Filed under: Parenting | Tags: family, humor, kids, mom, parenting, parents, suburbia, teaching, teenagers, teens
In light of all the awful parenting going on in the news, I thought that maybe a reality check for those of us who live in the cream cheese world of suburbia was in order.
I’m sure my kids could come up with a hundred right off the bat, and even more when they finally end up in therapy, but here’s ten mistakes I’ve made (these are all absolutely true, and the only ones I could think of that won’t have Social Services at my doorstep), that you can laugh at with your coffee or your happy hour mint julep. After all, when it comes to parenting, every day is a chance to screw them up even more!
- Never sit at the kitchen table, having a heart-to-heart with your child about alcoholism, with a giant glass of wine in front of you;
- Don’t try to explain the Cuban Missile Crisis by having your kid watch the X-Men First Class movie (since when did History teachers get so picky?);
- Never show how secretly pleased you are (however discreetly) as your child deliberately kicks another soccer player on the leg or pushes them down–you instantly become THAT parent;
- Leaving your toddlers unattended with a jar of blue paint and a dog is a bad idea;
- Another bad idea: reading “The 3 Little Pigs” right before Christmas. We had to leave a note on the front door and call Santa every year to ask him not to come down the chimney so he wouldn’t get burned;
- Never tell your second child she’s just trying to get some attention when she says her tummy hurts, too–OR, go ahead and tell her, and know you’re going to be on your knees with a bottle of Resolve in twenty minutes;
- (This one is Hubby’s, but it was too good not to pass on) When your child says you shouldn’t be driving because you had a beer, think before you say, “It’ll be ok, we’re not far from the house;”
- Think before you speak: when noticing a zit on your teenager’s forehead, don’t ask “Hey, who’s your friend?” Your best friend may be able to handle a snarky comment like that, but not your teenager.
- Never teach your children the art of “crop dusting” (being silently flatulent as you walk past them). It will come back to bite you;
- Never tell your kids the real reason you won’t go see Foreigner in concert is because you had your first French kiss (ewwww, gross!) to one of their songs–they can do the math.
Feel free to post yours, if your kids will let you….
Filed under: Food/Drink, Misc. Humor | Tags: bourbon, family, Food, humor, Kentucky Derby, Mint Juleps, south, southern, sports, Spring, tailgate
Spring has sprung in Virginia, and for those of you not living here, let me enlighten you as to what that means. In Virginia we go straight from sleet to 90 degrees in three days. As a result, daffodils and hyacinths pop up like whack-a-moles in every suburban garden, and all the trees bloom at once, leaving the air smelling vaguely like shrimp.
Pollen (which I used to think of as some powdery fairy dust that sticks to bee’s feet as they flit from flower to flower) becomes a yellow miasma hovering over our town like mustard gas from WWI. It covers the cars, sidewalks, and driveways so thick that my black SUV looks like a Van Gogh painting—a blurry, black and yellow bumblebee bouncing from one sporting even to another. I pop Allegra-D pills like and Oxycontin addict, and suck on my legal crack pipe, er, inhaler, just to go to the gym.
But, spring also heralds certain rituals, which I forget about each year until they happen: stinky soccer uniforms lay in heaps on the bathroom floor; there are new packs of gum in my car to chomp on during games (a last-ditch effort to keep from being THAT parent); fold-up chairs litter the trunk; saddle pads reeking of horse sweat (which daughter #2 swears is one of the best smells in the whole world—others beg to differ) lay forgotten on top of the chairs; Gatorade and white wine bottles fill the garage fridge. (That fridge is solely for the purpose of housing the many beverages we must have on hand for those days when “it’s just to nice to____________________. Let’s sit on the deck.”)
The final, end-of-spring symbol is The Kentucky Derby—that glorious first Saturday in May where 3-year-old horses come pounding down the backstretch as millions of fans and gamblers scream and cheer them on. It’s a day of joy (the bookies and winners) and tears (the unlucky gamblers and owners). It’s a day of silly hats, bow ties, and even more important, Mint Juleps.
Before I ever even liked bourbon, I knew the Mint Julep was a sacred beverage, one to be savored and evaluated each year. That golden nectar, poured over ice in a silver Jefferson cup and decorated with a mint sprig, meant the older folk weren’t watching what I was doing, and I would probably be able to steal an extra ham biscuit (or three). It also meant time stopped for a full two minutes as we watched the race.
Time stopped.
These days, I catch myself hoping time will stop, sometimes so my girls will stay the way they are, safe at home with me, and sometimes so I can just catch my breath. So this year, I’m going to hose the pollen off the porch, watch the Derby and pour myself a (second) Mint Julep. Then, I’m going to turn off the t.v. and enjoy the hum of the bees on the azaleas and the interminable drone of the neighbors’ lawn mowers.
And as I fall asleep (bourbon does that to me), time will stop again.
My personal recipe for them is a little different, modified from another recipe I got out of Southern Living (I’m sure their mixologists would be horrified):
1 tsp brown sugar
2-3 oz. bourbon
Splash of ginger ale to taste
Mint leaves
Muddle brown sugar and mint on bottom of Jefferson Cup. Add ice. Pour in whiskey, then add ginger ale to taste. Stir. Repeat.
