Hang Ups

The running joke in my family is that I have obsessive compulsive disorder.



They poke fun at my neurosis, and I laugh along, because c'mon ... doesn't everyone HAVE to color coordinate their shoes?

Doesn't everyone HAVE to have the clothes hanging in the same direction in the closet?

Doesn't everyone HAVE to finish one project before moving on to the next?

My husband loves to tell the story of how, when I got the call that my sister was in labor, and I had an hour and a half to get on a plane, I was in the middle of hanging curtains. And I couldn't stop.

Don't get me wrong, my sister and her impending motherhood was a HUGE deal for me. And I had every intention of giving it my undivided attention, and support, and encouragement.

As soon as the curtains were finished being hung, that is.

So maybe there's a slight hint of truth at the jokes about my OCD. And one of the things that fuels my obsessions happens to be a large part of my job, as luck would have it.

Because when I think about landfills filling with trash, for years and years and years, I almost can't breathe. When I think about my kids living in a world full of garbage, I want to scream.

Yeah, the movie Wall-E? Gave me NIGHTMARES.



As the editor of GreenCraft, I'm lucky enough to get to see firsthand the many ways in which people from all over the world find beautiful and functional uses for trash, and it makes this OCD heart of mine o' so happy.

One of the things in my house that drives me up the wall is hangers from the dry cleaner.

You know the ones I'm talking about -- the wire numbers with paper wrapped around them. They are flimsy and, let's face it, ugly. But throwing them away feels so wrong.

The challenge? Find a better use for them.



So easy to do, and I think it makes a huge difference.

I simply pulled apart the paper from a dry-cleaner hanger (gently!), traced the outline on the blank side of a Trader Joe's bag, and decorated.



What's that you say? This college-educated girl can't spell?



Well you are right, I did misspell birthday (which my work buddy Carmen affectionately pointed out). But I'm posting the pictures anyway.

Because we keep it real over in my corner of the OC 'Burbs.

What do you think of my ugly hanger solution? My work buddy Carmen also pointed out that you could write or stamp the day of the week on these hangers, and give them to someone as a gift. I think that's a pretty good idea.

I have one more small project for all of you, that I stumbled across last week.

Have you heard of Washi tape? It happens to be amazing (and addicting!)


It's my latest obsession...

It can be used for a ton of stuff, from gift wrap, to card making, to decorating pretty much anything.

Last week I looked down at my desk one morning and saw these two things sitting next to each other.



Genius!



And, again, so easy to do. Glue a magnet to the back if you like, and you've got some cute fridge decoration.

Hope everyone is having a fabulous Tuesday, and I will be back later this week with a post about the little boy who made me a Momma.

Fair is Fair ... Until Someone's Heart Explodes

Eva is potty training right now, and when she successfully manages to "go" in her little toilet, I try to give her a treat to encourage her.



This week it was fruit snacks which, in our house, is kind of like crack.

I hide the box of fruit snacks that my mom bought Noah and Eva ("They have no artificial colors!!" she wailed, as I shoved them in the back of a very high cabinet) and only resort to them once in a blue moon.

Because, seriously, my kids need a fruit snack support group. They are addicts.

But my larger point is this: when I handed Eva the fruit snacks a couple days ago, Noah immediately asked why he didn't get some too. The nice mother in me pleaded with the smart mother in me to have a heart. But the smart mother won.

"We all have jobs in this house," I told Noah. "Yours is to do well in school -- to get good grades and to not have notes sent home. Eva's, right now, is to learn how to go potty in the toilet. Just like we reward you when you do your job, Eva gets a reward when she does hers. But you don't BOTH get rewards when the other does their job. That's not how it works."

Harsh? Maybe. But it's fair, and I certainly am not interested in raising an entitled kid. I'm interested in raising a kid who works hard for his rewards in life.

As I turned to walk away from the disappointed look on my little boy's face, I saw, from the corner of my eye, his sister slip him a fruit snack.

And when I say slip, I mean girlfriend sneaked a shiny, red fruit snack into her brother's hand. And then I saw him shoot her a grateful look, which I wouldn't think of ruining with my rules for all the money in the world.



I am desperately, hopelessly, endlessly, in love with these children of mine.

