Meanwhile

Dear Mom,

While Wendy was having the new sprinkler system installed, things continued on pretty normally around here. Normal for Spring Break, anyway. The highlight of Spring Break (for me): The Annual Purge.
We accomplished the annual purge of the kids bedrooms in One Day (a new record!), leaving no surface untouched and every toy, trinket, article of clothing, bead, bobble and scrap of paper evaluated. "Keep", "Trash" and "Goodwill" were the buzz words of the day. I didn't stop to cook. My Hero brought pizza home. With a professional beauty shop hair clip in place to keep my bangs out of my face, we moved furniture, rearranged the Young Lady's bedroom, sweat, dusted and vacuumed our way to completion. They have come to realize after so many years, that I Mean Business and the sooner it is done and behind us, the better.


We rewarded ourselves with a movie the next day.


Last night My Hero took us downtown to Iaria's, an Italian restaurant, family owned since 1933. Curvy red booths. Chianti and calamari. Pizza with real cheese that stretched and stretched from the slice to the Young Man's mouth. The food was delicious, reasonable and plentiful. The bread was still steaming hot when it was delivered to the table. The Young Lady's description of Spumoni ice cream: "It tastes like taffy!"


After dinner we went duck pin bowling, which nobody is really good at, and the Young Lady did better when she used the ball that was so beat up that it wobbled all the way down the lane if that tells you anything about the skill level. Of course, "the boys" did lots better than "us girls", but we all had fun.



That leaves coloring eggs. We tried a recipe the Young Lady found that used beets, onion skins and blueberries to make the dye. An interesting experiment, but if vibrant colors are what you are after, nothing can replace the good old food coloring and vinegar dyes.

beet colored egg

Today we try making chocolate eggs for Easter. If successful, we will bring them for dessert to your house tomorrow.
And it is time to get a grip on laundry and the reality of setting the alarm and back to school on Monday morning.
Love,
Kim

This Can't Be Good, iii

Dear Mom,

After yesterday's post, this is what happened:

The source of the water main break was in front of my neighbor's driveway (the neighbor to the right of us). The water company dug up the street. And we lost all Internet, phone and cable service. For the entire day.

Then this is what happened to my other neighbor's yard (the neighbor to the left of us):

And we lost the free water. For the entire day.

I baked chocolate chip oatmeal cookies and shared with the repairmen. They were afraid to tell me what was coming so they did this:

This is my front yard. The repairmen drove this into my front yard, parked it and left it there for several minutes. To prepare me. For this:

What you can't see are the repairmen in the hole behind that huge pile of dirt. The work was finished at 7:00 p.m. All of our services are restored. I can do laundry again, but not for free; we can surf the web and talk on the phone again. It was a beautiful day so everyone just played outside anyway. I knitted and read outside. The cul-de-sac and its residents have new copper water pipes. And the water company is sending a lawn service to reseed the yard. Woo hoo!

Love, Wendy

This Can't Be Good, ii

Dear Mom,

The water company came out last night and tied our water together with the neighbor's water. We are sharing water so that neither of us will lose water.

On the upside, the water company has taken our water meters so that our water is "free" since we are inconvenienced and sharing with the neighbors. I have since washed all of our bedding, curtains and anything else I feel needs to be laundered. I have also taken several jacuzzi bubble baths to recover from all of the laundry . . . anyone need to wash a blanket?

Love, Wendy

This Can't Be Good

Dear Mom,

Uh-oh. The water company has been called. I predict the cul-de-sac and several driveways being dug up during our spring break. Specifically, our driveway.

I will keep you posted!

