walls of stink

I realized tonight my house is full of scent. Not the usual 'mmm what's for supper' stuff, but scent.

My dishwasher - and hence, the dishes -  smell like lavender.
B bought new laundry detergent, Apple Mango (Madness?) Something, and it makes our clothes smell like bubble gum.

The kids' shampoo smells like peonies, while mine is a blend of erm... musk and chrysanthemum green, and B's is minty and cool.

The dog smells like dog, at least, although his ear meds make him smell a little fruity. And we'll be polite and not talk about his back end. It too smells like....dog.

The cats litter is almost too scented (mm! Overly-perfumed clay!), but since I have three cats, frankly the stuff could be asbestos and rhino toe-clippings, and I wouldn't care.

The downstairs reeks of Swiffer fluid and Pine Sol and oil soap and Fantastik and oven cleaner (okay, for tonight, anyway) and the bathroom smells like scrubbing bubbles and soapy steam.

Tonight, I'll go to bed on my Apple Mango Bubblegum  sheets and wish it was warm enough to sleep with a window open, and wonder....just why is it that we're all so afraid of just smelling like....ourselves?

chores

I swore, when I realized I was going to have kids, that I would NEVER be the kind of Mom who cleaned the kids rooms. My Mom didn't, so why would I?

(And a caveat here: I remember getting my bedroom door taken off the hinges for not cleaning it properly, and I remember trying to stuff more than God ever intended to fit under the bedskirt, and I remember staring longingly out my window while I had to FUSS with things,but I don't remember my mother cleaning my room.)

Rosey and Cass both put their laundry in hampers and bring them downstairs. They take their folded clean stuff up too, and put it away. They make their beds (okay, often.) They strip their beds on Sunday, and both can make them again, although R gets frustrated with the bottom sheet and C hates pillowcases. Rosey unloads the dishwasher when asked, Cass sweeps, they both love to mop. They take turns setting and clearing the table*. Cass feeds the dog, Rosey the cats.

Am I proud of them? Hell, yes. Am I an excellent task-master or an incredible parent or (oh, I laugh) some organized phenomenon?

NO.

My brother and I were taught from a very early age that we were part of the household, and that we were expected to do these things. So it made sense for me to carry that on with my kids.

Although, today, when I went into Cass's room and left with a bag and a half of assorted toys, old school assignments, crumpled paper, and bits of mystery plastic,  I thought for a minute I'd turned into one of those women who cleaned their children's rooms.

Then I realized I was just performing a vital safety service and making sure firemen could get to him should there be a fire, and left.

We'll see if he notices when he gets home.

Rosey's room will have to wait for a few days. But, Little Ponies? You're on warning.



*Which sounds like: 'Cass, it's your turn to....' But they DO it.

evolving

There are times I look at this blog and I hate the voice I've become. I feel like the entirety of it is all rah-rah go mom things, all pictures of my children and stuff about school, and less of me. Major Bedhead talked about that today, about looking in the mirror and not recognizing the woman there, and sometimes? Sometimes I don't recognize my own life here, in these pages.

And now, to take my own advice, here I'll give you a story, and stop blatting angst:


We've been in the pool a lot lately, where a lot equals at least once per day, and I guess I shouldn't have been surprised when the kids started running out with fabric strips to dry themselves I thought had been consigned to the rag-bag long ago. I was idly looking over the picnic table where all the towels park until they're needed and realized that they all had at least one hole, and most were thin and flimsy. And was that one from my mother's house? (I haven't lived with my parents for....um...twenty-odd years? These are OLD towels. Practically antiques.)

At that point, I realized something that has probably been evident to most of you:
I'm just not terribly domestic.

Towels and dishcloths   - completely beyond my radar. So yesterday I sucked it up and went to a big box store and reveled in their low low prices and ohmigod TOWELS that aren't paper thin and stringing themselves into oblivion along one edge.  There! I thought. There! We look less like a paper-bag family now.
I paused, all triumphant and busy making a home! and maybe this domestic stuff isn't so bad!

and watched the children promptly use them, then toss them at the laundry basket and forget them.

