Bullies - nature vs nurture??

We hear a lot about bullying these days. When I was a kid, we knew what a bully was, and yes, some us  were bullied. I myself was a target many times growing up - we moved a lot, from country to country, so I was often at the disadvantage of being the "new kid" who had a funny accent and weird clothes etc, plus I wore glasses throughout my entire childhood, and I had braces as a teenager...you get the picture. Somehow despite these obstacles I managed pretty well, and was never picked on for long before I had figured out a way to fit in. But I certainly didn't have any help from special programs at school, or rallies, or pamphlets, or books or seminars. So with all these new resources available and the fact that bullying is so in the news all the time, why does it seem that the problem of bullying has gotten far more serious than I remember it being when I was a kid?
Here's what I think. When I was a kid, and someone picked on you, you told your teacher, or your parent, or your big sister, and one of them went and kicked the crap out of the bully's parents, or the bully. Unless you were talking about a whole gang of bullies, in which case you were basically screwed and you just did your best to fly under the radar as much as possible with all the other little kids getting picked on. It was just one of those many rites of passage of childhood that we all survived and at least then we weren't alone. The problem is that now if you're a bully you can get away with just about anything. Because not only can no one get away with punishing you, such as a teacher, or another parent, your own parents most likely don't give a damn what you do to other kids anyway, and they certainly don't give a damn what your teacher thinks, or other kids parents think. So there is absolutely no one left to punish the bullies out there. And they know it, so they go to even greater extremes than they once did.
This is why I believe that the Young Offenders Act is a load of crap and should be thrown out. If kids know they cannot be punished and held accountable to anyone for their actions, of course they'll do whatever they damn well please! Duh! Isn't that like the basic first rule of parenting?? Actions and consequences?? Apparently not the first rule anymore. I suspect that this basic facet of raising your children must be completely missing from an appalling number of households out there, because how else do you explain why so many kids are growing up to be these horrible little monsters who have no respect for other people? They cannot all be born sociopaths. Therefore I believe it is the parents who are responsible, and the parents who should be held responsible along with their progeny for any heinous acts they commit which should be punishable by law.
Okay, so what should the consequences be? Some lawmakers out there need to come up with a family version of punishment for harassment. Do they get their house toilet papered and egged every Friday night? Do they get wedgies doled out on a daily basis? Do they have to supply a different child with their lunch money every day?
I don't know what the answer is, but it's about time we started figuring it out. Maybe what we need is a good old fashioned Anti Bullying super hero, a vigilante to take matters into their own hands and clean up this world. Wouldn't that be interesting? I know one thing - that's a super hero that I could believe in! What do you think? Any takers out there??

birthday parties

When did birthday parties change so much? I mean from when I was a kid? Honestly. We dressed up nice, took a present to someone's house, ate snacks their mom had made, played some goofy games, got a little loot bag and went home again. Now, you have to drive your kid an hour across town to some whacked kids gone wild type of place where the host parent pays a ton of money for someone else to provide some form of entertainment for the children, some crappy food, and meanwhile I have to hang around at a mall or find some other way to kill 2 hours, because it takes too long to drive all the way home, and then turn around and drive all the way back, and I have other things to do on a Saturday afternoon, like spend time with the rest of my family, and if they had just opted to have hot dogs and chips and play pin the tail on the donkey at their house that is next door to mine I could be home instead of wasting a ton of time and gas money on a child's birthday party. Sorry but I just don't get it. I throw all my kids birthday parties at our house. Always have. Yeah, I have to take a little time to plan things out, make sure I have food organized, some games ready to play. So what? It's my kids birthday. I want to celebrate it with them, spend some time with them and their friends. Isn't that the point? Kids don't really need that much else do they? It's one day a year, surely it's not that much to ask of a parent to put a little bit of time and energy into running a birthday party for their child. Sure sure, I hear you saying, but we don't have a big house, or we both work and don't have enough time. I think it's a cop out. It's just like everything else in society today, "instant". As in pick up a phone and hey presto, instant birthday party. I get that when the kids are a bit older maybe they want to go out for pizza, or to a movie with a couple friends, something like that. Okay, I can accept that. But when they are little like mine are - 7 and 8 year olds - I think a couple hours of fun at home is a good time. I put a little time into something like a scavenger hunt for my daughter's party last year when she turned 8, we made it an "Amazing Race" for the kids. And then just let them run and play and snack etc. My kids love to help come up with some fun stuff for the goody bags to hand out at the end. And they love helping figure out what games to play, what their party theme will be. And I love throwing the party with them. But I feel like I'm in the minority, and I don't get why. A couple years ago I mentioned to another parent that it was my daughters birthday party coming up, and she said "oh really, so where are you going?" and it took me a moment to understand her question. "Well, nowhere, actually, the party is at our house," I replied. "oh really, that's different. Good for you, "she answered back, leaving me trying to figure out what exactly that meant. I'm sure part of it, maybe a big part is that although the party is supposed to be for the kids, more and more it seems possible that it is actually for the parents, as in who can come up with a bigger better version of the birthday party than the last one the kids went to. Hmmmm. So is that it, a combination of keeping up with the Jones's and just sheer laziness, not wanting to take the time to put the party on yourself? That sounds pretty awful. I'm sure there are plenty of parents out there who would take great offense to my opinions on this. That's okay, it is just my opinion, after all. They are just as entitled to theirs as I am to mine. Just please don't expect to drive my kid across town bearing gifts to your kids birthday parties any more - if that's how you want to throw your parties, the least you could do is provide transportation. And that's all I have to say about that!

