Cookie Day=Sanity

Napoleon Creams, Russian Teacakes, Cherry Blossoms, Nutmeg Logs, Maple Nutty Bars, Cranberry Pistachio Bark, 3 Shortbreads, Lemon Iced, and the still illusive-perfect-spice-cookie, these are the bits of the holidays that surround me today.  I just finished my annual cookie day(s), baking the Christmas treats that will highlight our gatherings and care packages. (The picture here doesn't do them justice.  I clearly don't have a career in food photography.)

My husband and sons, brothers and sisters, various neighbors and kids' classmates are always anxious to see if their favorite sweet treat will make the cut and be included in the lineup for that year's cookie day. Many people have questioned my sanity, my patience, and my commitment to 8-9 different varieties.  What about just making the perfect shortbread and calling it a day?  The answer is that cookie day IS my sanity and helps restore my patience with the small difficulties in my life. You see, cookie day is a labor of love and it is a labor that I share with my best friend.

Cookie day has evolved into an overnight and now this year, two nights and two days of baking mania.  13 pounds of butter and 12 pounds of powdered sugar later and my friend and I divvy up the "fruits" of our labor and return to our normal mom, family, and work demands. We return to a schedule of short phone calls, squeezed in during train commutes or waiting spells in the parking lot during school pick ups. I always think that we will delve into some heartfelt, Hallmark movie type dialogue during our baking intensive.  Maybe it's the effect of inhaling so much butter or tasting so much dough but what we really do, is just hang out with a dash of goofy.  It's such a gift, my favorite holiday gift, to spend time with her and just relax.

So, for the person on your list who you can never find the "right" gift, I suggest a day of hang time.  It's amazing to me to be with my friend and not have to watch the clock.  It's a sad commentary on our over scheduled lives but I know I'm not alone.  The more we work so that we can afford stuff, the more we wish we could just be with each other and relax a little.  Let that be your gift.  And if the family or coworkers in your life get frustrated with you being unavailable for a day or two, do what I do.  Feed them cookies.

Day Camp (registration) Drama

Summer camp final celebration. Donostia. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Today is the day that online registration for summer day camps opens.  Specifically, 9am.  Last night I finalized my wishlist (first, second, third, and "Hail Mary pass" choices).  I updated my husband's account and complemented his wishlist with mine.  I've arranged my work schedule so that the first 15 minutes of the day are free and clear.  At 8:50am, I will load up the park district site, pull out my credit card, and begin my prayers of supplication. In other years when I was attempting to register two children in various programs, I also enlisted a supportive friend in pursuit of a supervised summer.

Now, to be clear, we don't have to go through this online rush. You can register in person as well.  A couple of years, I enrolled the boys in a nature camp through the park district that only used in person registration.  It was to start at 9am.  I felt silly and a little high strung when I woke up early on a Saturday to be one of the first in line and arrive at 7am.  As I pulled into the parking lot, I realized that all the spots were full.  Looking up, I spotted the line of lawn chairs and parents wrapped in blankets sipping thermoses of "coffee".  It turned out that the first 20-30 people had actually arrived by 5am.  I frequently am in this position, where what feels extreme for me ends up being somewhere in the middle ground by other people's standards.

In lieu of  lawn chairs and camping out in the elements for a day camp slot, my husband and I  tackled the online system yet again.  We split the list of options since the gymnastics program that our son wanted to get into was broken down into 4 separate camps of two weeks each, hoping that he'd at least get some if not all of the offerings if we were on different computers and logging in separately.  It worked!  He's in the activities that he wanted and we have one more summer of at least semi-supervised fun for him.