Maybe they don't care about perfection? Maybe I shouldn't care about it, either.

At least not while there's a pool waiting.

housekeeping

I survived not only an ultrasound yoinking on old scars (am not pregnant, was not the point) yesterday, but an occurrence of the rarely-seen but hugely-hated chin breakout.

The sand for the poolis here. We're all terribly excited and we'll go spread and level it this afternoon. Tomorrow B will be home and he'll pack the stuff and we'll layer the rest of the big pool stuff and then....THEN...we can fill the pool.

I'm beginning to get a niggling feeling that I should be watermarking my pictures. Or something. Any advice?

Speaking of pictures, I sort of....broke....my camera last night. I'm still reeling (MAH BABY!) and I have NO IDEA where to take my preshus in to be fixed. I have a sneaking suspicion I may end up driving to Halifax.

I tried to plug the download cord in and succeeded in pushing the connector plug into the body of the camera. I flapped and swooned and was horrified until B, ever the practical one, explained that in the meantime I could take the memory card out and download into our card reader. So no harm, no foul, except that I broke my camera!!!!! ( she wails) a lingering sense of clumsiness.

A few weeks ago I entered a contest the lovely Schmutzie held - and I won a Ipod shuffle. (Go me - I never win anything) Now I'm noticing how much nicer my life runs when there's a soundtrack playing in the background. Really - how bad can the in-fighting be when Landon Pigg is crooning about coffeeshops? Ahem. Now I have to figure out what podcasts are and how they transfer onto this sweet little machine and I'll be all set.

Hum. This IS a harum-scarum post, isn't it? Ah well.

Going to have to steam my face tonight....

Mama, can I use the music player now??

thursday night commercial, scene twelve

Yes, yes, I'm late....




This whole thing cracks me up - from the cat to the dog's voice to the way the woman strokes the bony little ferret like he's the softest cuddly thing ever.

it was a dark and stormy night

Hey - I'm home!

And it was an adventure. I love adventures. Especially when part of the allure is a quiet (clean! By someone other than myself!) hotel room and good food.

Getting there? Part of the adventure.

I'm not a city driver. Highway/freeway driving? Looping through lanes, shifting into overdrive, zooming past Sunday drivers? The best. Blows all the cobwebs out.

But city driving? Inching along, gaze riveted on the car in front of you, too engrossed in watching for the sudden red glare of brakelights to see what's going past your window? No thanks.

It was dark. (Although not stormy. Yet.) and there was just enough snow falling to slush up the roads and dirty the windshield a bit. I made pretty good time (although the slick-ish roads made for a bit of judicious slowing) and was just getting onto the exit ramp when the pavement noise changed for a moment. (I's foreshadowing heah.) Then it went back to normal. I chalked it up to the road surface being wet? dry? something and promptly went and got lost in the outskirts of Halifax.

Halifax is the big city in Nova Scotia. It was designed and planned out to confuse the British, should they ever land there and stragglers withstand the assault from the harbour.

Okay, that and the planning commission is full of blind, greedy people. (Snirk.)

Yes. I got lost. There are these huge mall-like (I was in Beyers Lake/Clayton Park/The Land of Strip Malls and Gaming Clubs, if anyone local wants to commiserate with me on this) developments EVERYWHERE, and not much signage. I finally realized I was lost and pulled up in a strip parking lot to re-peruse my maps. When I swung back out on the road, there was a strange noise coming from my tire. Ka-whumpa whumpa whumpa.

I swore and swore and pulled over (into yet another big-ass catacomb) to assess.

Now. I've had flat tires before. My father wouldn't let me get my license before I could change a tire. But it was cold and wet and sleeting and dark, I was hours from my house, and every warning I'd ever had about being careful in the city was ringing in my head. I drove slowly around the corner, and there - like a lighthouse - in front of me, was a Chevy Jeep Dodge dealership. With people in it.