Filed under: Middle Age, Misc. Humor | Tags: Food, humor, menopause, Middle-Age, mom, shopping
Recently, I showed Daughter #2 a sign I saw on FaceBook that said, “There should be a line in the grocery store for people who have their shit together.” She laughed, then looked me dead in the eye and asked, “Which line would we be in, Mom?”
Ah, from the mouths of babes. Ok, from the mouths of sarcastic 13-year-olds. Lately, I’ve been feeling quite superior during my shopping trips (see previous blog about dressing for shopping success), even allowing myself to make some snarky internal comments about people who still pay for groceries with a check…in the express lane.
Then there’s the whole karma thing again.
The other day, I took my load of groceries to the check-out line, put them all on the conveyor belt and remembered I needed to go find a chocolate bunny to give someone as a thank you. So I left my things on the belt, took the cart and browsed for about ten minutes in the Easter aisle. When I looked down I had no idea where my stuff was.
I stood there for at least twenty seconds drawing a complete blank, when suddenly I remembered—I’d left it on the conveyor belt in the check-out line! I grabbed my cart and chocolate bunny and dashed back to the line, which was—shocker—empty. The twenty-year-old cashier was just staring at me as if I’d sprouted another arm out of my eye socket.
Not sure if I was blushing or having a hot flash, I fanned my face and gasped, “I am so sorry! I don’t know what’s wrong with me!” I’m pretty sure the teenaged bagger was smirking.
I think there should be a designated line in every store for middle-aged women. It would be long, because there are lots of us, and we’re always running back because we forgot something—usually the list we wrote to remind us not to forget anything. The line would have a bin of “found” reading glasses to use or reclaim at the front of it, and a coffee dispenser at the end–your reward for making it through. There would also be a sensor telling you when you’ve walked away after paying and left your bags sitting on the counter.
Clearly, I will never be in the line for “people who have their shit together.” Those days disappeared the day I had Daughter #1. But I still haven’t made it to the “still pays with a check in the express lane” group either.
Filed under: Middle Age, Spring Break | Tags: Atlantis Resort, Bahamas, clothing, Dancing, family, fashion, humor, Middle-Age, parenting, Spring Break, teenagers, teens, travel, Victoria's Secret
Ahhh…the human mating ritual, commonly known as Spring Break, has begun. For those high school seniors lucky enough to be able to flee the cold and go somewhere warm, bathing suits are agonized over, spray tans are purchased, and cheesy, I-think-this-is-what-grown-ups-wear-at-night-in-bars-clothing is packed.
I recently spent a week at the Atlantis Resort for my teenaged daughters’ Spring Break. While my kids are not even close to being eighteen and they weren’t eligible to drink, I saw many who were, and it made me realize one very, very important thing:
There is NO WAY my kids are going to a resort for Spring Break when they’re eighteen, at least not without my being there.
I also learned several other things:
- Spring Break at a beach resort is a Victoria’s Secret marketer’s Nirvana. Everywhere we looked during the day, there were bathing suits and cover-ups from the catalog, as well as the requisite Aviators and Ray Bans. At night, herds of 18-20 year-olds wandered through the casino wearing in-style shorty-shorts with super-high heeled wedges, looking like preschoolers playing dress-up. However, unlike the models in the catalogs, most of the teenage girls were not an emaciated 5’8”; they were pasty white (or white with red sunburn blotches), and lurched around like giraffes in those ridiculous shoes.
- I have no desire to wear anything from the Victoria’s Secret catalog ever again.
- I am proud of my ability to manage a buzz (after years of practice). In years past, I would have watched with perverse admiration as a guy upended a Grey Goose bottle and chugged away. This time, all I could think was, “Dude, you’re just gonna hurl on the next girl you dance with. Good luck with that.”
- I enjoy the fact that I can walk into a casino and out of it again without blowing a ton of money on the tables, or my dinner on the carpet.
- The amount of material that passes for a bikini these days could be purchased in the Band-Aid section of a pharmacy. Before we left, I spent some time outside the Target dressing rooms, waiting for my girls to find something we could agree on. I eventually buried my hypocrisy, realized there aren’t any bottoms that cover enough to make me happy, and choked back a “Hell no, you’re not going out like that!” I shouldn’t have worried. Compared to many of the girls I saw at the resort, my daughters and their friends looked like nuns.
- I have new appreciation for the tankini, especially when riding in a tube in the Lazy River. Those who are brave enough to wear a bikini top risk becoming the newest super hero: UnderBoob, as the top tends to ride up unexpectedly. There is also less risk of leaving a layer of sunburned skin on the tube when you’ve been in it for as while.
- Hip-hop music is addicting, no matter how old you are.
- Bourbon is a great lubricant for dancing–however, 40-year-old knees don’t bend as much as 20-year-old knees, and it IS possible to get stuck.
- I am not the cougar I thought I was. I used to say I wanted a guy with a 40-year-old brain in a 20-year-old body. But there’s a reason a 40-year-old brain is the way it is–we’ve learned all the things 20-year-olds are still toddling through, and it makes us more interesting. Ok, that was a load of crap. The truth is, any 40-year-old who has a 20-year-old’s body spends WAY too much time in the gym, and wouldn’t have any time left for me.
10. I don’t want to be eighteen again. Twenty-five? Now that I could do, at least for a weekend.
Subourbon Mom 