Jen on the Edge

Way back last winter, I posted an entry about Elegant’s art/aerobics. When the girl does art at her easel, which is permanently cocked, locked, and ready to rock, she also jumps up and down. Constantly.

Hard to imagine? Let me help you: Imagine a six-year-old, a cute one, maybe one who looks like this:

Now put her in front of an easel.

As this child is drawing, have her jump up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down, up and down.

Get the picture?

This happens EVERY SINGLE DAY of Elegant’s life. She makes art and jumps simultaneously. For at least an hour, often as much as two or three. Did I mention that she does it every day? It’s a huge part of her life and it’s how she blows off steam and generally deals with whatever issues are flitting around in her brain.

(I think it’s safe to assume that Elegant’s heart and lungs are in excellent shape. )

So the making of the art is very important to the artist. She uses a lot of paper, but we recycle it after she’s done, so my conscience doesn’t hurt that much over the dead trees.

Last week, disaster struck. Someone, oh I don’t know who, maybe the artist’s mother, didn’t notice that the artist’s paper supply was low. So low that Elegant actually ran out.

No paper.

Crisis.

What’s a girl to do?

Elegant actually paced back and forth and flapped her wings a bit when she discovered that she was out of art paper. She simply did not know what to do.

There was a stack of 8.5 x 11 paper on the desk three feet away. Granted, Elegant usually works on a larger scale, but I told her that paper is paper. She was unconvinced that this would work. Eventually, however, she realized that tough times call for desperate measures and that she’d have to use the smaller paper until the larger stuff could be obtained. She urged me to go to the store soon.

So for five days, Elegant had nothing to work with except normal sized paper. She did have a large selection from which to choose: white, various colors, lined, and even some with fancy borders. She made do and used what was available. A lot of it. Dozens of pages. She went through at least three new legal pads, plus loads of other stuff. She’d fill a piece of paper, flip it over to fill the other side, and then toss it aside like a used tissue. She’d get a new piece of paper and the cycle would begin anew.

Every day for five days, Elegant would ask me when I’d be getting more paper for her easel. For five days I put her off because I was busy with one thing or another.

Finally, today, we got new paper. Three oversized sketch pads just waiting to be filled. Upon our triumphant return home, Elegant headed straight for her easel and set up shop. Soon, the sound of jumping could be heard throughout the house and large pieces of paper began to cover the floor.

This evening, in addition to posting the blog entry below, I also emailed the same photo to various relatives.

Crazy Aunt Laura emailed me, “Why are they so cute? Love, Totally Unbiased Source”

I responded, “To keep me from killing them when they try to kill each other.”

Graceful started soccer camp today. For five evenings this week, she’ll learn basic soccer skills and play a real whole lot and then come home tired and ready for bed. The camp is World Cup themed, with the players divided into teams of various nationalities. Graceful plays for Spain.

Graceful has been eagerly anticipating this camp for a couple of months now and was really excited. She dressed with care: yellow soccer shorts and a cheery yellow shirt with a big sunflower on the front. I could tell she was also a little nervous beforehand; she’s never played soccer or been to a sports camp before, so she didn’t know what to expect and she knew most of the other players would be more skilled than her. Unfortunately, this case of nerves led to a new tic that started right around 5:20 — jerking her head — but I’m hoping it will be short-lived and not one we’ll be living with for the next month.

The parking lot at soccer camp was a veritable minivan and SUV dealership. If I had known that poor fuel economy was a requirement for us soccer parents, I would have left the car at home and driven our van. Many of the vehicles had some sort of soccer sticker on the back bumper. We failed in that department too, as our vehicles are sticker-free.

While there were plenty of normal parents like me, there were definitely those who are hard-core athletes. I saw one mother, dressed in her tennis gear, warming her kid up and giving him lots of advice on being competitive and making the other kids look like the losers they are. Hell, I only told Graceful to stay hydrated and to do her best. Clearly I’m falling down on the job of being a soccer mom.