Two thoughts came to me as I was waiting the 45 minutes for the computer to unfreeze (the site had a warning sign that a slow down would occur and if I budged from my seat, refreshed the browser, or logged out I would lose my queue in line).  The first thought, as I passed the time by working at my desk on other projects and compulsively looking up at the monitor was, "I'm really lucky that I am able to do this". How many parents went to work this morning as a laborer or saleswoman or nurse and couldn't take the time to watch for the clock to strike 9am and then obsessively stare at a crashed website?  I'm guessing that there is some strange disproportionate mix of children whose parents are office workers or unemployed who are making it into these summer programs. But then, if you're unemployed, you probably aren't prioritizing summer camp in your budget so it may very well just be a program for office workers' children. 

Anyway, my second thought was, "We do crazy things for our kids don't we?"  This morning was definitely in the category of,  Things I Do For Love or Things I Do To Keep My Sanity.  It's a hard call, giving my son a physical outlet this summer is as much about loving him as it is about my own mental health.  I probably would have even gotten up at the crack of dawn if I hadn't succeeded in the online system.  Sometimes we just know that doing a little bit of crazy is going to make all of the difference.  Today I'm grateful for the crazy things I do for my kids and the good fortune to be able to do them. 

What's the crazy that you're grateful for?

Sibling Memories: Affirming the DJ

The Black eyed peas (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

At the wedding this past weekend, I had a chance to eat great food, visit with family, soak up some beautiful sunshine and surf, and I got to dance.  Dancing is not necessarily something that I go out of my way to do.  I'm terribly self conscious about my limited repertoire of moves.  One of my favorite memories from the weekend though, will be dancing with my brothers and sisters at the wedding reception.  Four of the five of us were a bit nervous that we wouldn't have anything other than country music to dance to.  The fifth sibling enjoys the country but was also the mother of the bride and in high demand.  The dj played several country songs at the very beginning and we sat nursing our drinks.  No one else was dancing either so we didn't really stand out as a protest contingent.  Then out of nowhere we heard the beat of the Black Eyed Peas (I think that was what stirred us from our seats) and we charged the floor.  We danced by ourselves through three quarters of the song while others were begging and cajoling their friends to join in.

We broke open that dance floor.  Perhaps people saw how much fun we were having and felt jealous.  Perhaps people saw my moves and realized that they could look really great in comparison.  Who knows.  We stayed on the floor for a couple more songs and sat when the country came on.  Everyone else sat down too.  We decided that we would have to make a commitment - we had to affirm the dj in playing non-country music (sorry sis).  Whenever he played non-country we would get up and dance and give him positive reinforcement.  It's been a long time since I was just goofy like that - just hanging out with my group and cutting loose.  It was an extra rare treat that my group was my two brothers and my two sisters, a great memory.

I was in high school when my youngest sister was born.  My youngest brother lived with my husband and I over his college breaks.  The wide age span of my five siblings has meant that our relationships have taken very different shapes and hues over the years.  There were times when I felt more like a mother figure than sister.  In the present day, we are a very adult mix of work, relationships, debt, and health concerns and our decade and a half age span isn't all that significant.  We all too easily put people we love into categories, defining and limiting them to a narrow template.  Sometimes we take a template that's been put on us and resist acting beyond it's confines.  Big sister or oldest in the family are templates that I've held.  The great thing about the dance floor at the reception was that the five of us were just having fun.  All the templates were set down and we were just enjoying each other.  I've always liked the Black Eyed Peas and now I have a whole new reason to appreciate them.

Sibling Memories: Indian Paintbrushes

I just returned from my trip to Corpus Christi, TX where I attended the wedding of a niece.  The best part of the trip was that all four of my siblings were present at the wedding.  We converged on Texas from Washington, Illinois, Indiana, and Ontario, Canada.  Five years have passed since the last time we were all together.  There are so many thoughts and as one of my brothers commented, "There's a lot of fodder for your blog from this weekend."  Indeed.

