Kid Breakfasts; School Supplies

Popular kid breakfasts at our house:

• spoonful of peanut butter, cup of milk
• half a peanut butter sandwich, cup of milk
• dry cereal (a "compromise" variety such as Cinnamon Life, Honey Nut Cheerios, Frosted Mini-Wheats), cup of milk (or in Edward's case, orange juice, since it helps to absorb the iron in the cereal)
• banana, cup of milk
• cinnamon toast, cup of milk
• muffin, cup of milk
• bowl of yogurt, cup of orange juice
• two hard-boiled egg whites with salt, cup of chocolate milk (this is only William so I'm not sure it counts as "popular"---but on the other hand it's what he eats most mornings so it's popular with HIM)

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My last trip to Target didn't have much in the way of fun clearance (the clothing has been marked down at a snail's pace recently, and when I did buy a few clearance kid t-shirts I noticed after washing them that they're now cotton-poly instead of cotton, so that was a non-score), but I did bring home some things that make me feel happy and satisfied every time I walk past them:


This year I remembered ahead of time that on the first day of school the children will be coming home with piles of forms that need to be filled out with information that is the same as last year's and the same as each other's (could this process not be even SLIGHTLY computerized?), AND a request from each teacher for antibacterial wipes and facial tissues. Then I feel all panicky and frantic, as if the teacher will think that my week-long delay in sending in the requested items reflects badly on me as a parent. Target had both items on nice sales, so I got enough for each child to bring in a container of each and still have one of each left over.

I also got Elizabeth's lunch box for first grade; she chose the owl one. (It inspired this week's Milk and Cookies post on lunch boxes.) I wonder how many of our children are going to school with that cute owl lunch box? My mother is finding it fun to see the owl craze of the 1970s back in such full force.

Poor Start; Good Nurse; Erasable Pens

This morning when I woke up I was confident it was a weekend day, and in fact I thought, "I wonder why Paul is getting ready to take a shower already? Oh, well, it doesn't matter, I will just continue sleeping luxuriously, since none of the kids are up yet." And then it emerged that he was in fact done with his shower rather than preparing for it, which meant it was my turn, and anyway that was not a very good start to the day.

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Yesterday the hospital called to assign us Elizabeth's tonsillectomy surgery time for Monday (we need to be there at 6:30 a.m.), and then I ate Nutella right out of the container for awhile. But I did feel better after the call, because it was one of those nurses who is firm and confident and yet caring and understanding, and she had a comfortingly gravelly voice. It made me feel like this whole thing was totally routine and fine and everything was under control---and yet also like she was fully aware that the routineness/fineness from the hospital's point of view didn't mean that it wasn't weird/non-fine for the parents who don't see this every day. Really, she was very good at her job. Nurses make so much difference at times like this.

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We got Rob's school supply list in the mail, and it says he needs erasable pens. Do you have a brand you like? The last time I used erasable pens (back in school, I think), the technology had advanced only to the point of adding an eraser to the top, but not yet to the point of having the eraser WORK.

So, We Have Reached the Futile Purse-Rummaging Stage of Life

Last weekend I was at the liquor store buying some wine to bring with me to my brother and sister-in-law's house. Annnnnnd I reached into my Big Bulky Purse, only to remember I'd already switched my credit card to my Small Cute purse. Very embarrassing. Fortunately I live relatively close, so I zoomed home, got my Small Cute purse, and zoomed back to pay for the wine.

Mid-week, I stopped at the bank. We were urgently in need of cash: the last time I'd stopped, the machine was out of cash; the time before, I was sixth in line and I waited more than five minutes and the line didn't move at all, and we had frozens in the car so I had to give up. I was relieved to remember to stop again, and then I discovered I didn't have my checkbook (which has my ATM card in it), so I had to just leave. When I got home, I found I'd absentmindedly put the checkbook away with my calculator after balancing, instead of putting it back in my purse.