Love, Wendy

All Creatures, Great and Small

Dear Mom,
We've never been one of those families that head for warm climates over Spring Break. Someone needs to stay home and take care of the neighborhood pets.
This year the kids have been responsible for 2 cats (Maxwell and Cassie), Penny the guinea pig, a beagle (Millie) and a gecko (don't know the gecko's name). Add one neighbor's mail and mowing a lawn to that list. They may not have tans when school resumes next week, but the kids will have made some spending money.
As much as we all love animals, I feel significant relief when the pet duties are over with no mishaps. I hope the gecko doesn't run out of crickets. The Young Lady is managing the gecko on her own admirably, but I did need to help her capture an escaped cricket earlier in the week. If we need to "reload" the gecko with crickets....well, I really hope it doesn't come to that.
And I feel bad for all the lonely animals. The cats that try to ignore you early in the week are meeting you at the door mid-week. And the beagle will probably come over to our house for a few hours today just for the companionship.
The photo above is our Lucy laying on top of Smokey, the rabbit who lives. HA! Lucy is On Top of Old Smokey. I thought perhaps Smokey had gone to the rabbit hutch in the sky since Lucy was laying on his neck, but he was just laying there, letting her. The guinea pig with attitude has dominated a rabbit.
Love,
Kim

As we become Nocturnal

Dear Mom,
The kids are on Spring Break this week, and as nobody loves a good sleep in more than I, we are slowly becoming nocturnal. Up a little later each night, sleeping in longer each morning.
We all stayed up very late last night watching "The Goonies" on TBS. My Hero is not on Spring Break and since he did have to get up for work this morning, went to bed before the movie ended. The Young Lady's heavy eyelids got the better of her with a spare 15 minutes left in the movie, leaving the Young Man and I to finish the movie.
It turns out the kids can outsleep me now. Even the Young Lady, who used to be our early bird, is developing that pre-teen talent of sleeping in. It is nearly noon, and I probably should go wake them, but I have a stronger desire to enjoy these quiet hours as long as I can.
Love,
Kim

Bandit

Dear Mom,

My BFF/BFFL Brooke crocheted this for me. (Well, I think she really crocheted it for the yarn store but I loved on him and played with him so much that I think she broke down and just gave him to me so I would just stop already!) His name is Bandit (he was named immediately, even before his head had a body!) and I HEART him. I think he HEARTS me, too, because he wags his tail at me and rolls over when I want to rub his belly!

Bandit is super cute, super sweet and super loving. Just like my BFF/BFFL.

I just can't quite shake the feeling that I have seen Bandit before . . . .

Love, Wendy

Never Enough Purses

Dear Mom,

I have a new favorite obsession! I learned how to knit beaded purses! I LOVE it!! A friend of mine taught me last night so I have been a little crazy today. It took me just three hours to restrand my beads from the manufacturers' thread onto the Pearl Cotton floss that I will be using in my project. I wrapped my beaded floss onto one of my favorite old spools for easier knitting.

It took me only another hour to knit my (approximately) 9 rows, complete with beads.

When my beaded purse is finished, I will hand sew it to the silver clasp (in the picture above) and I will be able to fit a lipstick in it if I'm lucky!

My friend made my needles especially for me; they have a Celtic Friendship Knot on the ends of the needles! They are size 0000 needles. In non-knitters terms, this bag is being knit using toothpicks and sewing thread!!! I'm up for the challenge!!!

A girl can never have too many purses. We have many occasions for our different purses: weddings, funerals, date nights, shlepping to the store, girls nights out (to name just a few). We have big bags, small bags, knitting bags, going green grocery store bags, every day bags, pool bags, diaper bags (although, thank goodness, not me anymore)! My new beaded purse is perfect for a wedding or an anniversary date. I have orange beads to tempt the diva's love of colors. I'm also thinking about knitting a pink purse and pipsqueak can have a tooth fairy bag!!!! See, I told you I was crazy obsessed!!

Love, Wendy

A Squirrel's Nest

Dear Mom,
One morning when the Young Lady was quite little and just old enough to be in a "big girl" bed, I found a very large flashlight under her pillow while I was making her bed. How she slept with that thing under her head, I do not know. Here we are Years Later and the miscellany she manages to squirrel away in her bed and still manage to sleep in it is amazing. Yesterday when I changed her sheets I found, in addition to her pillows and quilt, the following:

2 small stuffed animals (1 cow, 1 dog)
1 medium-sized stuffed animal (dog)
1 very large stuffed animal (over-sized Valentine's Dog from her Daddy)
1 boxed set of 6 Star Wars books
a small notebook
a lap desk
a Nintendo DS
1 fleece throw blanket
1 crib-sized blanket
Flarp Noise Putty (don't ask- it is pretty much what it sounds like it is)
the shredded knot of yarn known as "Blankie".

