swonderland

earlier

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Thu, 02 May 2013 04:06:00 +0000

Tonight as Clark was reading "Captain Underpants" to me, my mind began to drift away. Except it didn't feel like drifting. It felt like falling and hitting the floor, quickly, landing somewhere. Landing in a place from the past. For some reason, perhaps my very slight sunburn, I was suddenly remembering.

It was a park. It had trails and hills and tennis courts and those little stations with pull-up bars and instruction panels where you're supposed to do the exercises along the way and oh my goodness, I spent so much time there. It was all mine. I thought it was mine.

The funny thing isn't that I remembered this park, I could remember this park at any time. It was the WAY I remembered the park, like casually thinking back on what happened today.

Did it happen today?

Sometimes I think, we don't actually understand time at all.

if you knew susie

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Tue, 12 Feb 2013 02:51:00 +0000

When you miss a person you don't just miss the interactions.

My grandma and grandpa (really Papa, he was always Papa, from the time I could talk) are gone now and the world is harder and has more edges without them.

It isn't just the things they did or the way they said, "There's my girl!" when I opened their heavy noisy front door. It isn't just the way they hugged and doted and loved me, always, all the time. They had a culture. A culture that doesn't exist anymore.

When I was tiny they had parties. Parties from a long-gone time. Parties where everyone was dressed up and drinking and smoking and singing as Papa played songs familiar to them on the dark wood antique upright piano. They all knew the words and they laughed and they sang. Together. And I sat on the edge of the piano bench, swinging my legs and smiling and absorbing it and

eventually

singing along too.

Their way of living and being had tones of that long-gone time and it was graceful and respectable and I miss the way it felt to be around it. You could feel it. There is no way to replace it.

I miss those songs. And I miss the hugs and words and mannerisms and habits and I pretty much just miss all of it and all of them, every day, all the time.

It seems

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 05:37:00 +0000

It seems we found a house.

It is just a plain old house, in a subdivision, in a suburb. The angels weren't singing when we looked at it the first time. We looked around silently and got in the car. And then after very few words, we got right back out of the car to look at it some more.

"The things we want are here," we nodded.
"We should maybe try to buy it," we nodded some more.

It has all the stuff we need and many of the things we only hoped for. It is currently bank-owned and needs some help. But I am good at helping houses! I have many ideas about such things! I want to move in already.

It has a laundry chute and a side load garage and it is in the elementary school district Clark is already attending. It has a nice floor plan for us and lots of storage and a giant laundry room on the main floor and new clean tile in all the baths. It can be cute. It will be cute. I am excited about making it cute.

I think we may be turning a bright corner after working our way down a very long dark path. It has been too much for too long and we are finally, almost, to the air.

sorting

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Mon, 28 Jan 2013 03:34:00 +0000

My house has been a character on this blog as much as any of the other parts of my daily life have been characters here. We sold our house. I didn't blog it but it happened anyway. It was hard work and emotionally confusing but we did it and it's over. Now it is a place we used to live. (Hey, remember that house? I liked that house.) I put this blog in a box with all of my other things and I don't even know now if I should get it out and look it over or just leave it be. Do people still say "blog"? It doesn't sound as natural to me as it did. We are renting for a bit (it's been two months, actually, which is another story) while we search for our next home and I am trying to sort it all out. It's like when you clean a closet and you have to mess things up before they go back in in the very best way.

All the life-things I had put way way away, the best and worst life-things, are out on the floor now and I am kicking around them,

making piles.

I am trying.

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Tue, 28 Aug 2012 03:28:00 +0000

I am trying to sleep but an organ keeps waking me up. An organ that isn't really there. An organ and some drums and a pencil and a pair of shoes and a bunch of things I did wrong today that I'm going to do better tomorrow.

Writing is one of those things. I quit hitting "publish" and then I quit writing drafts and it isn't that I don't have words, I just watch them all flitter by in my mind like ticker-tape. And then with my eyes closed, I form them into sentences and then I put them to music and then it is morning.
And then it is night.
And then it is morning.

