I thought we had left earthquake alley behind us? Of all the places I would have expected to experience a significant earthquake- Virginia wasn’t one of them. All is well in the armpit of DC. Lots of things fell off the wall, all my poor kokeshi dolls took a bad tumble off the bookshelf (although they had a soft landing on that zappos box I keep procrastinating on shipping). Mackenzie was abruptly awoken from her nap. Nathan was at school and seemed unfazed. PC happened to be home and pushed us both off the couch before picture frames clonked us on the head, I ran to the door frame and he ran up to check on Mackenzie. If you’ve never been in an earthquake its really quite surreal. Its like time just freezes and it seems like they last for minutes (though admittedly this one was quite long) and, for me anyway, its hard to process what to do…..run to the kids? Run to a door frame? Run with the kids to a door frame? Duck under the kitchen table? It all happens so fast and yet so slow. When the earthquake and subsequent tsunami scare hit Japan in the spring of 2010 I remember bolting out of bed (PC, of course, was deployed) and since both kids were sound asleep I contemplated for a second….then ran to Mackenzie’s room…..then ran to Nathan’s room…..then back to Mackenzie’s room….then it was over. Probably not a brilliant plan but the best I could come up with when bolting awake in the middle of the night.

After the great quake here this afternoon everyone starts running to the streets….Im not sure thats a smart idea? Aren’t you supposed to worry about falling trees and power lines? I had texted my friend (who is awaiting her household goods from Japan) about things falling off the wall and she responded with, “Im glad our decorating only consists of an air mattress and card table.” Touche.

Filed under: This Is My Life

Last week I went to Boston to watch my brother’s three kids for three days. In addition to my own. That’s right, add it up: five children under my care. I was a little intimidated by this, lets be honest, I find the two that belong to me a little daunting somedays I wasn’t sure how I was going to manage five. I warned Mark well in advance that I’d make sure that everyone was alive, and probably fed, but definitely not clean. And I also could not guarantee the house would be standing when everything was said and done.

Im happy to report that not only was the house still standing, but the only casualty was a picture frame. I was downstairs and heard something drop near the balcony. When I inquired about what had happened sweet little Sarah who is four announced “oh….it was just my light ’savoe’ (saber). It knocked a picture off the wall but its ok. I’ve done it before.” Yes- the light sabers get you every time.

So all in all, it really wasn’t bad. I survived. The kids survived. I could do it again. Ok fine, and lets be honest, I had help. They had gotten me sitters to help from the lunch to dinner shift to help control the crowd. That being said, I probably could have done it on my own. Maybe. Or not at all.

Filed under: This Is My Life

Dear Nathan,

Funny how my last post was feeling very WOE towards summer and now its speeding right by. We zipped through the rest of June and now we’re nearing the end of July which means next week you will be six. SIX.

We have just three more weeks until you head back to school- a big first grader. I sort of look forward to these annual summaries- mostly because for as much as you change, you just stay exactly the same.

I have this picture of you, this one here:

and I remember looking at it for the first time thinking “he looks like such a little old man- like a little grandpa in this picture.” I think there is some poetic justice there because, well, you act like a little old man. Our neighbor told me just recently how much you crack her up. “Nathan has such a great personality….he’s like your grandpa- he can be a totally crotchety old man, but he can be so sweet and gentle too.” Yes- that. You have the ability to be this perfect angel. You know how to behave and be good and treat people with kindness. You are also very blunt and direct and can be totally lacking in tact.

Last night we went out to eat with your cousins and Daniel wasn’t eating. He had a sad look on his face and both your aunt CJ and I were coddling him asking what was wrong and if everything was ok. You look over and without an ounce of gentleness blurt out, “Whats wrong with you? Why aren’t ya eating yer dinner? If you didn’t want meatballs, you SHOULD’VE just ordered the chicken.” All while using very “no duh” kind of body language. All I could do was glare at you because honestly…..Nathan….you’re going to have to work on your approach because this isn’t going to work with the ladies. Then again, maybe you get this blunt directness from your Uncle Mark who, on his first date with your aunt told her upon finishing her meal, “Wow, you really wolfed that down.”

