OPC

Why, one might ask, is Miss Holly up at 2:30? Because the other option was to lie in bed with the early 90's (or was that late 80's?) anthem about being "Down with OPP" (ahem... "Other People's Property"--- how quaint.) running through my head. While that tune is not really my thing, back in the day, MTV actually had music on it which expanded my horizons into distant lands I might not otherwise have bothered to visit. And that particular bit of stupidity was highly popular. Not that any level of popularity explains adequately why it wakes me in the middle of the night.
Except that in my own unique brand of mental gymnastics, the lyrics twisted to morph into "Down with OPC... Yeah, you know me!" OPC is "Other People's Children"--- and I do have the best time playing with them. It says to me that people are not terribly careful who they leave their lovies with that I keep ending up in possession of additional children beyond the three who call me "mawwwm". I'm so very, very glad because kids seem to naturally bring adventure to every situation. Yesterday's adventure involved five hilarious hide-and-seek playing champions and a pair of waffle-thieving doggies. Evan was phenomenal with the younger kids (as he often is), and he made it possible to love on the darlings despite the continuation of the post-IVIG headache that has followed me for the past week and a day. Later in the day, I managed a drive-by diaper change and crib retrieval of the FBG (Favorite Baby Girl in a twist on Roald Dahl's BFG or Big Friendly Giant) during a quick visit to drop off a little something for her Mama.
Don claims that we have an entire drive dedicated to photos of the FBG and her sisters. He's close, but the lense of my camera captures far more than my own and Ab's kiddies. Last night I observed something of a parade of middle-sized kids who have been left in my care at various points as many of them too to the stage in a Christmas Festival rehearsal. As I watched them, I flipped through mental images of hundreds and hundreds of photos I have logged of OPC. Not creepy stalkerazzi photos, but funny, honest photos of children being their precious, unique selves. And occasionally catching mommies or daddies in those sweetest of moments is the best sort of fun.

Bubble

Stretched too thin. Which by definition will extend to make one thin-skinned. That is where I am at right now. That bubble that one just kept blowing into to see how big it would get? That's me. If things don't start to give soon I'll earn a lump of coal in my Christmas stocking for sure.
Maybe tomorrow I will be cheerier. Because some cheer would fill my over-extended, fragile bubble self with something much better than the current empty pressure extending relentlessly outward.

Love it...

Yes. That's it. Protesting the church indicates that there is actually something interesting going on there.

Dating

The mister and I ran off for breakfast/coffee yesterday a.m. after dropping the assorted children off at their schools. It's a good thing we did, too. School breaks are always a little challenging for us in our general codependency because we have three people who fail to see us so much as a couple as, well, their parents. (Nobody wants to really dwell on the idea of their parents as a couple, so this is not selfishness on the part of our offspring so much as trying-to-not-be-grossed-out. Very reasonable.) Katie has stated when talking about the emotional upheaval of a friend's family during a messy divorce (after the daddy started dating someone other than the mommy) that she doesn't worry about "that sort of thing" with us. That security is exactly what we want to give our kiddies even if they do think it creepy and weird that their parents act like they are still dating about half the time. Because we are still dating one another.
Except that Junior is out of school for the next two days. And he is, no-holds-barred, an in-your-face sort of guy. Thursday is date day, but if we attempt to keep our date tomorrow at lunch he will be calling or texting. Because he will be compelled to convey some assinine information or ask questions that could wait until later. So it is doubly good that we attempted a secondary date because we would likely have missed out on this week's date entirely. We will fit in some alone time by driving one another to some destinations like his Man Coffee this morning before the boy is actually out of bed to begin his rounds of phone tag. And tomorrow will bring the knowledge that the following day will see Evan off to school for what presumably will be a few hours. And two of the three kids have overnights scheduled for Friday night that just might enable a real night-time date. It could happen.