Which was open.

I parked and double-checked the time. The service bays were dark. Still - maybe they could let me into the covered garage so I could put the spare tire on?

I went out of the sleet and the dark and the rising winds into a clean, comfortable haven, where after I blurted 'I need a rescue' a gentleman in a nice three-piece suit brushed over my idea, shucked his jacket, and went in and changed the tire. Himself. While his co-worker made me a cup of coffee and commiserated about the (steadily more) crappy weather.

My rescuer? The dealership owner. Patrick. (And I'm going to find out what the name of that place is, and promote you where ever I can - because really? That was a wonderful thing to do.)

They charged me nothing and sent me on my way. P even put the tire into a bag so it wouldn't drip mess all over my car and marked where the hole was, so when I went to have the tire fixed it wouldn't be hard to find.

Oh - and he gave me directions so I wouldn't be lost anymore. Simple directions, using landmarks, not this turn north and go 10.6 kilometres stuff. Who does that work for, anyway? You're in a strange place, driving, looking out for signs, watching traffic and peering at the odometer? Sheesh.

I made it to the hotel with no muss, no fuss, no bother, dropped my stuff, brushed my teeth, eyed the bathtub longingly, and went to bed.

Lord knows what further adventures I could have had if I'd tempted fate and stayed up.

------------------

Today is cold and snowy and still. We've a winter storm warning bearing down on us, (although we'll see how much of it we actually get) and the kids are fractious and tired of being cooped up.
There's a bathroom that really needs cleaning (bleach!) and laundry

(oh god, the laundry!! Bear did quite a bit while I was gone - unfortunately his idea of doing the laundry consists of washing it, drying it, and leaving it in piles in front of the dryer. So most of the clothes are clean - but the cries of Mo-om! I have no socks! echo around the house.)

and there are a ton of things to do.

I missed you! What happened while I was gone?

whistle while she works

My youngest has gotten a cleaning bug from somewhere, and oh, yeah, I'm fighting this.

Snort.

R whips her broom and dustpan around like she's going for the Silver Shoes competition (Junior Division) trophy. If she had pet mice they'd no doubt be singing a happy tune with her.

We tell her she's a good girl, that doesn't she want to play? but no. This is playing, she says, and swirls her mop with more joy than I've ever had wielding it.

'Y'know, honey,' I say, 'You could let me do that.' (I'm also covertly eyeing the puddles of water and the glued-on dog hair scattered behind.)

'Mama! NO. I am going to clean this, then I'll sit down and Cass and I can watch cartoons.' she said, zooming through the rooms with abandonment.

She's even got her brother thinking this is fun.

*shock*

I tried again. 'Rosey, I'll finish this.'

Rosey tipped the mop bucket into the sink. 'All done, Mama.'

'I can do this stuff b'cause I'm a gen-us. You have to be to take care of a fam'bly.'



Y'know, who am I to argue with this next generation?

the stove stays

I love my stove. LOVE LOVE LOVE it. It's a Findlay stove from the 1950's, converted at some point from wood (and coal, we think) to propane, and a graceful and beautiful thing to see each morning. It was the first thing I liked about this house, and it's remained my favorite.

Unfortunately, it's at least fifty years old now, and the last time we had it fixed, the technician shook his head and said something about borrowed time. He has no idea where to find parts for it anymore.

Last night the oven wouldn't light. B fussed with it for awhile and then came out to the living room, frowning.

'It won't work, Jess. I think we're going to have to think about a new stove soon.'

I shot him a pleading look and he shrugged. 'I'll go try to fix it, but....'

Crashing and swearing soon were heard from the kitchen, along with a (loudly) muttered 'If you didn't love this thing so much, I'd...'

'You'd what??'

'Nothing, dear. You realize the only reason this is still here is because you love it, right?'

B appeared in the doorway to emphasize his point, wiping his hands. 'It's working. For now.'