You come up with some great one-liners and I wish I had the kind of memory that could catalog them long enough to write them down, some of them I do, some I don’t but you are such a smart quick witted kid. You don’t miss a trick and you are old enough and smart enough to not let me pull one over on you. We went to the pool a few weeks ago and I told you we’d stay “2 hours.” Because of Mackenzie’s demenor we decided to wrap things up after about 50 minutes. “Time to go,” I tell you. You ask me if its been two hours and I tell you yes. “Impossible….there hasn’t even been one break time yet. If we were here two hours we would have had two break times.” Ah. Busted.

But for as much as you can be blunt and direct you can also be endearingly sweet. You love to play with babies and you speak to them in a high pitched motherease voice. You also can be so wonderful and sweet to your sister, especially given the right motivation (“if there is any fighting over the markers neither of you get to use them”). It makes me beam when I see you helping her and being your sweet self to her. Telling her what a pretty picture she’s drawing and did she need help opening the marker and helping her learn her colors.

You still love airplanes as much as you always have. Im wondering if this is going to be in every single post I write for you? If you don’t grow up to be a pilot, Im sort of stumped as to what you’ll do. We just recently were riding on an airport shuttle and there was a pilot on there who saw you carrying your new Jet Blue set. I explained your love of airplanes and he told me, “[the love of airplanes] it starts early, and it never goes away.”

Your 6th birthday has been celebrated a total of three times now; your Super Mario party with your friends, a poolside party in St. Maarten with your cousins, and a Boston BBQ with your other cousins. I think 6 is off to a great start.

I love you,
mom

Filed under: Nate the Great, Uncategorized

I know I’ve been sort of MIA lately. This isn’t intentional, there has just been a lot going on, PC has been gone a lot, and the biggest time suck of all: school is out for the summer. I can’t believe school starts in just a few short weeks but we’ve had a great summer. We’ve had family come visit, we went to St. Maarten for a week, we went to Boston to see family and when PC gets home this weekend we’ll finally be completely and totally finished with the Okinawa commuting. A. Men.

When we’ve been home we’ve spent our time by the pool, raiding Target, and trolling the candy bins at Wegmans under the guise that the kids may pick out one item for good behavior. In addition to candy aisle goodies, here’s what I’ve been loving this summer:

Lip Slip- you guys, I hate lipgloss. I just do. Its sticky and goopy. The only thing I hate more than lipgloss is lipstick. Lip Slip is awe.some. It feels like really good lip balm. Its still a little sticky but its no where near as bad as some of the other stuff I’ve had. Its just the perfect amount of shiny and sparkly and just brings out the natural color in your lips. Its spendy, but worth it.

Neutrogena Wet Skin Kids- I couldn’t help but laugh the first day that the pool was open, the mom’s came flooding in toting towels and coolers and pushing strollers. Within a few minutes a cloud of sunscreen started to emerge- everyone was spraying. I looked around and didn’t see a single person using sunscreen lotion. When you go down the sunscreen aisle at Target now there are more sprays than lotions. The problem is, I know its bad, all those chemicals but when it comes to sunscreen the way I see it is the lesser of three evils: paint yourself white using the ‘natural’ zinc oxide sunscreen, use the chemical laden spray or use nothing at all. I bought this Neutrogena kind based on packaging alone (well done marketing department). I liked the blue can. It looked summery and clean. It smells summery and clean. Try it- you’ll like it.

