Our Life In Pictures
It was a busy little weekend. Saturday was spent sliding the plastic. We purchased a very nice scanner that will allow you to scan several items at once and will crop each item into it's own file, and a printer that spits out absolutely beautiful (and waterproof) prints of our digital pictures and makes me nearly weepy.
The whole thing is going to make me a very busy and obssessed person. I am a closet beginner scrapbooker except that I lack the desire to produce horribly cheesy picture books with my pictures brutally cropped into stupid looking clip art type ugliness with little balloon stickers hanging over our heads with corny fucking captions. So, even though I would like to organize them all into books and put the children's into themed pages, I still can't bring myself to cut up our original pictures.
Last night we scanned in all two hundred of our not so professional wedding pictures and then some. They may not be the best pictures, we may look a bit goofy, some of us even look a bit stressed out and pissed off, and even though there were only about ten people there from my biological family and friends Terry's family was my family long before that day and they kind of filled in my empty seats. His father actually gave me away. At any rate, they are our memories and having digital versions of them makes me very happy.
Terry's cousin who lives in the Orlando area finally visited Sunday and we grilled out and it was a short but good visit. He is leaving in September to backpack around Eastern Europe for a couple of months. I am a tad envious. Who wouldn't be, right? I want to go. You know, the nomad in me.
The living room is painted. The Deep Garnet didn't turn out the way I had hoped. I prefer the color it was before. However, the paint swatch that it was is outdated. Bastard! The living room is very dark with the dark wall being opposite the sliding glass doors. We left all of the tape up and are considering just painting it Parisian Taupe like the rest of the walls. I am not sure yet. I do like the way the two colors look against each other. Very nice. I am thinking about the possibility of an entryway mirror near the door and some other light colored reflective objects that might look nice displayed high on that wall that might create more reflection and lighten the whole thing up. Maybe I should start investing in very interestingly shaped picture frames in various sizes and materials and cover the walls with enlarged black and white prints from our best shots of the kids. I just wish I could get over how critical I am of it not being the exact color I wanted.
In all of our technologically induced stupor we barely touched the household chores all weekend. Therefore, I am buried in laundry and dishes today. I need to get back to it.
Posted by gwendolyn on May 27, 2003 at 02:50 PM
Bananas For My Monkeys
So far, $1800.00, five appointments behind me, one appointment to go, one admitted screwed up appointment on my part., my one cancellation, one screwed up appointment which is their fucking fault (but they insisted was mine), one hissyfit on the part of the doctor which included being extremely out of line with me and then butchering my poor gums, and several evil thoughts running through my head, this whole molar thing is nearly fixed!
I will never need ice cream again! I just threw three very ripe frozen bananas through the homogenizer in my Champion juicer and it is the exact consistency of ice cream. It is extremely good. The kids ate most of it, I just got a little taste. I would venture to say that the riper the bananas are the better. I bet you could add a little bit of vanilla extract to it too.We had been experimenting with frozen raspberries and strawberries, which are very good also and makes kind of a sorbet. I am not big on the seeds though. This, however, will revolutionize late night dessert in the monkey household.
Posted by gwendolyn on May 23, 2003 at 01:17 PM
Color Me Pissed Off
We were up until stupid o'clock last night painting the two dining room walls from moss green to Parisian Taupe. Toward the end we realized that in order for Terry to function properly at work today he was going to need to go to bed. I kept painting to get finished so that I could wake up today and start painting the other two walls Deep Garnet.
I ran out of paint during the final few minutes and grudgingly went to open the brand new second can only to realize that it had never been mixed. I had about three square feet left to give a second coat and no paint to do it with. He tried to convince me that once it dried you would not be able to see the difference. This morning I see the difference. I am not a happy girl.
To add insult to injury, someone here in southern Florida has pissed off the Gods today and they have unleashed torrential rain on our neighborhood.
So, I get to go back to Home Depot, with three children, in pouring rain, to have my second gallon of paint mixed up today so I can finish the job. I am tired from having been up too late and cranky because of the dumb paint bitch messing up my stuff while I politely ignored the fact that she clearly felt like I was asking her to cut off her own arm by having four and a half gallons of paint to mix. Not to mention she insisted I had to prime the walls, especially the Deep Garnet, or I would just be back in there complaining to her when the colors didn't come out perfect. Like I have never painted a room in my life. I am painting over a satin finish New Burgandy with a flat finish Deep Garnet. I don't think there is going to be a problem there. I am basically painting it almost the same color just in a flat finish because I didn't realize what a hideous reflection Satin paint gives.