tax time

So tax time is looming again. Cut off dates for RRSPs etc coming up at month end, and time to start crossing my t's and dotting my i's, so to speak. In other words, time for my annual worry fest to begin. Does anyone else hate this time of year? I absolutely dread it. I don't know why, really. I keep track of all my paperwork as it comes in the mail. I have a few extra things I have to do as my husband does earn part of his income each year under his own business name, and so I have to keep track of that in addition to all the other bits and pieces that go with tax time - things you can write off, etc. I'm no accountant, so I try to keep it as simple as I can, but it can be a bit tricky, as I'm most of you out there can attest to. The thing is, I have this problem with honesty. As in I am super honest, to the point where I worry that even if I think I've done everything correctly that it will somehow turn out that I didn't and I will be in big trouble.  I am horribly paranoid that I will do something wrong, forget something or what have you, and then one day there will be this knock on the door and these guys who look something like the evil virus dudes from The Matrix will be standing on my front porch, waiting to take me away to whatever special hell is set aside for people who screw up on their income tax. And I'll be shrieking "but I didn't MEAN to, really! I swear I thought I had everything in that shoebox organized properly!!"as they drag me off, and no one will ever hear from me again....
So every year after tax time is done, I promise myself to be more organized, to get everything ready long before the cutoff day. That way I won't have anything to be worried about, I will know I've done everything right. But every year I seem to end up in low grade panic by the end of April. Okay, so the fact that I am already worrying about this and it's still February is a good thing I figure. I am hoping this means that I will be really motivated to get everything in order right away, and then this year I swear I swear I am going to get that filing system set up that I always say I'm going to do, and it will all be easy peasy this time next year.
Remind me to look back at this next year in April and see what I have to say then. Assuming that I haven't mysteriously vanished after posting this which somehow alerted those scary Matrix tax guys to my presence and they carted me off the moment after I filed my taxes, oh man...

tying the knot

This year two of my long time single friends are getting hitched. In fact, one did so just yesterday down in Mexico. The other is tying the knot in May. I have known both these ladies for many years, and I have to say it has been very fun to see how excited they both were when they got engaged. It has been a few years since I've had anyone close to me get married, and so I have gotten back into the wedding fever vicariously through them I guess. It's really quite fascinating to watch someone else go through the madness that is getting married. I forgot how consuming it is. Suddenly there is nothing more important than what dress you will wear for example - my one friend fell in love with a dress that she bought, sent us all tons of pics of her in it, and then when she picked it up eventually from the store and tried it on at home was horrified to find that she didn't think she liked it all any more. She shouted to her fiance (she was in her closet trying it on because she was so worried that he might try to peek at her!) whether he thought it might be alright if she bought another dress, and he bravely answered back that it would seriously affect their wedding budget if she did...Anyway, I guess she took it over to her sister's and tried it on in an actual room with her shoes etc and decided it was fine after all, phew. My other friend who got married over the weekend posted a comment in her Facebook status the day before the wedding that she was having some trouble composing her wedding vows. The day before!! Well, she was pretty infamous back in our university days for staying up all night before a final exam to study (I should know, I was often with her), so perhaps she still performs best under pressure.
It got me thinking, what were my vows? What exactly did my dress look like again? In my experience, most brides that I have known don't actually end up remembering all that much about their wedding, it's all such a blur. You worry for months about all the tiny details, hyperventilating over every facet of the big day - what your colours will be, who your guests should be, who will sit with who, what will be your song, what should your favors be, what kind of flowers should you have, oh my god, and then the day comes, and does any of it really matter in the end?
Well, I suppose it does. It IS your wedding day, after all. It SHOULD be special. Because no matter what changes, what happens down the road, whether you stay married happily forever after or not, in that moment, on that day, you are saying to the world that you are willing to give it a try. And that is all a wedding is really about, I think. Two people going out on a limb in front of people they care about, taking a great big leap of faith with each other. Sometimes they don't land well, and sometimes they fly. But you'll never know which it will be if you don't take that deep breath and say "I do."
Besides, who doesn't love a great wedding?? It's definitely not just the happy couple who don't always remember much the next day...!