My tote. PC came home one day and I announced I needed a tote bag. He looked at me and shook his head and said that I, in fact, did not. I was actually rifling though the house looking for a freebie I had gotten in Okinawa and it mysteriously disappeared. Its unlikely PC offloaded this without my knowing so it really is a mystery. Despite my husbands feeling that the nautical style beach totes are dorky, I think they are quite cute and ended up with one from Lands End. Don’t think this was an easy choice- no ma’am. LL Bean sells a comparable one but in the end, the Land’s End one had a key fob and when Im unloading all our towels and beach gear just to find our stupid key card to get into the pool- the key fob sporting tote was going to be the clear winner. I think PC may have changed his tune after we used for a week in St. Maarten and it was the bag that would hold everything.

Coconut Passionfruit lotion- frivolous, smells a little bit like what I may have worn in 6th grade but I love it. Its fruity and tropical and after this unPRECEDENTED heat we’ve been having, I can either slather some on and smell like a summer dream or do nothing and smell like a horse by the end of the day. Its no wonder people like being around me so much.

I would also list my babysitter, she’s been one of my favorite things of summer, but she might not like her face on the internet. What are your summer favorites? Because summer isn’t quite over yet, I might need what you have too.

Filed under: Things I like

I remember as a kid loving the long days of summer. I also remember being bored a lot. I’ve discovered now that Im on the other side of the coin (being the parent) that summer is not all its cracked up to be. I read so many blogs written by moms who “don’t have time to write because they are having so much summer fun with their children.” Who are these people because either they are lying or they know something I don’t.

I got all ambitious about 2 weeks before school let out and I came up with a plan: homeschool. Hold onto your hats- I know, Im like the least likely individual to propose any kind of homeschool plan but I knew the best way to approach those long days of summer was with a good plan in place. I came up with several topics and every week we’d start a new topic. For each topic there would be activities, worksheets, books, crafts and even a fieldtrip at the end. I even bought a whiteboard. We made it one week. Barely. Then there was whining and a 2yr old who has the attention span of a bean and not sharing colored pencils and not wanting to do that math worksheet and, “no, not read THAT book.” And because Im easily discouraged I said to hell with it.

So plan B was instead of going to the pool in the afternoon after nap, to start going in the mornings, tire the heck out of my kids and then make them tired all afternoon. That works pretty good except not so well on the days we need to run errands- because its morning or bust. This past week has been bible school and let me tell you it is like a Holy Spirit Breath of Fresh Air not having the two of them home all day every day. That has probably been the worst part of this all is the way the two of them are interacting. The fighting has increased exponentially, the dinner table shenanigans have resulted in them having to be separated (“her foot is on me”, “she touched my chair”, “he spit at me”, “he stuck his tongue out” “shes looking at me”- it goes on and on and on) because its so out of control. And there is just so much……commotion? Its not even that its always fighting its just so….noisy…..and messy……and boingy.

I’ve pretty much totally and entirely thrown my hands up in the air when it comes to the state of the house. I know we’re just sort of naturally messy individuals, but summer has caused us to reach critical mass. I don’t even flinch anymore when I hear the sound of the entire bin of Little People being dumped out. Standard.

But, its not all doom and gloom. We’ve done some fun things like gone blueberry picking. We go get ice cream. We have fun at the pool. We eat on the back patio. We make fruity drinks and I always have little people coming up and telling me they love me. I guess I can’t be screwing up too badly?

Filed under: McSassy, Nate the Great

I turned 32 a few weeks ago. I don’t think its really sunk in because someone asked me the other day how old I was and I answered 30. Not to be deceiving, but thats just the number my brain fired off.

Here is what makes me me, at the age of 32.

-Lets just start with coffee. I wouldn’t say this is the most important thing in my life, but its up there as one of the little things in life that I look forward to every day. Sometimes its a latte, sometimes its drip coffee….some days its iced, some days its not. I’ve searched long and hard for the perfect mugs to house such coffee– I found them at Target. They are stonewear and so they are heavy, and they are big-ish and just the right shape and fairly thick. While I have three colors I always pick yellow. Its the happiest I think. My husband- because he’s my hero– went to a couple different Targets to find the yellows- he bought the last three.