This, boys and girls, concludes my completely boring home decorating rant for today.
Posted by gwendolyn on May 22, 2003 at 11:12 AM
Slap It On
I bought four and a half gallons of paint today. I also bought a lot of crap that goes along with those four gallons of paint. I wish I could say that I am super excited about getting up on the ladder and trying reach the top of the zillion foot high wall while not to paint the vaulted ceiling Parisian Taupe. It would be a bitch to have to repaint the whole ceiling. Yeah, fun.
I am normally very into the whole idea, but it is four and a half gallons. Four. And a half. I get tired just thinking about it.
The joy of painting a room white is that you don't really have to tape everything off. You just kinda throw down a drop cloth and go nuts. With colors like Deep Garnet you kinda have to watch where you are slapping this stuff. Granted your walls look like something out of Better Homes and Gardens when you are done. What is important is that the dining room walls are perfectly matched to the placemats and the floral accents in the upholstered chairs, right? Someone please tell my husband that when he realizes that he actually agreed to repaint three whole rooms of our apartment.
This will be the fourth color on our bedroom walls in a year and a half. I hope there isn't some sort of bad karma for redecorating as much as I do.
Posted by gwendolyn on May 21, 2003 at 05:22 PM
Tic Tac Tone Deaf
I got an iPod. I am dangerous. I can now sing loudly out of key and be the only one who doesn't hear me. The people in the grocery store are gonna love my rendition of Poe's
Mr. Monkey is currently ripping tons of cds for me. It will be days and days worth of music for me. Gotta love him. I know I do. I have no patience for that sort of thing. I thought I was going to DIE from having to sort and fix all the ID tags on all my iTunes stuff yesterday. Our heads hurt so bad afterward we had to hurry up and get some Skyline chili sandwiches and then crash in our bed for three hours. It was that bad people! Actually, I think we were having caffeine withdrawal because we broke down and drank a bunch of cute little 8 ounce glass bottles of Coke this past week.
Overheard earlier while listening to part of a Jimi Hendrix song: "Dad, why are you listening to someone tune their guitar really badly?"
I am learning a lot about being the mother of children with triple bunk beds. The first thing I learned is huge colored glass O game pieces from a tic-tac-toe game will shatter when dropped from eight feet in the air.
It seems Mr. Logan built a pulley system with a basket attached to it and his little sister was on the floor playing and while she was waiting for Dad to come back and finish their game she wanted him to be O. So he kept lowering the basket to her from his top bunk, she kept filling the basket with O's. He kept insisting he didn't want to play, so he dropped each of the O's, exclaiming "Bombs away!" each time. Each time one of those heavy pieces of glass dropped, a fragment of blue glass went flying. Little did he know, his father heard him. I have to give him credit for the pulley system but I still can't believe he did that. It is so not like him. He is usually the first to be respectful of things. I am really worried about what is going on with him today.
Posted by gwendolyn on May 19, 2003 at 11:53 PM
Peak-A-Boo
Yesterday I had a rather amusing conversation with the co-owner of Audi-Oh via my cellphone in the tanning/massage store about what a bummer it was that it was defective when it got here yesterday. He promised to send another asap.
In nonrelated news, you can now spy on me via the link at the bottom of this site.* You voyeur, you.
*We will see how long this lasts as it isn't working very well.
Posted by gwendolyn on May 16, 2003 at 10:54 AM
Shoe Whore
Victoria's Secret just spammed me with a shoe promotion. You get free shipping with a purchase of a zillion dollars or something like that. Do they not know what a dangerous combination of forces that is, especially when I am so mentally fragile right now? I am not-so-secretly in love with sexy shoes and I was just a very good girl and paid my Angel's card back down to zero. That is like a dealer sending a crackwhore an email for free delivery. Well, maybe that is not such a good analogy but you know what I mean.
Posted by gwendolyn on May 14, 2003 at 04:50 PM
Calgon, Take Me The Fuck Away
My week so far:
The delivery truck drivers refuse to carry the 300 pound bunk beds from the truck to our apartment. The dental insurance company refuses to pay for a very expensive yet required step in the process of crowning a tooth which boggles my mind. The moving company that came to take my furniture to Ohio warned me of the dangers of crooked moving companies, convinced us they were the good guys, and then promptly lied and scammed us in all of the ways that those crooked moving companies do. Tires fall apart. Bills pile up. I wake up feeling like shit. The world keeps spinning. Life goes on.
