It’s the little things :)

I’m playing catch up a bit this month coming off a slew of posts in January and early February… eh I kinda lost my pace!

Free time? Nonexistent! Somehow our schedules have ramped up to such previously unknown high levels. There are more after school activities, more meetings, more classes and more weekend travel than I can almost sanely keep track of. (Kind of funny since it’s 5am and I’m sitting in an airport having left the house at 3:30am to fly to CA!! Oy!)

The other night Jack and I were driving home from his rowing practice and it was dark and raining. After a few miles I looked up and said “I have no idea where we are”. I had missed a turn and ended up wayyyy out of the way. Brain overload anyone??

So, I guess my long winded point is that when you barely have time to think (or pee) everrrr…. you have to take the time to enjoy the little things in life that make you happy. Be that a small white kitty (or two) 🙂 or a giant buffalo of a pitbull ORRR a not-so-little 15-year-old that can still sometimes surprise you by being… nice! (?)

Love it!

This past Valentine’s Day I surprised Jack with a few little candies and a card (well I do this every year so I’m sure it wasn’t a BIG surprise). One of Jack’s favorite candies are chocolate covered cherries. And those are his dad’s favorite too. Funny how that works out. Anyway, as Jack was opening his gift he remembers something.

Jack: Oh, wait! I have a card for you!

me: Oh really?

Jack comes back into the kitchen and wonders where I went.

me: Down here.

Jack: Very funny.

I had apparently (jokingly) fainted from the shock of him having remembered me on Valentine’s Day. 😂😂😂

But it was sweet and mostly in Spanish and eluded yo the fact that I have had to put up with much nonsense from him in the past. Haha.

That was a good day.

The other night I was trying to help Jack with some homework or studying or something. Jack was cranky and apparently I was “very annoying”. I reminded him I was only trying to help and I went to get ready for bed, leaving him to sort his homework out on his own.

(Side note, I’m on the plain now and it literally smells like 💩💩💩💩💩)

Ok where was I?

Oh yeah, Jack eventually headed upstairs to go to bed.

me: Goodnight. Can I have a hug?

Jack: Nope.

Me: Sigh….

A few minutes later… Jack came into my bathroom.

Jack: Sorry I’m being such an idiot.

(I got a hug)

Mom high fives all around! I did tell him he’s not an idiot.

Enjoy the small things because sometimes they are the big things!

A young couple passed me before I got on the plane. They had two car carriers and a screaming newborn, plus 3 suitcases and the look of the completely bewildered and underslept.

I’m child free sipping a coffee and blogging, in a row by myself. Ahhhhh the small things!

🙂🙂🙂

365 Days of Awesomeness

Taking a cue from Neil Pasricha and his blog 1000 Awesome Things, which is so totally cool and funny and delightful, all the happy words. His blog launched a book deal the very next year called “The Book of Awesome”. Read it.

My blog has not received any book deals. 😦

But I’m still hopeful! This is the decade, I can feel it!!!

Anywayyyy… we’re doing this thing that I saw on Facebook that involves a jar and little slips of paper and on the slips we right one awesome thing from our day. The goal is to read these on New Year’s Eve 2021 and see how awesome our year has been.

We are all for positivity on my house. Even the animals have a happy spring in their step. (Okay, Moca has a spring in her step ONLY if she has recently come in from a muddy walk and has a zoomie attack and tears ass around our living room which has WHITE CARPETS! PoBo will have a spring in her step only if she’s trying to get away from Moca, who will only chase PoBo and not Luna. Weird right? Well Luna will slice Moca a new one if she even tried to chase her. And Luna gets a real spring in her step when you open the cabinet containing their food. Luna will come tearing and skidding into the kitchen and twirl around your feet purring. Even if you accidentally bump the cabinet door she will be there faster than a blink.)

So yes, some of us are motivated by food. 🙂

me: Look! I started this jar and we can write down one great thing that happened to us each day. Then, at the end—

Jack: Not gonna happen.

me: Huh? No, look it’s easy, we just—

Jack: I’m already writing stuff in my own notebook.

me: Well then I’ll write my own stuff in THIS jar and read it to myself in 365 days.

(Suddenly I’m feeling less happy)

Jack: Cool.

me: Ok write one thing at least.

Jack: (takes a slip and writes something)

me: Can’t wait to read that one.

Jack: Heh heh.

Any thoughts on what he wrote? Did he call me a Boomer again though I’m clearly not a Boomer??? 😂😂😂

Sigh.

Aww remember when I had this little Dude who thought everything we did together was fun!!!???

Greetings friend

Jack and I pulled up to the gym where his rowing group is practicing every day off-season. (Gotta keep those kids in shape all winter!!)

We saw one of the rowers heading into the gym. I forget his name…lucky for him 🤣

Jack: Hey, there’s so-and-so, keep driving… don’t stop here.

me: What do you mean don’t stop here? You have to get out here.

Jack: No, pull up more so I don’t have to walk in with him.

me: Why? Don’t you like him?

