought I would post an email I sent to a friend right after Easter 2006. It was D1's first Easter, and in honor of that, Hubby and I decided to host our very first Holiday dinner with Hubby's family - his parents, brother and his girlfriend, Grandmother, Aunt and Uncle and Cousins. We were going to try to fit all those people into our tiny little house and impress the heck out of them with our well cooked food and great hospitality.

And of course, that's not how it went:

My Easter was a disaster. It started Saturday - my sciatica started giving me trouble, which it hasn't bothered me in probably 2 years, but it kicked in, so I totally didn't get half the stuff done that I needed. So Sunday started with me way behind. Luckily Hubby's Bro and his girlfriend came early and helped. But still I was behind. 30 mins before everyone was coming, I was just getting around to putting the ham in the oven. Before I could do this, we spied my neighbor (house behind me) passing out and falling to the ground. I ran over first, with Hubby a few seconds behind. We thought he was dead - so scary. Here he's diabetic and passed out from that. He hit his head on the driveway pretty hard and was bleeding. So we called 911. Then while we were waiting for them, I drove over to his church (very funny - me and an all black baptist church) to get his wife. Needless to say, I was a little frazzled by that. So I opened up the wine :) and started drinking :) drinking a little too much, to be exact :) Well, all the food managed to get into the oven, late, but that was ok. Then everything but the pineapple stuffing was done, so we decided to start with the salad while that finished up. Hubby complained to me that he was worried about the stuffing because it was dripping, and the oven was a little smokey. I told him not to worry about it. A few minutes later he checked on it again, and oooops! The oven was on fire. Really bad. We all had to leave the house and Hubby had to use the fire extinguisher on the oven (still haven't cleaned it yet - yuck!). It wasn't too horrible, actually. I think we only had to wait @30 mins before we could go back into the house :) Luckily Ham tastes good cold. Next, I decide to toast D1 for her excellent gene pool, and manage to drop my entire glass of wine all over Hubby's plate. Hmmmmm..... who do you think was angry by this point? Then, I find the whole event hilarious, so I go upstairs to take care of D1 and decide to call my parents, forgetting of course that the monitor was on. A classy kind of day :) I'm lucky my husband is still speaking to me.

I wanted to talk to you, I have great visions for D1's Bday party and wanted your advice. I'm hoping this time the fire will be elevated to the point of needing fire trucks. Every kid loves fire trucks :)No seriously, wanted to talk to you about baking and stuff.
And that was our first try at Holiday Entertaining! We haven't done an Easter at our house since.

Happy Easter, and if you're hosting, here's hoping it is Smoke Free!

Super Freak

So, I really enjoy using the word "freaking". Not nearly as much as it's cousin, the F bomb, but in a very poor attempt at censoring myself, I use freaking. A lot. In fact, I have quite a few words and/or phrases that ummmm, color my language. "For the love of god" is one. I attribute that to my Jersey days. It's just a very Jersey thing to say, I think. Oh, and along those same lines I say "oh my god, I almost died". "Crap" I say way too much, which is another pathetic try at not saying shit. Although I still say "shit" a lot too, a favorite phrase being "I don't give two shits..."

But anyways, I digress. Hmmmm, that's a word I don't use often enough. I'll have to remember that. Ok, back to what I was saying. About a month ago, my Dad was visiting and in the course of our conversation, I probably said "freaking" a good 5 times. Which he felt compelled to point out, saying "you know, you say freaking a lot, you should probably watch that or your kids are going to start saying it"

Arghhh... my Dad freaking jinxed me!

Today, I was standing on a step stool, digging out the finger paint from the top shelf in the craft closet (which EVERYTHING is on the top shelf in the craft closet, come on, you've read this blog, I can't leave anything lower!) While I was digging around, the bag of playdough fell and scared D1. Can you guess her response? Here it was: "Freaking playdough, you just freaked me out". Ahhhhh.... thanks Dad!

After I stopped laughing, I called hubby to tell him. And after he stopped laughing, he pointed out what a smart girl D1 is. She figured out how to use "freaking" two ways! As an adjective and a verb! Words can not fully express how freaking proud I am.

A Hit for Reality

This morning I took the girls outside. It's still a bit chilly, but we bundled up in sweatshirts and jeans, and were just fine. I spent the time outside working on a small garden bed. The girls dug for jewels and other mysteries, then they went onto the deck and played with some old flower pots - making "flower pizzas". I was just three steps below them in the yard. As I was listening to them chatter on about flower pizzas and dirt and jewels and other imaginary things, I smiled to myself, pleased with their little imaginations at work. As some of you who also blog may do as well, my mind wandered to a possible blog post about the morning. About how that moment felt so good, felt exactly like what I thought the joys and awards of parenthood would be like. My heart grew warmer as I mentally narrated the scene. Far off in the distance, I heard D1 whine about a crack in her pizza pot. As I knelt with my head down, from the corner of my eye I could see her coming towards me, but still I dreamed on.

And that's when she dropped the terra cotta pot onto my head. It broke into several pieces. ON MY HEAD. Ok, maybe you don't understand. She was on the deck, I was down on my hands and knees in the dirt. And she dropped a flower pot onto my head. My head broke the pot. Ok, do you understand now? The pain, I mean. I was lucky, it did not bleed - surprising since head wounds are supposed to bleed like crazy. But I guess I was lucky, nothing actually punctured my skin.

As I type this with one hand, the other hand holding ice to the lump that is forming on my head, I have to laugh, and once again remind all of you that parenthood is nothing like you think it will be. But it's certainly full of surprises.

Fame

So, I just wanted to let you all know that if you google "wiping someone else's bum" my site comes up #2 !

It's a proud, proud moment, my friends!