It is a good thing I love my life so much.
Posted by gwendolyn on at 10:57 AM
In Bloom
It is nice to wake up to vases bursting with white roses. I could seriously get used to this. I ended up with an extra dozen yesterday because they accidentally filled the order twice. So there are flowers in my living room and in the center of my dining room table. I think it was just that I was such a good mommy all year that the fates sent me a dozen too. Or maybe I just had some good karma points banked and someone cashed them in.
Posted by gwendolyn on May 12, 2003 at 10:00 AM
Talking To Myself
I can't sleep again. I don't know why. It could have been that pint of Ben and Jerry's. It could be that I have a million and one things I want to think about, read, learn, and do before I die. I have been so close to death and am still alive and it is all still swirling around in my head and there aren't enough hours in the day to live, or to think about it, or to love it all.
Little clear glass votive cups sit on my marble window sill with their tiny dancing yellow-orange flames. I don't know why but that makes me very happy and comforted and warm inside.
Everything is still in my world. Everyone is at peace in my little bubble. Even though I can't sleep, I am happy. There is the low hum of the air conditioner units outside of the building and the sound of my fingers tapping the keys. Occasionally, he breathes in deeply and I pause to wait for him to exhale.
I have been having more doubts about what we are doing here, what my role is in this whole process. I am trying to regain my strength and confidence. I have been looking for guidance and support. I am quite alone in so many ways. Even in the world of home schooling there are minorities. People who honestly believe in child-led learning and self education through interest are not in the majority, at least not where I am. I don't think it is because it doesn't work, I think it is because people are afraid of empowering and encouraging children to think for themselves. It is extremely difficult to trust in your children's abilities to choose their own education. It is scary to go completely in the opposite direction of traditional methods of teaching. However, it only takes a few minutes of reading the words of John Holt or John Taylor Gatto before I find that courage again. I believe that I am a good mother. Even with all of the floundering we do as parents trying to figure out the best way to handle everything, I believe I do everything I do because I want my children to be strong and smart and healthy and have a true sense of themselves and who they are. My heart is there. It has always been there. Even while I am still holding on to the occasional workbook, even those moments when I am ready to give up and send Logan and Savannah off to school and just not have to deal with it anymore. When I feel like I have to push them and I don't want to push them and I can feel that they don't want to be pushed. Those selfish and confusing moments. My heart keeps me doing this thing I do. Whatever it is that draws me to it is strong. Even in my moments of doubt, I feel the importance of what I am doing and stay true to my heart. It is the moment when I see a spark in their eyes that comes from complete imagination and their own creativity. It is when Hope brings me a handful of drawings to staple together for her very own storybook and one of them is a very accurate drawing of a cow with a horn in the center of it's head that she has called Polly the Unicow.
I have to start putting into practice my true role as facilitator and quietly get the hell out of the way of some completely amazing things going on in the kids' lives. I have to figure out what has happened that has halted Logan's voracious appetite for reading. I have a feeling it was either assigning him Black Beauty or the mention of book reports. It totally defeats the purpose if it is going to make him not want to read. I don't need proof that the kid reads. I watch him. I don't need proof that he knows what he read. I usually have to listen to a very indepth description of every single chapter of the story. Way to go ruining all of that by making it both boring and a pain in the ass for him. Isn't it enough that he has chosen to bypass the whole book report concept and started using Word to write his own story inspired by all of the great novels he has been reading?
Anyway, talk about going off on a tangent.
I may be the rogue mom. I admit that I do not think and do and say everything motherly all of the time. I am not June Cleaver. Who would want to be? There are different sides to everyone. I don't want to pretend to be someone I am not. I don't want to be someone else's expectation. It has taken me twenty-eight years to figure out that I don't have to be. I don't want it to ever be an issue for my children. The cycle has to stop. I have found this to be true in lots of different areas of my parenting, not just the ideals behind traditional methods of education.
So here I still am, waiting for the Ben and Jerry's to stop waging war on my stomach as punishment for being so freaking stupid. Hashing all of this out like someone is actually listening. Like someone cares. Listening to him breathe. Catching the last little bit of orange glow turn black on the window sill as the candles burn out.
Posted by gwendolyn on at 05:11 AM
All You Sexy Mutha's
I nearly forgot to say Happy Mother's Day to all you sexy mom's out there being everything to everyone! Just don't forget to strip off your apron or your power suit, as the case may be, and be just raw uncensored you once in awhile.