And then I get up again and all day long I knit a web for us to stand on
or maybe just
a net to catch us.

Linked up to sweet Heather's Just Write.

that

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Fri, 15 Jun 2012 03:57:00 +0000

I've been writing a story in my mind while I run. It's about a little girl and I don't know if it is long or short or if it will ever turn into black letters on paper (or screen) but I know the themes and I know what the little girl looks like. I know how she feels and I know how she reacts.

I used to come here every night and type stuff I didn't even know I was thinking. My fingers just typed it all, on and on, until they got tired. Then I would hit publish without even re-reading. That system worked for me, for a long time. I miss that system but I also miss that place, that place that isn't this place. It changed here, just like it changes everywhere.

I miss the way my house looked when we moved in. I miss that time, before it all felt too small. I miss the heart-melty conversation I had with Clark yesterday. I miss sitting in the hallway outside of my college poetry class, waiting for it to start. I miss being 28. I turned 29 last week. I miss everything that has ever changed, even though I love change and push for it constantly. I think I am burdened in this way. I'm just too much feeling, too much analyzing. Too much.

The girl in my story (that I will probably never write) has to confront her fears and assumptions about time. I am not the girl in my story, but I have to confront mine, too.

How can 26 month old Alice be gone? I love almost-four year old Alice just as much. I wouldn't trade this for that. But I still miss that.

TMI

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Tue, 15 May 2012 02:52:00 +0000

Have you noticed that I have been stepping away? Or maybe more like backing away, slowly. With my mouth open and my heart hanging all sad and dangling.

Were we designed to care about so many people?
All at once?

Not just in broad terms, but that so-and-so person I never really interact with on twitter has this neighbor with a daughter with a disease and it is all I can think about.

Is that the way it's supposed to be?

I know I am supposed to feel this Earthly life, but sometimes it's like I am feeling too much. Too much for one brain and one person.

I am exploding from the ten of thousands of people all tweeting and re-tweeting the worst thing they've ever heard.

I don't know if it is too much for mankind but I think it might be too much for me.

***

Linking up with Just Write because it is just what I felt like writing, right now, and also because Heather is one of my favorite prople.

i guess this is something people do

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 15:38:00 +0000

So I've been running. I wouldn't call myself "a runner" or anything so confident and commitment-y just yet, but I have forced myself to go outside and run every day (minus one or two) for the past month.

First of all, I feel like I have to tell you that am not this kind of girl. I don't wear yoga pants or shoes with laces, EVER, and I certainly don't "go work out" or "to the gym" or whatever. I wear a lot of eye makeup and I am particular about my hair and I am disorganized. I am not a morning person. I am pear-shaped and redheaded. I am not athletic.

There was a time when reading a blog post about running would have irritated me. Twitter and Facebook updates, "I just finished a 2.8 mile run!" made me squint and shake my head a little. Why did these people have to TELL me they exercised? Why do we have to TALK about it? Either you run or you don't and either way it isn't my business.

It was this ever-so-slight irritation, however, that made me try it myself. With each, "I just finished a 4 mile run!" status update, I began to actually believe that a four mile run is something people do. They just go outside and do it. Okay! Wait? This is something people do? They buy the right clothes and shoes and put them on. Then they go outside and move their feet back and forth.

Okay.

As I was in the middle of my very long blogging break and felt like my brain was sinking right out of my head, I decided to shake some energy out. To pull myself together. To go buy the right things and put them on like a costume and pretend I am someone who moves her feet back and forth.

I downloaded C25K and put on my running shoes and talked myself out of wearing my cardigan (I AM NOT ATHLETIC) over my Nike t-shirt. C25K didn't really work for me. The bossy lady telling me when to go and when to stop got on my nerves. I loosely followed it for a week, and then figured out my own pace. There is a street next to ours that is exactly a half-mile loop. So I used that, adding a half-mile whenever I felt ready.

