Amen

Thank you to all who put their own safety in jeopardy every day for the benefit of the rest of us.  We are in your debt, indeed.

What A Relief

Thing One's travel soccer team held their annual tryouts a few weeks ago.  It took approximately forever for them to get back to us with the results, but we finally received the team assignments this past week.  As background, the A team is composed of the "best" players, and the B and C teams are more development-focused teams. In general, this coming year's B players are the same boys from last year's B squad, and the C team boys are the newcomers to the club without much experience playing at this level.  We've been told that Thing One will be on the B team again.

According to Himself (who played soccer for years) Thing One got much better this past year, and also played really well at the tryouts.  One of the coaches we know who was doing the rankings came up to us afterward to say that he was likely going to end up on the 'bubble' between A and B, and to ask if we had a preference regarding where to put him if that was the case.  

It was a tough call.  Obviously, you want your kid on A if he or she is good enough for A, but this particular A team is seriously dysfunctional (mostly a massive parent ego/jerk problem) and on A teams, playing time is determined by merit, not an equal-time principle.  So, if you aren't one of the best players on an A team, you ride the bench a lot.  At this time, he'd never be a starter on the A team, so we finally decided to have him go B if there was any question.

On B, he's one of the best players.  He'll get good playing time and keep developing. And we won't have to deal with the crazy political nonsense and infighting that plagued the A team for the entirety of last year.  Win-win!!

Struggling

I really don't like holiday weekends, mainly because they are holidays for everyone but me: somebody still has to cook, clean up, make sure there is food in the house, do laundry, and referee kid squabbles.  And there is more of all of the above going on than usual during holiday weekends precisely because everyone is home!  The fundamental caregiver/homemaker responsibilities don't magically disappear just because the homemaker would like to have a day or two off as well.  In addition to all the regular stuff, kids still have birthday parties to attend: the gifts don't magically appear or wrap themselves, and Cinderella's coach doesn't appear to chauffeur them to these events.  There is a family barbecue tomorrow: our contribution for that event won't prepare itself either.  I'll be at the grocery store picking up ingredients for that later this afternoon.  

My idea of an ideal vacation, at this stage of my life?  A day off.  By myself.  Just one (no sense being greedy!) but really off.  Perhaps outside on a beautiful day, in a shaded swing with a book.  With nobody requiring feeding or cleaning up after or zipper help or walking or shoe-tying or taking somewhere or otherwise entertaining.  No household chores, either.

And blessed quiet, for Pete's sake.  I'm a sociable enough being, but since childhood I have always retreated periodically to a quiet place to recharge my batteries when I've had enough of people and/or ruckus.  Try doing that in a house with three children and a needy dog: somebody is always yelling through the door (or scratching at it, in the case of the dog) even when I'm in the bathroom!!

Bigtime first world problem.  I know.  But weekends in general and holiday weekends in particular are actually more stressful for me than weekdays, and I think there's something wrong with this picture.

One cranky Mama signing out, and wishing you all a better attitude and greater appreciation of your blessings than I am able to muster right now!  


ETA: In all fairness, I should note that when I wrote this, Himself was at a park with Thing Two for another birthday party and had the other two kids with him as well, so I could go grocery shopping in peace.  He's a keeper...don't mean to make him out as anything less here.
    

I Underestimated The Kid Again

Thing Two received a classmate's birthday party invitation last week.  If he hadn't seen it in his school backpack, I might have quietly gotten rid of it and RSVPd "no" without telling him about it.  And not because of any issue with the classmate, either.

This was a laser tag party.  Having been to these before with Thing One, I know that the game is played in a large, dark maze, with oddly fluorescing blacklit items scattered here and there and deafeningly booming music playing overhead.  The children wear light-up vests and carry "laser" guns, which they use to shoot the targets on other players' vests.  Every part of this sounds like a nightmare of sensory overload for my son.  Add to that the fact that he hates to lose, but has never tried this before and would therefore likely be hit just about immediately, and it seemed like a recipe for disaster to me.  But he really wanted to go, so I took him.  Entirely against my better judgment, though.

He'd forgotten to put his sneakers back on after climbing in the play structure at the beginning of the party, so I could easily identify him (from the viewing platform above the maze) by the blacklit-fluorescence of his white gym socks.  I saw the socks hesitate as they entered the maze.  I saw his vest light up, indicating that he'd been 'hit.'   And then I saw him walk further into the maze and disappear from sight.  I only located him a couple of times after that.  I did take heart from the fact that he hadn't come out, since I knew he'd been told to ask a marshal if he wanted to leave the field.  