-Sewing- I love to sew. I sew almost every day. You can see my stuff here. You can buy it here. I love to sew for myself and for others. I love being able to make something with my own two hands. I love that its somewhat of a lost art, and that Im one of the few who have the know how (though I have much to learn).

-pinterest- you guys, this is the single best website on the whole entire internet. I cannot get enough of it. Its just like the very best of everything and it makes me happy to scroll through it every day.

-cooking- I still love to cook, though admittedly its taking a bit of a backseat to the sewing these days. Also, I hate my kitchen. That may have something to do with it too. I love the art of preparing a meal, of combining simple things and ending up with something wonderful.

-thrifting/vintage- I can recall a time when I was in jr. high that my mom took me to Target (this was before Target was cool mind you) and I was so mortified to be shopping at Target. Like, we looked like poor people or something just by being in the store. I remember how mad she got at me and hissed at me to “grow up.” I wouldn’t have dared set foot in a Goodwill or some kind of thrift store. And yet here I am- a veteran thrift shopper. I love a bargain, I love something with a story. I like knowing that I’ve made use of something someone else thought was junk– if they only knew what it could be- how it could be revived with a little love and a can of spray paint! And I love how now its becoming trendy, thats me- a real trend setter at Goodwill.

-environment/organics- Im still pretty passionate about environmental issues, and especially when it comes to our food. We belong to a farm club that brings us organic, local milk in glass bottles every week. Most weeks I buy only organic produce and Im just delighted when the organic strawberries are the same price or cheaper than the conventional ones. I hope we’re finally trending in a better, more sustainable direction.

-the great outdoors- I love being outside. We just went camping for spring break and I just don’t think there are many things in life that top eating breakfast at a picnic table, sunshine on your face, our beat up green coleman stove heating up water for the instant coffee you are about to drink. I love camping. Nathan and I have a real garden this year (as opposed to the container gardens we fail at most every other year). PC made us a raised bed and we actually have a real garden. I want my kids to feel connected to the outside. I want them to know how plants grow and where food comes from and the satisfaction of eating a tomato you grew yourself.

-exercise- I like feeling strong and fit and healthy. I love the sense of accomplishment I get when I see mile after mile added to my total on my Nike+. I run with my neighbor and three miles goes by quickly. I run with Mackenzie or I run by myself. I don’t particularly like to run but I feel so much better for the entire rest of the day that its worth the 30 or 40 minutes of punishment. My friend Abbey is training for a marathon and while I don’t think I’ll ever go that route, she said it best when she said, “Im turning 30 this year, I want to be in the best shape of my life. And then I want to stay that way until I die.”

-i want a craftsman bungalow- I want something old and charming and with character. I want to fix things up and re-do things here and there. I want to paint and decorate. I want to tear down and rebuild. At the same time, PC and I are sort of lazy home owners and hired people to come turn on the sprinklers for us. So, this may be a little idealistic.

-i want an airstream. I really do. I want a little old Bambi and we went to gut it and totally redo it into something great. This is probably more likely than the craftsman at this point in time.

-i love the interconnectedness of family, of shared traits, of things that are passed on. My grandpa and mom came out for my birthday a few weeks ago and it was so sweet to see my kids with my grandpa. To see him on the floor coloring with Mackenzie, or building legos with Nathan. My parents are in the process of selling the house I grew up in. My mom is a saver and was telling me of Fiestawear of my great grandmothers that she is going to send to me because I love dishes- (I love dishes- you can never have too many dishes). She gave me some aprons of my grandmothers that Im anxious to find a way to display- they are just like the ones you see at Anthropology but they were hers, and that makes them special. I love hand written recipe cards that belonged to my grandmothers, notes from my kids, and love letters from that boy I met on the internet- these are the kinds of things I’d rescue from a fire (actually the love letters from our high school days are pretty syrupy and sappy- I think maybe it would be ok to let those go, he.)

