Because of the produce co-op, I now have leeks in my refrigerator. (I also have cantaloupe, tomatoes, lettuce, corn on the cob, bananas, oranges, lemons, potatoes, apples, kale, zucchini, a cucumber, and peppers. Finally, I have a 1.5 pound box of banana chips and an insane amount of love for banana chips. Sometimes I come across one that was sliced lengthwise and I squeal with delight—and we all know that’s not a common thing for me.)
Harper has a birthday on Sunday and Meredith has a birthday on Monday and I’ve been cleaning like crazy because I’m letting each of them have a friend over if they promise to NEVER discuss their “parties” at school. The last thing anyone wants or needs is weird birthday party drama and hurt feelings and sociopathic stirrings and had I waited one more month (in both cases) to get pregnant, school would be out by the time birthdays rolled around and we wouldn’t have to live with heads full of Crazy Town Fear.
When I was 23 years old, one of the orderlies at the hospital where I worked asked me if I wanted to accompany him to the morgue because he was eye bank certified and was going to “scoop a donor.” To this day, I regret turning him down. (I (mainly) turned him down because he would occasionally send inappropriate magazines (also known as Porn) to me through the pneumatic tube system, and he thought it was so so funny, and I mostly didn’t. BUT, how many of you have seen a donor being scooped? So many missed opportunities.) ((I suppose I could make a call and be all MIGHTY LIFE LIST MAKE IT HAPPEN WITH THE EYEBALLS, but I know myself better than that. It took me twenty minutes to muster up the courage to order a few dozen doughnuts for Meredith’s class on Monday. I am not a good phone person.))
Speaking of which, some guy called on Tuesday and he told me that he knows that I was on birth control pills and that I had complications that resulted from the use of those pills.
Me: What? Who is this?
The Guy Who Knew Too Much (TGWKTM): You will be handsomely compensated! Did you have blood clots in your lungs or perhaps an aneurysm?
Me: I’m not sure why we’re talking about this.
TGWKTM: How many times have you been pregnant in the past twenty years?
Me: Twenty times. Always pregnant! WHY ARE WE HAVING THIS CONVERSATION?!
TGWKTM: You were pregnant AND taking birth control pills?
And that’s when I hung up on him. Because enough is enough and unless I’ve introduced myself to you as Samantha, I’m not in a position (i.e., sufficiently Tipsy) to talk about pills and babies (and aneurysms!) with strangers.
But I will say this: Happy Anzac Day to You! (And to YOU!) ‘ ‘ ‘text/javascript’>
Ugh. Birthday parties. Ick.
You’re a better mom than I. Have fun! But happy birthday girls!!
Speaking as someone born in July, the rough thing about summer birthdays is having everyone be on vacation when your birthday rolls around. I don’t have fond memories of birthday parties as a kid b/c it was hard to put them together when everyone was away, so I only had family birthdays.
(This was not meant to sound “oh, woe is me I never had a birthday party I remember”, but just to show that it’s not all sunshine and lollipops for summer birthdays, either.) :)
My three kids’ birthdays are all within a month of each other, and the oldest and youngest are three days (and five years) apart. My birthday falls in that month as well. Can I get away with a “birthday season” gathering for all of them at once?
I didn’t think so either.
We also have the Do Not Discuss At School rule, instituted this year because last year the oldest, at 4, invited his whole class to our house. I mean, it is what you must do when you blab at school but also…oh my god all the kids.
Thanks for making me google “Anzac Day.” I was horrified to think I was missing out on some sort of special day. I was much less horrified when I saw that it is for Australia and New Zealand. Thanks for teaching me my something new that I learned today! :)
one of the many reasons we don’t have a land line.
Thank you for the Anzac nod! So nice to be acknowledged, it’s a very big day for all of us downunder.
My girls’ birthdays are exactly 6 months apart, so it felt I was perpetually winding up to or recovering from their parties. I never had birthday parties myself – kind of resented it at the time, but now fully understand.
Another thank you, here, for making me google Anzac Day. I like learning new things. Note to Google: No, we are not going to stop using your name as a verb, and it’s your fault, so stop it.
