Sybil

When Alex was little she loved to pretend she was someone else.  Usually she fantasized that she was a story book princess, and much to her delight her MiMi would make her princess dresses to whirl and twirl around in.  I will never forget the summer that she wore her Snow White dress 7 days straight before she decided to morph into someone else.

The hardest part about that week?  The fact that she was a natural born blonde and I am brunette and while people say we look so much alike now we didn't then.  It was quite a treat exiting the Blockbuster Movie's trailing behind a  three foot tall princess with a freshly rented movie clutched in her fist barking; "Come on Wicked Stepmother!"  I should have known then her teenage years were gonna be a complete bust.

I miss those days even though they were a trip to Vegas whenever I (or anyone else for that matter) was trying to get Alex's attention.  You see, if you didn't call her by her "correct" name she wouldn't respond. At all.

One day I yelled for her repeatedly without a peep coming from her direction.  I go to where she is playing in her room to see why she is ignoring me, and I am politely informed that she is NOT Alex, she is Christopher Robin.  Well, there ya go!

 She has since outgrown the need for multiple personalities and I have to say I kinda miss them.  Hopefully one of her children will do her the favor of tromping around in a super hero cape and mask for weeks on end living the dream.

Abby on the other hand, never really got into the whole make believe princess thing.  She is my live in the moment chick.  While she never really played make believe when she was little, she did love to dress up.  She loved her ballerina outfit complete with matching slippers and loved whirling and twirling in it much like her sister would, except she did this while playing with her Hot Wheels and Alex did it while playing with her Barbies.

Alex to this day loves the magic and romance of plays such as The Nutcracker and Beauty and The Beast, Abby loves the dark hilarity of movies like Harold and Maude.  Alex loves to shop for clothes and Abby loves to go work alongside her daddy in the shop.  Alex wants to be a fictional character, and Abby wants to be herself, except with a British accent.

A month or so ago, Abby was supposed to clean up the kitchen.  As we all know, "clean" to a mom and "clean" to a kid are two totally different things.  While standing next to her at the stove I drew her attention to a smear of some dried on something or other on the counter and asked her why she didn't wipe the counters off.  She assured me that she did, she just couldn't get that particular smudge off.

I took my fingernail and flaked up the smear in a couple of seconds.  I looked at her and said; don't play stupid with me, you could have gotten that up.   Her eyes got wide and then with a big grin she switched over to an outraged French accent and replied; "Stupida!  Who are you calling stupida?!   Do you speaka the Fraaanch?  I think NO!  Now who's a stupida?!!"   I couldn't help but crack up.

On the other hand, perhaps her inner defense to my total disregard to her self esteem by daring to use the word stupid in association with her has created a rather rude and obnoxious french woman to reside in her head.  That would be my luck.

Last weekend as I was carrying a load of clean towels to my bathroom to put away, Abby came up to me, stuck out her hand and said in a husky voice; "Hello, I'm Romando.  I'm 42 years old and black as midnight."  My response?  "Hello Romando.  I have to believe from the timbre of your voice you're a man."

Abby just smiled and moved on with whatever she was doing.  Well, that's two. How many personalities did Sybil end up having? Thirteen? 

 

The Big Cheese

My youngest, Abby, unknowingly landed a blow to my heart the other day when she called me at work to announce she wanted to move her bedroom from upstairs to downstairs in the lower level a/k/a the basement of our home.  Foreseeing the blood, sweat and tears involved in schlepping all the contents of each room around, I quickly pointed out that she had her room "down there" before and she was a'skeered of the boogie man.  She crippled me with her reply; " I was in 5th grade mom, I'm a highschooler now."

Highschooler! That made my heart hurt and I think I died a little on the inside at that comment.  I actually prefer my children to remain elementary school age and readily believe the many tales I tell them. They're also not as mouthy when they are younger.  Either way, I told her I had no problem with it but she must first clear it with her dad, and please don't bother him at work, talk to him when he gets home.  She of course called him immediately upon hanging up, if not sooner.

He was fine with it and proceeded to make plans to go fishing on the scheduled day and time of the "Big Move".  Mighty white of him is the term that popped into my head when he casually asked me on Friday morning if we had any plans for the weekend, because he wanted to see if Chris wanted to take the boat and wet a few lines.  He thinks he had me fooled, but I know it was his way of staying away from the impending chaos.

The Big Move was to take place right here and right now.  This weekend.  As you can see I am typing away and not elbow deep in piles of clothes that are mine and have been missing in action ever since they crossed the threshold of Abby's doorway.  I am in fact enjoying a good cup of coffee that my sweetie so thoughtfully made on his way out the door this morning as he headed to the fishing hole.

My daughter and the two friends she enlisted to help with the fun sat up most of the night, doing God knows what, and are still sawing logs in the living room.  They shoved the coffee table in front of the door leading to the front porch and placed the mattress to her bed in the middle of the floor.  They look like hobo's on a three day drunk sprawled across the room.

The Oreos I brought home seem to have been their snack of choice and the empty package is fluffing about in the draft of the ceiling fan like a baby bird gathering courage to take it's first leap into the air.  I really hate to wake them, I love this time of day when all is quiet and I can sit and marinate in my thoughts, but we really need to get this show on the road.