Fab Four

Why oh why is everything in this world designed for a family of four??? Every dinner deal, every vacation trip deal, every nice looking car, everything. Of course I am complaining bitterly because I have a family of five. I just had to overachieve and squeeze two babies out of my second pregnancy, and so now we are one the cursed families that don't fit into anything good in this world. Arrrgggh. I don't know how many times I have wished that my twins were at least identical instead of fraternal - I have these plans where we would book a trip somewhere for four and get the special rate, and then we would dress the twins alike and just keep hiding one somewhere so we could pass for a family of four, like in the bathroom on the plane, or in the bathroom in the hotel lobby when checking in...except that of course my twin girls look nothing alike anymore, other than being about the same size. They won't even wear their hair the same length any more, damn them! So selfish. Ah well. So it occurs to me that for every family of five out there like mine, all pissed off to be missing out on the good deals, there must also be some families of three equally pissed that it costs them as much or more to eat out or travel as it would if they had an extra warm body attached to their family....hmmmm. I may have found a loop hole! I wonder if there is like a match making agency out there somewhere for odd numbered families like ours, some company that would match us up with a family three, so that all we would have to do would be to book our vacations together, for example.  Geez, if there isn't such a service available I should set it up! Hmmmm. Of course for safety's sake you'd have to have one of the adults in my family travel with the family of three, just in case they became a little too fond of one of my kids and didn't want to give her back, and then I suppose that I would be the one who would end up sitting with my three kids on the plane for example, while my husband would "take one for the family" and sit with the strangers, and probably just drink cocktails and sleep the whole time, while I dealt with spilled meals, bickering, and vomit bags...but think of the money we'd save, right, it's about the money.
Maybe I should just lobby for deals for families of five instead.

Trash or Treasure?

They say the eyes are the mirrors of the soul. Meaning I guess that by looking at someone's eyes you can tell what kind of person they truly are. I don't know if that's true, but I would like to apply the theory to something more everyday. I'll call it "the minivan is the mirror of my life". This I do know to be true. The condition of my minivan is generally a very accurate reflection of the my life, I have to say. Today I attempted to clean it out, and found all kinds of things, none of which belonged at any time to me. An empty coffee cup from McDonalds, another from Krispy Kreme, an empty cardboard hot dog container from 7 Eleven, along with several napkins from all three of the above mentioned establishments. Two broken umbrellas, two working umbrellas. A backpack containing my husbands curling shoes, and his curling broom. A Tinkerbell rainjacket. A double bedsheet, 2 towels, a frisbee and a sandbucket, complete with some rocks and sand. Several reusable grocery bags, and two plastic grocery bins. Two empty wine bottles and an old jacket of my husbands. Four empty plastic water bottles. Okay, you get the picture, the list continues but I won't bore you with the rest of it.  So I bagged everything up and either threw them out or deposited them in the laundry room. You could map out the story of my family's day to day existence by the things I find in that car. Now expand that theory to my house. I swear that every horizontal surface in my home is magnetic, because no matter how many times I clear them off, I turn around and they are covered in crap again. My children and husband seem drawn to them like zombies..."ooohh, empty counter, must empty everything out of my pockets on to it....ohhhh, empty dining room table, must cover it with toys and crayons and half empty glasses of water..."And I run around behind them all like a deranged escaped lunatic shrieking "whose cup is this?? why are there socks on the coffee table?? who put pinecones and rocks on the buffet????"
And then they all just look at me, totally puzzled, and I realize that it's all just completely lost on them. Where my eyes see garbage, their eyes see treasures. And I do not have a clue how to change that, or if I even should. So I sigh and end up telling them to just put their stuff away - if it's precious, then at least treat it like it's precious, as I am handicapped in that way and cannot tell the difference between their trash and their treasure.  Maybe one day something will end up being worth a bijillion dollars, and I can hire a maid.