I haven't taken very many pictures this week because, to be honest, I've been in a funky mood. But even though I'm stuck in a rut, there are still golden nuggets to be found in the daily muck.

It Will Be Wonderful
Noah wanted to ride bikes to our local high school, and after making every excuse I could think of, I finally sucked it up, strapped Eva into her bike seat, and took him. We rode through the outdoor halls, past lockers, and vending machines. We rode down wheelchair ramps, and yelled "Weeeee!" the whole way, and Noah turned to me with serious eyes and asked "Mom, what do you think it'll be like when I go here?" and I told him "I think it will be wonderful" even though the sixteen-year-old cowering inside of me cringed. I hope it will be wonderful. I hope...



Slub Bub Boo
We often play the slug bug game while we are in the car, calling out colors and tallying points. Last week Eva was in the car with Erik and she called out "Slub bub boo!" Sure enough, there was a blue Volkswagen Beetle a few lanes over. Erik didn't see any other slug bugs on the rest of the drive, so Eva won.



You Do Not Like Green Eggs and Ham?
I am highly disturbed by food items that have been altered from their natural visual state. Does that make sense? For example, cupcakes that look like hamburgers are just ... wrong. And green eggs? I do not like them, here or there. I do not like them anywhere. I have issues. But I thought my kids might feel differently, so I put my hangups aside for St. Patty's day. Turns out, they could care less what color their food is, as long as it smells good and their bellies are rumbling. They didn't even blink when I put their plates in front of them. They ate their green eggs and green pancakes, and drank their green orange juice with nary a comment.



I have not forgotten my craftastic vow, I promise. I am hard at work on about 5,482 projects, and a couple will soon make their way onto this space.

Until then, Happy Thursday, from all of us.

Baby Steps

I used to think of my friends who ate only organic, free-range, locally grown, preservative-free food as being almost superhuman. I mean, c'mon -- how on earth do they resist Oreo cookies?

I have a serious soft spot for sweets -- it's something I seem to have, unfortunately, passed on to my kids. So for a long time I thought this whole healthy-eating movement was not possible for me and my family.

But I realized recently that I was looking at it all wrong. Eating healthy does not have to be all or nothing -- I didn't have to wake up one day and decide to never eat another cookie or cheeseburger again.

Instead, what I've found is that baby steps are what work for us. Teeny, tiny, baby steps.

And lo' and behold -- I do believe that we are making some significant progress. We get all of our eggs from our two chickens, Superwoman and Lucy. We even sometimes trade our eggs for lemons from our neighbor's tree.

Which is what prompted me to try my hand at making my own lemonade. I used to buy strawberry lemonade by the gallons. When I found myself with a big, fat pile of lemons from my neighbor this week, I wondered if maybe I could make my own, instead of the lemonade-flavored sugar water they sell at the store.

Turns out, my homemade version blows the store-bought stuff out of the water. Baby steps, people ... baby steps.



Here's the recipe:
-2 cups of water
-2 cups of lemon juice (about 10 lemons)
-3 cups fresh strawberries, hulled
-1 cup of sugar

I bought my strawberries from a stand by my house, and I hulled them with an extra wide straw. I blended them with the lemon juice, and set the mixture aside.

I then boiled the water and sugar until all the sugar disappeared. I let the mixture cool, and then mixed all the ingredients together.

I strained my mixture, because there was A LOT of pulp, but it's not necessary if you don't mind the pulp.

What I was left with was a thick strawberry lemonade concentrate, about the consistency of syrup. I put it in a recycled bottle from Trader Joe's, printed a label, and stuck it in my fridge.

To serve, I mixed it with seltzer water -- about 2 parts concentrate with 1 part water.


Spinach salad for lunch ... woop, woop!

And for dessert I had a handful of Oreos.

Because I'm not superhuman. I'm only me.

I'll be back tomorrow with a post about disciplining kids. It's a beast, so get ready.

Happy Thursday!

Quote of the Day:
"If you want your children to be intelligent, read them fairy tales. If you want them to be more intelligent, read them more fairy tales."
― Albert Einstein

Discipline

My mom tells us stories about my dad singing to us when we were babies. She says he sang 80s love ballads to my sister and I, crooning Rod Stewart and Elton John during diaper changes, and before bedtime.

