Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Freaking Winter! Bah!

It. Just. Won't. End.

Cancelling weekend trip because of the dump of snow that is currently falling on the roads. Highways closures all over the news.
I want sunshine, damn it!

Saturday, February 21, 2009

An Affair with a Woody

A snippet from an MSN conversation I had a few minutes ago with my wonderful & ironically innocent minded (I don't know how that is possible for a person who regularly speaks to me...) cousin & friend, Emily; she was telling me about a string quintet performance that she played in this morning:

Emily-bemily-bum says:
I have violin blisters on my fingers from the strings, and pimples on my neck from holding the violin- usually I get a hickey, but not pimples!
HeZa HeKeLe - - - says:
doesn't it mean you had a hot date when you have a hickey on your neck?
Emily-bemily-bum says:
or an affair with a beautiful piece of wood
HeZa HeKeLe - - - says:
oh darling, if only you knew how bad that actually sounds
HeZa HeKeLe - - - says:
you innocent thing you
HeZa HeKeLe - - - says:
an affair with a woody is a lonely thing indeed
Emily-bemily-bum says:
yes, i know

At the end of DC's 11th B-day Bash...


Bennett (6 yrs 10 mos), BP2 (26 mos), DC (11 yrs), BP1 (5 yrs 3 mos)

Friday, February 20, 2009

Male is Male is Male

A snipet of a conversation coming from my child in the back seat, while driving home this evening...

Bennett Pumpkin: I don't like Daniel.

Heza: Why?

BP: Because he punched me at school.

Heza: Oh?

BP: So I punched him back.

Heza: Shouldn't you have said, "Don't touch me!" or "Keep your hands to yourself!" instead of punching him back? Or perhaps tell a teacher?

BP: I don't like using my words.

Heza: You don't like using your words?

BP: Nope.

Heza: You like using your fists instead?

BP: Yep.

Heza: I think you should use your words and tell him that he cannot treat you that way.

BP: Nope. He's mean to me, so I'm mean to him.

The conversation stopped here, as I was speechless. Did my six-year-old just tell me that he would rather use his fists than his mouth for conflict resolution? I am still speechless.

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

The Niece II

K8 @ 16 weeks + 4 days

Wednesday, February 11, 2009

Tons of new pics and videos on bp blog. Msg for url if you need it.

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Male Child of Mine...Where Are Your Shoes?


The Peeping Tom

Thomas

Tom

Tommy

Thomas Oliver

Oliver

Ollie

T.O.

Tee

Toms-a-lot

Tomasina

Tommee-O

Ollie-ver

Oliviary

Oliviary Furiver

Sir Furiver


If Nicknames are a measure of how much you love an animal, it would not be far fetched to say that this fur ball has made his mark.

Saturday, February 7, 2009

Walk the Dog

Looks Innocent enough, no? Doesn't look like the makings of one panic attack after another, does it?

Since temperatures are actually a digit or two above zero, we pulled on our snow boots and walked down to the neighbourhood grocery store to pick up some supplies. Bennett freaked the whole way. Both ways. Because, you know, a car might come and plow us over and kill us and roads aren't safe and oh my god we are going to die! Can you guess what we will now be doing daily? Until he can calmly walk down a suburban road, beside his mother, holding the dog's leash (or scarf), without screaming like a little girl? Yeah, the dog will be getting her exercise this week...
Do you like our ghetto leash? I could not locate the real deal as we were leaving...it was not where it belonged...so I grabbed a scarf and ran. As I was walking down the street, looking at this piece of cloth, useless memories came flooding back into my head. How is this thing still around?

