Tag Archives: John

An Extra Birthday Gift

Last night as John and I were out and about celebrating his birthday, we traveled around a good chunk of south central Wisconsin, hiking, touring the new plant his work opened up and then we went out for a bite of food  and a few drinks downtown Madison.  We eventually ended up at the Nitty Gritty. For those of you who don’t immediately get the most annoying happy birthday song ever stuck in your head at the mere mention of the name the Nitty Gritty is Madison’s birthday bar. If it’s your birthday you get a mug with a balloon and free beer all day, once an hour they play the birthday song and shout out all the celebrants that are there that day. Not surprisingly it is often filled with college kids, (you did hear me say “free” and “beer” in the same sentence right? ) As it turns out it’s also a great place for those of us who are following Dave Ramsey and his cursed, I mean lovely plan. Birthday boy drinks free and designated drivers get free soda, it was right up our cheapskate alley.

So we were standing around, making fun of the current fashion, enjoying our free drinks and having a lovely time. Then on a trip to the bar John got another little birthday present. A younger guy with his own birthday balloon said “Hey man, Happy Birthday” as John went by.  Not unusual, drunk people are pretty friendly. Then as I followed John by, he says in a voice laced with disdain “What are you like, 28?”

When I caught up to John I related what I had heard, his face fell for an instant, and then lit up, “Yeah, I am like 28!”

Happy 33rd Birthday honey!

Delicious!…?

For dinner tonight we had shiskabobs with sweet potato, apples from our own apple tree, ham from our own pig, zucchini from next door, and pineapple. Served with our own sweet corn and brown rice.

Delicious!

Well,it could have been…

The epic badness I called dinner started around 4:30 while mixing everything up in the bag of marinade.  As I mushed and mixed my bag exploded spewing juice and chunks all over me and the floor. Of course a dog came running, and since I had no extras of any of the ingredients on hand I shoved the dog away, while frantically scooping everything up into a strainer and then attempted to wash it off in the sink. It was one of those times where you’d like to throw a fit and cry but since you are the mom nobody is going to help anyway so you might as well just swear a few times and get on with it.

So I did. Rinsed off, re-bagged, re-marinated, refrigerated, and well cursed, only a few hairs were left when it was time to make the skewers. Already dinner was not looking as delicious but I still had hope. Then John was late. This was a problem because clearly shiskabobs go on the grill, and clearly I have no business going anywhere near a grill. In fact I’m pretty sure the last time I tried I was 21 in collage and drinking enough beer that it didn’t matter how my brats (in buns!) turned out.  As John was delayed later and later I decided to bite the bullet and do it myself. It’s a grill, its charcoal, how hard can it be right? I can start fires, I can cook over fires, Ivy says she’ll help.

Turns out Ivy is no help.

I finally figured out how to get the charcoal lit with the help of the chimney thingy and get my skewers on, I’m so proud I take a picture.

At this point I’m still hoping that John will swoop in and save us, but it seems to be going OK… and going and going and going… then I realize that I am slow cooking my shiskabobs.

In case that didn’t make you gag, let me just let you know right now that slow cook shiskabobs that include ham are not good, not good at all. The girls and I are hungry so we eat it some anyway.  Ivy eats very little, then feeds the rest of hers to Storm while I am not looking. It’s bad enough I don’t even have the heart to yell at her for it.

All of a sudden I realized it was 7:00 (Clara’s bed time) I had more to grill, Clara seriously need a bath, food was out on the picnic table where the dog would grab it if I didn’t put it away, Ivy wanted to play in her sprinkler and John still wasn’t home.

So, I…

-stripped my filthy dirty daughter Clara naked

-brought food inside

-found Ivy’s swim suit

-put rest of dinner on grill (still assuming John will show up any moment)

-set up sprinkler

-moved Clara over to play in sprinkler with Ivy

-flipped kabobs

-finished cleaning up dishes from outside

-took dinner off grill, stashed in microwave so the dogs wouldn’t get it

-went to go get Clara for her shower (and mine too, don’t forget the spewing bag incident)

When I reached the girls Ivy looked at me and asked “Mom, what’s on your shorts?” After a flurry of questions, answers and running around the yard  I confirmed that Clara had pooped near the picnic table and I had carried her over to the sprinkler with out noticing, getting poop on my shorts, shirt, legs…

John got home while I was upstairs putting Clara down to bed. As soon as I got downstairs I told him that while dinner was in the microwave he might want to be careful, since in addition throwing it on the floor, and  slow cooking it I also had probably moved it around two different times with poop on my hands, but that I had only touched the wooden skewers so if he was feeling brave he could probably cut the food off instead of sliding it off, discard the end pieces and still salvage some of dinner.