Big Love

I'm not a huge TV watcher, at least I don't think I am. In part because who has time to watch TV? I don't, not until after homework is done, kids are in bed, lunches for the next day are made, etc etc. The other reason I don't think of myself as a big watcher of TV is the lack of anything worth my time to watch. Lisa's guide to choosing a show to watch - if it has a laugh track, forget about it. I know most of the shows that were popular when I was a kid all had laugh tracks - MASH, Happy Days, Threes Company - so maybe I just over did it, because now I can't stand the laugh track. So I gravitate towards watching the Food Network, because I love to eat, and almost anything on HBO. One of my favorite shows the past few years has been Big Love. That's the one about the polygamists in Utah. When I first started watching it I would tell people about it and they would be like, ewwwww, that sounds so WEIRD! Now of course it's all the rage. Everyone is talking about polygamy, it's in the news right here in British Columbia where we have our own controversial little polygamist community, and then there's a new reality show called Sister Wives, which I would swear was the basis for the fictional Big Love. Anyhoo, weird or not, I find the whole concept and hence the TV show quite fascinating, albeit in a kind of creepy morbid way, like when you drive by a car accident and you don't want to look but you just HAVE to look...
It's just not possible to watch the show without stirring up a discussion. Aside from all the religious hoopla about how God said that basically they'll go to hell if they don't engage in plural marriage (whew, the things men will say to get laid, I tell ya) what would it be like to actually have several wives if you were a man? Or share one man with a group of other wives? I have to say I like the concept of the built in daycare system - one wife goes to work, another stays home and takes care of all the kids - and I don't mind the idea of having my bedroom all to myself at least a couple nights a week. But come on. Ultimately it's just begging for trouble. I bet they have some amazing knock down drag 'em out fights, some serious hair pulling if you know what I mean. Eventually someone would have to rebel.
And really, why the hell would you want to share your husband? If you're going to go to the bother of being married, at least be married to someone who can practice enough self control to just be with you. Isn't that the point? Otherwise you might as well stay single. Aside from the daycare set up, I really can't see the difference. It seems to me it's just the man's way of saying okay, now you're mine, you can't see anyone else. If you were single, you would be free to date other people if you wanted to. Just like he is, as long as he's "married" to them, that is. It's a win win sweet set up for the men in that society.
I think the name of the show should be changed from Big Love to Big Ego. Because that's what those men have, egos the size of a small planet, in order for them to set themselves up with multiple wives and multiple children in their own little kingdom.
Whew. It's too early for this much drama. I think I need to go watch something on the Food Network now...

Valentines Day

What is the deal with Valentines Day? I mean, really. We hate it when we're single, and we almost hate it more when we're attached. There's just so much pressure to perform. Okay okay, I wasn't exactly thinking of sex, although I guess there's that too! More specifically, the pressure to come up with the perfect gift, the most romantic moment, the gushiest card, you get the picture. I tend to be more of a practical person than a romantic, and so how can I complain when my husband knows me well enough to make sure my gifts reflect that sometimes? Case in point. My thoughtful husband presented me with a lovely gift yesterday, a snazzy little make up bag that was full of expensive hair care products. I thought it was really nice, especially since I do struggle with my hair, and was impressed that he had thought of such a gift that was all about pampering myself. I was looking forward to trying out my new shampoos etc today, and once the kids were all at school and I had some just for me shower time set aside, I opened the cute little bag and started to examine the hair products. Hmmmm. Yes, they were expensive, and yes, they were a designer brand, but it also turns out they are designed specifically for aging, dull, lifeless hair. I might have been offended except that I realized I couldn't make out what the labels said without putting on my reading glasses....
So in the end, as I sit here with glowing bouncy hair I have to admit his gift was a winner, and remember that a ton of single women out there would give their left boob for such attention. As for me, I  presented him with a sushi cook book and a request for dinner, thus transforming my gift to him into a gift for myself.Actually now that I think about it, I suppose my little shampoo kit was kind of the same thing for him too....

