New Jersey Moms Blog

I have a new post up at New Jersey Moms Blog. Check it out here!

Sleep

Sleep, or lack their of, must come into my writing every so often. We had another comment today that just can't go by without mention...

We have been struggling to get Katherine to be an independent sleeper forever. In the last six weeks, we have been pretty ruthless in letting her cry for awfully long periods of time until she falls asleep. Today she had been in her crib for a very long time before we decided that, like it or not, she was not going to nap.

When I rescued her from her crib she said, and I am not kidding, "My tummy hurts from crying for you for so long."

Well, I wonder how long I'll be able to let her cry the next time...

Nails

I have written often on this blog about my struggle with being an old fashioned mom in a modern world. I had another run in today...

I took the girls to get their hair cut this afternoon and after their cut, our hair dresser invited Caroline to get her nails done. "It's complimentary." she said to me. She must have thought my disgusted look had to do with money and not the fact that I really didn't want my five year to get her nails done. I finally gave in this summer to Caroline's requests for nail polish by purchasing the faintest pink I could find. While I feel like five year old girls really don't need nail polish, I decided that this was one of those battles that I didn't need to choose. After doing some research, I did discover that Caroline was truly the only little girl we knew who didn't have chipping nail polish on her little fingers. So I felt like the pale pink was a good compromise. Today Caroline left the hair salon with bright orange nail polish topped with glitter. She was so excited that I smiled and told her what a special day it was, all the while wondering if I was right that the woman should have asked my permission before she offered my daughter nail polish. I suppose she really thought nothing of it...

For some reason, I still do...

New Jersey Moms Blog Launch Party

Why is it that blogging is so much like exercising or eating well? If I let it go for a few days then what's a few days more and what's a week and so on and so on...

This weekend, I drove to Princeton for the New Jersey Moms Blog launch party. It was funny timing in that I had been so quite in the blogging world last week. It reminded me though of why I do it. Yes, I blog to track my memories of our family. This is so important as I'll often go back and read a post and have no recollection of the event happening! But I also blog because of the wonderful community of women out there. I met great women who had inspiring, interesting and uplifting stories to tell. Some I had met in the real world, others on line and many were new to me entirely. I will look forward to following their lives now- in the virtual way!

It was also an interesting night because of our venue. Our party was held at Gold Medal Impressions, a sports photography studio. If you have a sports lover in your life, this is your one stop shopping spot. More though than bringing to me great sports photos, this venue showed me what a person can do if they truly follow their passion. The owner of Gold Medal Impressions loves sports and loves photography. He has blended these loves into an exciting career. He attends fabulous sporting events while photography all the memorable moments. As I listened, while he toured woman after woman around his gallery, I was inspired by his enthusiasm. His voice showed me the happiness that can come from doing what you love.

Hopefully I will remain inspired to keep writing, reading, doing...

Ticket Master

Over the weekend, we received a call from our credit card company. It appeared that we had done something that had alerted their fraud department. I got worried. I had started Christmas shopping last week. I thought I was being responsible but maybe not...

Rob laughed as he hung up the phone. On Friday, we spontaneously decided to take the girls to Playhouse Disney Live on Saturday. We have avoided these things because they are so loud, crowded and overstimulating. Just figuring that Caroline would be ready to leave before the first song was sung, we hadn't bothered. Apparently, we find all activities requiring Ticket Master to be overwhelming because it was our Ticket Master charge that alerted our credit card company. According to their system, we are just not people who use Ticket Master. Surely, they figured, someone else must have taken our credit card.

Well, guess what Credit Card Company? We have entered a whole new phase in our lives. Caroline tolerated the entire performance and frankly she did more than tolerate it. She sang, she danced, she smiled the whole time. While I still found it loud, overpriced and overstimulating we had two little girls who were completely in awe. Perhaps we will be using Ticket Master again soon...

The Election

I should have written this post yesterday but I was so sleepy... Rob and I are typically asleep awfully early but we stayed up to hear O'Bama's speech and my eyes were so blurry..

I should say we tried to stay awake. In our cat napping, though we had one of the greatest moments of this historic (I know many people are tired of hearing this word but you just can't escape it!) and important campaign and election.

