Archive for the ‘Days Like This’ Category

With T-minus seven days until school starts, I have one thing to say: Uncle.

In other words, I give up. I give up trying to work and maintain a blog and write a memoir (well, maybe not that one) while the kids are home. Why? Because in the minutes it took me to write this far, one child yelled into my office to ask if the printer is on and the other, sitting in a nearby chair that does not belong in here, playing his Nintendo DS (free, thank you!), just announced he might have a breakfast bar. No wait, a breakfast burrito. No, more Nintendo. (more…)

Have you ever noticed what’s missing from the faces of runners you see along roadsides throughout the world?

Joy.

Running, it seems, is hard work. I know I don’t do it unless there’s a chance someone might pass me a ball. My husband, on the other hand, is currently training for his eighth marathon, and never, ever does he look like our son, Chris, looks on the soccer field after his team has scored a goal. Never, ever the joy. (more…)

I wrote this one for Good Housekeeping 18 months ago and yet, it still applies:

The hotels are cheese wheels!” my fourth grader announced cheerily. I would have been more amused if he wasn’t the only one with hotels on the cheese-themed playing board on our Monopoly game for the Wii.

He was crushing me. But at least he was getting the hang of the game…and of investing and spending the way it used to be, back before the mortgage crisis ate a chunk of his college savings. In fact, Monopoly is more than a game. It’s a lesson in spending no more than what you actually have. (more…)

1. Your kids’ toes now hang over the edge of the flip-flops you bought them in May, but you can find only winter boots at the store.
2. You are billing the tub of Parmesan cheese and the lone pickle floating in the jar at the back of the fridge as a snack.
3. Your vacuum bag is filled with sand and those little pink and blue plastic playing pieces from the game of “Life.”
4. When you found a picture of the snow cave the kids made last January, it sent you into a fit of giggles.
5. It appears that you have redecorated the bathroom in Early Swimsuit.
6. There’s smoke coming out of the Wii.
7. The kids are dreading homework. You are dreading the task of matching up socks.
8. Uttering these two words can send panic throughout the house: “book report.”
9. Your car smells like summer (i.e. wet towels, potato chip crumbs, dried pink lemonade and bait.)
10. Yesterday, you swung around expecting to see the school bus, only to discover the UPS truck. And then you cried. Just a little.

Share, share: Add your own!

The world would be a better place without garnish. I’ve long believed it, and last night, I got proof…blood-gushing, “Oh my God!” proof.

Last night, we were at my neighbors’ house all of five minutes before we’d have to leave again, all because my husband continues to insist on sprinkling little bits of green leaves of various sorts — last night, basil — on whatever he cooks. He had made three salads – corn, macaroni and cole slaw– for our gathering, all gorgeous on their own, not to mention far more impressive than anything I can create in the kitchen.

“Wait,” he implored me, “They need basil.”

“No they don’t,” I insisted, and then he gave me that look, the one that says, “Why couldn’t I have married someone who shares my love for all things Food Network, instead of someone who shouts at English soccer players who can’t hear her through the TV?” (more…)

What day is it? I’m not sure, because I spent the last few days in a blur of BlogHer conference meetings and Project Mom casting calls, followed by crabbing and tubing at the Jersey Shore (the place, not the show, though I was near where the show is filmed. I did not run into Snooki.)

On Thursday, I dropped the kids off at the neighbors’ house where my friend Mary seemed surprised that I could clean up so nice. Granted, she normally sees me in ratty shorts or soccer cleats.

Anyhow, I was all dolled up because I was heading into the city (New York, that is) to film a segment with Today Moms of the Today Show.com. (It’s not up yet, but I’ll link to it when it is.)

The lovely and talented Alicia Ybarbo of the Today Show didn't seem as surprised that I sometimes wear makeup and a dress.

Then I headed over to the Bloganthropy Awards Dinner’s On Us, where I met lots of fantastic mom bloggers.

Corine Ingrassia of Complicated Mama knows how to pose for a photograph without holding your phone, business cards, purse and drink in the shot.

My 11-year-old son, by the way, said that my dress could serve as camouflage on Pandora in the movie Avatar. I predict a blog in that boy’s future.

The winner was the lovely and talented Katherine Stone of Postpartum Progress, which helps mothers deal with postpartum depression.

(Wordpress keeps stripping out my links from captions, so here’s Postpartum Progress and here’s Complicated Mama.)

And that was just Thursday. On Friday I went to the Hilton for BlogHer ‘10, the ginormous conference for the 2,500 mom bloggers who showed up. I didn’t get a lot of photos there, but picture lots of “Oh my God!” and hugging and swag and tweeting all in one place, including the lines to the bathrooms. And I got to have a tasty Smore up in the Hershey’s suite (or should I saw “sweet”? Nah, too corny.)