There were at least 200 kids at camp. Some are newbies like Graceful, but many are experienced players with at least one season of playing under their belts (or, under their Umbro waistbands, as it were). This latter group wore their old jerseys and scuffed cleats with pride.
The staff was impressive — most of the coaches are collegiate soccer players. The coach of the University of Virginia women’s soccer team, as well as many of his players, were there too. You could tell the kids idolized the college students. I, however, was busy missing the trimmer and fitter body of my youth.

I arrived for pick-up early so that I could catch some of the scrimmages. Graceful’s yellow shorts made it very easy to find her. She had finished playing and was on the sidelines, bent over and looking at something. She had recruited a couple of other children and they were also bending over, looking at the ground. When I questioned her about it later, she said the fields — soggy from yesterday’s storms — are full of tiny frogs. She and some of the other kids were relocating frogs from the middle of the field to the side so that no amphibians would be harmed. My heart swelled with love and pride over my little animal activist.

And that is the one area in which all soccer parents and I are alike and in which I will not fail: I puffy heart my soccer player (and her sister).

It just occurred to me that we have only a little over three weeks until school starts. Where oh where did the summer go? It seems like we were just dealing with Graceful’s tonsillectomy in early June and now I’m sorting through pencils, markers, crayons, and other assorted supplies.

I have to tell you that Elegant is really quite pleased with herself this summer. You see, she’ll be in second grade and second graders — unlike those baby first graders — are required to have scissors. SCISSORS, I tell you. You know, for all that cutting they’ll be doing. And, to really boost her happiness levels, second graders can have MARKERS. That’s in addition to colored pencils and the 48 count box of crayons. Really, these are big kids indeed.

I say that somewhat jokingly, but this is a clear line of demarcation between kindergarten and first grade and then the rest of elementary school. Having gone through second grade with Graceful, I can tell you that there’s much more responsibility in second grade. More independent work. More writing and more homework. These kids are so responsible that they are allowed to check out TWO books from the school library. Take that first graders.

And Graceful will be in third grade this year. [Sob. My baby!] Third grade is huge because it’s the first year with major standardized testing with potentially serious ramifications: The Standards of Learning (aka the SOLs or, in this house, the SOBs). The Commonwealth of Virginia, like so many other states run by idiots (aka Republicans) has placed a lot of emphasis on the SOLs. Results supposedly say a lot about a school and its faculty. I say BULLSHIT to that because all the SOLs really do is force teachers to spend far too much time teaching to the test and preparing students for the test instead of actually, you know, teaching the children.

But that’s just my opinion. I do seem to have a few of those.

So we’re simultaneously gearing up for the new school year and trying to squeeze as much fun into our remaining days of summer as possible.

Today, for example, I swung by the ever fabulous Melissa’s house and kidnapped Griffin (7) and Ethan (4) for the afternoon. At only four weeks post-partum, Melissa was baking a pie and even wearing a damn apron. Actually, it’s this groovy smock thing she made that I need to get a photo of. Amazing.

So, the four children and I went to the park, where they ran off their ya-ya’s. 90 minutes into our adventure, we heard a rumble of thunder and hightailed it back to the minivan. We weren’t about to let a storm ruin our fun, so we rolled over to Ben & Jerry’s for some ice cream and interesting conversation.

Then, and only then, did I return the boys to their rightful home. They were tired and filthy and Ethan cried that it was over. I’m pretty sure we’ll have fun again next week. After all, isn’t that what summer is all about?

Pete cooked dinner tonight.

Hi. I’m Jennifer and I have a confession to make:

I hate to cook. And bake. And especially to frost cakes and decorate cookies. And please don’t ever ask me to make candy.

For those of you who don’t know me, this isn’t a revelation. Lots of people don’t like to cook. For those you who do know me, this is probably quite a surprise. In fact, as soon as Melissa reads this, she’ll probably recoil in shock and then call me to demand an explanation for my perfidy. I do believe our friendship can withstand this betrayal.

So, I don’t like to cook. What’s the big deal, you ask?