the shoe fairy

Sometimes I really do think I am on the verge of completely losing my mind. Perhaps it's just sleep deprivation. Last night I was woken first by my daughter Emily standing over me exclaiming "MOM!" and  I struggled up from sleep saying "WHAT?" and Em said "I LOST MY TOOTH!"  At moments like this it is critical to somehow find a way to stay rational, or become rational when you are still more than half asleep and your heart is pounding, so that you respond in an appropriate mommy-ish manner. So instead of batting her away and mumbling something like oh my god, you almost gave me a heart attack, please go back to bed and leave me alone, I managed to sit up, take some deep breaths and say oh honey, that's great, where IS your tooth? and stumble off into the darkness with her to stow said tooth away safely for the tooth fairy, and dab up the blood that is still oozing from her little mouth, and stagger back to bed again. I even managed to think clearly enough to convince her to wrap up the tooth and leave it upstairs with me, rather than let her take it back down to stuff into her tooth pillow that she keeps for these occasions. I eventually coaxed myself back to sleep, only to be woken by the telephone ringing around 4am, oh dear god, you know that's not a good thing. As I leap up and stumble off through the dark house in search of a phone, in the midst of my second heart attack of the night, my only conscious thought is oh my god, either someone just died or it's one of those dreadful wrong number long distance phone calls from India that we get periodically and I am going to have to spend 20 minutes trying to explain to someone that the person they are looking for really doesn't live in my house, so they don't call back again the next night. Anyway, I find a phone, say "HELLO???" and hold my breath. It's my father in law OH SHIT, who's dead, who is it??? and after he asks to speak to Mike I ask WHAT'S UP as casually as I can and he replies that they have a work emergency at a building he needs to ask about, and I am already starting to shut down again as I hand the phone over.
Anyway. Somehow I manage to get some more sleep, and wake up in time to realize that my husband is already up and gone, it's time to get the kids moving, it's Valentine's Day, AND I still have to remember a certain tooth fairy task. I head downstairs and remember, oh my god, did I put a Valentine in each of the kid's Valentine bags that my daughter Kate had cleverly thought to make, hoping to ensure some kind of loot for them on Valentine's morning?? My god, I did. I had gone to bed and then suddenly recalled those bags sitting by the fireplace (I guess we hang Xmas stockings by the fireplace, so Kate must have figured it was a safe bet to put her V Day bags near it too) and I had gone downstairs in the dark and cut out 3 pink hearts and written them each a message and stuffed it in their bags with...what? "Wagonwheels??" "We got Wagonwheels for Valentine's Day??" came the puzzled comments from the living room. Okay, give me a break, it was late, I was tired, and it was the only form of chocolate I could find at that hour.
So the girls mentioned that Em had lost her tooth, and I said, oh yeah, I completely forgot, why don't you run upstairs and get it from my room and put it away safe for the tooth fairy to find tonight? And off she went, and moments later she returned shrieking that her tooth was already gone and there was money in the little wad of toilet paper instead. She didn't even seem to notice that the tooth fairy had left an odd assortment of spare change rather than the usual tidy one dollar coin. :)
Feeling pretty with it we got through the rest of the morning routine fairly unscathed, and then it all fell apart. Em couldn't find one of her shoes. This is a many times a day event in our house - nobody but me ever puts their shoes away when they take them off, which would just be messy except that every time someone comes into the house our dog gets all excited and grabs the nearest shoe and runs off with it...So I lost my temper, yelled at the dog who of course had no idea what he'd done, yelled at my messy house, yelled at the girls to just get in the car, yelled at my husband for not putting the car seats back properly yesterday after he hauled a bunch of empties to the bottle depot, yelled at the god damn shoe fairy for taking a shoe as well as a tooth and sent Em off to school in her rain boots. At least they matched.
On a side note, after I got home, took some more deep breaths, had some coffee, I discovered the missing shoe stuffed half under the corner of the fridge, and in an attempt to redeem myself as a good mother I drove the pair of shoes to the school and deposited them in Emily's cubby outside her classroom. And people wonder what I do with my time....