Part way through my explanation John got a funny look on his face…I guess he was hungry when he got home.

John went and had a shot of Scotch, and I re-gave up grilling.

Diet Coke Saves the Day… Again.

This week John has had to make up for being on vacation last week and so has been working long days. Long days as in he has not seen Clara other than at 2:00AM all week. Long days like Ivy has been watching for him to come home starting in the morning because she misses him. Long days as in I am having trouble remember to miss him instead of wanting to kick him in the shins (shins because I wouldn’t actually want to damage him because then I’d still be taking care of the house and girls by myself!) when he gets home because he’s been gone so long. And today, well today is Friday, Day Five, Day I Hope Your Dad Is Ready To Watch You All Weekend Because, “I HAVE HAD ENOUGH!”

Here is a conversation between Ivy and I this morning.

Me:” Ivy please don’t put your feet on me while I’m changing a poopy diaper.”

Ivy puts feet back on me.

Me: “Ivy get your feet off me.”

Ivy takes feet off and says: “Be QUIET!”

Me:…. (gladly shutting up it’d been one of those mornings, and I was currently winning this battle)

Ivy “Mom don’t talk any more.”

Me:….

Ivy “Mom I said be quiet”

Me:…

Ivy: “Be QUIET”

Me….

Ivy “Mom don’t talk to me!”

Me…

Ivy: “MOM DON”T TALK TO ME!”

Me: “OK! I won’t talk to you.” (even though it has become very obvious that more attention is what she is looking for not less)

Ivy puts feet back on me.

Then I grabbed another Diet Coke becuase in the words of my friend Sarah:

“Diet Coke helps me not want to strangle my kids.”

So we have arrived at nap (‘NO MOM, NOT NAP REST!!!”) time with two live children, and multiple dead Diet Cokes. It’s not a perfect solution, I’m running low on Diet Coke and I’ve had a few more bathroom breaks than normal today but it aught to get us all through ’till Saturday!

Note: Diet Coke consumed today has been out of regular cans. This cutie next to my little desk gargoyle is, well,  cute, and good for pictures, not for maintaining sanity!

Talking Smart

Today was the Pewaukee Triathlon John, my Uncle Jim and my brother Tyler got together to do it as a team. John took the swimming leg, fitting as an ex-swimmer. Tyler took the running leg,  not so fitting, but he does run, although I can now say that after 5K he does not look happy about running. Uncle Jim did the bike, very fitting since a few years ago my Uncle took up biking and while we have teased him unmercifully all the while he logs in an amazing amount of miles! Uncle Jim came all the way from Michigan to join the team (named “Not a Prayer” by my Mother who signed them up, let that be a lesson for next time you cook up an idea at Christmas dinner and don’t act on it first!) and they placed a very respectable 35th in the team division. As Gramps would say “They beat somebody!”

Now I just need to go back a pull up this little comment by my Uncle after a post about the Pewaukee River Run back in April…. Here it is… “Looks like an old fat guy from Michigan is going to have to come over there and put them in their place.” and.. Oh look! A tweet that reads “Don’t make me come over there!”  You can check out River Run for the full story. But in short, my friend and I have been attempting to beat my Mom and her friend in a canoe race for several years and haven’t managed it yet.  Talking smart is as far as we’ve gotten, something Uncle Jim excels at as well.