Yesterday I found myself hitting the TWEET THIS button on my Nike+ app. "I just finished a 3.23 mile run!" I did. I ran three and a quarter miles without stopping and I didn't want to kill myself. After the first mile I actually ENJOYED it. I am sleeping better and have less anxiety. This is a very good thing.

I don't know how long I will stick with this but it is working for me right now. I never thought I would have a positive experience with running. I have tried many times before but never pushed past the "I want to die" stage. I am running outside, slowly, with a face the color of a tomato. It is embarrassing and sometimes hard, but I don't want to die. You have no idea how surprised I am. (Also Luke. He is surprised. He is so surprised that he is, in his words, "a little scared." Me too honey!)

(I have to give a TON of credit to Erin and Erica and Keli and others for their twitter chats about running. Erin started running one year ago yesterday and was totally my inspiration. Her runs and commentary about them are what got me going and keep me going.)

corkscrew

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 00:45:00 +0000

Not blogging has given me a lot of time to think.

I've done so much unwritten thinking and over-thinking, around and around, that my thoughts put me underground or underwater or something. When you spiral around like that you can only go down. Tighter and smaller and lower.

I have a computer. I have my own computer now. After a few months without one.

I feel like the windows are open. I feel like the phone is ringing, but in a good way.

Hello, hi, how ARE you?

(My friend Emily told me to just write something already and I did, for her, and this is what came out. Thank you Emily. I probably would have gone another miserable week or so if not for you.)

I think.

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Sat, 17 Mar 2012 02:14:00 +0000

I think there are new wrinkles around my mouth. Actually, I know there are because my profile picture on this blog does not show them. They are new. They are wrinkles. I am not prepared for this.

I got pregnant when I was 22. Twenty-two. Do you know how many times I have been in a bar? Hmm. I don't. I am counting on my fingers... three? Four? I don't know. I don't know bars.

I had a lot of dreams when I was smaller. I wanted to do things in a louder way. I wanted to be on stages and in magazines. I wanted to make things you would recognize. But my life dramatically changed and then it did that again and again and again. I can count those changes on my fingers too.

Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if my life had stopped making left turns. If instead of going around in left-turn circles, I had carried on in one direction. Those things I wanted to do are still there. I can still feel them and I am still excited and happy when I dip my toe into them. But they don't consume me.

I am 28. Twenty-eight. I have wrinkles around my mouth. And my oldest dream, to be a mom, is my whole life. I am not lamenting this fact. But it would be hard to look at those wrinkles without soaking in the reality that six years of my youthiest youth are gone. That was the youngest I was ever going to be. I think I thought I had all the time in world. I think I thought I could have the kids and then they would go to school and I could still try something else too and I don't know, maybe I can try something but I can't try everything. I traded that for this. But I've thought about it a lot and you know, if I could go back and do it all again, I still would.

Vacancy

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Sat, 25 Feb 2012 03:01:00 +0000

A few months ago I visited my grandparents' home. House. It's really just a house now. It's empty. The stuff is still there but the house is hollow. I wrote about it then, but I am still thinking about it (and writing about it) now.

It kind of blew my mind the way things were falling apart. Just because. Just because no one was there to fix things up. There was a dead mouse in the basement. Things were cracking and peeling and leaking and plants were growing and I could see it all happening in my head like a stop-motion video, this house and home and place I love, turning back into earth. Turning into the world the way it is when we aren't there to make our very people-y changes.

I walked around the yard with my kids, just the four of us, and I felt like a ghost. I thought about everything that ever happened in that yard. I looked at the little shed in the side yard -- the shed that stored my first bike and my first wagon -- and I looked straight into the eyes of a fox. A fox. A fox that lived there now, in a hole under that shed full of history. An actual fox, with a lame leg. It came hobbling towards us and I froze, both terrified and in awe as this place to which I belong was taken away from me by the earth and the grass and the way things just are.