The big deal is that, at this very moment, the smell of freshly-baked pumpkin muffins is wafting through Jenworld. And I made those muffins FROM SCRATCH. Not just from scratch, but practically from PIONEER SCRATCH.

Last fall, I:

• cooked several pumpkins,
• scraped out the gooey stuff,
• pureed it one of my TWO food processors (one big, one little),
• strained it through a cheesecloth (because everyone has one of those),
• and froze it in two-cup batches.

Today, I:

• put oats in my little food processor
• and pulsed them until I had a coarse meal.
• I then mixed the oat meal (get it?) in with the flour and defrosted pumpkin puree and other stuff to make a more nutritious muffin batter than could ever come from a box.
• I also grated fresh nutmeg using a microplaner. Do you own a microplaner?

I ask you, how many people do you know who go to all this trouble, especially those people who don’t like to cook?

Why do I, for that matter?

I like to eat, as evidenced by my ample thighs, and I like for my family to eat healthy meals made from good ingredients. I could have bought muffins at the store or at least made them from a mix, but nutritionally I might as well be feeding them cupcakes.

Philosophically, I think it’s good to understand where food comes from. Muffins don’t originate in a shrink-wrapped container. Someone had to grow the wheat and harvest the sugar cane and water the pumpkins. While I personally did not go through those steps myself, I can at least start at the next step and assemble the ingredients and create something that tastes a hell of a lot better than anything Betty Crocker could produce and is way healthier too.

On a larger scale, this is how I cook. If I want chocolate chip cookies, I’ll bake them, because I think we all can agree that fresh-from-the oven is vastly superior to Chips Ahoy. And, in this house, soups do not come from cans — except that those Pete buys because he has a coupon he just has to use and then I refuse to serve said soup, but that’s another story.

I’m not completely hardcore. I do buy tortilla chips and crackers and other pre-packaged foods. But, in general, if I can make it and it will be better than what I can buy, then I’ll do it. I’ll just bitch quietly to myself about it.

I didn’t actually realize that I don’t like cooking until recently. For years I subscribed to various cooking magazines and dutifully clipped recipes. Somewhere along the way, I didn’t renew my subscriptions and it’s been months since I cut out a recipe. Last month I thought I’d make some lemon poppyseed muffins for the girls, but I put it off and put it off and put it off.

It’s pretty amazing that it has taken me so long to figure this out about myself. I mean, I’ve even gone through the classic five stages of grief:

1. Denial — I l-o-v-e to cook! I could just cook all day. Let me whip you up a pot roast.
2. Anger — Is it time to fix dinner already? Didn’t I just do that yesterday?
3. Bargaining — Let’s order a pizza tonight.
4. Depression — Okay, I just skipped this step.
5. Acceptance — Cook? Why, no, I don’t actually like it all that much, but that doesn’t make me a bad person. In fact, I’m probably better adjusted than Martha Stewart and I don’t have a criminal record either.

Today, I came home from a meeting and Graceful asked me if we could make scones. Scones? Where is that coming from? I have never ever made scones because I don’t actually like them. Combine that with that whole baking thing and you can imagine my reaction. But that is what pushed me to just finally just bake the damn lemon poppyseed muffins and be done with it. I went ahead and also made pumpkin and banana, so now I have dozens of muffins cooling on the counters. Graceful and Elegant will devour some today and the rest will be frozen until school starts, at which point the girls will get muffins in their lunches or snacks a few times a week. And I won’t have to bake any again until probably late fall.

Well, I’ve diddled around on baking and blogging far too long. Time for me to get back to work. I’m stationed at the kitchen table today, so I can smell the fruits of my labors while I do what it is that I do.

This wonderful fall-ish weather we’ve been having all week has me looking forward to Real Fall when we can wear sweaters and not die of heat stroke.