I ran into loads of friends, new and old, including:

Dawn Sandomeno and Elizabeth Mascali of PartyBluPrints.com, who rescued me at the right moment.

Katja Presnal of Skimbaco, who understands English quite well, thank you very much.

Beth Feldman of RoleMommy

Jen Drexler of Just Ask a Woman

Tonya Staab of This and That

Linsday Maddox of Silly Mom Thoughts 

Liz Thompson  of This Full House, who will never live down grabbing my hand and dragging me to the E.L.F. table while exclaiming “C’mon Jen! You need makeup!”

Tracy Beckerman of Lost in Suburbia (You know when you can hear a dog vomit story coming from down the hall, it’s Tracy.)

Joanna Dreifus of My Mom Shops (Thanks for making me feel like a rock star for stopping me in the hall and making sure we met.)

Thanks to Dawn, I was invited to a showing of Secretariat (two thumbs up!), and got to thank the producer for making a hero out of a middle aged woman, Penny Tweedy, Secretariat’s owner.

I am not certain why Mark Ciardi and I appear to be listing, as if on a boat. It was too early in the party for that.

Speaking of boats, I snapped this pretty sunset shot on my way home to New Jersey:

If it's called the "New York Waterway" ferry, how come they name the boats after Jersey boys?

On Saturday, I had to return the Windows 7 PC laptop that the nice people from Microsoft had let me play with for 24 hours, leaving me to groan at my own four-year-old laptop every time I boot it up now.

Then I spent the afternoon in the green room at Ciaran Blumenfeld (Momfluential) and Leane Vandeman’s casting call for Project Mom, which I told you about a few weeks ago. (Am I selling my devil to the soul or is this a smart move? )

I met tons of talented bloggers and I’d list them, but I’m certain I’ll forget someone and that would be bad. Hopefully we’ll all wind up on a TV show together anyhow.

The "Shhh" part was hard, what with dozens of mom bloggers passing through the green room and a two-hour backup for interviews.

Then I found myself on a boat again, this time with my family on my sister-in-law’s boyfriend’s boat on north Barnegat Bay, watching the sun set:

Yeah, that's Jersey.

In just 12 hours, I went from schmoozing with Today Show producers and Hollywood producers and getting interviewed for a reality show to crabbing with my sister-in-law in my pajamas and college soccer sweatshirt.

Hmmm. I wonder why my friends and family are so surprised when I get all dressed up?

Luckily, the boys woke up and took over:

All those hours of watching "The Deadliest Catch" finally paid off.

You'd be crabby, too, I suppose.

And we took the kids tubing, too.

I wish I could bottle their laughs and smiles and dab on a little bit each morning just behind my ears.

Here it is Tuesday (right?), and I’m still a little hungover from all that activity. So, I’ll leave you with the video I made that snagged me one of the coveted spots in the Project Mom casting call, and the hope that next weekend is a tad quieter. At the very least, I hope I don’t have to wear a name tag.

Here’s one from my GoodHousekeeping.com days that, sadly, still applies:

“Did you try on the coat?” my mother asked.

The coat…um, which coat?

She had given me several coats and some sweaters that she decided she didn’t want anymore, so I wasn’t sure which coat she meant. I figured it must be the “expensive one” she mentioned when she handed me the pile of stuff in the school parking lot on Halloween, while I, dressed like an Oktoberfest waitress, was busy rushing off to run the party in my son’s fifth grade class. (more…)

Just the check, please.

Back when I was a full-time at-home mom, people would sometimes ask, “What do you do all day?” It was meant to be either innocently inquisitive or incredibly insulting, as though staying home with two children under three was some sort of vacation from “real jobs” involving unsticking the copier and raiding the leftover danishes in the conference room. 

My answer was always the same: “I undo everything my kids have done.”

You know, putting away the 143 Matchbox cars snaked across the kitchen floor for a game called “Thanksgiving Traffic Jam.” Wiping peanut butter off the cat’s tail. Fishing the remote out of the toilet. Retrieving my bookmarks from behind the heaters. (more…)

If we listened hard enough, we could hear our hearts breaking knowing ng that Springsteen was playing just 10 miles away.

Here’s a classic one from my days as a GoodHousekeeping.com blogger…because it’s summer, and I’m having a hard time putting together anything longer than a tweet today.

“where r u” my brother, Scott, texted me as I was racing around the streets of Newark, New Jersey, in my mini-van, desperately trying to find the garage where I’d paid for parking in advance.

“mulberry,” was all I could thumb back before the light turned green and I pulled out onto the wrong street…again. I asked yet another police officer where parking lot “Yellow 2″ was located, and she gave me yet another wrong answer. Finally, my kids, Nicholas, 11, and Christopher, 9, and I found the garage.  I parked before we ran to the Prudential Center, where the American Idol concert had already started. (more…)