Jack: I like him but I don’t want to do that awkward talking as we go in the door. Just wait here until he’s in.

me: Jack, you can’t just say hello to the poor guy? Geez. Even dogs sniff each other’s butts as a greeting.

Jack: Yeah, I’m not doing that either.

🤨😬

Lolllllll!!!’ Too funny. So we waited that extra half of a minute so Jack could walk in alone. Sheesh.

Growth Chart & Flashback to Some 8th Grade Memories

(Another lovely text exchange I had with Jack…)

Yesterday I made Jack stand against the wall so I could measure him again. In one month he grew another half inch. He’s roughly 6 feet 1 inch, but I’ll have to confirm the exact height. This kid was always in the 100th percentile for height, weight and (sorry Jack) head size. Actually that one trended “off the charts”. Full of brains as I always say.

I started measuring Jack when he was about two. I put some marks way up on the wall (hidden in my walk-in closet) to denote where I thought Jack would be at certain times years from then. I picked a height somewhere close to my mid-chest height and wrote “cry”. Which meant, when he got that big I would certainly cry because he wouldn’t be a baby anymore.

I made marks to show how tall I thought Jack would be when he was 14, 15, 16, etc. Right now, he’s about a quarter inch below the “16 years old” mark. Boy did I underestimate the stretch factor in this kid! I also track what grade he’s in so we can see the growth pattern in a few different ways.

Check out the Growth Spurt Meltdown here when Jack was 5. :O

Now back to this story…

Jack: Why did you write “cry” here?

me: Because I knew I would be so sad when you got bigger than that.

Jack: Did you cry?

me: Not really… I don’t remember actually. (I probably did!)

Jack: Look, I grew only a half inch here, but two inches here.

me: I must have fed you well then. Growth spurts are sort of random it seems.

Jack: When we move we’re totally taking this wall with us.

me: Totally. Sawing it right out of the closet.

Jack: (looking at where I measured myself a few times for comparison) Look, you shrunk since the last time we measured you.

me: And… we’re done here.

Here’s another funny post about a growth spurt and Jack getting in trouble in school…Oy!

And this one about the backwards pants incident and what actually wasn’t a growth spurt, lol.

I’m not sure when the current growing will stop, but man, this is one tall kid. 🙂

And just for fun, a bonus post that talks all about Jack heading into 8th grade. Well, mostly I talk about my 8th grade experience, because I like to talk… and then eventually I get around to some of Jack’s 8th grade news. If you’ve made it this far … THANK YOU!

 

 

Affirmations vs. Reality

I drove Jack to school as I do every day, and we rode in silence for awhile. I asked if he wanted to listen to my audio book in the car “Money and the Law of Attraction”. I’m almost done with it. He politely declined. So I put it on anyway. 🙂

Esther Hicks was talking about illness, and how you can think yourself healthy with positive vibes, etc.

me: Hey, you should try positive thinking today and say some affirmations to yourself to kick off the day.

Jack: (grunts)

me: Like try this: “I can do anything I want today and it’s going to be a great day.”

Jack: I just detonated your car.

me: What? (Pause) Oh geez Jack come on!

I hastily rolled down all the windows.

Jack: Ha!

And there you have it. Affirmations vs. reality with a 14-year-old. Kinda gross eh?

Pre-teen depression (me not him)

I’ve learned that being a parent means there is always something to feel guilty about, always something to feel sad about, and always some sort of feeling of loss after every milestone has been met and your child charges headfirst into the next stage of his or her life.

And of course there are many happy times and good times and funny times, just look at the last seven years of my blog, hello! 🙂 But this is a new phase for me, one that my friends have told me they are going through or have recently gone through. It’s kind of pre-empty-nest-syndrome because your child still very much needs you in almost every way. Except, they don’t anymore.

I watched my son grow and change from a chubby little boy who was curious about everything, into a toddler that could never be told “no” when he wanted to do something, and then he grew into the little boy that had to master everything himself with as little coaching as possible (insert tantrum here if you tried to show him how to ride his bike for the first time without training wheels, for example); and now he’s this tall, handsome, amazing, mature and talented young man who I think takes his own talents for granted. He really is gifted in certain things that have just shown themselves in the last couple of years, like his cartooning, his video making skills, his wit and use of language, (though I wish he would use those powers for good instead of evil LOL), and and his ability to make people feel comfortable around him no matter what their age, or their situation. He is just generally easy to be around and very good company… especially for me and our animals 🙂

So why is it, as parents, we are so excited to get to the next phase of our child’s life, and then when we reach it, we struggle desperately to keep them there or to turn back the clock to where they just came from. I think that’s why people have two and three kids, they just want to relive those special times because once they’re gone, they are gone forever.

I didn’t have the ability to give Jack a sibling, though I really wanted to, so I have to enjoy this ride fully, and that may be why I’ve documented so much of his life on this blog, I know that it’s so special and so precious to me that I don’t want to forget a single minute.