Happy Birthday to the lovely Pudding daughters!
As a child my birthday was always during Easter vacation and now it is always during or close to Passover. When I was a child I always felt I was missing out and now I am just too exhausted after the holidays to have the energy to celebrate.
Mind you, the ‘Crazy Town Fear’ does sound a little nightmare-ish.
Most primary, middle and some high schools here have a rule that if a child has a party they have to invite the whole class. I’ve actually done that a couple of times but there was no way I could have done it every year for both of them.
I don’t know what the second bit was about, because I was too busy barking with laughter at “MIGHTY LIFE LIST MAKE IT HAPPEN WITH THE EYEBALLS”
You, my lady, you are a writer. Sod Plato.
Although I can’t really get behind the eyeball thing (I am weird about eyes – I have a hard time even putting makeup on sometimes because EYES!), I am actually doing that life list thing on Maggie Mason’s site. (I was just going to call her Maggie, but I’ve never actually met her, so….)
anywho.
Birthday parties. Our school has a “no invites in the backpacks” rule, which just makes sense, I think. I am firmly of the “who to invite, and freak out about who might feel left out” school, myself, but my children seem completely unphased by birthday parties. If you tell them they can invite 5 children, they will choose five, and go merrily upon their way. If you ask “well, what about this other person, they say things like “nope, those are my five” or “I think I have enough for the group”. If they hear that someone had a party, and didn’t invite them, they seem to think its obvious that not every child can attend every birthday…..but they honestly did not get that from me – so I don’t know how they came to it. It’s nice, as a mom, because I think we can all agree that if you hurt our child’s feelings it is like stabbing the mom in the (metaphorical) heart. I still feel a bit sad when someone mentions weekend plans that don’t include me – even though I too have weekend plans, and they don’t involve that person…..what is that ABOUT?….must learn from my children!
My dislike of children’s birthday parties stemmed originally from a dislike of the sheer excess of THINGS that resulted from people bringing gifts to these parties. We don’t need more stuff. We don’t need other people buying it, either. THEN one of the moms at our daycare, many years ago, came up with the “book exchange”. Every kid brings an age appropriate book. Every kid goes home with an age appropriate book (not the one they brought). Sometimes there is the old “white elephant” game to choose the books. Sometimes not. We’ve since done a puzzle exchange, a CD exchange, and many, many book exchanges. It also solves the ridiculous “goodie bag” nonsense! So – I pass this along to the readers of the comments – because every parent I’ve ever encountered thinks it is brilliant. (I can say this, because it was not my idea – I think it was traced to a woman named Shelly after it became the norm at birthday parties amongst these daycare families).
Finally – my oldest daughter is belatedly having her birthday party this weekend. At her request, we are doing a service project, and then going out to pizza. Instead of gifts, donations may be made to the service project organization. She’s a good egg, this kid. And wonderfully, her friends are just as great – excited to go and do the service project with her!
SO – that’s the whole story on birthdays at our house. The end.
But how could you pass up that handsome compensation? How?
Eyeball scooping. Yes, I could pass on it but yes I would admire you for checking that off your Life List.
My daughter figured out this brilliant strategy to avoid all hurt feelings for parties. She invites every girl in her class–and NO ONE ELSE. Except this one girl she was friends with when she was 4 who doesn’t go to her school. So it isn’t personal if anyone doesn’t get invited. Sounds crazy but it works. It was totally her idea.
Oh, we also go somewhere kind of far away so not all the girls come. She’s done this for 3 years and this time I was sitting there at the party and realized what a genius she was for working this all out on her own.
(Last time she invited every girl in her class and every girl in girl scouts. So that did get a bit big but not overwhelming.)
On behalf of all of us who enjoyed a day off on Thursday, courtesy of some very very brave people on both sides, thank you! And a very happy Pudding Birthday!
Wow what a creepy phone guy. Blech.
Creepy phone guy indeed! Ewwww :-(
And, elsiroomom’s party gift idea — WOWZA! Am so passing that one on to our daughter-in-law. Service project idea is great too, but may have to wait a few years for that – the grandsweetie is only just 2