All I can say is that it is probably a good thing she is confined to an antique double bed. Anything larger and who knows what I might find in there!
Love,
Kim

Pardon me, Ma'am

Dear Mom,
Earlier this week, I treated myself to my annual mammogram.
Enough has been said about the extreme squashing and the contortions involved and I will not add to that here. I will just say that, for me, it is not the Flattening, or the rib-poking-sternum-bending, relaxyourshouldersloosenyourgrip part that I find most difficult about the process. It is the command to "hold your breath" that bothers me the most. There is nothing like being told not to breathe that makes me suddenly need to hyperventilate.

Over the past few years, a few lymph nodes have decided to migrate to the warmth and comfort of the ma'ams. Typical lymph nodes are supposed to be kidney shaped and being that my lymph nodes (like my cheeks and my, ahem, cheeks) are round, I have had many extra pictures taken. A lymph node stalked. Like the paparazzi. I've had so many mammograms over the last year and a half that I actually found myself holding my breath during dental x-rays.

I have seen the same Mammography Tech, Ginger, so many times now that I ask for her. We talk about my knitting and where she is going on spring break. But most importantly, we have a Routine. We really work together and git 'er done. And this time we were able to get all the views we needed with only ONE "retake". And the Best thing is that all is well, there are no changes, and no new lymph nodes have taken up residence. No need to "follow up" in 6 months!
Ginger and I will have to wait a whole year to catch up.
Love,
Kim

Eggheads

Dear Mom,

I'd like to introduce you to Kary Mullis. The teenager did research, wrote a research paper, complete with bibliography, and fashioned an eerily-similar-to-the-real-Mr.-Mullis Mr. Mullis from . . . . an egg. A Buff Orpington egg, which was given to us by Bonnie Jo, straight from her farm. That led to another research paper of sorts about the Buff Orpington hen, which the teenager included as an addendum to his Kary Mullis Egghead Research Project. The teenager has a wicked sense of humor; hopefully Mrs. McDowell, his science teacher, will appreciate him for his gusto as well as for his no-help-from-us project! In the meantime, we can all appreciate the scientists in our world and their Nobel Prize winning discoveries, even if they have been reduced to jr. high eggheads!

Love, Wendy

Throwback

Dear Mom,

The May issue of Creative Knitting Magazine arrived in my mailbox this afternoon. My second professionally published knitting pattern is in there!

On page 62.

See!

Love,

Kim

A Blog is Born

Dear Mom,
I am not gonna say my old friend, I will say my long-time high school friend, Jill, has started a blog. The photo above shows our friend Polly, me, and Jill holding her 5 month old daughter. Our first time meeting the baby and seeing our friend as a Mother.
Jill and I have kept in touch over the years, never failing to send Christmas cards and gifts and sporadically writing letters. I am thrilled to now be able to regularly keep up with her and her family and get a glimpse of her life through her blogging.
Jill has had an exciting life as an Air Force wife and is now enjoying retirement. She and Her Hero have built their dream home in Florida after years of living all over the country. Jill literally felt the earth move when the bomb went off in Oklahoma city and evacuated Key West when hurricane George came to call.
Jill, Polly and I had great fun together with Susie, Colleen, and Erin in high school: Friday nights at Polly's house practicing disco moves [HEY! It was the late 70's!!] which Polly and Jill were good at but I was much too uncoordinated and laughing too hard to mimic their moves-especially when Ping Pong paddles were involved, talking about boys and handsome teachers, falling in L.O.V.E. with Rocky Balboa and rushing out into the mall (we had to hurry because one of our Mom's was picking us up) when the movie ended to buy beefcake posters of Sylvester Stallone to hang in our bedrooms, (in fact one snow day I recall Jill and I sculpting a Stallone torso onto our version of a snow man), getting lost and scared when we found ourselves in a bad part of downtown on the way to Paramount Music Palace and even more scared when the song Highway to Hell played on the radio, (I probably never told you about that- but see I am still here! It all turned out okay!!!). We were Good Girls. Heck, when the rest of our class spent Senior Skip Day getting drunk at the track, we had a picnic at a park and practiced cartwheels, fed the ducks, soaked in the sun and LAUGHED.
When you have some time, go take a look at Jill's blog. And soak in some of that sunshine.
Love,
Kim
Edited to Add: Reminiscing some more- we swooned over Paul McCartney's "ooooaah" at the end of the song, Jet- and shared many, many bus rides home with THE most unfortunate looking, angry bus driver ever to get behind the wheel. (I must admit, however, that if I were forced to drive a bus, it wouldn't take long for me to look that bad and feel that angry.)

