The end of the school year is here. Already?

It is May and the end of the school year is fast approaching.  Vader will finish 2nd grade this year and we are trying to determine whether he should move on to 3rd grade or stick around for 2nd grade 2.0.  That is a whole other blog post.

In addition, Splash and Turtle are finishing VPK in two weeks.  And yes, that is early.  In fact, it is 3 weeks before Vader which creates a small child care problem.  We’ll figure it out.  We always do.

So with summer fast approaching, we are starting to get excited about lazy pool days, beach trips, barbecues and parties.

And work.  But not the bad kind.

This is good work.

If you are not friends with me on Facebook, you may not know that my little start up company, the one that blossomed out of my win at last year’s Start Up weekend, launched its website on March 31.

Yes, MystiKit is live.

I am going to be blogging for MystiKit to promote not only the amazing kits that bloggers are already creating to help people (like me) get projects done, but also to share other Pinterest related things – project successes, project fails, tips and tools.

As soon as that blog gets up and running, I will share it with you here.

In the meantime, I want to share a few MystiKits that I built on the platform.

MystiKits are a way for people to batch items in a pre-populated shopping cart.  If a blogger creates a MystiKit, her (or his) readers can buy knowing that they have all of the items they need (and in sufficient quantities) to do the project that the blogger created.  And the best part?  She/he already found everything and put it there for you to buy – no searching, no guessing, no endless clicking and adding on two or three or ten websites…  No driving to Joann’s only to find that you cannot find what you need…and then you are off to Michaels or Hobby Lobby.  Nope.

MystiKits are convenient.

And correct.

And quick.

Since my personal DIY project activity has suffered recently, I created two kits for non-project use.  (We don’t discriminate.  You can use MystiKit for anything!)

• A MystiKit for a book themed baby shower – I have a friend who is having one next month.  Someone else might find this kit useful for a shower they’ve been invited to.

• A lunch box MystiKit – this one is for me.  Unlike during the school year when I am only making lunch for one kid, I will be making lunches all summer for all three kids.  This kit is most of the non-perishable stuff I will be buying each month for the boys.  Even if no one else finds this useful, I will not have to go back and find this stuff again. Yay!

If you want to try your hand at creating a MystiKit, just email me or register on the MystiKit website on the “Become a Kitter” page.

We are in Beta testing mode, but we are extending invitations to new kitters every day!

Thursday, March 21, 2013

Hello.

I’m still here.

Things are busy here.  I am sure they are busy for you too.  We are all busy.

The boys are good.  The boys are leaning on “great” actually.  We are seeing improvements every day in Vader, Splash and Turtle.  Less crazy, more cooperation.  Less pushing and shoving.  More sharing and loving.

Work is good.  I am planning lots of fun stuff for the spring and may have gotten a HUGE initiative that I developed with Junior Achievement blessed by both my internal team and the school district to help 9th graders become more financially literate.

The house is showing signs of “good” too.  A new cabinet is up in the kitchen.  I got a deal on laminate floors and when we have a spare day, we’ll rip out the paint/marker/food/etc-stained carpet and put something more durable in the boys’ rooms.  And the piles of stuff are disappearing, as trash bags of out-grown clothes, toys and copious amounts of crap stuff is moved out our house to places where it will be appreciated, used and hopefully passed onto to others.

My outside activities are all good.  R+F is booming and Mystical Basket is set to launch any day now.  In both businesses, my colleagues and partners make it a joy to “work” outside of my regular job.

So, that’s the update. That’s the busy.

I may not be back for a while.  Or I may be back tomorrow.  This was cathartic.

Happy Friday to you.

Happy new year (+11 days)

I have been on a road a bunch in the first 12 days of 2013.  From one end of the East coast to the other, I have been on planes, subways and in taxi cabs.

Perhaps that is why this video brought me to tears.

How cool would this type of homecoming be?

My morning.

Like so many people across this country, I am stunned and saddened by the shooting in Newtown, CT.  Like many mothers and fathers, I clung a to my little ones when I saw them Friday afternoon, reluctant to let go, squeezing them unit they squirmed free.  I felt eternally thankful to have the opportunity to be able to smell them, hold them and love them, when other mothers and fathers were dealing with an unimaginable new reality in their lives.