I’m sure you can guess what happened today but here is my race synopsis anyway…

Luck of the draw the boys and my Mom ended up starting in the same heat. John (blue cap) and Mom(red cap) lined up together on the beach for the swim. John sped out in front of the heat with another ex-swimmer leaving the rest of the heat behind Mom included. But soon we saw John bounce face first off a buoy, a LARGE orange buoy and then careen off in the other direction. Result being that he seemed to swim at least half again as far as necessary. The trouble with being an ex-swimmer is we are all used to those cushy things like lines on the bottom of the pool and lane lines. He exited the water in style… …well,in style might not be the word for it, he realized after than he was the only person he saw there wearing an “old school Speedo”. To my husbands defense, he was a swimmer, they all wore Speedo’s. Anyways, my husband ran out of the water in his Speedo, and handed off to Uncle Jim (OK, so we actually never really call him Uncle Jim it’s Uncle Weasel or Uncle Mushroom, Ivy called him Weasel all day so lets go with that one) and Uncle Weasel took off on his bike… …as it turns out the team didn’t rate too high on the style meter no mater who you were watching!

Mom swam a very straight course, got far enough out of the main pack that she was swimming mostly by herself, ran in to the transition area, and took off her on bike. Lets also just say that my mom bikes on her red Schwinn Traveler that she got in college. I don’t know much anything about bikes but it seems that most triathletes (or Uncle Weasel) have things like clip in pedals, or baskets, or bikes that are super light weight,  not so much with the old Schwinn…

Waiting at the transition area we didn’t see much of the biking but reports from the road say that Mom caught Uncle Weasel around five miles, gave him an encouraging “Root hog or die!” and left him in her dust.  Mom ran into the transition area with her bike and left again with a smile (sort of) for her fans. Uncle Weasel does not run, not even in a race, but he moved as quick as he could over to Tyler who took off on the run five minutes behind his Mom. Even with the Weasel’s lack of running factored in we are still all scratching our heads as to why it took the two guys longer in transition than my Mom. I’m thinking it has something to do with Tyler never making it out of the locker room at swim practice in a reasonable time but I could be wrong.

The cheering section (plus John and the Weasel) all moved over to the finish line to see if Tyler, the-25-year-old-stays-in-shape-lifts-weights-runs-on-a-regular-basis-son, could eat up the time and catch his mom. Turns out no. Mom showed up just two minutes before Tyler did, still smiling, sort of. Tyler said only two people got by on the run both old ladies, and then amended “Not as old as you!” looking at his Mom.

My Mom won her age class in the Pewaukee Triathlon today, she was almost twenty minutes ahead of the next woman in her age class, and two minutes ahead of the smart talking Uncle Jim and his relay. That’s right, three of them doing the legs separately couldn’t manage to beat her. So let me just say, she’s fast and if you think you can beat her, go ahead a try. Oh and let me just throw in there that she sorta freakishly competitive so if you’d like a fighting chance you better not mention that you are gunning for her!

My Uncle Jim, did awesome for a self proclaimed “Old fat guy” doing the bike course in 15 minutes less than his predicted time, coming in just over the one hour mark! Maybe one day Uncle Jim will  beat his little sister but he’ll have to join the rest of us and stick to talking smart for the time being!

P.S. If you wake up really early and run a race, eat a huge brunch, then climb and trim some trees,  go ahead and take a nap on the couch…

…just be prepared for company!

Good Mousers Needed!

Yesterday I watched a mouse run across the kitchen floor right in front of Clara and our cat Fiona then dash under the dishwasher to safety. Only Clara tried to catch it. I already wrote about how our cat Henry (above in orange) was the worlds worst mouser but Fiona(black) is right up there with him. Henry was awful because he could catch mice, never did anything to them and would eventually let them go. Fiona just seems to be lacking any hunting instinct whatsoever.  I have never, ever, seen her with a mouse. And believe me, in our house, there are plenty of mousing opportunities.  The worst performance by Fiona was about two years ago on a dark and stormy night. OK probably it wasn’t dark and stormy. In fact I really have no idea what it was doing outside, I’m not even sure of the season but I suspect it was winter since that’s when the mice really invade. Whatever was going on outside, inside John and I were both in the kitchen when a mouse ran across the counter and hid behind all our liquor bottles in the corner.

– A note on “all our liquor bottles in the corner“:

We used to keep these all in the pantry before a home improvement disease took over our house.  Now our pantry has no shelves, and things are stacked on the floor or kept in Rubbermaid bins, not a good place for glass bottles so the bottles were relocated to the counter. Now, when I use the word ALL it seems like we are crazy party animals with a full bar but they are actually a strange collection of mostly empty bottles that are  a minimum of 4 years old collecting dust next to one bottle of whiskey. There is no dust on the whiskey.