I told Alex that Abby wants to paint the walls of her new room purple and put lime green hand prints on them.  She replied; "She will regret it when she decides to paint over it.  Remember when I did that?"  I told her that yes I did remember and did she remember that I said the same thing to her and SHE did it anyway.  Alex laughed and replied that some things you have to learn by doing.  That made us both laugh and we commiserated on how we hated that Bitty Sissy was growing up. 

Well, I must get up from here and make a battle plan.  I actually look forward to having my sewing stuff back upstairs in the room next to me.  I never got to work on any projects because downstairs was just too far to go without someone missing me, having it all up here will be a bonus.  Moving it up here is gonna be a pain!

Alex just called to see if I needed her help with the move.  I told her sure, come on over at high noon,   I see no reason why we can't all have our eyeballs bleeding by the end of the day.  This mix of headstrong women will either be fun or pure hell, let's hope for the best.

Well, I better go wake up my little Cheese in her hair kiddo so we can haul all her crap downstairs.  After all, she not skeered any more, she's a Big Cheese now!

If You Wanna Look Small, Get Bigger Friends

You would think sitting in a chair this big would make me look smaller.......

Stupid Smartphone

Just as in years past Ray and I purchased ourselves something nice in November and called it our Christmas present to ourselves.  Everyone does that right?  You know, purchase a high ticket item and call it a gift for a future occasion.  Well, we are notorious for it.

This year the Iphone was our item of choice.  I was, and have found out the hard way, am still a Crack-Berry lover.  There are certain things I wish I had known before making the choice to go "I".  Believe me it is not for everyone.  Here is what I have found out about myself because of the switch:

1.  The name Iphone is deceiving.  This is NOT a phone.  It is a handheld computer with the capability of making a phone call in four easy steps.  Now you can use the voice feature and easily make your calls that way as long as your phone understands the words that are coming out of your mouth.  Sorry Brian for all the hang-up calls, my phone thinks I am saying Brian every time I ask it to call Ray Martin. I have found that unlike when speaking to a foreigner, slower and louder actually works with the Iphone.

2.  Technology has dumbed me up.  All the phone numbers I had memorized prior to my cell phone days have dissipated like the early morning mist once the sun comes up.   I used to be the person folks called for phone numbers, not anymore!  I actually have my blackberry in my purse along with my Iphone because all of my numbers didn't transfer over in the big switcheroo and I have yet to take the time to put all those numbers in manually.  Manually....who wants to do that?  I need an app for that!

3.  Face Time.  In theory it is cool, in reality not so much.  First of all, much like a Big Foot sighting, all conditions must be just right.  All parties involved must be near a wifi hot spot and I have found that spot is in my own home.  When in my own home I don't want everyone to see that I am sitting around in my ratty clothes swilling coffee and sitting on the sofa with a mound of unfolded laundry.

4.  Words With Friends: Scrabble I love, WWF, not so much.  I like the way the wooden tiles feel in my hand and the audible groans when someone puts a great word on the board.  WWF, the waiting around for my turn is not fun, and for those of you that had a game going with me and I resigned the games (six of them I believe) I bore easily and playing one game of scrabble for a week is NOT for me.

5.  Life360 App:  I call it Stalker 101.  This is a great free app that let's you follow every move a member of your family network makes, or more accurately their phone makes as it moves about town.  I actually check it out most when my sister travels so that I can see how close she is to being back home when I am taking care of her spoiled pooches.  Look guys, mommy is on I-75, she will be here soon!   This App actually has cool features such as showing the location of hospitals, police and parks in your general location as well as registered sex offenders.  This app lets you check in with the touch of finger to let your network know you have arrived safely or God forbid it will let you alert your network that you are in need of immediate help.  Your family can then see the location of your phone as well as the closest police department and their phone number so that you can get help to them as soon as possible.  Love it!  (Chris, when are you gonna accept my request so I can stalk you....?)

6.  Lose It! App: This is an app that helps you with your weight loss/work out goals.  You can select how much weight you would like to lose and the time frame you'd like to lose it in. It then tells you how many calories per day you can consume to reach that goal.  It will also tell you based upon the type of exercise you put in, how may calories you will/have burned.   That's all well and good if you are disciplined enough to put all the details in every meal you eat and every work out you have.  I am a fly by the seat of your pants kind of gal and would benefit more from an app that just let me take a picture of the junk I am putting in my mouth and it then posted the actual number of calories I was consuming right on the chart and then told me what a fat cow I was gonna be if I kept that crap up.

All in all, I hate the Iphone but much like my droopy eyelids, I will learn to live with it.  I am sure with time we will become just like relatives that have learned to tolerate one another.

I Resolve...

Well, we are day two into "Twenty-Twelve" and as of right now, 9:24 am, I have not yet made it into my home gym.  Good thing I didn't make that one of my "New Year Resolutions" huh!

I have determined it is best to go with the reverse psychology approach and thus be successful in my resolve.  Insane as it sounds, it's my plan and hopefully with my past performance it will turn out to be the secret to my success.  So, here it is folks read it and weep:

1.  Blog less, perhaps only once in 2012

2.  Give away all my gym equipment and put in that pool table Ray has always wanted, that way I can gain as much weight as possible...going for the Professor Klump look.

3.  Box up "the book" and wait for it to finish itself.

4.  Filter my thoughts before posting to fb on American Idol nights.

Here's to my past success in keeping a New Year Resolution and hope that history repeats itself!