This morning, I went to the grocery store, and discovered at checkout my wallet wasn't in my purse. Which I felt pretty stupid telling the cashier, because I was holding a wallet as I said it---but it was my Assorted Stuff wallet (member cards, department store credit cards, coupons) rather than my Absolute Essentials wallet (driver's license, CREDIT CARD). And my grocery store doesn't take checks (I DID have my checkbook this time) without an application process, which I have never done because I never pay with a check. And I kept rummaging with increasing desperation through my uncooperative Giant Purse, because the wallet COULD NOT be gone, and yet it continued to be gone. So I pulled out my bank card, which has a Visa symbol on it, and I've never used it to pay for anything so I hope that hasn't screwed up everything in the world. It said "debit" on it, but she said it wouldn't go through except as a credit. OH WHAT HAVE I DONE?? (My wallet, luckily, was on the floor of the coat closet.)

I don't know if I'm hoping you'll tell me you do the same thing all the time, or if I'm hoping you'll encourage me to check in to a nice quiet assisted-living facility.

Gift Ideas for Late-Pregnancy Treats

Katie writes:

I am 36 weeks pregnant with my 2nd son (and therefore destined to be outnumbered forever as we may have one more child, but aren’t sure), and getting to the UGH IS THIS OVER?/WAHHH IT’S ALREADY ALMOST OVER! point, and thought about finding a small way to treat myself to perk me up for the last few weeks. The problem is…with WHAT? I tried wonderful coffee, didn’t do it. I would try chocolate, but it gives me the worst heartburn. I even made a fabulous dinner tonight, complete with from scratch apricot clafouti for dessert…no dice. Clearly food is not working.

I don’t want to spend a lot of money (because newborn clothes…squee!), but would like to do something.

Help!

When food treats don't work, we are indeed in trouble. Have you tried ice cream? That was one of my favorites. Ice cream bars are good, too, or Italian ices.

Cashews, almonds, etc.? I love the Emerald Nuts cinnamon almonds.

I also liked getting nice scented shower gels, and nice oils for soothing the tum skin. Maybe a nice beauty bar soap (I like Dove, or Oil of Olay, or Caress). There are about twenty kinds of each brand, so it's fun to choose: "Hmmm, Summer Revitalization, or Winter Protection? Citrus-Lemongrass Fresh, or Soothing Coconut Vanilla? Vitamin Therapy, or Antioxidant Infusion? Clarifying Glow or Extra Moisturizing?"

My favorite scent at Bath & Body Works is lavender-vanilla: it's marketed as sleep/relax aromatherapy, and I find it very soothing/comforting. They have a candle you can burn, and I like their lotion and body wash too.

A face moisturizer upgrade. One of those jars that's half the size of the regular kind you use, but also twice the price.

Or one of those nice face mask things to use in the shower. I like the Oil of Olay warming cleanser.

If manicures and pedicures appeal to you, now is the perfect moment.

I would recommend a haircut/trim, but I did that in my final weeks and there was a problem or misunderstanding and in any case I ended up with layered hair that had to be styled to look good, and was not long enough to put into a ponytail. Were there tears? OH YES, and also self/hairdresser-recriminations and wishing to go back and change reality. But if there is no problem/misunderstanding, it's nice to get the Needing-a-Haircut Meter set back to zero.

Comfy socks and slippers will be nice now on swollen feeties, and also nice to have in the hospital.

A flowering plant, if you don't mind having one more thing to take care of. Our grocery store has cute ones in the $4-8 range. One for the bathroom where you can see it as you pee every 10 minutes. One near wherever you sit most often, so you see it whenever you glance up.

Books! Especially absorbing ones that will help pass the time.

DVDs! Especially absorbing ones that will help pass the time. And if you get started on a good series, you can continue watching it during night feedings.

Magazines! It can be fun to get a few you don't normally buy.

Tea! Although, if coffee didn't work, tea might not either. But there are so many fun kinds to try.

Things for the hair: deep-conditioning treatments, leave-in treatments, a new pack of ponytail holders, a new barrette.