Car vs car

Yesterday I took our little Audi to the glass shop to get the windshield replaced. At some point it got a crack that just kept expanding, so it was definitely time. Plus, we have decided to sell it. We bought it when I went back to work so we would have 2 vehicles to transport the kids in since I worked a lot of crazy hours, and my husband's work van doesn't accept passengers. Since then, I not only have quit work, but my husband bought yet another car, so we really really don't need this many vehicles. Sadly, it is my sweet little ride that is going to go, not the most recent addition to parking lot that is my driveway. Basically because of the two, the Audi will garner us the most money. Which means that it looks like I am stuck with the worlds ugliest car parked in front of my house. Sorry Mike, but come on, it's soooo true. We're talking about a 1975 Cadillac Sedan de Ville that's about 5 million feet long (really) and smells like someone died in it. Even with the 25 little tree air fresheners that I bought it for Christmas. Speaking of which, I really tried to give it a chance at Christmas, figured I was being too hard on it, so I not only bought it air fresheners, but also some nice fuzzy dice to hang from the mirror, and a sweet hula girl to jiggle on the dash. And then when we were going to my inlaws house for Christmas dinner, I sucked it up and accepted a ride in the Beast for the very first time. My husband was so proud, pulling up in front of his parents place, with all his extended family looking on from the living room window. It was a great moment, right up until the engine suddenly revved up really high, and a huge cloud of smoke came billowing out from underneath it, and we all evacuated in a hurry, coughing and laughing all the way to the front door. Well, all of us except Mike of course. Sorry big guy! Now I just always think of Uncle Buck's car every time I look at it. Which is every day, since it is parked blocking one of the main entrances to our house. There used to be a nice rhododendron, an azalea, and a maple tree among other living things planted in that spot - but yes, he paved paradise and put up a parking lot.....but I realize that some battles just aren't meant to be won. By me at least. Because for now, it is my husbands pride and joy, and really, I tell myself, there are worse things for him to be obsessed with. Besides, I get a sick sort of pleasure from it myself, just in the making fun of it. It must satisfy some inner need I have to pick on something, even it's just a big old butt ugly car that smells like a corpse with dirty socks on. Just as long as I don't have to ride in it - by now it must know I hate it, and I start to imagine that it will turn all Christine on me, and it will try to trick me into going for a ride, and that will be it, I will never be seen or heard from again, just another one of it's many victims....hence that evil smell!
So for now I will be patient, and hope that eventually something else will come along to replace the Beast in my husband's heart.  And only accept rides from my minivan.

daycare - what do you think?

How much are your kids worth to you? Can you put a monetary value on them? I'm sure the vast majority of parents would be horrified at my question and reply with a resounding NO, and go on to say that their children are priceless, etc etc. So what's my point? Submit a quote for daycare to many of these same parents and watch them flip out at the cost.
I myself have been on both sides of that fence. I have worked in licensed daycare facilities, provided daycare in my home to other people's children, and have been a working mother taking my own children to a daycare. Having seen daycare in action from both points of view, I fully realize how important it is to have your children in a daycare environment that both you and your children are happy with. And sometimes that means paying a little more, or driving a little further, or whatever.
Consider this. Most dog owners at some time or another take their dogs to a kennel, say when they go on vacation. The average kennel charges anywhere from $20 to $30 on average per night for your dogs stay, plus you often have to provide your dog's food. The average daycare charges about the same per day for each child. Does that seem right? Daycare providers have sole care of your child, are completely responsible for their welfare. I guess kennel operators also have the same accountability for your dog, but really, is it comparable? We're talking about your CHILDREN.
Daycare providers in general do not get the respect that they deserve for the extremely important service that they provide for our society. Perhaps that is because nearly all daycare is provided by women, and it reflects the way society seems to still view the homemaker/mother/care provider role as secondary, or not as important. Basically, I guess what I'm saying is that daycare is not VALUED in the way that I believe it should be.
I am talking in generalities here, I do know plenty of folks who treat their daycare providers with respect, and are obviously grateful for the service they provide, and how well many of them do provide it.

What do you think?

what's it worth?