ohbutno again

Well, we have prayed for Evan to be held accountable for his actions without much success until today. Last year he had a blow out after being given a detention that caused school administration to be hesitant to give him consequences according to his behavior. Which left him a bit too free to be himself. Until our middle school had a near total changing of the administrative guard this year.
This morning I sat in a meeting with Evan's special ed advocate preparing for our annual meeting with assorted school personnel to set the plan for the following year of Life with the Boy. As we talked about Evan's tendency toward avoidance and escape mechanisms, the door opened to reveal people there to inform us that my child's current location was unknown. He was not in class. He was in the library without a pass at one point, but he had since moved on to some new destination. They were looking for him. I called Don so he could join in the excitement.
When the boy was found we hear that he was avoiding Mrs. B's class because he decided to leave it early the day before, and he figured she would be mad. *sigh* So Advocate and I hang out while the principal gives the boy a two hour detention for Thursday. Then we walk the Boy back to Mrs. B's class.
Thirty minutes later the committee meets to discuss Evan. This group includes Mrs. B as the representative from the general education classroom teachers, the same principal who just gave the boy detention, a new special ed lead teacher, and three of us who have been working with Evan for years. Joy has been Evan's counselor since mid-elementary, and Patty's had Evan in her excellent care as a student for two and a half years. I have only been his mother for thirteen years, but I still have a voice. And it is both a resigned voice and a resolute one. I know my child, and I love him with all his idiosyncracies.
The meeting shuffles along for an hour and a half. We get everything settled nicely for Evan to handle daily life at school, testing, and answer behavioral questions like how to address episodes such as the one faced earlier in the morning. After the meeting, I stayed to talk with Patty and Joy. As I start to leave the building, the school receptionist asked that I remain to talk to the principal for a third time today. Because my son had been in a physical altercation with another student.
Joy came out to request that Evan be pulled out of class to meet with her. Instead she cooled her heels with me in the principal's waiting room. We talked with the principal, and were told that Evan bumped into a bully by accident. A kid who by all accounts is a hot head, and someone who pursues trouble. On a day when Evan had "trouble" written all over him already, and Evan is not one to submit to a bully anyway. So there were words exchanged. And someone was put in a headlock. And there was kicking. And my son has been suspended for the next three days.
I am holding onto the simple reality that he is being held accountable for his actions. And he is going to be spending these days doing chores and schoolwork. There is no t.v. or goofing off because he responded to provocation inappropriately. In a bit of irony, he was going to miss out on a writing assignment that required a partner for the topic of walking in someone else's shoes. Until I volunteered. That should be interesting.

Conflict of Interest

My brain is tired. It is all full of numbers. Numbers that overlap and trip one another up. Numbers that represent conflicting interests in the family's various talents. Numbers that have begun to take on the nightmare role of Walt Disney's Winnie-the-Pooh's "Heffelumps and Woozles". The date and time numbers are today's primary concern. The only date I cannot seem to reconcile is the band concert and big Christmas Extravaganza rehearsal.

In a way I have yet to understand our family will somehow all attend Middle Child's Winter Band Concert and a simultaneous full dress rehearsal for Christmas Festival. That should be interesting. Maybe the costumed shepherd child can just try to be unnoticed during the Beginner Band's rendition of "Ode to Joy"? The Mr. will be dressed all in black (like a ninja), moves silently (again like a ninja), and has the added benefit of being a bass player--- no one ever notices those (like a good ninja). So he will not detract from the great herd of middle school students killing Christmas one note at a time on stage as he and the little shepherd have to slip out to run for their rehearsals the second Katie's band is finished. Which will leave me sitting with the Boy (who is likely to be "bored" and who finds it incomprehensible that people in Canada can hear him when he "whispers") until the absolute first second we can politely collect our band student and escape.
I wonder if I can go to the band concert in costume. Then no one will know it is me with the loud boy, the escaping ninja and shepherd, and the irritable sixth grade horn player who feels slighted because her family has more than one commitment the night of her concert. It could work.

Christmas Cheer

This Mom is fighting the desire to light her Holiday pom poms afire and watch 'em burn. The Christmas Cheer has already gone up in smoke and it's not even December yet. (That does not bode well.) I love most of the people parts of the holidays, but cringe at the shopping, pressures, and grossly inflated expectations. We do not celebrate X-mas around here, but Christmas. Yet, most of the holiday-related hoopla centers around juggling the rings of Holiday Hell.
What to do away with? Every aspect that can be trimmed down is important to someone. And the assorted someones are all precious. Selfishness wants to shriek, "Enough! No. No. No more can be added without Mom being taken away by the elves in white coats to Santa's Special Holiday Home for Grinches!" Except that no one is asking for anything that is too much. Each single request is reasonable.
I wonder if installing a long roll of paper on the fridge for holiday requests from "Will you drive me to rehearsal?" to "Can we bake cookies for my class?" and another next to that for regular stuff like "Please pick up a jug of milk." and "I need someone to watch over me so I do not get distracted while completing yet another Social Studies project." would be tacky? It might help the family to understand why Mom is less than enthusiastic about seemingly mundane requests and the fun, fun, fun additions to the to-do list if they could all see what the others are asking. Otherwise there is going to be one more Prozac Mom mechanically driving her Mom Taxi from place to place while grinning a frighteningly vacant chemical smile and waving slightly charred pom poms.

Blackness.

Exactly how I feel about Black Friday shopping.

