Falling and Getting Back Up and Falling and...

Our family recently went ice skating.  It was the kids' third time ever, my second, and Derek's hundredth.  Or something.  The point is, he's been a lot, the children and I have not.

As such, Derek is very steady on his skates.  Adelaide and I actually skate quite well, for novices, whereas Caedmon takes a while to master his fear and let go of the wall.

Atticus, meanwhile, continually hurls himself across the rink at high speeds, inevitably falling in a flailing and sprawling of limbs. He is never seriously hurt, usually smiling as he gets back up.

Taking a break between skating/falling/skating/falling.

I, on the other hand, fell twice in the two hours we were there, and now have a bump at the base of one of my fingers, where digit meets palm, which hurts when pressed on, and which one of my friends has given a layman's diagnosis of a bone chip caused by these falls.  This is apparently the difference that 25 years makes in falling.

Just a few years ago I was pretty good at falling; I had frequent practice, tripping every few months while walking or running throughout my life, and had learned a way to not fall quite so hard.  With increased yoga practice, though, my balance has improved dramatically, to the extent that I can no longer recall the last time I fell.  Barring the time I strapped blades to my feet and went coasting along on a sheet of ice, of course.

I've been reading a lot about falling lately, in large part due to this book that we got at the library several months ago.

I don't think I'm within the intended audience age bracket for this book, but I can't help it:  I still found it helpful, and it's caused me to re-evaluate the way I do a number of things in my life.  I think my favorite part is that the author recruited a group of women, who call themselves "goldeners" and who are all over 70, all of whom went through Bowman's program and benefited greatly from it.  There are sections throughout the book written by these women, where they talk about what led them specifically to the program, or about things they found they could no longer do, and how the exercises or shifts in movement helped them, along with any number of other things that I can't think of without the book in front of me.  In short:  it is so good.

In the book Bowman states that fear of falling is just as crippling as actual falling and outlines a series of exercises addressing this, which I apparently need to incorporate into my daily routine.   Also, I want to take one of the classes featured in this New York Times article.  Do you think they'd let me in?  And who wants to pay for my flight to the Netherlands so I can fall with the elderly?  That's not a euphemism.  

For now I'll just treat every run as an opportunity to potentially practice my falling; we've been covered in snow and ice for a while now, with only a couple days above freezing to allow any melting.  I've tried running on the treadmill at our local gym, but anything more than ten minutes on those things makes me want to go full Office Space- Printer on them.

Yes, that is an imperfect analogy, as the treadmills don't enrage me by malfunctioning; I just can't abide spending copious amounts of time on them without being overcome with feelings of worthlessness and resultant, irrational anger, usually going something like this: "I'm not going anywhere.  I'm not getting any of the benefits of being outdoors.  This entire enterprise is utterly meaningless.  Life is meaningless." 

So, I run outside, even though yes, it is very cold out.

At that point I find I have exorcised what may be some underlying anger issues for yet another day.   Life once again has meaning!  Huzzah!  

Big Fat Update- Kind of- and a Winter Hike

Well!  Long time, no blog!  It's hard to force myself to spend any extra time on the laptop when I'm now working on it for hours a week at one of my new(ish) jobs.  I hesitate to even mention it, because the company I work for is super weird about confidentiality and constantly reminding its employees that THIS IS PRIVATE INFORMATION and TELL NO ONE and IF YOU TALK WE WILL COME FOR YOU IN THE NIGHT. 

I'm kidding, of course, about at least 40% of the previous sentence.  Good luck figuring out which part. 

And no, I'm not in an abusive professional relationship, and no, I was not recruited by the CIA.  Just typing that last phrase made it hard to type this one, because I'm giggling somewhat madly at the idea of working for anything like the CIA, what with my utter lack of a poker face, ability to get lost in a cardboard box, and penchant for giggling madly. 

Really, though, I've found a meme that describes at least one aspect of this work rather well.  Thanks, memes.

Still, I'm not ready to finally put this blog out of its misery and kill it off, so I'm declaring (yet again, somewhat wearily) that I will be attempting to post with some degree of consistency!  Just like I did in ye olden days when our chillins were little and nap time equaled blog time!


Um, let's see.  It's cold here.  Yay, Iowa.  Derek and I have agreed to jack our house's temperature all the way up to 70 degrees to combat this forecast:

I don't think I'm really allowed to complain about today's temp, as the high is supposed to be above zero, but tomorrow and Monday, look out:  I will say what I want.  You get to do that when the temperature isn't supposed to be above zero for days.  It's in the Iowan handbook.  I have no idea what's in the Minnesotan handbook for negative temp days.  "Congratulations, it's Tuesday, now get back to work"?