Winter break started for my three boys today. For most of this holiday vacation from school, I have arranged a smorgasbord-esque schedule of babysitters, winter camps and play dates to cover the boys while HH and I are at work. But today, I am sitting in a patio chair, taking in a little Florida sun, and enjoying a rare bit of vacation time on the first day of the break.  I am supervising a pack of 7 neighborhood boys between the ages of 4 and 9, who are treating the lawns of all of the houses like one giant obstacle course; some are racing bikes, others are throwing balls, all are playing Star Wars at some point…and doing other things boys do.

For a little while today, I am simply a mom.

I am the one fetching the drinks.

I am the one double-knotting shoelaces.

I am the one breaking up a quarrel.

And I would not have it any other way.

RIP, Sandy Hook students, teachers and staff.  May you be all be reveling in the joys of heaven.  Even those of us who did not know you are missing you terribly here on Earth.

~Jennifer

Well, well, well.

Things are really going well.

My HH has a job and it is going well.

My job is going well.

I have become an entrepreneur and that is going really well.

My boys are all healthy…and nothing is better than wellness.

We have found a place to call our spiritual home that is…well…really cool.

I have more to say, but…well, I am…

A little overwhelmed.

Don’t get me wrong.

I am “joyfully overwhelmed”…if there is such a thing.

So, in lieu of blogging, I am going to focus the remainder of 2012 on the items listed above.

See you in 2013.

Be well.

 

Splash’s new lovey

Some kids sleep with a favorite blanket.

Some kids sleep with a snuggly bear.

My kid sleeps with a label-less can of clam chowder.

I love my kid.

A bittersweet parenting moment.

Tonight I did something miraculous.  I got through to my kid.

I just wish I felt better about it.

For the past year, Vader and I have been having shouting matches about his bike.  I can be heard shouting one or more of the following items:

• Wear your helmet!
• Watch out for that moving car!
• Do not ride to close to that moving car!
• Do not try to race that moving car!
• Do not try to play chicken with your brother(s) on their bikes!
• Do not go past X point on the street…where I cannot see you!

And then, over the weekend, I added a new one to the list.

• Do not go up onto the driveways of neighbors we don’t know!

You see, at the end of the street, we had a new family/person/couple/who knows move into a rental house.  And Vader, the friendly guy that he is, was attracted to the moving van like a magnet, where he proceeded to tell the neighbors everything about everything – his name, his brother’s names, his age, his school…

You get the picture.

And, because he is 7, he then wandered up onto the driveway to see what stuff they were pulling out of the truck.

Thankfully, I was not far behind and saw him disappear up the drive. And I quickly went up to the house, called him back and tried to introduce myself to the new folks.  (They weren’t even there.  It was the movers from the moving company that Vader was chatting up.)

So I asked him to come home and I reminded him about stranger-danger and the new rule.  And that was that.

Or not.

Tonight, when I went out to call Vader in for dinner, I was able to see him appear from that very same driveway.

And I freaked out.

And he freaked out.

“I like to ride up the driveway.  It has a hill and it is cool.” (“Hill” is an exaggeration to say the least.) “The people are nice too.”

So, after I collected myself, I asked him to sit down with me and we logged onto the internet. And then, I had one of my more impactful and successful, albeit sad, parenting moments.

We logged onto Family Watch Dog, one of the national registries where you can learn about violent and non-violent offenders, sexual predators and other really bad people who live in your neighborhood.  And I explained to my oldest son about people who are mean to other people, who hurt or touch kiddos in not nice ways.

I explained that our new neighbors are probably very nice, but until I know for sure… until I have a chance to meet them, it is NOT okay to be on their driveway or talking to them without mom and/or dad knowing first.

And he got it.

And there were no more tears shed or shouting or freaking out.

I am only sad that this epiphany had to happen in the first place, and that the world is not safer for little guys to be friendly and to ride their bikes without fear.

~ Jennifer

Knots, vows.

Every time I think about tomorrow, my stomach is in knots.  This election day has wreaked havoc on my nervous system.

I feel confident that no candidate will go quietly into the night upon hearing the preliminary results.  And I am also concerned, that even if a victor is proclaimed, that the nation is so divided and so different in their belief about what is right, that we won’t be able to move forward, regardless of who wins.

