Wednesday, December 27, 2006
Ick Happens . . . The Holiday Blues (and Bluey)
Everyone knows that caring for a fish is harder than caring for a dog. Which is why, as we exited the birthday party and saw the live-fish-as-parting gifts, I wracked my brain for an excuse not to take one. Before I could say no, my kids sealed the deal: They named the damn fish.
My son dubbed the blue one “Bluey” (so much for originality); my daughter named the red one “Rosie”.
A few weeks later It happened: The once-radiant Bluey started looking grey (“Mom, we can’t call him Bluey anymore because he’s grey; let’s call him Grey-ie.” (At this pace he’ll be Dead-ie very soon). The Great Google helped widen my paranoia exponentially: Our fish either had Ick, Sepsis, Shock, Fish Tuberculosis, Popeye or Dropsy (since my butt is suffering from a permanent case of Dropsy maybe I’m the carrier?).
Einie meanie mienie mo, what Bluey has I’ll never know…One woman on the Internet actually performed fin surgery on her Betta fish. Yikes—MacGyver moves for minnows…. While I Googled away, the kids kept watch over the tank.
“Do you think he’ll die, Mom?”
“I hope not,” was my Really Lame answer. My mother-in-law had recently passed away and we were still trying to work through it. (“Why do people die?” “When will she be back?” “Will God have licorice jellybeans to welcome her to heaven?”)
Off to Pet Supermarket we went. Fifty dollars, some antibiotics and Ick Cure later, a surprising thing happened: the little guy rallied.
“Mommy, we can call him Bluey again. He’s swimming at the top of the tank. We took good care of him!”
On Christmas morning, the kids woke up at 6:00. After watching them tear through gifts, I went to feed Bluey. He ate his fish pellets with gusto and fluttered his fins. All was right with the world. No fish was dying under my watch.
As close to the Acceptable Time to Wake the Neighbors as we could wait (8:30), we went outside to “rollerskate.” (The packaging calls them skates but they’re really just plastic shoes that your kids clomp around in looking like giant bumblebees with yellow helmets, and elbow-and knee pads). After a few fun-filled minutes of falling down on the pavement, we went inside.
I saw him the instant we walked in: Bluey, now Half-Whitey, floating face down. I didn’t want to make the kids sad or start any bad holiday karma, since this was our first one spent without extended family and without my husband’s mother. I was doing my best to inject some Yankee Christmas traditions in our south Florida landscape without calling attention to the fact that we were alone. No table cloth, no place cards, no table extension needed this year. Could I wait a day to tell them? No, I couldn’t stand to see the poor thing drifting around the tank.
“Kyle, I’m very sorry. Bluey has gone to heaven. “Oh, I feel so bad. Can I get a puppy?” Thankfully my daughter didn’t try to upgrade the deceased before he was out of the bowl (maybe it’s a guy thing?!). She cried and then scurried around the house collecting a bowl of “fish toys” for him to take to heaven.
We buried him out back in the flower bed.
As we sat down to eat, my daughter said what probably a lot of people feel on Christmas Day: “I’m very happy today because of all my presents but I’m also very sad because I miss Bluey.” Yes, a day to be happy and a day to be sad.
After the kids said the prayer, neither my husband or I added our families’ customary: “And God bless those who are in heaven.” Why didn’t we say it? Maybe it was just too soon.
Sometimes Ick just happens in life and you’d rather not deal with it.
And then my daughter said, “I know why Bluey died today.”
“Why?” we asked, half expecting one of her silly knock-knock-type riddles of late. “Bluey died because Nana Louise loved fish, so we sent her a fish to heaven for Christmas.”
Made sense to me. And with that, I was able to remember some of the happiness that goes with the sadness, and dove into a plateful of soggy stuffing and extra-dry turkey. Pass the gravy please.
Everyone knows that caring for a fish is harder than caring for a dog. Which is why, as we exited the birthday party and saw the live-fish-as-parting gifts, I wracked my brain for an excuse not to take one. Before I could say no, my kids sealed the deal: They named the damn fish.
My son dubbed the blue one “Bluey” (so much for originality); my daughter named the red one “Rosie”.
A few weeks later It happened: The once-radiant Bluey started looking grey (“Mom, we can’t call him Bluey anymore because he’s grey; let’s call him Grey-ie.” (At this pace he’ll be Dead-ie very soon). The Great Google helped widen my paranoia exponentially: Our fish either had Ick, Sepsis, Shock, Fish Tuberculosis, Popeye or Dropsy (since my butt is suffering from a permanent case of Dropsy maybe I’m the carrier?).
Einie meanie mienie mo, what Bluey has I’ll never know…One woman on the Internet actually performed fin surgery on her Betta fish. Yikes—MacGyver moves for minnows…. While I Googled away, the kids kept watch over the tank.
“Do you think he’ll die, Mom?”
“I hope not,” was my Really Lame answer. My mother-in-law had recently passed away and we were still trying to work through it. (“Why do people die?” “When will she be back?” “Will God have licorice jellybeans to welcome her to heaven?”)