I don't remember any of that, of course. I remember that my dad was ... gruff. I remember that he never wore shorts, and that he grew to be ten feet tall when he was mad.

I remember that he worked really hard, at everything, and that on the few occasions when I saw him relax, he had a great smile.

My dad has five sisters and two daughters -- he has spent his entire life surrounded by women, and I'd like to think the universe took pity on him and sent him two grandsons.


Waiting their turn patiently...

This past weekend, we met up with him at my grandma's house, and like we always do, we walked to the park down the street. Noah and my nephew Caleb begged their "Papi" to push them on the tire swing, and he obliged.

I watched from behind my camera lens, and then I was hit with the feeling that I had been there before. Except it was me and my sister sitting on the tire swing, squealing with laughter.

And there was my dad, twisting the chain so that it would spin faster, pushing the tire hard -- there was no coddling or fear of falling allowed. Tire swing sessions with my dad are not for the faint of heart.



These are the kind of moments that always shake something loose inside of me -- how could I have forgotten the tire swing?

Don't get me wrong -- I have an enormous amount of affection for my dad, and we definitely have a great relationship now, but my childhood memories of him are a mash-up of spankings, and raised voices, and a general fear that anything I said could set him off. I was afraid of my dad growing up.



Which, now that I'm a parent, I have mixed feelings about. I see kids today who are so disrespectful, so entitled, and I think to myself that I would never have acted like that, because my parents would absolutely not have tolerated it.

And then it gets me thinking ... maybe kids should be a little afraid of their parents. I mean, where do we draw the line between a happy childhood and a high standard of behavior?

A couple years ago, I took Noah to Disneyland to see the Halloween decorations. I was excited to go, and I took off work early. When we parked the car, it was very clear to me that Noah was in a crappy mood. I told him we were going to the happiest place on earth, and that he needed to adjust his attitude STAT.

When we got on the tram, the crappy mood persisted. I told him he had one more chance to get it together, or we were going home. When he continued to pout, I knew I had no choice: I told him we were not getting off when the tram stopped, and that we were going home.

And then my little boy told a Disney tram full of people that I was the WORST. MOMMY. EVER.


Donald is his favorite... no freakin' wonder

He told me (loudly) that all of our fellow passengers could see how horrible I was, and that he hoped they called the POLICE on me. And then he cried, loudly, while everyone stared.

When the tram stopped, and everyone filed off, the tram driver looked back at me with doleful eyes, and I could read his thoughts: Are you really not going to take your kid to Disneyland, just to prove a point?

And I said Um, yes Mr. Tram Driver Man, I actually have no choice now because I said it and if I don't follow through my kid will know I have no backbone and then he will spend his life walking all over me, thank you very much, so even though this is no fun at all, and I'm CRAZY disappointed, yes, we are leaving right now, so kindly stop judging me.

Except that's not what I said. At least not out loud. Instead I told him to please take us to the parking lot we had just come from.

We went home, and Noah whimpered the entire drive.

And then I realized how completely not-fun it was for my parents all those years to be such hard-asses. I called my mom that night to tell her this, and while I don't remember her exact response, it was somewhere along the lines of "Yeah, DUH."

We are just starting to implement a routine of discipline for Eva, mostly consisting of time outs.


It's not easy to get mad at this face...but we manage

Time outs for Eva mean sitting on her bed until she's ready to stop whining/hitting/pouting/screaming/biting, and let me just say, time outs for two year olds are about as much fun as walking a cat on a leash.



When I say "Five minute time out" I don't get five minutes to myself while my little girl sits in her room and thinks about what she's done.

Instead, I get to sit for five minutes in Eva's room while she screams, boogers running down her face, begging for her daddy to come save her.

Every 20 seconds or so, she tries to get up and walk out the door, at which point I promptly pick her up and put her back on her bed.

Does it break my heart? Absolutely.



I admit, I worry sometimes about what my kids will remember of me, and of their childhoods. Will they only focus on the times I got mad, and on the punishments I doled out?(Which surely leave a larger impression than the good times.) Or will they also remember the trips to the park, and the movies, and the stories before bedtime?

In my heart, I know they will remember the good.