Fifteen very long minutes later, the game was over.  He came out talking about a laser battle with an eighth grader, one of the birthday boy's older siblings.  He'd lost, but was okay with it.  And surprisingly, the strange lights and incredibly loud music hadn't fazed him at all.  I couldn't believe it.

Good thing I listened to him and not to my inner voice.  Although my instinct will always be to protect him, he needs to grow too.  Sometimes I need to take a step back and let that happen!

Not All Bad

I posted several times yesterday about the crazy day I was having, which involved a lot of running around, one major mommy-gaffe in the form of inadvertently keeping my daughter home on a day she was supposed to be at school, and a long, hot elementary school band concert in the evening.  I admit freely that I was fried and ready for a nice glass of wine and some peace and quiet when we got home, but it really wasn't a bad day overall.

I enjoyed having the extra time with Petunia.  The band concert went well, all things considered.  Thing One played his little heart out and looked so darned handsome in his white shirt and tie, nice pants and dress shoes.  I helped him get dressed and immediately took a picture before he could mess himself up!  (His normal taste in clothing runs more toward baggy t-shirts, basketball shorts, and sneakers.)  Both Thing Two and Petunia behaved well the whole time we were at the concert.

And, as the icing on the cake, there was this.

This is my Senior Green taekwondo belt (the two ends of it, anyway.)  The black stripes indicate that I know the techniques, self-defenses and form for this level.  The green stripe is for sparring.  And the red one, with yesterday's date on it??  That's the one signifying that I have been deemed ready to test for the next belt up.  It's the big kahuna, the last stripe applied to any given belt.  

Next Tuesday evening, I will test for my Blue belt.  This will be my sixth belt.  Still nowhere near Black, but solidly mid-level.  Pretty cool.  Wish me luck!!   

Mom And Dad, I'm So Sorry

Karma is officially a bitch. Or what goes around comes around.  Or something!

After 90 minutes of beginner band and chorus performances in a stifling gym this evening, only about ten minutes of which (max) involved my son, I now have a much better idea of what I put you through for all those years of concert attendance!!  And Dad, now I really understand why you asked every time if we could please leave after I was done performing for the evening, even if the show wasn't over yet.  ;)

And as a side note, I'm now of the opinion that nobody under the age of about 12 should even try to play the trombone!

You're Going To Love This One

I mentioned earlier that this was going to be a crazy day.  It actually started off well...got Thing One to school on time for his rehearsal, put Thing Two on the bus at home, got back to school for Thing Two's end-of-year celebration, made a mad dash from there to my taekwondo class, and swung quickly by the shoe store to buy size adjusters for Thing One's new dress shoes for tonight's concert.  All of this with Petunia in tow, by the way...she was off from school today.

Or so I thought.

Petunia was supposed to have a day off at the end of last month--a teacher planning day or some such. There was some issue with that, and they had a normal day of school instead, with the day off shifted to this month instead.  Today, I thought.  Because of the day off, one of the moms of the boys in her class offered to host a play date at her house.  Given how nuts this day has been, it was the last thing in the world I wanted to try to squeeze in, but I love my daughter, so our next stop was her friend's house.  Which I had to find using the MapQuest app on my iPhone (oh, how I love that app) because this kid lives off roads I've never seen in ten years living in this area.

Anyway, we finally get to this house.  There are no other cars in the driveway, even though we are twenty minutes late.  The grandmother opens the door, looking confused.  She says that the mom is at work.  I take the playdate invitation from my purse to show her, and realize belatedly that the play date is actually NEXT Thursday.  Which means that the day off is too.  Which further means that Petunia missed a full day of school today for no reason other than that her mother is a dingbat who can't keep track of the date.

She's sailing through school--missing a day won't kill her.  I just feel like a flaming moron.  But at least she will still get her play date, even if it is a week from now.  We did get home earlier than anticipated, too, which is a bonus since I was hoping to let the dog out of her crate for a while before the next round of activities begins.

It's official: there is just too much in my head right now.  There is only so much mental juggling I can do before balls start to drop, and one landed with a resounding *splat* today!