Rare Ladybug

Dear Mom,

I think this may qualify as a rare ladybug. One never seen before.

I'm sure our discovery will be posted in all of the bug field guides, front and center on the Ladybug Project page!! Until then, pipsqueak should feel quite proud.

Love, Wendy

Late

Dear Mom,

Lest you think I am a slug for not hearing the phone ring when you called this morning because I had gone back to bed after the kids left for school, let me explain. I stayed up late watching something EDUCATIONAL. (And knitting a sock, which I finished.) I got really hooked on the John Adams series that was on HBO- now on DVD, borrowed from the library. It is probably a very good thing that the first disc had only 2 episodes on it, or I would have stayed up even later. As it was, I turned it off just as the Continental Congress Declared Our Independence. I didn't think it possible to be so mesmerized. It isn't as if I don't know how it all turns out! But I love seeing our founding fathers brought to life. Humble John Adams and his love for the law, his simple life and his family; clever, wise and amusing Ben Franklin; intense and brave George Washington; and intelligent, passionate Smokin' HOT Thomas Jefferson. Abigail Adams fighting smallpox. I see that some things never change as John Adams becomes frustrated with "politicians who only talk to hear themselves speak". And marvel at the courage of those brave citizens, soldiers and statesmen, who changed the world. And that is only after 2 episodes!

I also hunted down one of our lady bug guests after reading Bonnie's post. We are not plagued with the rare 9-spotted ladybug. Our visitors are Asian Ladybugs, introduced here for biocontrol and known to spend the winter, you guessed it, inside houses. This summer, we will keep our eyes focused for the Nine-spotted ladybug and send a picture in to the Lost Ladybug Project if we see one.

In the meantime, I leave you this. The dog who thinks he is cute, and what I usually find laying on the floor behind me when I sit here at the computer. He thumps his tail to attract my attention. And it works. Every time. Only something a dog's "mother" could love...

Love,

Kim

In Search of Ladybugs

Dear Mom, This is a picture of a nine-spotted ladybug. After reading Kim's post about the ladybug invasion, I saw an article in John Deere's Homestead magazine which caught my attention. "In Search of Ladybugs" tells about how some ladybugs are missing. John Losey, an entomologist at Cornell University said, "Over the past 20 years, several native ladybug species that were once very common have become extremely rare". Mr. Losey has developed The Lost Ladybug Project, supported by the National Science Foundation. He is asking people to find and photograph ladybugs! Two children actually documented the first nine-spotted ladybug seen in the eastern U.S. in 14 years! The project website gives instructions on how we can help by "Finding ‘em, photographing ‘em, and sending ‘em". They even have a Field Guide that identifies eight different types of ladybugs, each having a unique color pattern and number of spots (I didn't know there were THAT many types of ladybugs, did you?!)

I think Kim's Young Lady just found herself a good reason to adopt one or two of these pesky little house guests...at least long enough to photograph and identify them!! What a neat little summer project this could turn out to be!