The girls are excited too and are pouring their enthusiasm into catalog shopping — a tradition here in Jenworld. Each summer, as the fall catalogs pour in, I put them in a stack. Then, at some point, when I need some sort of entertainment for the girls, I hand the pile of catalogs to Elegant, along with a pen. I don’t even need to say anything, because she knows her mission and she definitely chooses to accept it.

Elegant goes through each catalog page by page. Any time something catches her eye, she marks it with an E. There are a lot of E’s. When she’s done, she hands the catalogs to Graceful, who then goes through them, scattering a few G’s here and there. In this manner, I find out what the girls like and it helps me figure out what to order.

Why does Elegant always go first? We used to be fair and have the girls take turns, but then we discovered that Elegant was simply marking whatever Graceful marked, thereby rendering her choices null and void because she was copying her sister.

The girls have been doing their fantasy shopping this week, so I’m getting a sense of what their respective “looks” will be this fall.

Graceful is sticking with comfort over flash. Pants and shirts over dresses or skirts. Cotton and fleece over wool or tulle. She gets cold easily, so by October, she’ll be pulling out sweaters and fleeces. By Thanksgiving, she’ll be starting each day off in many layers: sweater, turtleneck, thick pants, and warm socks. She’s also much pickier than her sister, who is an indiscriminate sartorialist, so Graceful examines everything carefully to make sure it’s not too “baby-ish” or might have something itchy or scratchy on it. She prefers pants with elastic waists and pockets are always helpful for serendipitous discoveries.

Elegant on the other hand, will wear just about anything fashionable and doesn’t worry as much about comfort. She seems to be embracing the “flouncy skirts with boots” look this year — too bad her choices are outrageously overpriced — but she’s also interested in pants for the first time in, well, ever. And she’s continuing with her signature look: bright knit dresses with thick colorful tights or leggings underneath.

(In Jenworld, Elegant is required to always have some sort of leggings, shorts, capris, or tights under her dresses and skirts, as she has a tendency to flash her business regularly — both accidentally and intentionally. This is the same child who started a mooning riot in preschool when she showed off her pretty big girl panties to her class — mostly boys — and they responded by showing off their Spiderman, Batman, and other fabu briefs and boxers. It took the teacher several minutes to restore order and then I had to face the music when I came to pick up Elegant.)

Both girls are suckers for shirts with great pictures. Neither girl liked this, which disappoints me, as I was hoping to get it for one or both of them.

Luckily, both girls understand that they can’t have everything they mark. I’ll make sure they have all the basics and I’ll even throw in a few splurges, but they won’t be getting $100 or even $50 shoes, nor will I buy $60 wool sweaters. I do tend to buy name brands, such as Mini Boden, Hanna Andersson, and Lands End, but I’ll supplement with some stuff from Target, as well as goodies I find on eBay.

So I’m definitely getting excited about fall, which is my favorite of the four seasons. We have four weeks until school starts, which is hard to believe, as this summer is just flying by.

Time to hit the catalogs for myself.

As I’ve written before, there are a variety of milestones that children and their parents reach. First baby steps. Potty training. Going to school. First lost tooth.

We hit another today with both girls simultaneously. They both learned to tie shoe laces.

I know, I know, at nearly seven and nine years of age, they should have learned this ages ago. I agree and it had been a point of discussion between Pete and me many times.

And why the delay, you might ask.

I am left-handed. The only southpaw in the household. All the others are right-handed.

Just so you righties understand where I’m coming from, let me be very clear: Left-handed people tie shoes backwards from you people. Actually, y’all tie backwards from us, because our way is really the correct way, even if we do comprise only about 10% of the population.

I can remember when I learned to tie shoes about a century ago (okay, it was about 1974). My parents are right-handed and, even though they tried hard, I just didn’t get it. So my Aunt Kathy, a fellow southpaw, was called into action. I can remember us sitting in my grandparents’ living room, working and working and working until I finally got it.

So, teaching the girls to tie shoes became Pete’s project and something I’ve been reminding him about for a few years now. Given that I did the bulk of the potty training on my own (with lots of phone calls to my mother), I thought it was only fair to hand this one thing off to Pete.