So tonight, on the eve of what is likely to be a very close race, I vow this:

• To support my newly elected or re-elected President.
• To re-learn and remember the reasons why the people who voted for him did so, especially if I did not vote for him, and to remember why those who did not vote for him chose not to, regardless of the outcome.
• To admire the other guy for standing up for what he believed in and for putting himself and his family through hell on earth to share it with other people.
• And finally, to quietly admire our great system, one that generates passion (and phone calls), enthusiasm (and robo-dials), and respect (and direct mail) from the four corners of the earth.

To Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan, and the hundreds of men and women who offered themselves up to us to serve as a public servant in this and every election cycle, thank you.

And good luck tomorrow.

 

Sunday, Monday, every day is fun day.

I have flirted with a separate post on each of the photos below, but I have a ton of work to do tonight.  So instead, for your viewing pleasure, a selection of photos from this past weekend that really need very little explanation.

Turtle – plotting who knows what.

And Turtle again – semi-naked pumpkin carving.

And Splash – This is not finger paint and I do not know where it came from.  I went to the potty and when I came back, he was gilded.

This is my family’s reunion photo from the weekend.  Don’t we look nice?  

Well…most of us.

I thought that was bad.

And then I saw Vader.

Scroll back up and look at HH.  Based on the two faces of our children, he looks somewhat normal.  :) (Sorry, honey.)

And finally, this is what happens when I saw, “Yes, we can walk down to the end of the dock.”

It took all of 3 additional seconds after taking this photo for one child to get a splinter the size of a pencil in the hand he was skimming along the weathered banister and then shortly thereafter, the other slammed his thumb in the door.

So that is a recap of the last 48-72 hours.

How was your weekend?

Pop!

Tonight, we celebrated my father-in-law’s 70th birthday and HH’s new job.

And we did it up right.

Hamburgers.

Hot dogs.

Mac and cheese.

Red velvet cake.

Dom Perignon.

Yep…that’s right!

No, I have not lost my mind.

In fact, I have been plotting, planning, hoping, praying and waiting for more than 2 years to have an occasion worthy of popping open this very elegant bottle of bubbly.

In 2010 (I think), HH and I attended a great fundraiser for a local college.  The tickets were purchased by my company and the event was lovely, but as usual, with our fragile economic situation, we did not have much to contribute to the silent or live auction.  However, there was a very cool option that I had never seen before: a blind auction.

On a pair of tables, there were 50 bottles of red, white and sparkling wines, all wrapped up in plain brown paper bags.  For $25, you could buy one of the bottles and have confidence that you would, at the very least, come home with a decent bottle of vino.  However, for one lucky buyer, you came home with a wonderful bottle of Dom Perignon 2002.

You could not touch the bottles, but you could eye-ball them to death and that is what HH and I did.  When we both had picked our “winner”, we negotiated to decide I decided which was the one we would claim.  And them we went on with our evening until it was time to collect the bottles.

Obviously, we won!  We took our little paper bag into a corner to peek and, much to our delight, we saw the famous gold label. (I had a suspicion the moment they handed it to me when I felt the curves of the glass.)

We got it home and just ogled it.  We did research on it.  It is was a really good bottle of Dom.

“The 2002 Dom Perignon is at first intensely floral, with perfumed jasmine that dominates the bouquet. With time in the glass the wine gains richness as the flavors turn decidedly riper and almost tropical. Apricots, passion fruit and peaches emerge from this flashy, opulent Dom Perignon. The wine’s volume makes it approachable today, but readers in search of more complexity will want to cellar this for at least a few years to allow for some of the baby fat to drop off. Geoffroy describes the vintage as very ripe and adds that some of the Chardonnay showed the ill-effects of the hot growing season in the somewhat burned, dehydrated fruit that came in that year. This bottle was disgorged in July, 2009….96″

We talked about what it would take to open it.  And while there are lots of occasions worthy of celebration, we both knew that the biggest thing on our wish list was the end of HH’s unemployment.

So we said we’d wait until the big day.

And now, two years later, we decided that today, when HH passed his first exam at work with a 96% and when his dad celebrated a BIG birthday after a rough year of health ups and downs…well…today was the day.

With cheeseburgers on the grill, Kraft mac and cheese on the stove and red velvet birthday cake waiting on the counter, we popped open our first ever bottle of really expensive champagne.

And it was sweet, exciting and absolutely delicious.

The champagne was good too.

Happy Tuesday, everyone!!