Love, Bonnie Jo

Spring

Dear Mom,
I have been unusually busy these past few weeks. I have been weird busy. A photo shoot here, a knitting class there. Laundry, spring cleaning, taxes, knitting, ripping and reknitting a sweater for the store. We have had typical spring weather--busy in the yard between rain storms. We are enjoying magnolia blooms, crabapple blooms, crocus, daffodils and hyacinths. I am hanging laundry on the clothesline and then running out to rescue fresh laundry before the rain again. I am cleaning closets, changing over from winter to spring. Always a reminder that the kids are growing and I am shocked at how they have all outgrown so many things! A gentle nudging to enjoy them TODAY.
It is raining today--my favorite kind of rain. The kind of gentle, steady, all-day rain that feeds the new growth without threatening to blow anything away. I wanted to leave you with a beautiful pot of daisys; a thoughtful gift from a friend who knew I needed the sweet gesture. Now I am paying it forward--enjoy your pot of daisys today!
Love, Wendy

The Big Reveal

Dear Mom,

Tights are the Enemy is finished. I figured out a way to finish the neckline that looks pretty and easily slides over the Young Lady's head. The picture above shows the top after the ends have been buried and the sweater blocked. The Young Lady did not want to model the finished product and did not Cooperate.

In fact, the expression on her face was quite like the one I made that time you were trying to take a Christmas card picture of the four of us in the morning before school.

Okay. So we're even. Paid back. HA. Ha. ha.

She happily modeled the sweater before blocking with strings hanging off of it.

See? Strings. And~ Oh MY! A guinea pig on the couch. Zooming in on these photos is quite revealing......

Love,

Kim

Updated

Dear Mom,
You will be relieved to know that today, after a clueless 2 months, and an alarmingly aware 3 days, I am no longer driving with an expired license. They didn't even scold me at the BMV, so I'm guessing this happens a lot.
They were also really quick. I had all that yarn to knit and only knit about 14 stitches before I was out of there.
If forgetting to renew isn't alarming enough, for the first time EVER I missed a letter on the vision test.
The photos are now logged in with some facial recognition software, so "you can smile, but don't show your teeth". I don't know how to do that so I didn't smile. Plus if I ever got pulled over and had to hand my driver's license to a police man, I don't think I would be smiling anyway. This facial recognition trick is supposed to prevent identity theft but I suspect it is some kind of Homeland Security thing.
And then I saw the face of a middle aged woman looking at me on MY driver's license. With a wrinkled neck. And maybe even an extra bit of chin or sagging jowls. I am going to pretend that when I smile all of that disappears. I do not think I can wear turtlenecks all year round, but I sure wish I wore one today. I do notice that my "tinted glow enhancer" seems to be doing its job under my eyes, so I take what little comfort I can in that.
Departing the BMV, an old coot seemed to think if he tried t-boning me into the right turn lane I would move faster or get out of his way. I stopped and gave him my best "I just saw how old I look on my driver's license so don't you be messing with me MISTER, and besides it is Ladies First" look and then took my time to make my turn safely. I didn't want to have to present my fresh license to a police man so soon.
Love,
Kim

Contrasts

Dear Mom,
It was a full weekend. A weekend full of activity and contrasts.
There were visits with friends from far and near, sleepovers both here and there.
Traffic jams and detours, time behind the wheel and time in the back seat.

Saturday morning, I saw a bride(!?!) in a McDonalds/Shell station:

And Sunday afternoon we were celebrating a cousin's engagement.

Salads, omelets, sandwiches and fries. Her mother's diamond, and a gift of her grandmother's china.

Happy celebrations, engagement rings, reunions of sorts. The pleasure of seeing in her daughter the familiar smile and gestures of an aunt no longer with us, and the sorrow of that as well. Memories shared between cousins, the oldest and youngest of us. The chance to get away for a day and the relief to be back home again.

And Sunday evening I saw a guy at Jimy John's who looked just like Meatloaf. Not the meatloaf you eat, the Meatloaf who sang "Bat out of HEdoublehockeysticks" but you probably don't know that song. At least I hope not. Anyway, I didn't take his picture because I thought he would probably notice and I didn't want to start a rumble. And his arms were covered with tatoos. And his girlfriend could easily have taken me. And my knee is starting to feel better and I didn't want to have to run fast.

Love,
Kim