A new picture for the wall, near where you'll see it while feeding the baby.

Another thing I found happy in the last few weeks was stocking up for AFTER the baby. Buy a bottle of wine, if you like wine, or beer if you like beer, and set it aside. A box of your favorite candy/chocolates, for when the heartburn is gone. Things that are easy to eat while you're feeding the baby, or for times when you feel like you don't have time to even pee: a box of good crackers; trail mixes; pumpkin seeds; Nutella; the kind of granola bars marketed to grown-ups (I like the look of the Planters ones but haven't tried them yet). An expensive unscented hand lotion, for when you don't want to get lavender-vanilla all over the baby. A pretty new water bottle. A pretty new coffee mug. A DVD series you won't let yourself watch until night feedings. Some magazines or light novels for when your brain is too wobbly from low-sleep and high-distraction to enjoy its usual fare. A pretty notebook and pen for the feeding station: I always found I thought of something important the minute I was trapped under a baby. Deciding on and buying these things, and then going and looking at them and petting them, can be very pleasing.


More ideas for Katie?

FULs

Hey, do you remember awhile back when Edward had to get blood drawn because he'd lost several pounds in the year between check-ups? Well, a reasonable number of days after that blood draw, we got a call from the nurse saying all the bloodwork came back normal, but that the doctor wanted to see Edward a month or two later for a weight check. I think weight-checks are a little silly if everything is otherwise fine, but I haven't had enough therapy to be able to say, "Hey, why don't I just weigh him at home and call you if there's been a change for the worse?" After thinking it over, I decided it was worth the $20 copay to avoid swimming upstream.

So today was that appointment, and at the appointment it was revealed that the bloodwork was NOT all normal, that Edward is anemic. And I would have been mostly okay with this little surprise, except that I definitely got a "You must have not have been listening when we told you about this before" vibe about it, first from the nurse, and then from the doctor. Not a BIG vibe (they are both VERY NICE), but a definite SLIGHT vibe. Which changes things completely for me: I am as fine as I can possibly be with a no-harm-done misunderstanding (we are all HUMAN; occasional mistakes are COMPLETELY UNAVOIDABLE), but NOT for it to be assumed that I'M the weak link when I'm NOT.

In short: it's good I was too much of a wuss to argue against the wisdom of having a whole appointment just for Edward to use a scale in front of someone with a medical degree, because I also ended up finding out something I was too much of a wuss to make clear to them that they didn't tell me before.

Not that it would have done any good to make it clear they hadn't told me: not only does it change nothing ANYWAY, but also they would have continued to believe that they HAD told me. In my experience, in every job there is a set of things people constantly claim are true, despite them not being true. Pharmacy customers, for example, claim to have spilled their narcotic painkillers down the sink, or to have received too few narcotic pills in the bottle. Occasionally, this is a true claim: it DOES very occasionally happen that a bottle of pills gets spilled; it DOES very occasionally happen that someone miscounts a bottle of pills; and it makes sense that of all those times, a small percentage would involve narcotics. It's odd, then, that almost all of the claims are made about narcotic medications, and only verrrrry rarely about non-narcotic ones.

Similar Frequently Used Lies occur everywhere, and employees of those everywheres do get a bit HARDENED to their own oft-heard sets of them. It is tempting, then, for an employee to assume they are ALWAYS lies, and to act accordingly. Statistically, this is a solid plan. BUT: treating the statistically-unusual person who IS telling the truth as if they are lying is SUCH a bad move, it cancels out any statistical efficiency of treating everyone the same. And yet, I also understand the extreme reluctance to take blame and make apologies in the smug face of someone who KNOWS he or she is getting away with a lie, so I don't know where that leaves us, except to say that it is almost impossible for me to protest the truth of the kind of claim I KNOW is almost always made as a lie to that sort of employee, and so I almost never do, and I didn't do so THIS time, EITHER.

And also, they want to see him back in a month or two for another blood draw. If you have experience making that procedure easier for a child, I would be very grateful for the advice.