Because we knew this cold front was on its way, I took the kids on a forced march through the snowy forest preserve yesterday, although I charmingly called it a "Winter Scavenger Hunt" because they tend to balk at anything that calls to mind gulag-like conditions.  Maybe all three of them were Russians in their former lives?  Never mind that I don't believe in reincarnation.

Wow, ANYWAY. 

Seen above is the list of things we were going to be hunting for on our hike, a thumb belonging to Caedmon, and a face belonging to Atticus.  Pop quiz:  Which of our children is still young enough to be fooled by exercise disguised as fun?

Really, though, what is it about children and their inability to stay off the ground?  Even now, at any given public space that we enter, I'll turn around and at least one of them is rolling around on the ground.  I don't know what this is about.  They like getting the crap from other people's shoes in their hair?  Children have a better barometer for what's better for their bodies than adults?  I mean, who can tell?

Oh, look, they're on the ground again.  Imagine that.

Lest you think our hike was all fun and games and our lives are snow-winter-perfection, may I submit this photo for your consideration:

He had just learned we not even halfway through our hike.  That is not a happy face.

Not to worry, though, he got back on the ground- well, onto a log over a frozen creek bed- and everything was better.

We made it back to our vehicle, I mused aloud that we could make another loop through the preserve, as we'd only been out for around an hour, and Atticus climbed a tree in protest, saying we could go but he'd stay and take a nap in a tree.  We've read The Little Match Girl four times in the past month, so he knew how this would end.

In the end we did not go 'round again as I decided we had properly celebrated temperatures in the teens, so we went home, the kids got hot cocoa, and I got to be the adult and stay outside for another hour shoveling and waiting for the plow to charge by- for our more southerly friends, the snow plow drives by so fast it throws all kinds of snow from the street up onto the sidewalk that you have to shovel that mess, too, so you're not really done until it's gone by.  It did not complete our street until after I had come inside and hung up all my wet snow gear.  Naturally.

I Hate California

Last night, I spent a good chunk of my time brooding over how much I hate California.


This happens every year right around this time.  It's been cold forever.  It takes a million years to get the kids out the door because of all the layers, and every evening each kid has to lay out not just their school attire upstairs, but by the front door I make them lay out their snow pants, snow boots, hat, and gloves or mittens, because if they are missing a single one of those things the school will not allow them out the door for recess.  This, of course, makes perfect sense, as another of the school's policies is that if it is above zero degrees, those kids are going outside.  Because I love that our kids get regular recess times, I love this rule, even if it does occasionally make me question why we have more than one kid (SO MANY GLOVES. SO MANY MITTENS. SO MANY HATS. SO MANY BOOTS.), but that is what winter does to you: it makes you start mentally paring down on how many children you should have.  It is a cruel, merciless time.

Enter California hatred.

Just to be clear, I don't hate California in actuality.  (I think.)  Although the number of people I personally know from that state can be counted on just one hand, every one of them is lovely.  The one time I visited California, it was nice.

It's the idea of California that I hate.  The always warm, always sunshiney, all the people who live there squeal and huddle into their parkas when the temperature drops to 50 degrees, oh, and all they eat are salads- that California is positively loathsome.  Particularly when you've been living under near-constant cloud cover for what feels like weeks.

Again, I know:  California is a big state.  There's major variety in topography, weather, cultures, etc, depending on where you're at.  And if it's just the warm places I want to stab with my abundant supply of icicles, why not Florida?  The Gulf coast?  The southwest?

And this winter hasn't even been that bad!  Way less snow than normal, and there for a week or two we had highs above freezing most days!  It was like some kind of (global warming) miracle!


I'm telling you, I know the whole thing doesn't make sense.  But man... California.  I hate that guy.

This morning, though?  There were no clouds in the sky, including those low-hanging ones that feel ever-present this time of year.  If Iowa is a trailer park, then those clouds are a dangerous, rusted out old swing set: inevitable but so dang depressing.  (Criminy, even my similes are sad this time of year.)

Back to no clouds today:  Do you know what that means?  DO YOU?



YES!  THE SUN!  AND THIS ABSOLUTELY DESERVES ALL CAPS!