As we started the drive from San Antonio airport to Corpus Christi we were all taken by the very different landscape.  Watching the cactus pop up along the roadside was foreign to all of us. We were all admiring the beautiful and unfamiliar wildflowers.  I can't remember the sequence of the conversation but I basically commented on a pretty flower, my youngest brother made a joke about pulling over to pick some, I said, "Don't offer unless you're really willing to make good on it."  Then, all of the sudden, my brother pulls over on the side of the highway and calls my bluff.  Next thing I know we're all spilling out of the SUV and making a mad dash to pluck coral colored blossoms.  I was actually a little nervous that some Texas Ranger was going to come upon us and arrest us all for poaching a part of their state.  (An idea planted by my one brother who was convinced that he wouldn't escape Texas without an arrest from one of the Rangers - it may just have been a fantasy).

Back in the car we gathered our individual efforts and had a very beautiful bouquet.  We drove the remaining two hours and found the church where the rehearsal and dinner would be that evening.  After dinner we returned to the car and found our lovely bundle had shriveled, wilted, in a word, died.  We found our way to the beach condo where we stayed and plopped them into a plastic cup of water.  It was sad and a little pathetic, looking at the pink cup of dead flowers.  I wish I would have taken a picture so that the rest of this story could be more dramatic.  We left to go down to the beach for a bonfire and returned probably two hours later to find the flowers in the photo.  My sister who has lived in Texas calls them Indian Paintbrushes.  The rest of my siblings thought that calling them Lazarus flowers might be appropriate too, (reference to Bible story about the man who rose from the dead).

The weekend was great.  It was great because we had a chance to make new memories instead of relying on a stash of old childhood stuff that we all remember differently anyway.  And in a very hokey way, it was good to bring our wilted relationships with one another back to life, dip ourselves in some cool water and draw upon that to rehydrate our connections.  Those flowers just kept offering themselves up to us, opening up even after being terribly neglected.  I am thinking about other people in my life that I might do the same.  I am thinking about people who I need to take on a road trip and pick some flowers with.  What are some of the ways that have helped you restore life to your relationships?

Asking the "village" - apples and oranges

I started talking about this yesterday but just to remind you - my boys are very different.  They have the same mother and father, born two years apart, live in the same environment and go to the same schools, and yet they are different as apples and oranges.  Per my brief bio, my boys were born at home, so we can rule out some weird mix-up at the hospital.  Whether our kids are with us from birth and share our DNA or whether they come to us as toddlers or teenagers, through adoption or foster care, or whether "our kids" are the neighbors who visit us on a regular basis, they are "our kids" because we love them as they are.  We love the pieces of them that we recognize and the pieces that are bizarre and foreign (my husband is convinced that our one son's early morning rising is perhaps an early warning sign of some strange mutation).

So, if we accept the fact that our kids are going to be unique creatures and not cookie cutters of us, how do we meet the varied needs?  We want to encourage their talents and be sensitive to their concerns but we also want to be sensitive to our desires or those of others in the family.  Take my guys, one is a raging extrovert.  His ideal day would be talking non-stop in a mosh pit of humanity, taking breaks only for food and reading.  My other son can be very social but in his perfect world he is juggling or unicycling for hours, with no more than one other friend. They are both smart, but one thrives on group projects while the other prefers to work alone with focused attention. One lingers on, saying, "goodnight" multiple times and remembering one more story or footnote on the day that needs to be shared.  The other keeps watch of the time himself and can disappear at the bewitching hour without a peep.  If we decide to go to a museum, we have one child who is in heaven, reading material and mingling with people everywhere while the other son is "peopled out" 30 minutes into the outing and begging to do laps around the parking lot instead. How do you engage two (or three or four) divergent personalities in a way that honors everyone?