I was appreciative, I was, and I smiled sweetly and thanked him, adding:

'You realize that you're still here because I love you, right?'

(He shakes his head at me a lot. Wonder why??)


Today he started looking on the internet to try and find out if he can gut the interior and replace everything.

Because he's sweet like that. And like my husband, the stove stays.

mango dreams

I painted the bathroom today.

After all my angst and second-guessing myself about the color, I rolled it on and

hmm.

Mango Dreams. The color name is Mango Dreams.It ....looks like off-white.

Hmm.

Well.

...well, I still can't tell if I like it or not. But compared to the baby-blue and black with random red squares that it was*?

It's fricking gorgeous.





*It was baby-blue squares with rims of black. When we moved in, I painted a few random squares red. It was great for about a month, and I've hated it ever since.

spilt milk

We were halfway through supper (B's yummy pan-fried haddock) tonight when Jasper oozed by us and nonchalantly ambled into the pantry, walking slowly and unobtrusively, intent. Distant crunching noises and a happily wagging tail whomping against the wall (Nothing to see here, folks! Just a Good Dog! Look away!) alerted us that he had his head in the dog food bag again, and R was sent to roust him out. R came back to the table wiping her fingers on her napkin.

Mama, Jasper's sticky.
Stinky?
No, sticky.

So when the chocolate brown dog disappointedly kerflopped down near the table we all had a look. He looked fine. A bit disgruntled at being caught stuffing his face...his face...his face?

Jasper never had a white eyebrow before. Or a white streak on his side. This was bad.

I looked at B. 'Glue?'
He shrugged unhappily. 'Maybe, although the only thing I can think of that's in the pantry that it could be is..
'Paint' I breathed, and sprinted for the door.

Oh God no.

At least half a gallon of bright white acrylic flat base coat was puddled on the floor. While the middle was gooey liquid, the edges were hardened and tacky.

It took me most of an hour to clean it up. At least it came up.


Now, does anyone know how to get paint off a dog?

Jasper says: I like the Groucho Marx look. Now feed me.

I was sorta a busy woman

Today I must:

Clean up the kitchen (counterspace will be a lovely thing to have again)
Tidy the livingroom
Walk El Doggo (who is bursting out of his skin)
Start drawing up plans for Spring Improvements (B does much better with actual drawings in his hand versus me saying 'Oh, put it there,')
Make gingerbread men, which I've been promising the kiddles for weeks.


Besides, is there anything finer than getting flour and sugar all over a freshly cleaned kitchen? Apart from the giggles and squeals and stealing bits of dough from my helpers, I can't think of a thing.

Today I:
Cleaned up the kitchen (counterspace is a lovely thing to have again)
Tidied the livingroom - although now you can't tell now, a few hours later
Walk El Doggo (who is bursting out of his skin) um, whoops?
Start drawing up plans for Spring Improvements (B does much better with actual drawings in his hand versus me saying 'Oh, put it there,') - had a general conversation about which project we'd like to start first - the first of many, I'm sure!
Make gingerbread men, which I've been promising the kiddles for weeks.

Made the dough, while a kitty made mew-mew noises and sang songs and danced around the room and batted toys around, and the boy sat with his father and talked.

A nice day.

squeaky clean

Some nights I don't want to do the dishes or clean up. At least until the junior members of the household have shuffled off to Buffalo, I've had some me time, and the house is quiet.

Then I'll clear up, fold laundry, whatever. It makes me feel good to know that when I wake up in the morning I don't have the congealed dishes lurking in the sink or six million billion quadrillion lots of toys left around.

Some days, though, this backfires.
Some days it's plain I should have been paying more attention.

Rosey was messing around in the kitchen this morning. She likes to load and unload the dishwasher (NOT discouraging that, no no!!) and feed the dog. The dog is happy, she gets to splash about in the sink, and usually this is a wonderful thing.

Usually.