As soon as I saw that the sun did not hate us, that it had merely been hidden by the trailer-park-swing-set-clouds, my spirits lifted.  I also felt this strange sensation where the light touched my shoulder- why, it was warmth!  As it turns out, the sun makes you warm!

I did the only sensible thing, and took myself right on over to the forest preserve, where I traipsed hither and yon in that sunshine, the same sunshine that made the snow all sparkly and reminded me that I like the feel of crunchy, ice-crusted snow underfoot, and the feel of cold air in my lungs, and the silence that winter brings as all the sensible people are driven inside.  The presence of the sun made it feel at least twenty degrees warmer than it has been in weeks, although a look at my phone showed me that the perhaps the sun is not to be completely trusted.

Almost every person that walked through the doors of library today immediately exclaimed, "The sun is out!" or "Can you believe that sun?" and the few that didn't were promptly reminded by me or my co-workers that it is risen!  It is risen, indeed!  Hallelujah!

If any of those conversations sound sad, well, it's probably because they kind of are, but hey- the sun was out today!


But I still hate California.

Winter in Not-California

We Also Went to the Coffee Shop

Adelaide received roller blades for Christmas.  She previously did not own any, but had used my old pair over the summer, back and forth on our sidewalk.  There was a lot of squealing, and arms windmilling as she fought for balance, and yelling at any brother who came within two feet of her whilst rolling.  Her brain interpreted this as fun, and luckily for her her grandparents came through.

A couple days after Christmas we enjoyed some unseasonably warm weather- we're talking highs in the 40's, the kind of temperatures that pull roller blading mothers and daughters out of doors to take their questionable ability to balance on wheels out to public places, where the promise of being humiliated not just in front of our neighbors, as we're used to, but by scores of strangers, proved too enticing to be ignored.  Simply translated:  Adelaide and I went to a park.  We brought our roller blades.

 After donning our blades (by how many points, I wonder, does my coolness factor drop when I refer to them as 'blades'?  I've been in the red for so long I suppose it doesn't matter, as is evidenced by my unironic use of the term 'coolness factor.'  Maybe we'll just go with inline skates.) Adelaide wasted no time in pointing out how pretty her skates were compared to mine, and how quiet, and how none of her plastic straps were broken.  I told her none of those things really mattered when I was the one who wasn't afraid to use both feet while skating- there at first she kept one foot firmly planted and just pushed herself along with the other foot, like a skateboarding trainee.  All my taunting/instruction ("pick up your left foot, Daughter- your LEFT FOOT, pick it up!") kind of fell apart right about the same time my roller blades did, though.

I kept stumbling and couldn't figure out why things kept getting stuck in my wheels, but as it turned out, it was the outer black layer of the wheels themselves peeling off and exposing the ridged inner white part.  My skates were literally falling to pieces around my feet.

Really, though, who could have seen this coming?  I mean, I've skated miles on these wheels, they're twenty years old and have been just fine up 'til now (except for that broken ankle strap, of course).  So... me.  I should have known better than to skate on twenty-year-old cheap plastic roller blades.

Thankfully, a quarter mile walk back to the van in socks really drove that lesson home.  Either that, or it was Adelaide cackling as all the international students from Iowa State politely averted their eyes and tried to hide their smiles as we passed them.

"Well, just imagine what we look like, Mom!  The young, graceful girl gliding along on her new roller blades, the middle aged woman carrying her roller blades next to her daughter.  You know it looks like you just can't roller blade and got tired of trying, right?"  I told her that if I'm truly middle-aged, then it looks like I'm only living to the age of 68, and NOW DON'T YOU FEEL BAD FOR WISHING AN EARLY DEATH ON YOUR MOTHER?

Judging by her lack of reaction, I need to be a little more selective about when and how often to employ my special brand of motherly histrionics.

Adelaide on roller blades, communing with geese. 

My chosen method of revenge was to drag her along to Target to look at their newly-clearanced Christmas decorations.  Judging by the amount of feet-dragging she did down those 70% off aisles, my retaliation scored a direct hit.

So Misunderstood

Last Sunday we awoke to our first real accumulation of snow this season.  It was only a few inches, but it was still enough to excite our children and have Adelaide exclaiming, "Finally!  I was beginning to think we weren't going to get any snow this winter."  It was December 4th.