And this- I don’t know who wrote it, but its just perfect.

I BELIEVE IN SIMPLICITY. I BELIEVE IN FAITH AND FAMILY, FRIENDSHIP AND FIDELITY, FORGIVENESS AND FORTITUDE. I BELIEVE IN MOTHERHOOD AND MAKE BELIEVE. I BELIEVE IN DRINKING COLORFUL COCKTAILS AND FEASTING ON FABULOUS FOOD. I BELIEVE IN MUSIC AND ART AND LANGUAGE AND LOVE. I BELIEVE IN LAUGHING UNTIL YOUR FACE HURTS AND LOVING UNTIL YOUR HEART BREAKS. I BELIEVE IN BUBBLE BATHS AND BEING BAREFOOT. I BELIEVE IN POETRY, PUPPIES AND PLAYING IN THE PARK. I BELIEVE IN SCHEDULED WORKING ON WEEKDAYS AND SLEEPING IN ON WEEKENDS. I BELIEVE IN HONEST EXPRESSION AND THE GOLDEN RULE. I BELIEVE IN NATURE AND NAPS AND NOVELS THAT END LEAVING ME SAD THAT THEY’RE OVER. I BELIEVE IN GOD AND GOODNESS AND GRATITUDE AND GRACE. I BELIEVE IN UNICORNS AND THE POWER OF THE UNIVERSE. I BELIEVE IN BEING AUTHENTICALLY AWESOME. I BELIEVE IN BEING HAPPY AND I BELIEVE THAT IN ORDER TO ACHIEVE THAT I MUST RECOGNIZE AND APPRECIATE MY MANY BLESSINGS AND BE A BLESSING IN RETURN.

Filed under: Grace in Small Things, This Is My Life, Uncategorized

How was your Mother’s Day? Ours was quiet- just the way I like it. PC made breakfast, carved a watermelon shark and both kids were happy playing outside so I was able to work on this:

PC says our current picnic blanket is too small so I finally decided to use up this Hope Valley fabric I’ve been hoarding and make the largest picnic blanket possible. I love it.

Filed under: Uncategorized

Dear Mackenzie,

I suppose I should start this out with an apology. Years from now when you ask me “what did I do?” I’ll have a sporadic record at best. In fact, it just occurred to me recently that between our flying back for Scott and Ashley’s wedding and our whirlwind move, you didn’t ever get a 2 yr old check up. Whoops.

A few weeks ago you turned two and a half. While I have to admit that with your brother, it seemed like the stages flew by (or maybe Im just remembering it that way) but with you, I find that every time you melt into the floor in a heap I think “seriously- we’re still doing this?” You do have a little drama princess in you. Your thing as of late is to look all hurt when you don’t get your way, head hung low and let out these HUGE NOTICE-ME sighs. You’ve caught on to their ineffectiveness and now you’ve even started crossing your arms in addition to sighing. Dang-it its cute.

You are a vibrant, colorful, fiesty little girl. I think Ive used the word fiesty or sassy to describe you in every post I’ve ever written. Its funny because I called you McSassy based on what I thought your personality was like in utero. Nathan was mellow, you….were not. I find it sort of amazing that I was spot on and you haven’t changed one bit. Maybe I should have called you McObedient or McDoesWhatMomSays. Probably wouldn’t have made any difference. When your grandma was here a few weeks ago I asked her if you reminded her of me. She told me that the ‘lowering-your-head-looking-up-with-big-eyes-when your-feelings-are-hurt’ is much like your mama. But mostly she said this, “she’s…….well, she’s got her own plan and her own course.” Yes, I was afraid of this. You are a very determined individual. Someday I think this will serve you well. Right now, I’d just like it better if you do what Im asking you to do because dammit why does it have to take so. long. to just put your shoes on and go out to the car. They are FLIP FLOPS for crying out loud.