Tonight (Umm, thirteen hours later??) I scooped up the dog's dish and thought idly "R must have been sharing her juice with Jasper again" as the bowl was half-full of pinkish fluid.
Except I couldn't rinse it out. And it smelled...fruity. Tropical, with a hint of....clean?


And when I asked her why Jasper's dish was half-full of dish soap, R shrugged.

"Jasper likes, Mama."

charwoman

I've done so much laundry lately.

The spring weather confuses the husband and children into yanking everything out of their drawers (Do I need a sweater? Maybe I can get away with just a long-sleeve shirt...) where it all mingles with the dirty pyjamas and gets swept up into the laundry baskets.

I'm also in the midst of creating giant bags of Salvation Army stuff, (crap these kids grow fast) which will sit on my sun porch until I remember to take the damned things in (fall? never?) and with the '3 bag limit' imposed by the local branch, emptying the sun porch of clutter could take awhile.

Even with the mountains of old clothes I am hauling away my daughter has more clothes than God ever intended.* Does she really need an entire dresser drawer full of short-sleeve shirts? (This is not counting the drawer underneath it full of long-sleeve light weight shirts, or the drawer full of pretty summer sets.) Do t-shirts multiply in the dark like bunnies?

And another thing. She has more underwear than I do.

Now how is that possible?? She's not totally toilet-trained yet, while I have had years to amass cotton goodness...

So not fair. At least the dryer doesn't eat my socks.



*That's this minute. If I turn around, she'll have grown into another size.

things from home

We cleaned out the big toy-chest today.

The kids have slowly taken over the far corner of the livingroom with stuffed animals and blocks and legos (note to SG: Not just you!) and the sun porch looks like a toy tornado hit it. Today we worked on the living room.

Note to relatives: no more toy cars EVER.

So in the midst of matching puzzle pieces and assigning boxes and bins (and in the case of the dinky cars, a backpack*) to different things, I found a wooden train and car that had been my brothers', and seeing it in my daughter's hand made me realize how many things I have scattered through my life from home.

Big things - the kitchen table (it's the only one I remember my parents having) a hutch, a picture. My grandmother's bookcase is in the living room. My great-aunt Bertie's music box and all the photo albums my mother made. Little things - wooden spoons. My rings sit in a covered bowl that looks like a fish that I've had since high school. My baby cup. Books.

And yet... as I looked around I realized how much of Bear was here too. For the most part our stuff co-habits well (in large part because my house is (sigh) functional and not decorative in the least, so the mish-mash of common items works**) but in some areas - not so good.

At what point do things stop being my stuff and his stuff to my casual eye?

And I've lived here six years - when do the things I brought with me just become 'things I brought with me' and not 'things from home'?



*And it's FULL. Rosey almost went ass over teakettle trying to hoist it up on her shoulder.
**The best thing about our house? The side-yard. Definitely.

hooligans

And this is what happens when I don't make my bed. Notice how nonchalant Chumba is (he of the incredible girth and soft yellow fur) "Who, me? Pull the bottom sheet off? Wreck the bed? Really."

And Kate is sleeping on my pillow.
(Probably exhausted from playing hide and seek under the quilt with Fluffo.)

Bad cats, both of them. Bad cats.

We'll see how smug they are when I let loose the small girl who loves to fold kitties up and carry them around.....

autumn cleanup

Tomorrow is designated Fall Clean Up Day, where the trash men will pick up big items as well as regular trash.

I tend to go into a zen-like state where I want to throw out everything and start fresh - the whee! zone. Bear (who never met something he couldn't re-purpose) gets tighter-lipped throughout the process. (and wees if he can't get me off the scent)

So we started small - an old mop, a shredded tarp, a broken window blind. Some old toys of the kids. A box of oddments from the shed.He wasn't flinching yet, so I went to the next level.

A five gallon bucket, a crushed laundry hamper, a window shade. Some more tarps and groundcovers, in better condition. The kids' pool, which was left out with water in it and froze. Still okay.