But it didn’t get done and it didn’t get done and it didn’t get done. To be fair, I didn’t push the issue. The girls’ shoes are all pull-ons or have velcro. Even Graceful’s riding boots zip instead of tie.

But Graceful is going to soccer camp next week and her cleats have laces, not velcro. As it is, she’s probably going to be one of the few girls who’s never played soccer on a team before, and probably the weakest player there, so she’s going to be a bit behind the curve. No sense in making it worse with the damn shoe-tying thing.

So on my “to do” list of the week, I made a note to make sure both girls learn to tie shoes (sort of two for the price of one). At dinner tonight, I announced that lessons would begin after dessert. There was actually an ominous silence, and Elegant looked worried, as if I had just announced that floggings were imminent.

Graceful grabbed her new cleats, still new and untouched in the shoe box and brought them downstairs. We’re all so germ-phobic that we decided that learning to tie on new, unworn shoes was about as clean as we could get. Father and daughters sat out on the screened porch and got busy. Less than 10 minutes later, Graceful walked in to show me her success. Elegant followed a few minutes later.

Whew, I’m so glad it’s done. I was feeling a bit sheepish about the whole thing.

Now, if we could just get the training wheels off of Elegant’s bike…

Have you ever had one of those days where it seems like your ‘to do’ list is just too long?

Wait, of course you have. We all have.

Today is one of those days and this week is one of those weeks.

This morning, the girls and I left the house, not to return for several hours.

Elegant had her first occupational therapy session to work on her writing grip and related dexterity issues. That was an hour right there.

(Oh, and have I mentioned that our insurance company refuses to cover Elegant’s OT? They say it’s not necessary, yet the school told us it is and we agree. So we’ll be paying for at least eight sessions with our very own cashola. Sucks.)

Afterward, we swung by the library, where Graceful tried hard to put as many books as possible into her backpack. Elegant was more restrained but still managed to get an armload.

Then I took Graceful to meet a friend at the friend’s neighborhood pool, where we ran into a lot of people we know. I had already packed her lunch and snacks and she had taken care of her towel and swimsuit, so that was more stuff to remember earlier this morning before I was fully caffeinated.

(And by the way, Graceful has gotten the most adorable scattering of tiny freckles across the bridge of her nose and cheekbones. I’ll have to take some pictures because she’s just so cute.)

And then — because of course we weren’t done yet — Elegant and I went to get lunch at her favorite place, Raising Cane’s, which she thinks is haute cuisine and which was my bribe to keep her from fussing about why she isn’t swimming this afternoon. As she said happily after lunch, “These are the best chicken strips in the universe that I’ve ever eaten.”

The lunch break was followed by a stop at the local teachers’ store to get new grips for Elegant’s pencils and some workbooks to practice writing. (Yes, the occupational therapist gave us homework.) It was hard work deciding exactly which were the best colors to choose, but Elegant ultimately went with purple, blue, and green grips.

After that, we went to Sam’s Club, where we picked up only a couple of things and then got the hell out of there, because people we all know how much I hate that place.

We’re home now and I really need a nap, but my boss is calling in a moment for our weekly phone meeting. After that, I’m sure I’ll have plenty of new projects for work.

I must say, I’m really wishing someone would enforce 9:00 bedtimes for parents.

We are having the most amazing and perfect weather this weekend.

Normally in Virginia in July we have temperatures in the upper 80s to even as high as 100. The air can be so muggy that your clothes stick to you just on the walk from the air conditioned house to the air conditioned car. It’s miserable when it’s like this, but it helps us appreciate the crisp fall air all that much more.

So far this summer, it hasn’t been that bad — only a few truly hot days here and there. The humidity hasn’t been as soul-sucking as usual.

And this weekend, we’ve had high temps of only 78 with nighttime lows in the upper 50s. Virtually no humidity either. It’s just absolutely perfect. I enjoyed it today by sitting on the screened porch and reading the Sunday paper.

Perfect in every way and I wish it would stay until about October.