Its hard to stay mad for too long because well you are just so cute and charming. You’ve recently started getting into dress up stuff, this makes all my hoarding of halloween costumes from the thrift shop all worth while. You usually change between a satin yellow skirt and a sheer sparkly purple skirt. You call them ‘dress ups’ (as opposed to it being the act of getting dressed up). You love to run into the bathroom and admire yourself in the mirror donning one of your dress ups. Note that I said run because still, to this day, you run everywhere. People who don’t know you find great humor in this. We just attribute it to the fact that some part of you will always be Japanese. And the Japanese never walk, they run. I don’t know how you aren’t more exhausted at the end of every day with the amount of running you do.

You love to play outside and go to the park. You especially love digging in the dirt. This is in stark contrast to your brother who refused to walk barefoot in grass, or sit in grass and if he did, then he’d use the back of his hand to push himself up so he didn’t have to actually touch the grass. You have dirt under your fingernails daily. I think this is a good thing. Your dad and I joke that you are a hippy at heart, digging in the dirt adds to our suspicion.

Im not proud to admit that you love TV. We do spend some portion of every day outside so its fair to say that your entire brain is not turning to mush, but I suppose I should be embarrassed that you know several words in Chinese from watching so much Kai Lan. I often hear you singing a song from a show and you now refer to hearts as “super happy[s]“. Or my other personal favorite, you’ll run up to me, scrunch up your nose and furrow your brow and tell me, “I so mad” (another quote you’ve gleaned from Kai Lan). Your TV watching is usually directly correlated to my workload and while its not a great excuse, it comes down to either getting dumped at daycare or being home with me and watching an hour of TV. Based on the fact that every time we get in the car you tell me, “no, not Mindy’s how (house)” you’d rather not go to the sitter.

You always have lots to say and for the most part we can understand it. I find the fact that you [still] add ‘now’ to every phrase you utter pretty cute. I even find myself responding with nows. You can’t simply say ‘lets go outside’ but ‘lets go outside now.’ You’ll ask “where dad now?” and I’ll tell you “he’s at work now.” Almost everything ends in now. Thankfully its not a demanding now, rather, an unnecessary clarification. You tell people “swe-shew” when they sneeze, and if you aren’t sure about something (climbing up at the park, standing on something) you nervously will say “I dot (got) you.”

You call flashlights “swash-shwites”, ketchup is yaya and ice cream is i-peam. After your bath, without fail you remind us, with eyebrows raised “dede have i-peam now?” You still call yourself Dede. I have a whole host of names for you but most often you are Mackenzie McDoo or just McDoo or Magoo. If you are being particularly ill behaved I call you McGru after the character Gru, in Despicable Me. A lot of the other names like Kiki or Kunu or little Macky have slowly faded away.

You love bandaids. Every time you fall or bump or trip no matter where it is you’ve gotten hurt, you “need a may-me-be’r now” (make me better) on your left thumb. I think we own most every kind of character bandaid there is.

We just converted your bed into a toddler bed. The hope was that instead of yelping from your crib in the morning, you and your brother could get up together and play or come downstairs or do whatever it is you do when parents foolishly think they can sleep in on the weekends. When Nathan went into a toddler bed he had no idea he actually had freedom. He stayed in that bed and waited for someone to come get him out when he woke up. This lasted for months with him. With you it lasted about 12 hours. By the second day you’d figured out you were free to roam and during nap time its a game of cat and mouse. I’ve come up stairs to find you rooting through the hall closet, I’ve found trails of dress-ups down the hallway, found you dumping an entire bucket of those foamie craft things out, playing with the things on the nick-nack shelf (that bell from Korea that rings with the smallest of movements is a dead giveaway btw) or my favorite, playing with a flashlight in Nathan’s bunk bed. When you wake up from your nap, there is no waiting for someone to get you. I know you are awake by the stairs creaking and the sound of those little hands sliding down the wall on the stairs, until you get to the bottom and announce, “I dun seeping now.”