Posted by gwendolyn on May 11, 2003 at 03:44 PM
Reclaiming Our Turf
This morning was like moving day, except the part where you get into the car and drive away behind the big ugly moving truck and don't ever come back. This was a new concept for me. Nine pieces of furniture is on it's way to Ohio.
The living room is livable. The bedroom is well...sleepable.
We are considering sanding the piece of shit dining room table top and crackle glazing it so that it looks like really old wood under peeling paint. We did this with a sofa table and it turned out extremely well. We are going to paint the two moss green walls in the dining room a tan color, like old parchment. I have decided that moss green walls in a room with no sunlight depresses the shit out of me. We are going to leave the other two walls the sodeepburgandyit'snearlyblack color and paint one of the walls in the living room in that color and the other three the old parchment color. It should match the very few pieces of furniture we actually kept really well. At the moment monkeyboy is setting up the bigass television and stereo and running speaker wire for the surround sound.
Posted by gwendolyn on at 02:12 PM
Look With Your Eyes, Not With Your Hands
What would you think if you were randomly checking your stats and were made aware that files from your website were being copied onto someone else's server for whatever purpose, for whatever reason, valid or not?
Maybe they were just using your files for "research" as a class project at the University of Indiana. Maybe they were using a lot of randomly chosen files. Does that make it any less offensive? It isn't supposed to matter that they didn't bother to ask permission to copy actual files? If they are "just looking" couldn't they just link to the site via the permalink?
I didn't have a copyright notice on my site before because I foolishly assumed that people pretty much have a general respect for not doing that sort of thing. Even if the only reason they did it is just so they can study you or your site or catagorize you or your content. That doesn't make it nice or acceptable.
I notice this person has a copyright notice at the bottom of their site. Do you think it would be the same perfectly acceptable thing if I copied her blog files to my server and posted them to my site? For whatever reason, without her permission?
I am not thinking so.
Every single time we are in someone else's house or in a store I remind my children that you look with your eyes, not with your hands. That means don't pick things up, don't carry them around and place them where they don't belong, or just where you feel like it because it is not yours to touch. It means have respect for other people's property and don't do anything with it without permission from the owner. To me the ideas that come from people's minds would seem like property that should be treated with the same respect.
You would think the University of Indiana would teach their students the same thing.
Posted by gwendolyn on May 08, 2003 at 10:39 PM
Would You Like It In Your Box?
If you are a prude with no sense of humor then close your eyes now and click on to something else.
me: I just thought of the most preeeeverted thing
me: god my mind needs a douche sometimes it is just that dirty
me: want me to share it with you?
him:: Yeah
me: I got this question thingie from Mariah
me: and I was very contentedly chowing down on my avocado with balsamic vinegar, sea salt and pepper, and when I was finished I went to put the plate in the sink and was thinking in my head of questions people really want to know about you like what is your favorite sexual position
me: then out of nowhere...
me: I started doing this Dr. Seuss thing in my head...
me: Do you like it in the butt? Do you like it like a slut?
me: what the hell is wrong with me?
me: it is all that Dr. Seuss reading I am doing.
me: it has crossed the Momma/Dirty line
him:: would you like it in the butt? Would you like it like a slut?
me: hee hee
me: still making me cackle
him:: You should write about a dozen lines like that.
him:: Dirty Seuss
me: for?
him:: For your site, silly.
him:: Just like that.
Okay, so since I only have like a zillion other things I should be doing and since one of the luxuries of my charmed life is hanging out at noon on a Thursday in my pajamas eating avocado with balsamic vinegar, sea salt and pepper on it and laughing at my own retardedness here it goes:
Dirty Seuss’s Really Get To Know Me Questionaire
What we all really want to know
is are you secretly a kinky ho?Will you go down in a parking lot?
Does exhibition leave your nipples taut?Do you prefer whips, chains, and leather boots?
Or do you quiver in liquid latex suits?Is your favorite color Come Fuck Me Red?
Do you secretly want to be tied up in bed?Do you have a stash of toys?
A flavored lube?
Like making noise?If you do just say it’s true!
you aren’t fooling anyone
you naughty shrew!
Posted by gwendolyn on at 12:15 PM
Bastard Womanhood
I love my life.
I love eating and breathing and sleeping on my belly. I love hugging people and wearing my clothes. I love laying on my back with my knees up and being able to type on my laptop which is propped all funky on my stomach.
I love the absence of needles and tubes and bandages. I love privacy. I love driving Ferris and not being a prisoner. I love being with my family and not having to say goodbye at the end of the day.