Then I went for it: 'How about that big desk the kids don't use?' and the blinking lights of 'OVERLOAD!' went off in his brain.

He stared at me. "But...WHY?"

I couldn't answer, because I was already lifting it to the curb. "Because," I puffed. "It's (unh!) huge and takes up too much (unh!) room, and they don't sit at it, and it weighs a ton and could you help me?

He did come help, although he was mournful. "It's just....it's just...when you throw it away, it's gone forever."

I looked at him. He wasn't kidding. I let several cars go by* (and several things left unsaid) before I answered.

"Yeah. That's how it works."

So tonight I'm going to have to sleep with my hand tucked into the back of his t-shirt or something, just to make sure he doesn't 'liberate' the damned desk.

*The traffic is always heavy on Clean-Up nights - a lot of college students and people with Perma-Yard sales drive through and take things they can use. People actually sit on their porches and watch other people paw through their trash.

these kids are trying to kill me

Rosey's turning two has been an interesting experience.
Today, she said 'No' for the first time ever. (Just in time for the terrible twos!)

Tonight, she crossed another milestone I had hoped we'd missed - she pooped. In the tub.

Cass was horrified. 'Mom! Rosey's got something on her hands!' Then his tone changed to fascination. 'Is that poop?'

Two milli-seconds later, they were out of the tub. I pulled the plug and started containment exercises.

This was, of course, the one night where I'd said 'Sure!' when they both wanted all the bath toys in the tub.


(picture taken after clean-up, before sterilization.)

Bear rustled around downstairs. 'Hon? We're um..out of bleach.'
Shit. What now?

Ignoring the two naked kids huddled together on the step, I bounded downstairs and rifled through the cupboards. Borax - no, Softsoap - no, Silver polish - no, PineSol - no...and there it was. Tucked back in the corner.

A brand new bottle of Lysol Power Toilet Bowl Cleaner.

The label said clearly 'Kills 99.9% of germs.' What could be better?

I used the entire bottle. It um... smells powerfully of wintergreen. And it foams! A lot.

Twenty minutes later, after rinsing (and rinsing, and rinsing!) everything with the hottest water we had, the problem had been solved and the tub sparkled. Sparkled.* It hasn't been this shiny since we moved in.


I was feeling pretty smart as I turned back to the kids. 'Ok! Who wants to have the first bath? You guys still need to rinse your hair, you know.'

Rosey shook her head at me. 'No, Mama. No. Shower.'




*Of course, reading the label now, it says 'Not to be used in tubs'. Obviously not made by people with kids. Or, you know, people with kids that have this problem.

I seriously signed on for this?

Things you never want to hear your son say...

I had poop juice again!

Off to scrub the bathroom...

damn and blast

You would think with the mountains of paper that B has squirreled away (in the most unlikely places!) that if we needed something, we could find it.

But no.

Now my house needs a good sorting...

I digress. It's B's birthday next week, and I have the perfect idea for a present for him. It's perfect. And I'd be getting a deal, too, he would never think I would get this for him, and he'd love it.

Now if I could just find that stupid paperwork....

This weekend: the Boy runs off to camp, and the Girl-Child and I will probably go shopping.
Y'know, for a birthday gift.

continuation

My father in law is a pack rat. Bear comes by it honestly.

A few months ago, FIL handed me a plastic bag and told me he found something for the girl. Inside was a princess dress, shimmery satin and lace and tulle - a bit yellowed and aged, but simply beautiful. It had been in one of the outbuildings, waiting for a little girl to dance while wearing it.

I did research on the net. I searched for gentle stain removers. I finally found one on the Everyday Cheapskate website which advocated a lot of water, a small amount of bleach and dishwasher detergent - and swish and swish and swish. Three times I put it through that treatment.

It came out perfectly. The spots, the stains, the age marks.

My sister in law saw it at our house, and recognized it. It turns out Miss Posey's dress was hers.

Thirty five years later, my daughter got to be a princess too.