Because it's December, I've been venturing outside of my usual stores (Aldi, Fareway, and Aldi) to do some Christmas shopping.  This is always a highly entertaining time, because since I'm not used to visiting such a vast array of stores, so many of their contents are a novelty to me.  Behold:

Derek's mom gave me three small, conical foam trees a few years ago, and I'm just now getting to doing something with them, because our children are finally all old enough that I can do things like get out the hot glue gun without fearing for anyone's lives or digits.  I've hot glued pennies all over one (the effect is cooler than it sounds), but what to do with the other two?  I saw these and Hello, Inspiration!  A tree covered in eyeballs!

And another in hair!

Fortunately I walked out of the store with neither eyeballs nor hair, and with the fresh air returned my sanity.  Still looking for ideas as to what to cover those foam trees in, though, if you care to share.  Not strictly opposed to body parts.  (Oh, to be a fly on the wall when Derek reads this.)


In addition to such exotic stores as Target and Hobby Lobby, I'm on Pinterest more often this time of year (Christmas crafting, huzzah!), and for some reason Pinterest seems to be under the mistaken assumption that I'm one of those higher level, crazy-super-healthy eaters, so it keeps grossing me out with "Suggested Pins" like this one.

I mean, really, Pinterest, isn't the fact that I pinned this

and this

and this

 enough of a clue?

Now, I won't be eating all of those in the same week, but make no mistake, I will be eating them.  I'm not interested in your ocean witch's brew, Pinterest, even if it would prolong my life by five (sad and hungry) years.

Do Old Ladies Like Key Chains?

This morning I was going through the house, opening the blinds to let in some sunlight in an attempt to help warm our chilly home.  I pulled a cord, the slats turned, and this little guy was sitting there waiting for me.

I was planning on cutting this hydrangea back all fall, as it's gotten so big and top heavy, but then I got sick and then it got cold out and then I saw this fella and remembered our hydrangea bush is a favorite perch for cardinals every winter.  It's tucked into an outer niche of our house, which means it's somewhat sheltered from the wind, but also means I can look out the above window in the living room and watch the cardinals, or...

... I can go into the front room and spy on them from a different angle.  It seems to stress them out when I go back and forth too much, though, so after snapping a couple pictures I left him alone.  The only thing that would have made this better is to have had a female cardinal in there, too, as I prefer their muted coloring and besides, female solidarity and all that.

Last night Derek's mom very kindly drove down to watch our kiddos for the evening so Derek could take me out for my birthday.  I wanted to eat at a restaurant that has these amazing(ly unhealthy) waffle fry nachos topped with pulled pork and other glorious fixin's, and while yes, those nachos were incredible, our joy was somewhat muted by the fact that we were freezing the entire time we were there.  See, this local chain of restaurants builds decks onto their buildings, then for some exasperating, flummoxing reason encloses the top with a glorified tarp and continues to seat diners there all year.  There are heaters suspended from the ceiling, but as Derek put it, we were eating on a three-season porch during the fourth season.  

Why, yes, we did wear our coats, scarves, and hats throughout the meal, thank you so much for asking!  I took my gloves off because I found manipulating my silverware with them on to be a bit unwieldy.  I was so mad I hadn't worn my long underwear under my jeans, as the draft coming in under the table around my legs was brutal.

This wasn't mere overflow seating, either; we saw numerous open tables as we were led through the (deliciously warm and cozy) dining area to the winter porch.

Jethro's, your food is good, but it is December in Iowa.  Please stop with the deck seating.

I MEAN

Let's see, I have talked about one of my favorite birds, my hydrangeas, and complained about a recent visit to a restaurant.  Although I have tiptoed around it many times before, it would seem that 34 is when I begin my official foray into cranky old-ladyhood.  I am comfortable here.

My next request for our birthday date was to visit the local antique mall (hang on while I search for the expedited application to AARP).  Which we did.  And it was, as usual, glorious.

Derek and I will be celebrating 13 years of marriage next summer, and while I know ten years is Tin and 15 is Crystal, I have a feeling 13 might just be Basket of Heads.  If I'm right, I know exactly where to look!  Thanks, Brass Armadillo!

Really, though, the only thing I came close to purchasing was found in this stall.

Do you see what I see?

The good angel was saying, "Do you really need a muskrat foot key chain?  What about the starving children in China?" but the bad angel was like, "It's your birthday:  Treat Yo Self!"

In the end, I did not bring the muskrat foot key chain home, as it's hard to buy something you're afraid to touch.  But gosh, did my grinchy heart grow three sizes that day.