Off to Pet Supermarket we went. Fifty dollars, some antibiotics and Ick Cure later, a surprising thing happened: the little guy rallied.
“Mommy, we can call him Bluey again. He’s swimming at the top of the tank. We took good care of him!”
On Christmas morning, the kids woke up at 6:00. After watching them tear through gifts, I went to feed Bluey. He ate his fish pellets with gusto and fluttered his fins. All was right with the world. No fish was dying under my watch.
As close to the Acceptable Time to Wake the Neighbors as we could wait (8:30), we went outside to “rollerskate.” (The packaging calls them skates but they’re really just plastic shoes that your kids clomp around in looking like giant bumblebees with yellow helmets, and elbow-and knee pads). After a few fun-filled minutes of falling down on the pavement, we went inside.
I saw him the instant we walked in: Bluey, now Half-Whitey, floating face down. I didn’t want to make the kids sad or start any bad holiday karma, since this was our first one spent without extended family and without my husband’s mother. I was doing my best to inject some Yankee Christmas traditions in our south Florida landscape without calling attention to the fact that we were alone. No table cloth, no place cards, no table extension needed this year. Could I wait a day to tell them? No, I couldn’t stand to see the poor thing drifting around the tank.
“Kyle, I’m very sorry. Bluey has gone to heaven. “Oh, I feel so bad. Can I get a puppy?” Thankfully my daughter didn’t try to upgrade the deceased before he was out of the bowl (maybe it’s a guy thing?!). She cried and then scurried around the house collecting a bowl of “fish toys” for him to take to heaven.
We buried him out back in the flower bed.
As we sat down to eat, my daughter said what probably a lot of people feel on Christmas Day: “I’m very happy today because of all my presents but I’m also very sad because I miss Bluey.” Yes, a day to be happy and a day to be sad.
After the kids said the prayer, neither my husband or I added our families’ customary: “And God bless those who are in heaven.” Why didn’t we say it? Maybe it was just too soon.
Sometimes Ick just happens in life and you’d rather not deal with it.
And then my daughter said, “I know why Bluey died today.”
“Why?” we asked, half expecting one of her silly knock-knock-type riddles of late. “Bluey died because Nana Louise loved fish, so we sent her a fish to heaven for Christmas.”
Made sense to me. And with that, I was able to remember some of the happiness that goes with the sadness, and dove into a plateful of soggy stuffing and extra-dry turkey. Pass the gravy please.
Labels: Ick Happens and the Holiday Blues
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Glue Gun Gone Bad (or “Ba-a-a-hd”)
The Woolly Lamb Recital - December 12, 2006
Today, after resolving to conquer the pile of clutter that is my kitchen counter, I saw It, the piece of paper that reminded me yet again that I will never make Mom of the Year: the announcement heralding the highly awaited Annual Preschool Christmas Pageant… dated two weeks ago, for the gala event that was now 72 hours away. Holy crap! [I mean “holy crap” in the most biblical of senses]
“This year the children will come dressed as woolly lambs.” Since both of my kids are fluent in “Waahhhhh” I’m sure they can pull off a “Baahhhh”. (Last year it was a real stretch: thirteen three-year-olds had to be “angels” for an entire hour and a half).
I don’t scrapbook. I don’t cross-stitch. And I don’t bake. While I’d like to say it’s because I have better things to do, it’s actually because failed Home Ec. That and the fact that I’m inherently lazy. Unfortunately, lack of motivation and talent doesn’t make any mom craft-exempt.
Every month us moms are pitted against each other in a glue-gun show-down: quarterly bake sale; Halloween costume parade; and now… my Mount Everest – two woolly lamb costumes. I could do this. How hard could it be? Just the day before I left a Kleenex in the laundry and everything came out woolly.
What You Need:
One white or grey hooded sweatshirt and pair of matching sweatpants
Double-sided tape (available at craft stores)
Cotton batting (used to stuff pillows)
Face paint
Black socks or mittens to cover hands and feet [Where do I get mittens in south Florida? Put socks on their hands? Would the Department of Children and Family Services approve? If so, I’ll try the ole’ sock trick the next time my son won’t listen when I say, “Keep your hands to yourself.”]
To Make:
Affix double-sided tape up and down the sweatshirt. Stick cotton batting on tape.
Simple. With newfound hope, off to Tar-ghey I went. With goods in hand, I sat on the living room floor re-reading the instructions. Yes, they were simple. Yet deceivingly simple.
Where exactly do you put the batting? How thick--are these woolly lambs of Northern variety or do they have short coats? Do you go for downy clumps or clean lines? Should your lamb have unsightly back hair? I felt like I was undergoing a Giant Rorschach test. Fast-forward 15 years: I can just hear the therapist now, asking my children: “And vhy did ur modder say she vus putting de batting on like daht?”
In less than 72 hours, 12 woolly lambs would enter the auditorium and you’d instantly tell a LOT about their mothers: who was caring and nurturing and who was drunk with glue gun in hand; who did everything she could for her kids and who was the ultimate slacker. Even worse than this Mommy Dearest lineup was how my kids would look compared to the others. Will my kids be the WORST woolly lambs in history since Noah? [“The animals came in two by two…except for the lambs, because they looked…Well, let’s just say we’d like to reproduce without them.”]