Hi, again.

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 01:40:00 +0000

Hal is sick, again.

This Winter's weather has been gentle and keeps trying to become Spring, but that hasn't stopped our family from developing all of the usual Winter sickness and insanity.

Today I decided to introduce sick Hal to Yo Gabba Gabba while I folded laundry. The characters were singing some song called, "I'm Scared of Bats" but I thought they were saying, "I'm Scared of Facts" and I thought, wow... "I'm Scared of Facts"?

Facts are the scariest. I am scared of facts. Oh my God, I am so scared of facts. I try to hide scary facts from my kids and I can't believe they are introducing preschoolers to this concept, this is heavy and dark and you really need to only be scared of make believe things until you are older, like, maybe 25, and the weight of the world and all of it's horrible reality can descend upon you all at once. You're taking "quirky" to a bad level, Gabba. Facts terrify me, too, and I don't trust you to entertain my children anymore.

But no, no. Because, of course, they said "bats." Bats. The costumed characters were afraid of BATS. And I am clearly losing the battle for my sanity to Winter.

Hi blog, I guess this is me getting my feet wet here, again.

boy

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Wed, 21 Dec 2011 15:58:00 +0000

When I am having a bad day with Clark I should probably just stop what I am doing and watch this.

(PS. He had a ton of sand in his hair from the sandbox and it was driving me nuts. I do not routinely do that to his hair. HA.)

Christmastime again

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Sun, 18 Dec 2011 22:24:00 +0000

Seven days until Christmas, people.

I shared my Retro Christmas Pandora Station on here last year, and have had lots of requests for links to it but I swear I cannot figure out where to find one? And anyway this year I also have a Spotify playlist to share, which I named Merry + Bright and affectionately refer to the songs as, well, retro hokey. I want to make another, with traditional Christmas carols at some point but for now we are singing "Christmas Candy" and "Santa Claus' Party" and all is retro hokey happy.

I added so many ornaments to our collection this year, finding them and squirreling them away all Summer. We have SO MANY fun vintage ones and flashing oversized bulbs and bubble lights. Bubble lights! Unfortunately I don't have many photos of all of this, because my laptop is dragging along, not uploading things, crashing and crashing. I think this is a direct result of the ten million photos stored on the hard drive. So I kind of brought this on myself.

Not everything is out this year, because Hal is at such a grabby age. But it IS our first year with a real live Christmas tree. We used a 30+ year old artificial tree for years, until it was too shabby to reasonably put back in the attic.

Seven days. Merry and bright.

drops from the day

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 17:06:00 +0000

I was going to blog Thanksgiving, oh, ten days ago. But I didn't, so I am blogging it now.

I want to tell you about it.

How I cooked all of the food and it actually tasted really... good.

How nice it felt to be in my kitchen, on my feet all day long for two days in a row, actually producing something worthwhile rather than treading water and re-sweeping and spinning and spinning.

It was hard work but the final product was so satisfying. I think that sometimes it may actually feel better to do just slightly more work. Sounds counter-intuitive, I know.

Hey look! I made all of that!

I made seven courses plus two pies, all from scratchy scratch scratch. See those white squares on the top of the stuffing? Those are butter. I used... (hide your eyes) four pounds of butter in this meal.

It's unbelievable how much time and energy we have to put in, just to scrape by. Just doing the bare minimum or even a fair amount. Just living, especially as a parent, requires you to do thousands of things you don't want to do every day. It is easy to get stuck in that hollow place-- just doing all the necessary stuff, silently cursing it in your head, toiling in ways that no one will ever see or recognize. Turning around to a new mess and then turning back again to another one.

I feel like I am squeezing every drop from my day but am I really? I want to look back on every day feeling unblurred. I want to close my eyes and know that something happened. Not just the done-and-then-already-undone stuff of life, but something beyond that. I write here fairly often about my thoughts and ideas and creative drive, how they are all pushed to the side, how I don't have the time or energy to get them out or organize them.