John and I closed in on the mouse and then tried to figure out what to do. I thought, ” We’ll get the cat, brilliant!” (this was clearly before I knew she was one of the two worst mousers in the world) I ran and got Fiona and put her on the counter next to the bottles.  Then while I tried to keep Fiona focused John slowly started removing bottles.  When we were down to just three or four in the corner (we don’t even drink them I swear they just show up and never leave!) the mouse poked it’s head out and Fiona saw it. “AH HA she’s got it!” we thought, but we were wrong. Fiona went up and tentatively poked her paw behind the bottles.  The mouse stuck it’s head out the other side, Fiona never noticed. John put on an oven mitt (we were in the kitchen after all) and poked the mouse, the mouse ran and stuck it’s head out by Fiona, she poked it back to John…. You get the idea? After this went on for many minutes (while I helpfully laughed in the background) John brought Storm into help. Now Storm is a hunting dog, she has hunting instinct, she is even what is known as a versatile hunting dog, but she is NOT a good counter top mouser. The mouse went back to hiding behind the bottles. Finally John ripped all the bottles out and smashed the mouse with his oven mitt clad fist.

Every now and then John talks about getting another cat. My new criteria is that it has to be a better mouser than he is!

New Respect Part II

If you remember a post awhile back called New Respect you’ll remember I was having a bit of trouble with my lawnmower. The reason I was re-attaching the cutting deck that day was that it had broken and my Dad had fixed it for us. When I got the lawnmower back up and running Dad cautioned me that because of the way he had fixed it I should be extra careful not to run over stumps or rocks.

So I didn’t. I ran over tractor tire chains… Turns out that’s just as bad as stumps and rocks.

Tonight we again unloaded a freshly fixed up lawnmower deck back from my Dad, (thanks Dad!) and needed to put it on the lawnmower.

Tonight the girls were already sleeping.

Tonight John was home.

Tonight it was back in the barn in 10 minutes.


He probably would have done it in five minutes had I not been helping!

For the record

John said that in years down the road I get to sit around, eat bonbons and read books while he goes to work.

OK,  that’s not exactly what he said.

It was more to the effect of, “Just think you are putting in all your time with the kids now, and it’s hard, and I wouldn’t want to do it.  But all this time will pay off when they are older, down the road I’ll still be working and you’ll be done.” He was trying to cheer me up after a rough day. It worked. I asked if he would please write that down so we could refer to it at a later date.  He declined, and said he would never own up to such a comment once the girls are off to school or out of the house.

So I’m just saying, for the record, John said I can sit around and eat bonbons and read books while he goes to work.

That is what I heard, and I wouldn’t lie about something that important!

*What are bonbons anyway? Would I want to eat them while I read?*

Mother’s Day

Lately I have been saying that I want to be the Dad. This is a comment I could elaborate on, but for fear of offending some of you (the Dads, sorry John) I’m not going to. I’ll know that all the Mom’s will know exactly what I mean and the rest of you will just have to use your imagination. I’m sorry about that but I like my husband and I want to keep him. Anyways where was I? Oh yes…

I want to be the Dad.

And that is the great thing about Mother’s Day. It’s like the Mom’s get to be the Dad for a day, with the addition of flowers and chocolate, what could be better?? And again, I could go on and elaborate, but for the sake of my marriage, I’m not going to. I’m just going to say that today was almost (couldn’t get John to nurse Clara today no matter what I did) like being the Dad, and it was wonderful.

It was not a picture perfect Mother’s Day. I got breakfast in bed, but Ivy started out crying then dried her tears and ate most of my food while she told me what my present was before I opened it. We didn’t get to do quite what I had hoped for the day, but we got needed projects done and had some fun too. It was a day of spending time with my family, (including my Mom, Happy Mother’s Day Mom!) while dealing with a normal days up’s and downs.
The part that made it different – it was almost like I got to be the Dad.

Thank you John for helping make my day special!

Running

There has been a rash of new runners in my family.
First Tyler started running, then I started running…Then John started running…But only Ivy smiles while she runs!
Note: There are only pictures of Ivy because the rest of us were swimmers, our running is not something you want to see.