I love being the momma.
Cross your fingers that this persistent sonofawhore bladder infection I have been diagnosed with and the dull ache but occasional shooting pain where I assume my right ovary should be isn't connected in any way. Especially not physically.
Posted by gwendolyn on May 07, 2003 at 05:48 PM
To All My Friends I've Loved Before
FRIENDSHIP
Friendship is like pissing in your pants....... everyone can see it, but only you can feel its true warmth. Thank you for being the piss in my pants.
thanks Sherry..right back at ya ;)
Posted by gwendolyn on at 02:57 PM
Stir It Up
I am awake at stupid o'clock again. I have talked a lot about this subject. I still have the same feelings, the same questions, the same struggle. We just keep going down the same road, not changing anything even when it seems very obvious that there is so much more we can be doing.
Now that we have aquired more resources for the children and given them some semi-personal space to call their own I am trying to think of activities and subtle things I can do to take the things I have learned about unschooling and and apply them to our daily life without feeling like I am failing to keep the children, especially Logan, since he is the only one that is really stuck in the confines of traditional schooling and bookwork, from progressing with the skills they are working on.
I don't want to fail any of them and I feel like I have grown complacent. I have been hiding behind the curriculum because it is easy and they can work pretty much independently. Savannah has even completed a few workbooks now. She is eager to "do school" but on the other hand she gets disinterested quickly. I would rather not stifle her creativity and natural curiosity by insisting she conform to the bookwork. I don't think they are being challenged or encouraged enough.
I wish for more for them than that. I want them to pick up books on their own, whole books. It doesn't matter to me if they are not "grade level". In fact, I don't want them to feel like they can't open a book because it is too hard for them.
I want them to find their interests. I want them to get excited about things around them, not ask me which pages I want them to do today. I want them to figure out where to find answers without me having to tell them. I want them to be confident and think for themselves.
I have to figure this out. Me handing them papers to fill out just to satisfy some standard, some expectation is just as bad as schools and television dumbing them down. We have all grown extremely lazy. It is my fault. I am not doing my part to stir their interests and creativity. There is no excuse. I need to find time and ways to encourage their creativity and share with them the excitement I have for their progress and their learning. Life doesn't wait. It is time to get busy.
Posted by gwendolyn on May 06, 2003 at 02:44 AM
One Fell Off And Broke His Head
Somehow over the years I have gotten even more stubborn. If that is possible. I found out this week that I am quick to do things but not willing to give up anything until I am damned good and ready. I thought I was more flexible than that. I'm not.
I didn't do all that struggling to stay alive just to live a life I am not happy with. So I am not compromising. Money is tight and we don't always do the right thing. I am going to try not to lose any sleep over that fact. We have what we need and that is what matters.
I am pretty much of the understanding that the situation we are in is not conducive to the optimal lifestyle for raising children. At the moment I can't change that. We are doing the best we can considering the circumstances. Maybe someday we will figure out what course of action we need to take to get to that place where we can be comfortable. In the meantime, I am just going to love the stuffing out of them and be happy doing our thing the only way I know how.
I watched Purple Rain tonight for the first time all the way through. As horribly cheesy as it seems to me right now, I bet in 1984 it was a sort of okay movie. Prince's last name, if it isn't already, should be Sex. I had forgotten just how much I like Darling Nikki. If I would have had The List in 1984 he would have been on it. Seeing how I was 10 then my list wouldn't have had the same kind of criteria as it does today.
It is 3:15 a.m. and I am up watching The Flintstones and talking about Prince. What the hell is that about?
I ordered the triple bunk beds. They will be here within two weeks. The mattresses came yesterday. The children are trying like hell to break their necks jumping on them. I am waiting for the inevitable sound of heads cracking together. I keep telling them "No more monkeys jumping on the bed!" Since, they are used to being referred to as monkeys this isn't registering with them. We painted their bedroom white Wednesday night. I am sure that another reason why the monkey thing isn't registering with them is because they are still high on paint fumes. I really wish I could have waited and ordered nontoxic paint but it just really isn't in the cards at the moment. So, I bit my lip and went to Home Depot and got it over with.
Their new iMac got moved into their room this evening. They are all used to being around our laptops and know that they have to be very careful. I am not too worried about it. I am sure monkeyboy is though. It is going to be tight security at the mosh pit that is their bedroom this weekend. I don't need that kind of trauma.
Posted by gwendolyn on May 03, 2003 at 03:37 AM