Around 10:30, we both drifted off. Shortly after 11pm, we heard shouting and cheering in our street. In looking out the window, we saw our teenage neighbors running, shouting and high fiving. "He won! He won! He won!", they cheered. At least one of these boys was one who in our year here, to the best of our knowledge has never smiled or made eye contact with us. He was celebrating in the street.

To me, this was the perfect way to end this campaign and to celebrate this election. Regardless of one's personal political opinions, a president-elect who can bring such eleation to such a sullen teenager is an inspiration.

Hopefully, the inspiration and the happiness will spread from our small block throughout our country. Hopefully, we will see more people who haven't smiled in a year, running and jumping through their streets. Hopefully, many more people will be woken from their sleep by cheering and joy.

Voting

The girls and I arrived at our poling station at 8am. Fortunately (or unfortunately!) there was no line so we marched right in...

I really wanted the girls with me when I voted. I truly believe that this election and how we choose to vote has the potential to change their future. I want them to be able to say they were in the booth on November 4th, 2008.

After we left, I talked more about the importance of this election. Caroline said, "But Mom, all you did was sign your name and push some buttons."

I tried to sort out all my thoughts and figure out the best way to explain this day to her. I kept starting and stopping sentences about the first black man, an inspirational leader, chances for the direction of our country to truly change. As Caroline is only five, I settled on explaining how woman have only had the right to vote in our country for such a short time. I was shocked when she said, "Yeah, I know. And a while ago woman couldn't be ministers or go to college or a long time ago even speak in public."

Apparently, I didn't need to explain myself at all...

Albert Einstein

During lunch today, we enjoyed some Smart Puffs, the healthy version of Cheetos. A very funny conversation ensued...

Katerine (while looking closely at the bag): "Who is that man?"

Me: "Albert Einstein"

Caroline: "Is he on the bag because he invented Smart Puffs?"

Me: "No, he's on the bag because he was a super smart man and the inventors of Smart Puffs thought it would be funny to have his picture on the bag."

Rob: "I never realized that Albert Einstein was on the bag."

Me: Feeling intellectually superior and more observant sat back, shaking my head. How could he not have noticed, I thought.

Caroline: "What else did Albert Einstein do?"

Me: More silence as I couldn't quite put my finger on what else this super smart man had actually done...

Rob: "Well, he had a great impact on the Manhattan Project, the group that led to the invention of the atomic bomb." Rob continued throwing out facts and words like Oppenheimer, Hiroshima, August 6th 1945 and then Nagasaki, August 9th 1945.

Me: Relieved that Caroline ran off to find more Halloween candy instead of asking what an atomic bomb was stared at Rob.

At first I tried to put off all this extra knowledge on the fact that Rob's birthday does happen to fall on August 6th. You do tend to remember more about big historical occurrences that happened on your birthday but still...

Apparently, I am no Albert Einstein. Off to brush up on my United States history...

My Love/Hate Relationship with Halloween

Love:

Walking around our neighborhood with a friend of Caroline's from school and neighborhood friends. Recognizing lots of people along the way and knowing many of the families whose homes we visited. It was another 'what a difference a year can make' kind of night.

Caroline and her friend from school walking down a darkened neighborhood street holding hands and singing Halloween songs.

Katherine falling and as soon as she could catch her breath, saying, "Where's my candy?"

Reeses Peanut Butter Cups

Caroline coming home and sorting through her candy giving me my favorites and Rob his.

Caroline telling me that she needs a bigger trick or treat bucket next year.

Katherine saying, as I was getting her into her pajamas, "We never went to Halloween." You forget how confusing this holiday can be...

Hate:

Caroline waking up on Halloween morning at 5:30am shouting, "Happy Halloween!" Ah, right then, no it wasn't.

Caroline waking up three times in the night. Too much sugar, scary dreams, schedule off?

Katherine waking up at 4:30am on November 1st. Too much sugar, scary dreams, schedule off?

Having to say "No." to the quazzilion requests for candy.


Love or Hate?

Walking into the living room after telling the girls that they could have no candy until after soccer and finding them sitting on the couch, each sucking on a tootsie pop. Katherine looked at Caroline and said, "Caroline's eating one too." Caroline looked at Katherine and said, "Katherine made me eat one."

Enough said.