Except that Mark isn't shopping. He's having dessert. Which one would expect to be way better than shopping. Perhaps not.

Twas

Twas in the weeks before Christmas, when all through the house, several creatures were stirring, all larger than a mouse. The stockings were piled on the arm of a chair, in hopes that someone--- anyone, would take the decorating from there.
The children kept popping up out of their beds, pursuing the ideas that come into their childish heads. And the Mister and I had just begun to settle in, having turned off the t.v.. The drowsing was just about to begin.
When from the kitchen there arose such a clatter, that we looked at one another in horror of what might be the matter. Away to the dining room I flew like a flash, prepared for the worst and ready to make the kitty hash.
With the flick of a switch, the lights shone down on the objects below, when what to my wondering eyes should appear but twelve furry feet all scrambling in fear.

With three kids not far behind, so lively and quick, I knew in a moment we'd be in for a time.
Despite my shouts of , "Be careful!" and "Stay back!" still onward they came, so I called them by name:
"Out Buster! Out Maggie!
Bella, you terrible, very bad beastie!
Hey, Evan! Hey, Erin!
No, Katie, not you, too!
Go back to your rooms!
Get back in your beds!
Now dash away! Dash away! Dash away all!"

Knowing better than to stand around and gawk, my observers fair flew off to their nests. Each one figuring it was better to lay low than chance being blamed for the mess.
Once all the wee beasties were quit of the room, I reached for my broom.

And then, in a twinkling, I heard kitty paws patter back across the floor. That dreaded feline beastie was back on the counter! As I drew in my breath, and was turning around, the mister saved Bad Bella from what was about to come down.

She was covered in fur, from her head to her foot, but all I could see was the trail of broken crockery and glass--- her sins black as soot. A bundle of dinnerware lay where it fell after crashing to the floor.

Stupid cat.

Hurdles

In school my Dad ran hurdles. So did I. It's a little like miniature bursts of flight. Actually, it's a lot like that. This week I have been confronting hurdles, but I have been slamming into them rather than sailing over smoothly. It's a little too "America's Funniest Home Videos" for my taste. Then I ran across a video a friend posted. Because I am apparently incapable of posting video, check out Enter the Story at adventconspiracy.org.
The spend less, give more is not so much the issue. What I so needed to hear was the reminder to give of myself when I just do not feel like it. On a day when I want to stay in bed with a heating pad, and there is frustration with the nursing agency's inability to cover their staffing, I just need to care for someone else rather than focusing on me. To look outside of myself, my home, my family, and see the needs of others without turning a blind eye to the ones that seem too messy, too big, too inconvenient, or too hard.

Garlands

I am no longer interested in wiring little shiny ornaments onto garlands. In fact, I have a big, ol' "Bored Now." for the very idea. But the windows look festive. Yay!

Heights are not my Happy Place. That is where the Mr. steps in to make things pretty. I only had to be on the ladder long enough to undo some minor bow squashing and rearrange a few wonky bits of greenery. Whew.

Swirly

Infusion is tomorrow. And this weekend saw multiple slowdowns thanks to joint and bone pain. This morning there ought to be a mile-long to-do list, but an ADHD moment is keeping the list from happening. Which makes it doubly difficult to accomplish the tasks that should be neatly lining up on said list rather than swirling in no particular order through my thoughts only to surface briefly before being carried away as some new bit of whatever floats to the top of the maelstrom. Argh. I know the following should happen:

• Food. And paper towels. We need the food for Thanksgiving dinner and for eating on the days before the holiday. Because sometimes infusions leave me in worse shape than I was in before. I feel like I should have most of the meal prepped as much in advance as possible. I wonder if this is paranoia or reasonably thinking ahead?!
• Decorations. All the Christmas stuff is scattered around the house waiting to make everything pretty and festive. Waiting on me. I'm thinking we decorate the tree tomorrow during the infusion, or maybe on Thanksgiving Day between the turkey and the pie?!
• A trip to the dump. Because I need to clean out the weird little places that seem to accumulate stuff that should have made it into the bin. And there always seems to be way more stuff in way more places than should be possible.
• Storage bins. This year we are going to replace the boxes that have become more duct tape than box with those nice plastic bins that one can see into... and that is where the holiday stuff will live during the off months. In my mind I can already see how neatly the bins will stack in the attic rather than the leaning towers of collapsing cardboard that have served as holiday storage for a decade or so.
• Orange oil. Because the cat knocked over the tree last year, and she is far too interested in my garlands already for her own good. The cat will not survive another tree toppling. No. Hopefully the citrus scent will make the breakables wholly unappealing to our curious kitty.