You like riding in the ‘Aah-deee’ (odyssey) and lately we’ve run into a problem of you insisting on buckling yourself in your carseat (the alternative being a tantrum in the parking lot) but you also want to close the door like you see Nathan doing. I finally got smart about this today and started using the “voice activation” [wink wink] feature. You tell the door ‘door cose now’ and the door magically closes (this works since the Odyssey comes with sweet power doors).

You are still a snacker. This is something that has persisted for so long that I think its just who you will always be. You don’t generally eat huge meals, but prefer to have noshes throughout the day. I figure this is ok since you eat healthy food. Lately you cannot get enough of ‘be-butter-beh-ey’ (its like belly without the L). You ask for PB&J occassionally for breakfast, often for snack, always for lunch and sometimes again after your nap. This is ok, there are so many worse things you could be eating. On the days Im not making lunch for breakfast, you like your Eggos. We ran out of Eggos this week and it presented quite a crisis at 7am. Not even eating the marshmallows out of the Lucky Charms could right this injustice. Thankfully we went to Target and you quickly spotted the big yellow box, told me, “I dit it now” and I made sure you grabbed the family sized box. I can see where a spare freezer could come in handy. You’ll eat most everything we put in front of you but clear favorites are corn and peas, grapes, rice crackers, cheese (fine, its not really cheese but Kraft singles), the marshmallows out of lucky charms, the raisins out of raisin bran, curry-hold-the-rice, ice cream and your new favorite MMs. Many of the things that are not in your top 100 will often times be found in various places around the house, or worse, chewed up and spit out. Just yesterday I found a chewed up chocolate covered peanut on a napkin at the table. But we aren’t total purists here- you always point out every time we pass a “MIH-NONALDS.” “Dede have sheeezburber now?”

You hate having your hair brushed, and sort of tolerate having your teeth brushed. You fight with your brother so much in the tub that you can no longer bathe together, you like to sing your version of the ABCs. You HATE worms on the ground, you don’t like anything that feels squishy or slimy or hairy (think koosh ball or those squishy rubber balls), you hate hair on anything (you start screaming that there is a “YUH- EEE” (yucky) in your presence.) You like to follow your brother, you love to perform tricks for praise (good or bad). You are so many wonderful things all rolled into one fiesty little package. Somedays you and I clash, somedays your dad comes home and I tell him “Mackenzie and I aren’t friends today.” He reminds me that I don’t have to be your friend, I just have to be your parent. I tell him fine, “we just don’t like each other very much today.” You are so unlike me and very much your own person that sometimes I find you to be a bit more…’challenging’ than your brother. But thats what makes you you ["now"], and I wouldn’t trade you for anything ["now" or ever].

love,
Mom

Filed under: McSassy

We’ve been mulling over some possible spring break destinations/ideas. One of them is to go back to my parents house in Iowa and collect the rest of my crap. Well, whatever will fit in the Odyssey. A second choice, assuming PC can take leave, is to go south (warmer) and go camping for a long weekend. Both are good options. And I’ve been anxiously waiting to be back where we can camp in a more traditional setting (though camping on the beach was great, its just…..sandy (hey- did you know baby powder works like a charm for getting sand off though?) And lets face it, up to this point we’ve needed to drag a pack and play to camp and Im so glad to be beyond that now. In fact, I think this weekend Mackenzie’s crib is getting converted to a toddler bed. By this age Nathan had been in his found-on-the-curb-by-my-friend (thanks Deidre!) firetruck bed for months. I think Im trying to keep Mackenzie little. Moving from a crib to a bed just feels so….big.

But, enough tripping down memory lane. Here is what Im pining for for the great campout(s) of 2011.