I'm just trying to get by, or so I say. I just want my house to be clean and my family to be fed. And I do want those things, except at the end of the day I don't ever remember what happened. It is a 11pm and then it is 11pm again and again and on and on, and when it isn't 11pm it is time to get Clark from preschool or it's meal time or bath time or whatever and weeks and months go by, spinning and spinning, wondering what happened. It isn't a horrible lot or anything and there are so many things I love about this life, it's just often so static.

I always wonder about those other people, the ones who keep chickens and teach their kids other languages and write books and create and I don't understand them or how they can do all of that AND the daily grind stuff. I always imagine it would involve letting something drop, but it is becoming clearer: it would really only take a tiny bit of extra planning, a tiny bit of extra effort, a tiny bit more of me.

A tiny bit.

The difference between making dinner and making Thanksgiving dinner isn't much, but the difference in satisfaction at the end is great. Maybe the answer to my static is to take on more, raise my expectations for myself rather than lower them? I think that "just getting by" might be 90% of the effort. It's just that little hard bit leftover separating me from the feeling that Something Happened each day.

This is probably all very obvious, except in my day-to-day moments when it doesn't feel obvious at all. So I guess I am writing it here as a way to remind myself, and for you too, if you need reminding.

And anyway, I also learned how to make pie crust. So hey, there's always that.

(Did anyone else make the whole Thanksgiving for the first time this year? High five!)

And now? I can officially start blogging about Christmas.

some things about november

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Mon, 21 Nov 2011 13:06:00 +0000

There is this chalkboard in my kitchen and for the longest time I would use it to hype my family up about the things ahead. I would write the name of the month and then write all of the fun things we were going to do.

I liked it.

But then, exactly a year ago this past weekend, I wrote some things about November. I wrote about Luke turning 30 (which was already over but a major event worth writing on there and crossing off, just because) and Thanksgiving and I remember writing the word "thankful" and cringing inside because I didn't feel it. Our kitchen drain was clogged and our dishwasher was broken and hours of frustration and telephone calls and desperation were going on, all around me, as I found a piece of chalk and threw those words up there. But we were just a few days off of Thanksgiving and I really wanted to be cheerful. So I wrote fakey cheerful stuff. NOVEMBER! THANKSGIVING! THANKFUL! TURKEY TASTES GOOD! I wrote it and looked at it and forced a smile at it. It was my little bit of, okay, this week will be saved. I can make this stuff come true. The plumber will come and my kitchen will not smell like this anymore and this fiasco will be a funny memory and nice-feeling things will happen.

But I didn't make it come true.
The drain was fixed and the dishwasher replaced and then -- my grandma died.
Unexpectedly. Out of nowhere.
A year ago tomorrow, but it really feels like today because it was Monday.

So the turkey went into the deep freezer and all the other Thanksgiving stuff was pushed aside and away as we frantically packed suitcases with black clothes and sippy cups. The framed photos of her as a little girl were grabbed off of the walls to display at the visitation. It felt insane and hazy.

My grandma wasn't just a lady. She was MY GRANDMA. A beautiful wonderful lady who rocked me to sleep and sang to me and taught me things and made me breakfast (peanut butter toast cut into four pieces and a bowl of cereal and chocolate milk) and took me to school every single day of elementary school. My mom and I lived with her until I was eight and after we moved out she would answer the phone in this particular cheerful voice asking, "How's our sweet girl?" every time I called. She was the best. She still is. We just don't get to look at her and tell her so now.

Erasing that fakey cheerful stuff from the chalkboard last November was hard. It's funny how your brain latches on to things and puts your sadness there. With each new month I would intend to write fun things but instead stand with the chalk in hesitation, mostly choosing generic words or drawings instead. A cat drawing stayed for many months, until yesterday when Alice brought it up. "Why is that cat on there all the time? It should be a turkey. My school turkey needs a mommy and daddy."