Even if it takes 20 years and them becoming parents -- I know my kids will one day look back and appreciate the tough choices we made in order for them to be good people.



Until then, I'll remind them, every chance I get, of the things my dad was never able to say, but I know he felt.

I love you more than anything. I sang to you during diaper changes so that I could hear your cute laugh. I would cross every ocean, and climb every mountain, and walk through any fire to be with you. Being the mean parent is not fun, but it's completely necessary if I want you to grow up to be an honest, polite, and responsible person, and I do want that, more than anything. So even when you say you don't love me anymore, and even when I almost believe you, I will keep being a hard-ass. For you

Greener Grass

I was 20 years old when I sat on the floor of a tiny bathroom and found out I was going to be a mom. I was, in fact, 20 years, 11 months, and two weeks old.



It wasn't supposed to be like that.

I was supposed to go out to a bar with my friends in two weeks for my 21st birthday, get really drunk, kiss a random guy, and puke in the drive-thru of a Jack in the Box

I was supposed to finish college and travel a little, and then come home and find a job at a small newspaper, where they would pay me enough money to make a car payment on a Honda Civic. Well ... maybe a Saturn.

I was supposed to find a great guy, have a big ridiculous wedding, and then mull whether or not I wanted kids before or after we bought a condo.

It wasn't supposed to happen the way it did for me, but I couldn't change the second line on that pregnancy test. It was too late.

I told my mom during Oprah. I fell apart while somebody else talked about their problems on Oprah -- I heaved and sobbed with snot running down my face. My mom kept asking "What?! What is it?!?!", her voice getting louder and louder until I finally spit out the words.

Nobody wanted me those first couple months. And I don't say that in some sort of self-pitying way, trust me ... it's just simply the truth. My mom was so disappointed, and I think she thought if she made it clear that I was NOT welcome at home, then maybe it would force Erik to take me in.

But Erik ... did not want to take me in. I don't blame him either. I had spent the few, short months we had dated acting like a crazy person, running out the front door after arguments, barefoot, wandering the streets, sitting on benches at bus stops until the sun came up.

I was a mess.

During those first few months after I found out I was going to be a mom, nobody around me really talked about what was going to happen. I slept on my mom's couch, because she had given my bedroom away to her sister. I went to school wearing baggy sweaters, and I tried to eat better. I got a part-time job at a hair salon.

When my clothes stopped fitting, my sister took me to the mall and bought me some bigger-sized outfits, because I didn't have the money and I couldn't bear the thought of asking my parents or Erik.

I found a studio apartment that I could barely afford. The day I went to move in, I opened the door, flicked on the lights, and what seemed like hundreds of cockroaches scattered to the corners.

I would love to say that I barely remember what it felt like to be so terrified and lost during that time -- I wish I could say that the comforts of my life now have somehow erased the pain, and the shame, that I felt then. But I remember.

Last night one of my dearest friends from high school came over for dinner. It was the first time she had visited our home, the first time she had met Eva. She looked around and said that our house was beautiful, that it was so crazy to see this adult life that I'm living. She said this is what she wants too -- a nice home, a guest room, a kitchen filled with good food and all the right appliances.

I get it, I really do. I get how it looks. As cliche as it might sound, we are absolutely living the suburban dream ... soccer games on the weekends, and block parties with the neighbors, and morning carpool, and summer weekends at the lake. Our lives look pretty damn good on paper.

But the truth is, the road to the OC 'Burbs has been difficult. It has. And, to be perfectly honest, I'm still waiting to wake up one day and not feel like I destroyed my life -- I'm still waiting for the day I stop feeling like a failure for throwing away my youth.

I'll be 30 in a couple years, and my friends are finally catching up. They are getting married, buying homes, having kids, moving to the suburbs. And all of a sudden, I've gone from being the girl who screwed up and got pregnant, to the girl who's got her shit together.

And all of a sudden, my friends are saying "I want what you have" and it's all I can do to not burst out laughing, because it doesn't feel like all that long ago when I was seriously considering sleeping in my car.

I will be 30 in two years and, I'm embarrassed to say, I'm not handling it all that well. I am being pushed, slowly but surely, into another decade before I've come to terms with how badly I messed up the previous one.