Then and now:

Jack at 5 years old: Mommy, guess what? I invented a dump truck that pushes the sand in your sandbox and turns it into…

me: Jack, honey, hold on one sec.  Mommy’s on the phone.

Jack (not listening): And it turns the sand into magic sand so if you ever run out of sand this will fill it back up and it will be all clean like the beach sand, and not dirty like the sand in the woods that gets you all muddy because…

me: Jack hang on one sec… (I make an excuse and hang up the phone)

Jack: And its magic sand that I don’t have to worry about getting dirty and it will never ever run out! You just have to use this magic dump truck right here and it will push the magic into it and then see? You don’t have to ever worry about it again!

me: Take a breath Jack. Try to break it into breathable chunks of story. You’ll pass out if you talk that fast.

——-

Jack at 12: What.

me: Um, just wanted to call and say good morning. How’s your day?

Jack: Good. 

me: What’d you do with dad?

Jack: Stuff. Can I go?

me: Jack you need to talk longer than 30 seconds and say more than 2 words. Geez.

What to do if you’re bored

 First, confirm that you are, indeed, REALLY bored. Check boxes help.
  
Then, make a list! Perhaps you like to write in gold marker. If so, do that! Or maybe you just want to lay down wherever you are. OR, better yet, take a nap! Though that one is frowned upon at work or so I’m told.

 
When all else fails, you can question the universe:

  

Let’s Play College

 Jack has always loved playing college, ever since he was little. He would pretend he was in class or teaching class or eating at the cafeteria (his personal favorite). So I have high hopes that he will actually GO to college. Lord knows we talk about it enough.

Jack has bee so into filming and vlogging and editing lately that we are trying to get him into the NYU film school summer camp. For two weeks. For a million dollars. No, actually just a few thousand. But still! Regular summer camp costs like $250 or something per week. Sigh.

We’re riding on the train right now heading to NYC and Jack just noticed this poster:

  

Jack: Mom, I might want to go to college there.

me: Really? Actual college for filming? 

Jack: Yeah, either there or Brigham Young.

me: ?

The randomness of it all…

  
He’s not very excited about me taking pictures of him while he sings Celebration. 

And in other news…sad news…our beloved kitty Ed has passed away after a very short but aggressive battle with cancer. We will miss him terribly.

RIP Ed 💔

  

#1 most-read post from 2014

And here you have it. Ta-daaaa. The most-read, most-loved, most-viewed post of 2014. You like me, you really like me! Gah… 🙂

Enjoy! Oh, the post is below. It wasn’t the Sally Field thing.

heh heh.

Failure is NOT an option!

The real apology letter…and some Legos…

Jack and I had a blowout yesterday. I asked him to select only one electronic device to take with him on the bus, not TWO. I stated this calmly and nicely. He proceeded to fall on the floor on his back, wearing his backpack, kicking and screaming, looking like a turtle that had lost its mind.

Not only did he lose BOTH electronics, plus all others, for a week, he had to write me an apology letter. After school, he was in a much better mood, so I reminded him of what transpired earlier in the day and that I expected the apology letter before he could go play with his Legos.

Here’s what I got. He was giggling when he gave it to me.

Jack: Dear mom, this morning you would only let me take one electronic, so I hit you with a stick and then i called you an Idiot. I’m sorry for what I have done, and I will not do it again. Next time, I will just take one electronic, and we will not go through the process of you being beat with a stick. Once again, I am sorry for what I have done, and I won’t do it again. And now, a word from our sponsors: PIE!

Sigh.

So I chuckled and said that, yes, he was clever and entertaining but now I needed the serious apology. To which…he … fell on the floor on his back screaming that he had just written the apology and that I had laughed so he was DONE with writing apologies.

I waited. I googled some stuff and played around online.

He wound it down a few minutes later when he realized that I was not paying attention to him in the least.

me: Are you all done?

Jack: Sniff… (glare)

me: I still need the real apology letter. It needs to be serious and I need to know that you’re not making a joke of this. It wasn’t nice this morning and I don’t want to go through that for such a silly request ever again. Go ahead and come back when you’re done.

Jack: (few minutes later). Here. It’s not as long. Can I go play now?

“Dear Mom, I realize that I may have made some bad choices this morning, I know that I did something wrong and I’m sorry for that.”

me: Okay. Go play and I’ll be up in a minute.

He ran upstairs and my phone rang. It was his friend. Jack came back down and told his friend that he wasn’t allowed to play. That was another thing I added to the mix. After the phone call I followed him upstairs and we made the most awesome Lego Christmas village, complete with a Darth Maul Santa riding a reindeer (horse) and eating pizza while wearing helicopter skis. And we used Lego guys to set up a snowball scene. Photos to follow. Oh wait, I can actually go take one now. Why not. It’s only 1:13 am. Sigh. I actually had already fallen asleep for a few hours, but woke up and have been wide awake for an hour. Time to go back to sleep! Yawn…

Goodnight! I mean, Good Morning!