Her school turkey was made out of her hand print, so at her insistence, we made a family out of handprints.

And then I went out to the garage and got last year's uneaten turkey out of the deep freeze and threw it in the garbage.

I am going to use my grandma's potato masher that now belongs to me and we are going to do this. We will eat turkey and potatoes and dressing and I will hug my mom and kids and brothers and husband and be thankful, for real.

11/22/2007

space

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 19:34:00 +0000

Our house is shrinking. Our kids eat and eat and eat and then wake up bigger, in a slightly smaller house. With five people in a 1,600 square foot ranch, there isn't much left over anymore.

We just bought bunk beds for the boys and replaced Alice's full bed with a (smaller, space saving) twin. A girly iron flowery twin.

On more than one occasion I have considered dismantling this room, putting Clark and Alice together and making this the baby room. It probably would have saved a lot of trouble over the last year. But I just can't take this space apart.

We met a tiny newborn baby girl named Alice today at Target. She was all snuggled up in her car seat while her mom paid in front of us. She even looked like my Alice did at that age, with black hair and a little pixie face. I picked my Alice up so she could see the baby better and though she didn't say anything, I can read her shy faces and could tell she felt special and connected, having the same name as the fresh pink bundle everyone was cooing over. I felt a few stabbing pangs of dissonance, of wanting my baby Alice back while also not wanting to give up my three year old Alice to the past or the future.

After we paid, my Alice cried because she didn't get to tell baby Alice goodbye, so I carried her all the way to the car and she hugged me so cuddly tight while I pushed the cart and she told me that my hugs are, "SO GOOD at helping to feel her better."

I made this room for her before I even saw her pixie face.

And yes, I keep adding to it and changing it. But the basic feeling is the same for me. And I just can't take it apart.

I know someday she'll have the walls covered in posters of Justin Timberlake, Jr or whatever.
But it's okay. Because the older she gets the better I get to know her.

I am so glad I get to know her.

Laundry 2

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 04:41:00 +0000

I can't get everything just right and it freezes me.

I can't write here until my house is clean and I can't clean my house until I am wearing makeup and clean clothes but none of the clothes are clean so where does that leave me?

I don't know where this came from, the having to do everything in this order, but it's the only way I can build momentum and win the day rather than dragging through and collapsing and wanting to punch things.

There is dead laundry in a heap on the floor. You know, dead laundry? It's at least as bad as debris. Dead laundry is laundry that gets left in the dryer for a few days and is wrinkled beyond help but you have to take it out and go through it anyway for one reason or another. You put it on the floor and it collapses there and doesn't breathe.

Dead laundry looks like a pile of wadded up paper. Like someone wrote a lot of drafts or drew a lot of bad pictures and then killed them all and made a pile. There is no energy in dead laundry. There is nothing promising or engaging.

I think I have to move it back to the laundry room like it's dirty, mixing it in with the actually dirty laundry so I can pretend none of this happened, and start over. Otherwise I'll flee with the kids to the thrift store or the Target and I'll spend a few dollars I don't have in exchange for escaping the chore creature on the floor.

I wrote this a few days ago in a flurry and without reading it twice but I didn't hit publish because I have commitment issues. Laundry drama. I have created a genre.

Laundry Debris

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Wed, 09 Nov 2011 01:41:00 +0000

So it turns out that I only know how to do things that are very very simple. Okay, no, that isn't true at all. It just feels true. I can do anything if I am motivated. I just can't get boring detail tasks done unless all the obstacles to getting them done have been cleared away. Do not leave it up to me to make a lot of phone calls or send things in the mail or match socks. Socks kill me. Remember when I threw all of Luke's socks away and started over? That's kind of where I am at with kid socks right now. I just want them out of my life.