Semi-Sweet

This week I've been driving our kids to the school bus stop in the mornings, because although I know we can survive twenty minutes outside in single digit temps, I choose not to.  I'm generally a "Why drive when you can walk?" kind of person, so I've had our children out in some extremely questionable weather in the past (number of times kind citizens of our community have stopped their cars or stepped out of buildings to ask if we need a ride:  Countless.  In my defense, our little town stretches out for no more than a few miles at its widest point.  This is not exactly the Trail of Tears I'm forcing our kids down here.), so our children have welcomed this reprieve.

The older two wait in our vehicle until they see the bus getting ready to round the block toward them, then they hop out and go to stand in line.  Every day this week, from the back of the van, Caedmon has given voice to the fierce war waging within him:  "Ohhhh.  I really want to go say good-bye just one more time.  But it's cold outside!  The bus is coming.  I-I- MOM, I NEED TO GET OUT."

He then bolts out the van, and scurries up to Adelaide to hug her tightly one last time before she leaves him for seven long hours.  

Caedmon's in the orange coat and blue hat, squeezing his sister.  Pardon the frost patterns and snow in the foreground; I don't get out of my vehicle even for a picture, so this was taken through the windshield.

Today Atticus got a hug, too, although there's no picture of that embrace as it was quick and very perfunctory.  

You would think that this would mean that Caedmon loves it when we go to his sister's school to eat lunch with her, but no.  Absolutely not.  He gets very quiet and increasingly downtrodden as more and more fourth grade girls squeal over him and say to Adelaide, "Oh mah gahsh.  Your little brother is SO CUTE.  He is adorable.  Oh em gee.  Look at his face.  Look at his Batman hat.  Do you think he'd give me a hug?"  

It got bad enough last time that Adelaide took the worst offender, a very nice but rather loud girl aside and said, "Privately, I agree with you, Caedmon is cute, but you really shouldn't say that in front of him; he considers it very offensive to be called 'cute' or 'little' or anything like that."  

By the time we left, he hadn't said a word in thirty minutes and his shoulders were hunched up around his ears.  All he'll say about the lunch experiences is that he does not like to be around so many bigger kids, and he does not like to be called cute.  Fair enough.  

None of this is terribly surprising given how loud and crowded and busy Adelaide's lunch room is, and I'm able to watch as it begins to overwhelm our youngest within minutes of our arrival, but I was in Caedmon's preschool for two hours yesterday morning for his Valentine party, and you want to talk about overwhelming?  So loud.  So shrill.  And it's busy-ness borders on a swarm at times.  It is nuts in there.  It's always incredible to watch how Cade's preschool teachers can begin singing any of the songs they use to transition from one activity to another, because all those children who were I swear about to go Lord of the Flies on each other settle down and start cleaning up or washing their hands or sitting on the carpet.  I guess it really is the presence of bigger kids that overwhelms our son so much.

Those same magical preschool teachers had also instructed that their students were only to write their own names on their Valentines; scratching out the recipients' names on nineteen pieces of paper is too cumbersome for little hands, and it's much easier just to go through a line and drop a Valentine in each sack, not worrying about which one goes to whom.

Our Caedmon, however, threw a wrench in this whole plan Wednesday night when I stated how happy I was that all his Valentines had been finished for days, as he'd already written his name on every last one.  He grew upset, started honest-to-God weeping, and through a torrent of tears told me that "But Mom, the Valentines all say 'To:' and I can't just leave those blank!  It'll look stupid!  You're supposed to write who each one is to, Mom!"  Then I began sorting through them, and he had already phonetically spelled out half the names of the kids in his class: Noah was Nou, Drake was Drak, etc, etc.

And that is how Caedmon got to stay up past his bedtime doing something his preschool teachers told him expressly not to do.

Ice Skating! Worthy of Exclamation Points!

Last Saturday, the Crislers went ice skating as part of an extended-family birthday celebration.

Derek had been ice skating before, but the other four of us- including me- had never been.

The kids were excited to try it, if a little nervous.  I was just plain excited, having long ago made my peace with making a fool of myself while doing any activity involving my person.  For years, our kids watched those VeggieTales cartoons, and you may remember how the vegetable hosts always ended each episode with the benediction, "God made you special," "And he loves you very much."  Well, one of the ways that God made me special was to gift me with extraordinarily poor hand-eye coordination and a propensity to fall/run into solid objects/accidentally hurt myself on a disturbingly frequent basis.  Strapping blades to my feet and letting me loose on some slick ice in a crowd of innocent bystanders?  I've really outdone myself this time, says God, as he pops some popcorn and settles in for a good show.