In the end, I decided my kids would be minimalist lambs: I put some cotton in patches on the stomach and arms. (Really, have you ever seen a totally uniform lamb?) Both suits were finished in an hour.
The next morning I unveiled the suit, asking my daughter: “Does this look like a woolly lamb?” “No, it looks like a woolly monster.” SCORE! At least it’s woolly!
My husband came home and I showed the outfits to him. He—who has learned to respond without hesitation to the “Do I look fat in this?” question—was speechless in this foreign territory of crafting. “Don’t worry, the kids are young and won’t remember it anyway.”
Apparently I failed the test My kids will look like giant tampons! Should I rip off the tape and start again?! Add more batting? Take off some batting? Give the batting a trim? Despite my neurotic bad-Mom conscience that urged me to try again, my inherently lazy side won over, as it usually does. Who cares? It’s just a costume.
Tonight, as I hung the costumes in my kids’ rooms, I looked over and watched them sleep. Their stomachs rising and falling as they breathed in and out so peacefully. It was true: Even though no lamb can be absolutely perfect, every lamb is beautiful….that is, until 72 hours from now.
The Woolly Lamb Recital - December 12, 2006
Today, after resolving to conquer the pile of clutter that is my kitchen counter, I saw It, the piece of paper that reminded me yet again that I will never make Mom of the Year: the announcement heralding the highly awaited Annual Preschool Christmas Pageant… dated two weeks ago, for the gala event that was now 72 hours away. Holy crap! [I mean “holy crap” in the most biblical of senses]
“This year the children will come dressed as woolly lambs.” Since both of my kids are fluent in “Waahhhhh” I’m sure they can pull off a “Baahhhh”. (Last year it was a real stretch: thirteen three-year-olds had to be “angels” for an entire hour and a half).
I don’t scrapbook. I don’t cross-stitch. And I don’t bake. While I’d like to say it’s because I have better things to do, it’s actually because failed Home Ec. That and the fact that I’m inherently lazy. Unfortunately, lack of motivation and talent doesn’t make any mom craft-exempt.
Every month us moms are pitted against each other in a glue-gun show-down: quarterly bake sale; Halloween costume parade; and now… my Mount Everest – two woolly lamb costumes. I could do this. How hard could it be? Just the day before I left a Kleenex in the laundry and everything came out woolly.
What You Need:
One white or grey hooded sweatshirt and pair of matching sweatpants
Double-sided tape (available at craft stores)
Cotton batting (used to stuff pillows)
Face paint
Black socks or mittens to cover hands and feet [Where do I get mittens in south Florida? Put socks on their hands? Would the Department of Children and Family Services approve? If so, I’ll try the ole’ sock trick the next time my son won’t listen when I say, “Keep your hands to yourself.”]
To Make:
Affix double-sided tape up and down the sweatshirt. Stick cotton batting on tape.
Simple. With newfound hope, off to Tar-ghey I went. With goods in hand, I sat on the living room floor re-reading the instructions. Yes, they were simple. Yet deceivingly simple.
Where exactly do you put the batting? How thick--are these woolly lambs of Northern variety or do they have short coats? Do you go for downy clumps or clean lines? Should your lamb have unsightly back hair? I felt like I was undergoing a Giant Rorschach test. Fast-forward 15 years: I can just hear the therapist now, asking my children: “And vhy did ur modder say she vus putting de batting on like daht?”
In less than 72 hours, 12 woolly lambs would enter the auditorium and you’d instantly tell a LOT about their mothers: who was caring and nurturing and who was drunk with glue gun in hand; who did everything she could for her kids and who was the ultimate slacker. Even worse than this Mommy Dearest lineup was how my kids would look compared to the others. Will my kids be the WORST woolly lambs in history since Noah? [“The animals came in two by two…except for the lambs, because they looked…Well, let’s just say we’d like to reproduce without them.”]
In the end, I decided my kids would be minimalist lambs: I put some cotton in patches on the stomach and arms. (Really, have you ever seen a totally uniform lamb?) Both suits were finished in an hour.
The next morning I unveiled the suit, asking my daughter: “Does this look like a woolly lamb?” “No, it looks like a woolly monster.” SCORE! At least it’s woolly!
My husband came home and I showed the outfits to him. He—who has learned to respond without hesitation to the “Do I look fat in this?” question—was speechless in this foreign territory of crafting. “Don’t worry, the kids are young and won’t remember it anyway.”
Apparently I failed the test My kids will look like giant tampons! Should I rip off the tape and start again?! Add more batting? Take off some batting? Give the batting a trim? Despite my neurotic bad-Mom conscience that urged me to try again, my inherently lazy side won over, as it usually does. Who cares? It’s just a costume.
Tonight, as I hung the costumes in my kids’ rooms, I looked over and watched them sleep. Their stomachs rising and falling as they breathed in and out so peacefully. It was true: Even though no lamb can be absolutely perfect, every lamb is beautiful….that is, until 72 hours from now.
Labels: pageant, woolly lamb costume