Turns out that this is the scarf off of the coat my bio dad bought me in 1989. It once had tassels on the ends, but those were pulled off when my little sisters and baby cousin used it for a game of tug-of-war in my aunt's basement in '90. I cried over the destruction of this scarf for a very long time...and carefully sewed up the ends to keep it from unravelling completely....as it was from the only "new" coat that I ever had as a child and my dad had taken me on a special shopping trip to pick it out. We had a similar shopping trip the previous summer to pick out my first (and only) "new" bike of my childhood. These were priceless trips for a small girl who was thirsting for attention from her father. My parents were separated at the time, and these "excursions" equalled more positive interaction with my father than I had ever known when he lived under the same roof as me. He was building memories and building trust and I loved it. And then it was gone. My bio dad died in August, 1990. Today would have been his 52nd birthday. My aunt was murdered in her Seattle suburb, by a serial rapist who had recently been let out of prison, in 2004. She fought back too much for his liking. My bio dad took his own life, my aunt's was taken from her.
I regurgitate these facts with little emotion on this day. I have done my mourning. Today is heavily shadowed by the beautiful funeral I went to yesterday; for an individual who had a profound effect and me and my son's lives and so many countless other people's lives; a person who went out with her boots still on, who lived life exactly how it is supposed to be lived...making a difference every single day...being a "doer" and not a talker. Actions are so much louder than any words that you can say.
A year ago today, I felt this way and two years ago, this way. Today, I feel that a dog leash is a befitting end to an old scarf. I am thankful for the sunshine and look forward to watching my son learn to enjoy walking the dog. Life: it is truly for the living and today I am finding great solace in the memory of those who really knew how to live...

Wednesday, February 4, 2009

Sick.

I always tell the kids to share.

Lukey gave us a nice parting gift this weekend...the flu. Bless his cute, snotty little heart. The poor boy suffered through the weekend with the flu and a double ear infection; laughing and smiling and delighting my heart between doses of Tylenol and Biaxin and nose wipe after nose wipe. Those Bonus Pumpkins of mine are such amazing little souls! Such delightful and unexpected blessings! Such a wonderful parting gift from the sperm donor. To think I would be god-mother to my son's siblings; to think that the man I once loved would leave nothing but havoc in his wake...and siblings for the son he blessed me with. Life: it can be so truly odd, troublesome and beautiful all at once!

The glands in my neck are swollen, my throat hurts, my body aches and my nose has more in common with the Amazon than a breathing apparatus.

Bennett is sick. Home from school today. He is such a man when he is sick. So fucking crabby. The apple does not fall far from the tree. We are just two peas in a fucking nasty pod of snot and whining.

My child is usually so freaking tough, it blows me away. That child has a pain tolerance many stories taller than my own. But he just does not do sick. I don't blame him.

Funeral on Friday. I am still so shell shocked. I knew that Anne had touched me and my son's lives in a positive and substantial way, but I truly had no clue how deep that impact was until this tragedy. I found myself thinking, "Why do all the good ones go first?" Of course, this is what any person thinks when they see a beautiful life disappear before it's imagined time, or a child robbed of the chance to grow up, or any other loss of life that appears to be promising... But it's not like the idiots of the world line themselves up on the street, auctioning themselves off to death's door. The world just does not turn that way.

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

Sore throat and body aches.

Check.

Exhaustion.

Check.

Funeral to attend on Friday.

Check.

So, why am I sitting here feeling so damn blessed?

Funny how the shittiest of situations can make you see more clearly what you DO have and how very thankful you are for having exactly what you do.

Oh how very, very fragile and fleeting life really is...

Monday, February 2, 2009

Like any good spectator...

...Lukey had no problem standing there nicely and watching the pretty ballerinas...

Blind Sighted

When I picked Bennett up from daycare today, one of the teachers pulled me aside; Bennett's beloved teacher had a stroke yesterday. They could not save her.

Anne was not just any teacher; she was exceptional; a true angel on earth. She was my son's afternoon preschool teacher from 2006-2007, his full day teacher from 2007-2008 and again, his after school/afternoon teacher for 2008- last Thursday. She has had such an impact on my child, words do not come close.

My heart is hurting.

Anne has also taught Shayanna, as well as a dear friends daughter (Sunshine M.) and years ago she taught Shayanna and Luke's other older brother (DC) as well. Her reputation reached the far corners of our town; by far one of the most talented and intuitive minds in the childcare industry. Her absence will be felt by many.

This will be the first time I have to explain death to my child. With all the other things that have touched his young life, death has not been one of them, until today.