We are lucky enough to have a good sized room in our basement that the kids use as a playroom. Actually what seems to happen is that the playroom spills over into the rest of the rooms in the basement, because the girls apparently regard the entire bottom floor as their zone. I wouldn't really have any problem with that, except that they never clean up after themselves. Slowly but surely (and sometimes not so slowly) the entire basement is transformed into a something resembling a home that has just barely survived some natural disaster like an earthquake or a tornado. Now I know that although I'm not down there actually making the mess, I still have to share the blame for it with my girls. Number one - I don't remember to enforce a clean up at the end of the day/play period a lot of the time. Number two - I encourage my kids to just go and play without my participation being necessary. Isn't that the whole point of having a big basement for the kids to play in? So play they do, and play hard. They are very into making stuff out of something else, so there is always a lot of cutting, gluing, painting, colouring etc going on, as well as a lot of fort building which necessitates dismantling all of the furniture and draping of sheets and blankets. And I think that's great. Except for that moment when I venture down at the end of the day to make sure the door is locked or get something from the freezer, and I enter the wreckage of that days activities. Because I know that I have let it go too far, and now when I ask them to clean up, they will take one look at what they've done, and be totally overwhelmed by the task at hand, and much wailing and protesting and dividing up of who actually messed up what will ensue.
So. I spent the weekend telling them to clean up, or there would be no play dates for any of them for a month. I thought that would be pretty good incentive to get them moving, as they love having friends over and vice versa. No dice. By Sunday, I threw in a monetary bribe, offering a dollar to anyone who cleaned up, providing the whole area was cleaned, not just what that particular person deemed "their" share of the mess. They lollygagged around all weekend, procrastinating until Monday rolled around and the mess had only deepened. I couldn't believe they wouldn't even do it for the money. So after school Monday I announced that until the basement was cleaned up, there would be no play dates for a month, no allowance of any kind, and no TV for a full week, which would include all of the coming weekend. Talk about pulling out the big guns.I went upstairs and let them work that one out. I don't think my kids watch a huge amount of TV, some in the evening sometimes, but usually very little during the week. But apparently that was the deal breaker. After a just a few minutes of frantic discussion, up they came to let me know they were ready to clean. I handed out garbage bags and helped them break the job up into separate tasks - one person in charge of toys, one for books, one for craft items and so on, and then I set up my ipod on the portable stereo for them and cranked it up and left them to it. And they cleaned. By the end of the evening it was done, and although it needs some tweaking, it looks about a million times better. Now I have to keep up my end and be the daily clean up enforcer so we don't have to go through this all again next week....

The Corrections

So I just finished reading The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen. One of those darkly humorous books about what would appear to be a run of the mill midwest family on the outside, but then goes into lovely gorey details of how totally not run of the mill each family member is, and of course the family as a whole. The kind of book that makes me go, ahhh, I am not so weird after all, and geez, my family is doing okay. Except that at the same time, I kind of had the feeling that we are all just one wrong turn away from actually being the family in the story, or dangerously close neighbors anyway. Yikes.

the new dishwasher is here! the new dishwasher is here!

Yeah, I feel like Steve Martin in "The Jerk" when he realizes the new phone books have arrived, I am THAT jazzed. After a month of doing without, my new dishwasher will be arriving sometime tomorrow. When the old one died and my husband ordered the new one, I tried to be totally cool when he revealed that it was not available for a month. I thought, oh come on, my mother didn't grow up with a dishwasher, and my grandmother certainly didn't, and they managed, I will not be a modern woman and whine about doing a few dishes.

After a month of doing dishes after every meal for a family of five, all I can say is OH MY GOD I MISS MY DISHWASHER!!!!!! If for nothing else but the way you can hide the dirty dishes away, instead of having them pile up on the counter by the sink, by the oven, by the coffee maker, basically everywhere, because we like to cook, and a family of five plus a big meal equals one hell of a lot of dirty dishes. For a month I have been running after the kids "Hey you! What do you think you're doing?? Didn't you just have a drink of water a little while ago?? Use the same cup please!!!!" I purred with pleasure when my husband pulled out a stack of paper plates on Friday night to go with the pizza we had ordered....I am so pathetically easy to please. When the phone rang this morning and the delivery man asked if they could come tomorrow, I practically screamed YES YES YES! and did a happy dance right there in the kitchen, once again confirming to my kids that I am more than a little nuts. So okay, sorry Granny, I AM a modern woman, god help me, but seriously, if my Granny or any of those housewives had been given the chance to own a dishwasher, they would totally have jumped all over it. Unless they were COMPLETELY mental, and then sorry but I just have no sympathy for that.

So WOOHOO to tomorrow, and the arrival of my new favorite large appliance. Well, kitchen appliance anyway. I don't even want to get started on what my mental condition would be if my washer/dryer were to croak on me. Although at least there are such things as laundromats, so I wouldn't be forced to go down to the river and hand wash my undies with rocks or anything. Ha.