That is why Saturday was such a pleasant surprise:  I can ice skate!  Like, actually ice skate!

Listen, there are very few physical activities I've ever tried in my life that I caught on to quickly, so having a natural knack for something like ice skating made it so that I spent most of my time gliding (with, yes, frequent wobbles, IT WAS MY FIRST TIME, OKAY?) around with a gobsmacked smile and baffled laugh accompanying me.  This must be how Derek feels all the time, and let me tell you, it is glorious!


Adelaide likewise took to it with relative ease, and like me, was just as pleasantly surprised and cheered as I was to find something she could do with such quick confidence.  "I am good at this!" she crowed after an hour.  "I know!" I replied, and we understood each other perfectly, as this is not normal for the two of us.  Not normal at all.

Atticus was... well, he was interesting to watch, at least at first.  He's a pretty athletic kid, and so far has taken to most of the sports he's tried rather well.  So it was just bizarre to watch him struggle so much when he first got on the ice.  That boy's feet acted like they had a blood vendetta against him at first, like they were bound and determined to slip this way and that way and often two opposite directions at the same time.
You know how, in the Harry Potter books, there is a curse that is cast by yelling, "Tarantallegra!" that causes your opponent's legs to dance under them in a quick and uncontrollable fashion?  You remember that?  Watching Atticus during the first half hour of ice skating was almost exactly the way I envisioned that curse playing out.  He fell over and over and over, then he'd take a break, then drag himself back on the ice, then fall again, over and over and over, but at some point, even though he kept falling, he forced himself away from the bar running along the wall of the rink, and by what I'm guessing was sheer stubbornness forced his feet under control, and began skating.  He was still falling quite a bit, but he was also skating, and getting faster and bolder and stronger on his skates, and I'm not gonna lie:  It was beautiful to watch.  He's the Crisler that started our outing rather dejected, but ended begging to go back.

Caedmon's skating abilities fell somewhere between Adelaide and Atticus's:  He wasn't as quick a study as his sister, but it wasn't as difficult for him as it was for his brother.  He used the little ice-skating-aid-walker-looking thing every so often (or sagged against it as the adults took turns pushing him around the ice, which, by the way, is exhausting), but also pulled himself around via the bar and mustered enough courage the brave the ice away from the bar.  He won Saturday's award for Refused the Most Help which, despite being a medal that only exists in my mind, still equated to many, many cries of "Don't hold my hand!" "I don't need any help!" and "I can do it MYSELF!"  That was before being reminded that guess what, bucko, manners still matter on the ice, and why, yes, you can still get in trouble while ice skating!  After that it was polite but repeated, "No, thank you"s.  He, too, can't wait to go back.

Derek skated around for a while with his usual disgusting natural ability for physical endeavors, but his ankles didn't hold up for long; whether that's actually his legs' fault or not, it's hard to say.  He had warned me before we went that the worst part about skating at a public rink were the rental skates.  I obviously have nothing to compare them to, but I will say I still have sore spots where the top of the skates met my shins- if I had to guess, and based on the skates I saw people wearing that were owned by them, my skates weren't tight enough, and I had them laced as tight as they could go.  Even whilst skating, I had a fair guess as to what the problem was, as it reminded me somewhat painfully of the perils of not properly tying and tightening the ribbons on my pointe shoes.  Ankle support matters, friends!

Look at us!  We're a family of ice skaters!  Not in a triple-Salchow-kind of way, but in an able-to-propel-ourselves-about-on-ice way, which I will TAKE.

Big thanks to Derek's sister and her family for the idea and invite, to his mom for helping drag the kids up and encourage them time after time, and his dad for providing two solid hours of rink-side assistance.  We can't wait to go back!

Things I Don't Understand

• Texting while driving.  

(See also:  Reading texts while driving.  I've received some important texts before- "Guess what?  I'M PREGNANT.  WITH TWINS," but it's never occurred to me to celebrate such important news with my own death.)

For a while I really, truly believed this wasn't something that happened all that often.  I mean, I'd seen the cautionary ads and read some appalling news stories about victims of those who stare at their phone while operating a 4,000 pound piece of machinery, but really, people couldn't be that crazy, right?!