Sponsored

I have a preference to state, and I would like to emphasize this a little more before I actually state it: that it is a preference. A preference I hope others will share. Not "Other ways are stupid! Everyone should do it the way I think is right!" I have plenty of opinions that fall along those lines, too. But in this case, I realize that what I'm basically doing is hoping/requesting that people change the way they're doing something, in favor of the way I prefer it to be---but fully acknowledging that they needn't, and/or that they might prefer it otherwise, and that it is a big deal to change something for someone else just as some sort of concession to that person's preferences, so it's not something I'm expecting. I won't be all, "WHAT?? This again?? But I SAID I didn't LIKE it!!" There are many people who express preferences in regards to what I write on this blog, and I decline to meet those preferences, so I am familiar with that process.

Nevertheless, here is the preference: I would prefer if a sponsored post said so at the very top of the post, or within the first few sentences.

Here is how it feels to me, when I read a sponsored post without realizing it's sponsored until a little note at the very end: it's like being invited over to someone's house for a fun evening, and then realizing when you get there that it's a "party" selling make-up, or kitchen tools, or candles. Crap, I got suckered. And I feel foolish for not realizing it sooner. And my relationship with the person who tricked me has taken a hit.

I have several local acquaintances who do sales parties, and they would argue with this. I know, because they have argued it within my earshot: "It's not like a SALES thing!" they say. "It's just a fun evening! Friends getting together! No pressure! It's not like you have to BUY anything, it's just for learning about cool new things! And it's been so long since I've seen you guys! It's a GIRLS' NIGHT OUT!" I understand that they might really feel this way about it, but I continue to NOT feel this way about it. And with sponsored posts, I understand that a blogger might say that it's their own content, that they weren't in any way pressured or instructed what to write, so it's the same as a regular post. I understand how they can see it this way, but it's still not the way I see it. My preference is still to know from the start what I'm getting into, rather than getting tricked into it and feeling manipulated and suckered at the end.

WWMSD?

I just finished watching It's Complicated, and I gave it 5 stars on Netflix even though my actual score is more like 4 or even 3 (I liked it, but I save 5 stars for "OMG I CAN'T BELIEVE HOW MUCH I LOVED THAT!!"). The bonus star or two was to skew the Netflix recommendations so I'd get MORE MOVIES LIKE THIS PLZ KTHANX. Movies about people older than me? having relationships just as if they continued to be real people after their twenties were over? and dealing with issues involving their children? THERE IS A MARKET FOR THIS, I THINK.

I ALSO like movies about attractive single people in their twenties finding Obviously True Deep Real Lasting Love with other attractive single people in their twenties ("We're REALLY attracted to each other, so we MUST be eternal soul-mates!"), but it's nice to see some VARIETY in human relationships. And, just as I enjoyed the "romance in their twenties" movies in my teens and the "having a baby" movies in my early twenties (it's exciting to imagine What's Ahead in life), NOW I would enjoy seeing movies about people navigating things in middle age.

And perhaps they can deal with problems I'm more familiar with than the "Do I think the bad-boy guy is too hot to give up for the obviously-better-choice Nice Guy guy who is also really hot?" theme. Like, maybe the husband could say that he's going to do the dishes every night, and maybe he even kind of cheeses his wife if she tries to do them. And she SUPER LOVES that he is going to take over this chore, and praises him mightily and regularly. But then, like, some nights he doesn't do them. Which is fine! It's FINE! It's FAIR to share this chore! But in that case, he should mention it to his wife, because then she wants to take her option to do them herself, because waking up to a dirty kitchen and dried-on food and no clean sippy cups makes her want to give up and just heap the dirty dishes in the TRASH. But she's already mentioned this several times, with careful explanations, and still she is sometimes waking up to a dirty kitchen, and HOW CAN MERYL STREEP SOLVE THIS PROBLEM IN A WAY I CAN APPLY TO MY OWN LIFE??