This was my dilemma last summer.  Our normal vacations involve road trips to visit family members.  For the very first time we took a family vacation that was just our little foursome, planning our days and nights, routes, food, and entertainment for a whole week.  As the planner of vacations I was a little nervous.   I decided that the best way to get "buy in" was if everybody was part of the plan.  I asked everyone what a perfect trip to the Black Hills would include from their perspective. We made a list of all those ideas and made sure that everyone knew their thing would get done and when.   I also told them that if we ever got to a point where we weren't sure what to do next on a given day, everyone could have one wild card choice during the trip.  They could choose to use it during the week if they felt their needs just really needed to be considered most in our decision.  That week we went horseback riding, explored caves (in the dark and in very confined space), toured the Wounded Knee Museum, and took incredibly long and beautiful scenic drives through Custer Park.  We all participated, even though the museum almost bored my youngest son to tears and my husband had a bloody scalp from scraping the ceilings of the caves. 

When the kids were little such idyllic displays of cooperation and enlightened compromise did not exist.  It often felt like a day was not complete unless someone was pouting, crying, or in full blown, red alert mode.  Usually the upset was directly linked to somebody needing to sit outside of their comfort zone for just a titch too long.  I could count on a meltdown when the extrovert was forced to stay home with me all day or the introvert was required to hangout at a church activity AND stay indoors.  I would sit at baseball games for one, watching the game part of the time and part of the time playing catch with the other one who hates team sports but loves being physical.  I ended most days feeling like I had let somebody down.  

Fast forward ten years.  to my oldest son surprising me and  putting all of this in perspective.  He said that while he didn't like it at the time, doing things together as a family helped him.  His insight came when I asked him if he had any idea how he came to be such a cool person (the single most awesome conversation I've had with him).  He shared some interesting thoughts and one was, "I hated having to do everything together but I also think it ended up helping me.  Whether you planned it or not, it was teaching us that "it" isn't always about what we want."  It absolutely wasn't planned but he's right.  The differences in our families allows us to practice cooperation and compromise.  They allow us to set aside our own personal desires once in awhile and think about other people.  They allow us to learn new things and try new things that our own little comfort zone wouldn't have made possible.  It isn't very pretty at times but it's absolutely better than only doing things that we want, when we want them.  Our family is our first little practice run at having classmates, coworkers, and personal relationships.  You know the people in your life who didn't get enough practice as kids.  Differences can be a pain but they can also help us learn how to be great grown ups.

Big Boys

Garage Roof - launch pad during Snowmaggedon

**Before anyone starts calling child protective services, let me just say that no animals (or children) were harmed in any way during the filming of these stunts.**

The boys had finished hours of shoveling after a huge snowstorm last winter.  They were having snowball fights and shaping a large igloo in our front yard.  They wanted more.  There was so much snow and it seemed to be calling to them.  We asked for their help with one more project - shovel out the garage door.  The snow had drifted and packed up against the door into a nice, firm, wall of white.   Ingeniously, they filled their sleds with snow and carried it to other areas of the backyard to dump.

Just when I thought that I heard a cup of hot chocolate beckoning, I looked up to see my sons on our garage roof.  The high packed snow made the trek not only possible but very easy.  Then, I saw it.  The little orange, plastic, disc was on the roof too.  My son's butt was in it and perched at the edge.

Air time

We negotiated for awhile, laughed an anxious laugh, checked the snow padding at ground level, and said, "O.K., Go!"

They were thrilled.  They were also scared (had they been secretly wanting us to say, "No?").  It was truly a wonderful moment.  They felt larger than life and couldn't believe how cool we were for letting them take on these feats of daring.  It wasn't enough though.  "Dad, Mom, you have to try it!"  As I was insisting that my role was to keep a firm hold on the phone so that I could call "911" at a moment's notice, my husband climbed up to the roof.  What!?!  Unbelievable.  Earth-shattering.  "DAD'S going to do it!" 

We had spent a big part of the day with two boys who were offering tremendous help to us and to our neighbors.  They were in fact, acting like little men with a very high level of responsibility and an intense work ethic.  My husband reminded me and them that hard work only feels good when it is balanced with hard play.  Teaching my sons how to be little men happened best when my husband showed that he is still just a big boy.