Then I started to actively look for drivers looking at their screens rather than the road, and my gosh, they are EVERYWHERE.  We have to cross a relatively busy road to get to our kids' school bus stop, and every single day I see teenagers freshly unleashed from the nearby high school doing the stare-at-phone-stare-at-phone-QUICK-GLANCE-UP-AT-THE-ROAD-stare-at-phone-stare-at-phone bit, and every day, I point it out to our children:  "See that, kids?  Those people don't care about your safety.  Texting 'K' to their friends is more important to them than your very lives.  That is not acceptable behavior."  And lest you think it's just teenagers, or even mostly teenagers, NOPE.  The people I have observed texting while driving more than anyone are my contemporaries:  Adult women.  Grown-up, supposedly intelligent women.  I left church Sunday and a woman I know was behind me for several miles with her vehicle full of kids, texting away.  If I'd had to slam on my brakes for any reason, there is little doubt in my mind she would have rear-ended me, so engrossed was she in her phone.  

For me, the only salve is knowing that we have three small children who not only know not to check your phone while driving, but also feel little compunction about pointing it out in others with unbridled disgust and little to no care for political correctness.  I'm careful to curb our children's comments about smokers outside of stores- yes, it's bad for them, but the smokers are outside, and as long as they're attempting to smoke away from the lungs of my little ones, I feel like it's not really my business- I have no problem with the accusatory pointing our kids reserve for the nefarious texting drivers. 

• These suckers.

I can only assume flavors like these were developed for children like our Atticus, who was gruesomely thrilled at the revelation of these creations.

• Why it's still winter.

Do you know how sick I am of seeing this nonsense on my phone?  Even on the warm days- like the one above- it's often too windy or blizzardy to enjoy it.  And while yes, running during today's relatively gentle snowfall is beautiful, it can be hard to remember this when you can't find the trail through the snow and keep stumbling into the ditch, or the rocks, or the creekbed, because it all looks the same when it's blanketed in a thick layer of snow.

Somewhere under there is a trail.  Supposedly.

Thank heaven I have a Caedmon who spends his rest times (I'm not allowed to call them "nap times" anymore, because naps are for little kids, and guess who's super sensitive about being called "little"?) making these paper flowers for me, because "Mom, I know you like to see lots of flowers, but there aren't any flowers right now, so I made you one.  And it fits in your pocket!"

Unexpected Snow Day Adventures

7-8 inches of new snow + high winds + dropping temps = going on our second snow day in a row.  It's served as a nice little break from our regularly scheduled life, but sometimes our children need to be reminded that they are not allowed to go all flying squirrel in the house.  Outside?  Sure.  Whatever.

They've spent large portions of both days outside, and while I sometimes feel a pang that I am not that mom that spends hours outside making snowlumps and snow forts with them, I get over it real quick and get back to my usual routine of setting the trash/ compost bowl/ whatever right outside the door and hollering, "Somebody come take care of this, please!" in their general direction.  Then I hurriedly shrink back in because it is warm in here and cold out there, and that's pretty much all my brain needs to know to make its decision.

Sometimes I stay at the door long enough to take a picture through the glass.  That's just good parenting.

I assuage any residual guilt with the knowledge that I spent an hour shoveling this morning, then I make hot chocolate for everyone and give myself a sanctimonious little pat on the back.

Today I'm doing an experiment in cookie dough, because Adelaide was making peanut butter cookies yesterday afternoon, but within about a minute of turning on the oven, I smelled a very strong scent of gas, so I turned the oven off and called Derek.  He said to get the heck out of the house and call the energy company, who would send a tech out to inspect everything.  So I called the energy company, and they said to get the heck out of the house, they would send a tech out to inspect everything.  The guy on the phone also said exciting things like, "Do not turn any lights on or off.  Do not open any windows.  If you are on a landline, do not hang up the phone, leave it off its cradle.  We do not want to risk creating any sparks.  Get out now."

I instructed Adelaide to get bundled up as best she could with the winter gear right by the front door, then I went upstairs to rouse both the boys from their naps (see flying squirrel reference above; they had worn themselves out by midafternoon) and hurried them down the stairs.