My 20s will be gone, and none of them will have looked like they were supposed to, and even though it all turned out great in the end, I'm bummed out.

I've got two beautiful kids, and a kind husband, and a great life and, trust me, I'm grateful, but it wasn't supposed to happen the way it did, and sometimes I wish I could just be 21 in a bar, or 23 sleeping in until noon, or 25 going to the gym after work, guilt free.

Sometimes, people, for god's sake, I want what you have.

These Are a Few of My Favorite Things...

It's been crazy busy around these parts, but I wanted to take a minute and share a few things I've been crushing on lately, because sharing is caring people. SHARING IS CARING.

At least that's what I've been told.

So here, without further ado...

THIS book



One of the traditions I love the most in our family is a bedtime ritual that includes plenty of reading. When Noah turned five we started reading him chapter books, and it's honestly been one of the best things we've done.

We've made our way through most of Roald Dahl, as well as Frankenstein, Superfudge by Judy Bloom, The Hobbit, and, currently, we are lost in the world of Narnia.

I came across this book recently and I can't wait to add it to the lineup. Mostly because it's a book full of funny and quirky stories, which seem to be the ones Noah loves the most.

It also has some illustration, which is always a big hit with our very visual little boy.

If you have a kid over the age of four -- or if you're really a four-year-old at heart anyway -- definitely look into this one.



Next is THIS fabric



This fabric has me practically foaming at the mouth. It's Echino fabric, imported from Japan, and it is crazy fun.

I found a tiny shop in Oceanside that sells it, so methinks a field trip is in my very near future. I've invited my good friend Andrea from A Sprouting Acorn to come with and she's game, so keep an eye out for a good old fashioned blog challenge, soon to come.

I will be using this fabric to make something for Eva.

One of the things I was most excited about when I found out I was having a girl was all the great stuff I was going to make for her. We're two years in and, so far, I've made her NOTHING.

Major fail.

The truth is, we are blessed with so many wonderful friends and family, and they have more than lavished Eva with adorable outfits, and bows, and shoes, etc... and I haven't really felt the need to make her more cute stuff.

But of course it's not about that ... it's about watching your little girl walking around wearing something you made with your own two hands, something you will make sure she keeps forever. I am pushing this one up a couple notches on my priorities list...



Lastly, but never leastly, is THIS blog



So here's the story ... this woman has spent the past twenty years creating scenes with handmade felt mice that live in a world she likes to call Mouseland.

It was a private thing for her, until she was brave enough start a blog, cataloging this very quirky hobby. She found a supportive audience and, last year, even illustrated a book based on her mice, which you can find here.

I'm adding my name to her list of fans, and here's why:

The first thing I do every morning when I get to work, before I do anything else, is browse the interwebs for the daily news. It's a habit I have, much like our parent's habit of reading the paper at the kitchen table, or in their favorite chair, every day.

I want to know what's going on in the world. But the truth is, most of the stuff I read is so incredibly negative -- wars, recessions, school shootings, parents that hurt their own children....

It makes me cynical.

It makes me feel like there is very little good left in the world, like my adulthood is increasingly becoming a bleak landscape filled with ugly realities.

Sometimes, I've found, the best cure for cynicism is allowing yourself to just get lost in your own imagination, or in someone else's. Sometimes, I think, it's okay to let yourself feel the childish pleasure from cartoons, or made-up stories, or little felt mice who take baths in teacups.

This is the way Erik and I are raising our kids, for better or worse, and this is what we do to lead them by example.


Happy Thursday to All!

Conversation of the Day:

Last week, I caught Noah in a lie, and in true Andrea fashion, I might have overreacted a bit...

Me: "Noah, I cannot tell you how important it is that you DO NOT lie. I know people who've spent their ENTIRE LIVES lying to the people they love, because it was easier not to tell the truth, because they thought that they were somehow doing their loved ones a favor by not creating the turmoil that would have resulted from telling the truth, but do you know what happened to those people??!?! DO YOU?!?! They found themselves ALL ALONE, at the end of their lives, and unhappy, so UNHAPPY, because they destroyed trust, and lives, with their lies. Is that what you want?? IS IT?!?!"

Noah: "Mom, I'm only SIX!! I have NO IDEA what is going to happen in the rest of my life!"

Word.