We need a bigger tent. This is unfortunate because we just bought a new tent when we lived in Okinawa. The King Pine Dome Tent from LL Bean. This is a great tent because it has an attached screen room. Our fatal mistake was buying the four person instead of the six person tent. We discovered when we went camping that our queen blow up mattress fits, and the kids could barely fit in the narrow area (stacked one on top of the other feet to head). This was when Mackenzie was small enough to sleep on the changing pad we brought for her. Now that she is a big two year old, and Nathan is the size of an average 8 year old, this isn’t going to cut it. So, we’ll be purchasing a third tent (and yes- I realize I should get rid of either our two person or the 4 person tent- but then I think when we have our family visiting- and we drag them along with us, those extra tents may come in handy. So, we’ll hang on to them at least for one more summer. Behold: the 8 person Copper Canyon tent.

If you read some of the reviews on LL Bean (who now offers free shipping all day every day no minimum– Im just a WEALTH of useful information….first baby powder, now free shipping. No need to thank me) they are talking about fitting gaggles of kids and two dogs and having room for activities and games and gear. Its seven feet tall. Even PC can stand up in that. Im going to call it “The Thunderdome” (did anyone watch Parks and Rec- HI-LARIOUS).

PC and I have been camping….well pretty much since we were located in the same dorm. I remember one particularly miserable trip where we went camping in a non-designated area, it was freezing cold and it rained the entire time. It was, how you say? not. fun. Our long camping history means we’ve collected a fair amount of gear, some of it has been swapped out over the years but there are several things we still have from our college days. That being said- we need some dishes. I’ve scoured the internet trying to figure out what makes the most sense because PLASTIC! and HOT FOOD! spells danger. There are many BPA-free options out there which is good. I was researching melamine dishes (which we have lots of for the kids) and read that in a test 100% of the items tested leached chemicals when heated or when hot food was placed in them. 100%. I guess its a sure thing. Which is too bad because there were some really cute melamine bowls at Target. We’ve had enamelware (you know- the very campy looking blue or red plates with white speckles on them) and those do nothing to retain heat (here-have some cold food) and all you really end up doing is burning your hand before your food gets cold. So….around and around I go. I’ve been eying this set:

but….you know….metal…..cold food.

Or this:

Before we moved I sold our propane lantern because without fail, every time we moved the glass globe would break. I was sort of done with purchasing new ones. Plus, we had been eyeing the Coleman Quad LED one at this great store in Japan. But with the Yen rate being what it was, it made the Y7990 a little more than we wanted to spend. Now that we’re back here I see they make the duo with a rechargeable battery pack- and once I saw that it was a done deal. I refuse to buy anything that just chows through D batteries. Too expensive, too wasteful.

The last thing that has me totally stumped is (can you guess?) coffee mugs. Oh yes. This may be the most quintessential camping item in my mind. I’ve searched. And I’ve searched. And I’ve searched. PC asked me why I don’t just use a couple of the 50 *approx* starbucks cups I’ve collected over the years. Um, since I realized they probably have the very BPA Im trying to avoid and thus, drink only cold drinks out of them. I want something very cliche and campy and great outdoorsy. Like this, only, without the terrible reviews that say it doesn’t. retain. heat. (who wants to sit at the picnic table drinking cold coffee on a brisk morning?)

And last but not least- Im working on a project. I saw this awhile back and I loved the idea of having the kids sign the tablecloth….either their names or where we went. Im probably too lazy to embroider it but I think some fabric markers would work just fine. As it is I’ve had Nathan label things here and there- I bought a little plastic box before we went camping last year and Nathan labeled it “frist aid kit” in his shaky little just-turned-5yr old writing. I think it would be a neat life long souvenir of all our family camping trips, all the places we’ve gone and mostly a way of preserving what those little hands are up to.

As you can see, I think camping is just about the greatest thing ever. If you are a camper (which, I think you should be) do you have any piece of gear/item that you absolutely love? Do you have a damn coffee cup that works?

Filed under: Colorado and Mountains Make Me Happy, Things I like, Uncategorized, crafty crafstman

I laughed out loud. I just can’t imagine who these people must be…. take a look.

Filed under: Uncategorized