A few delightful pieces of information:  If Atticus is in the house, he is wearing shorts.  We keep our house at 67 degrees in the winter during the day, and 60 starting at 8:30 every evening, but he still wears shorts.  Yesterday, while Adelaide was making the cookie dough, I was doing laundry, specifically boy laundry, which includes every pair of pants Atticus owns and his snow pants because I like his teacher and don't want her to faint from the scent coming off of them every day at school.  Because of all this, when we got out of the house, Atticus was wearing snow pants that hit about mid-shin over his shorts, along with snow boots and two jackets, because oh, yeah, I was washing all their coats, too.  Ditto the multiple, layered jacket look on Caedmon.  We looked homeless, but I figured it was no big deal, we were just going to go hang out at our small town library for a while 'til either the technician figured out the source of the problem or our house exploded in a giant fireball.

We arrived at the library.  There was a hand-lettered sign informing us it had closed early, I'm guessing due to the weather.  Super.

So we went to Wal-Mart, because at least there we'd fit in, right?  I've heard about that People of Wal-Mart website, and while I doubt it applies to everyone on there, keep in mind that some of those customers may look like that because they've been turned out of their house and had to dress in whatever was immediately by the front door.  It's possible.

So we went to Wal-Mart, got the kids' valentines for school, got a call telling us to come back, there would be no slow suffocation tonight.  All the hallelujahs.

The technician was really nice, but informed me that yes, something is up with our oven, and that we are not allowed to turn it on until we get it looked at.  As of today, we have an appliance repair guy coming out in a week to look at it, because that's the soonest he can get here.  Hence the cookie dough in a crock pot.  I mean, I couldn't let Adelaide's beautiful dough go to waste, could I?

I'm not real sure how it's going to turn out; we could be treating ourselves to peanut butter mush tonight.  Or it could be our new favorite dessert!  Aren't adventures fun?

Books and Caucuses, But Not Books About Caucuses

Big week, friends.  We're finally over the awful illness that trashed us last week (except for those odd moments where we have to sit down due to continued weakness and lingering nauseau.  OTHER THAN THAT.), today is the Iowa Caucus, and as of midnight tonight, we're in a winter storm/blizzard watch until Wednesday morning at 8 a.m.  Yay, Iowa!

Derek's out caucusing right now while I stay home with the kids; four years ago, I got to go be a good little citizen and caucus while he stayed home.  Either way, after today hopefully we'll stop receiving enough political flyers in the mail to wallpaper the first floor of our house and the radio will stop with the non-stop political ads, at least until the fall.

When we haven't been hearing about how this candidate is evil and a liar and possibly the anti-Christ and how that candidate is a criminal and eats babies and doesn't even know how to garden, we've been hearing about this giant storm that the Weather Powers That Be have somehow had their eye on since it was over Ethiopia.  You know, or somewhere.  It's Monday, and Monday is grocery day in this house, where I emerge with my Aldi bags and my Aldi quarter and my meal plan with my specific lists broken down by store, but today is not just Monday, it's the day before a possible blizzard, which means the stores were packed and people who are somewhat less capable and efficient grocery shoppers than I (read:  99% OF THE POPULATION) were just wandering around, stopping their carts in the middle of the aisles, thinking their no doubt incredibly deep thoughts right in front of the bag of brown rice I needed but couldn't reach without risking a molestation charge.

You know what grocery stores need?  Grocery police.  I don't mean, like, who gets which items, I mean someone to aid the flow of traffic through the store, perhaps help certain shoppers lessen their risk of imminent death by other shoppers.  I would be terrific at this, because I understand that moving through a store should be just like driving:  You travel on the right, if you have to make a stop you pull over, and in general just try to be aware of your surroundings, because as it turns out, you are not the only person in the store attempting to restock your larder!  I could somehow reward conscientious shoppers with discounts or high fives or something, and write citations for those who are pissing off everyone around them, but I'd probably need a whole separate pad for those guilty of just being all-around jerks.

I may already be drunk with power.

Even without grocery police, I made it through all the stores and got everything I need to make bierocks and shredded beef tacos and other deliciousness this week, plus we made our trip to the necessary libraries just a couple days ago, so we are ready.

Look, if the State Library of Iowa says I need three books to weather this storm, then who am I to argue?

I think I'll start with this one, because it won't be starting so much as continuing, as I'm already halfway through and it is fantastic.

Nonfiction history book about medieval England:  Sounds eeeeuuuuurrrgh, right?  But you guys, it is so good.  I can't put it down.  

Now, off to put the kids to bed, aka "I don't care if you're praying your tiny little heart out for a snow day tomorrow:  Chances are, you'll have school, so bed!  Now!  But keep praying, because I don't want to get up, either!"