Kindergarten ready

Tomorrow, you are five. It's been an amazing journey from infant to toddler to boy. We switch from duplo to lego now... even the past 6 months you have grown from being shy and afraid of loud noises, to wanting a party with 15 of your friends from school in our tiny house.

You always amaze me and I am in awe, until you complain about dinner, then I'm slapped back into reality. ;)

Happy Birthday! I look forward to the next 5 years, and the next, and so on... seems it only goes faster now... I officially no longer live in the present.

Happy New Year!

I just read a great article in the New Yorker (the one with the happy new year guy drawing a skyscraper on the cover) about this building on Pearl Street. It sounded like a guy (his name is Al) we would like to know, and he lost the good fight to save a building, but it was still a great article. I'll see if I can find it online if you can't locate it.

I've decided I collect alot of junk for possible projects I never get around to... fabric for quilts or pillow covers I never make, chipped dishes for mosaic tables or planters I never make, mini-dvs and digital movies for home dvds I never make, old window frames for mirrors or stained glass whatevers I never make... hell I even have stuff I bought on sale for gifts I never give because now that I've bought it, it seems shabby. Then there's the broken down furniture in my basement that I'll somehow restore (once I become a carpenter).

It's a bit overwhelming. Add onto that all the articles I've cut out from magazines about recipes, exercise, inspiration, home decor, furniture ideas, gardening tips... all to be filed in my black hole file drawer that I never open. Oh yeah, then there's all my mixed tapes that SOMEDAY I'm going to transfer digitally to my iTunes. We have the tape drive and everything... just need a bay for my PC to install it in... oh yeah, and TIME (passion wouldn't hurt either). Then there's that "things to sell on Ebay" shelf I have. And the ever present, where to invest my retirement money... the Ebay of all Ebay's the stock exchange. I keep thinking I'll get interested in that and become a Warren Buffett... when I get the time.

I also think I'll read Walt Whitman someday... and The Power Broker and those books keep learing at me... dare I get rid of them?

As you can see I'm organizing... am starting to realize my idea of making things is just an idea. Am not sure I can actually or that I ever want to make anything. But I have these ideas and I can't throw this stuff out.

That's why the guy in the New Yorker intrigued me. He's sort of like me on a bigger scale... and he has money and smarts enough to investigate and store stuff properly... I just seem to end up with clutter and a project list that's piling up to make things I'm not sure anyone wants or needs.

So that's my New Year's rant. I go through this cycle about once a quarter, after I clean up my inbox which has overflowed onto the desk and a couple bookshelves. It is what it is. My Dad says if you ever catch up with your organizing, you'll have no life. But currently I don't have either.... that is, if you consider "a life" as going to concerts.

P says I need a new system for an inbox. I think I just need to stop being lazy, or else just start throwing everything out. And we know THAT's not going to happen. So P has this idealized version of how we're going to IKEA this weekend to pickout a stackable inbox for Jane and her ever increasing "things to do" that never get done. He seems to think that will work. I know it won't, but I hate to burst his bubble. Plus I like going to IKEA. It gives me ideas on how to design the house.

I'm very similar to my Dad, so I know my clutter bug mentality won't be changing really. The only difference is that at 80 I won't be able to find anything either. So I have that to look forward to.

And that's my rant for 2008! :D

my little alarm clock

For 3 plus years now I've had this alarm clock that was so nice to wake up to. It was erratic at first and going off at all hours of the night, but soon it settled into a rhythm and I could always count on it. Unfortunately he no longer wakes me up as he goes straight downstairs now to watch TV.

I miss my little alarm clock.

Maybe I should get an electric one and record his voice on it, because the thought of going back to zippy morning news or that incessant beep-beep-beeeep is just a bummer to think about right now.

So, here's my thought for the day... enjoy it while you can. :)

Wow....

Those ads must have really gotten to me... I haven't posted in awhile. I guess I'm not a daily planet. And to be honest I think best with a pen... that generational divide again, so most of my notations have ended up in unmarked notebooks stuffed throughout our house's bookshelves.

Thought for the day. What is the big taboo of a child climbing UP the slide (not via the ladder)? My thought is, as long as the climber understands that anyone at the top has priority this isn't an issue. I don't get why this is made into such a big deal at playgrounds.

That's all I've got today... maybe once my toddler starts preschool I'll be able to form more mud pies.

Later... ;)

Publish or Perish

The Internet seems to be the best place to get published and lost at the same time. Not lost as in "where am i", but lost in the sense that "no one will ever see this webpage, and that's okay because I'm not that ready yet".

It's the writer's radio... someone might be tuning in, but probably not, and that's okay too. Still it's the prospect that someone might be...

After podcasting my favorite radio shows, I really miss the live format of radio... that exciting feeling I get that someone else is listening to the same thing I am.

However, when I am able to listen to live radio, I miss the rewind and pause buttons. Must be a generational thing... my generation is stuck between analog and digital the way my parents were stuck between written media (papers/books) vs. visual media (tv/radio).

That's it on that note.... oh yeah, but I will say, that dj's who give a nod to the podcasters in their show are the best... we like to feel included... even if we are in the future.

Memories of Thanks

I miss the thank yous. That's really what is missing from my life since staying home to care for my son.

Pre-baby, I was a Sr. Systems Administrator, and while not always understood by my co-workers (CEO didn't know my job description, and I wasn't aware of his either), I had managed to gain respectibility and many thanks were given when I solved a problem for the user community.

Post-baby, the thanks only exist in memories. Baby's don't always say thanks (he's just starting to now... so 2 years without have been the real gripe)... and it's just my monologue otherwise... looking for someone to appreciate how I re-did the pictures in the hallway, or my knitting, or the latest outfit I found for my son on sale.

Am a bit of an Ex-Michigan-Patriot if that's the semantic. So I've no family in my community. And we left our friends in the city after we moved to the 'burbs. Lots of phone calls and digital photos to show off our house that no one's gotten around to visiting.

Don't think for a minute I want the pity vote... I'm getting out there and meeting others, etc. I'm an adult who can be completely satisfied with my own accomplishments without approval.

Still it's a funny thing to miss about an old job.... or even identity. I'd grown accustomed to the thanks, even among all the complaining my users did about their computers... their thanks still managed to filter through to my ego and make me feel useful.

Murky waters to conquer now... in the meantime, mind your p's and q's... (I can't even remember what that means, but I think it's relevant.)

Yogurt

Now for the courage and the brainpower to actually just write something. Usually by the time my computer boots up and I've managed to circumvent emails and ads to get here, I've lost the time and/or the thought.

There are so many things about motherhood that need to be recorded that just aren't because there's no time, and no recollection. After my first child, I was expecting my mom to lead the way and tell me what to do. Instead she acted more clueless than I was... apparently having completely forgotten that she had 4 children. Now that my son is 2, I too no longer remember the tricks of caring for a newborn. Sleep deprivation, c-section pain, and all the newness just forces you to live in the present only, and not much is written about it then or since. So for newborn moms... I won't be writing about that here... am in the toddler phase now.

So, the only thing I can think to write now is, I wish when I had started feeding my son yogurt, I had used a bowl instead of leaving it in the container. Because now, if we don't have the Blue's Clues yogurt container, there is no yogurt. It used to be only the Dora container would work (they are all the same flavors and consistancies). So my tip for the day: use bowls.

Gotta run now ...