Actually anything that has two matching pieces-- two-piece pajamas sets for kids? No thank you. My kids will never ever wear those two pieces together unless it is an utter coincidence because I will never keep track of them from the dirty laundry to washing to drying to folding to putting away. One will make it through and the other one will end up under a tablecloth that doesn't get washed for three weeks or under the hamper and by the time it goes through the whole process, the other piece will be dirty again.

I actually have a word for these items: laundry debris. It isn't just the mismatched stuff, it's also the stuff people think they like but don't. The last resort t-shirts and the too-stretched-out and the stuff you think you want to wear and try on but you don't really ever want to wear and take off in desperation before you leave the house, throwing it into the dirty pile when it is actually just unloved. All of that? Laundry debris.

So I've started doing laundry with baskets, a storage tub, and two garbage bags. I put all of the top-tier stuff in baskets. This stuff is easy to identify because you wear it all the time. Then I put the underwear with the too-stretched elastic and the shirt Alice drew all over with permanent markers and the junked washed-too-many-times shrunken tops in one of the garbage bags to throw away. I use the other garbage bag for things (even nice things!) that we can no longer use and need to be donated and I put the things that have been outgrown and need to be taken out of rotation into the storage bin. Phew.

Basically, the only way I can solve the laundry problem is to actually solve the problem. I only want to be washing, drying, folding, and putting away the top tier items, the stuff we really wear all the time. Otherwise I just won't ever do it and I will have to buy my kids more new clothes just so they can go to school.

Part of my willingness to donate nice stuff comes from my luck at the Goodwill Outlet. They sell clothes for 69 cents a pound and I have purchased Matilda Jane, Tea Collection, Mini Boden, Crewcuts, Stella McCartney for babyGap, etc., stuff there in the last few months. So it doesn't phase me to put some nice stuff back into that rotation. I like to imagine somebody finding it and being very happy.

Does anyone else have this very low threshold for laundry BS? Do you have a system? I am always up for improving mine. Even doing it this way... I hate it.

placeholder

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 05:36:00 +0000

So I made a new blog header. I don't know if I'll leave it up. It feels a little too cheerful or something. And I miss the chalkboard. I'll try to do a new chalkboard soon but who am I kidding? Nothing I think I am going to do ever gets done until eight months later when everything perfectly plays out and the light is right and somehow someway the right photo gets taken or whatever. Anyway, I just had to change the header away from what was there or I was never going to post anything again. I am ruled by how things FEEL and the old one just felt... done. And it made me feel done. Maybe I do just feel done? I don't know. I think I blog less because I post so much on Instagram. It isn't the same as blogging at all, but it does satisfy my desire to put things out there.

These are all from today. Today! I wonder what I'll post tomorrow.

Are you on Instagram? Do I follow you? I should. Say something to me there and I will.

Tea for Alice

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 03:06:00 +0000

You all know I don't do PR stuff, like, ever. But when Tea Collection contacted me and asked if I'd do a little review, I couldn't resist. I love their stuff, I do I do.

I picked out the 5-piece Ancho Androna set for Alice, mostly because I wanted the dresses and it seemed like a good deal. The fact that it came with leggings didn't even make an impression on me. But you know what? The leggings are totally Alice's favorite now. I never would think to buy nicer leggings like these because they sell them at the big red chain store and we have a whole drawer full. But now that I have tried them I will definitely consider them for future seasons. They are softer and the waist is more comfortable. They are first pick from the drawer, now, every time.

My favorite piece is the Ancho Chile Stripe dress. It's hard to get Alice to wear things that aren't pink but she likes the way the skirt looks on this and I have convinced her that it is a twirly party dress. Love love love. She wore it for her first day of preschool AND for her first ever school picture.

They have girl's clothing, boy's clothing and even grown-up stuff. And it's all so preeeetty. And soft. And Alice can dress herself in the mix and match pieces! (This is huge. You guys, when I try to dress her now she TAKES OFF the clothes I put on her so she can put them back on herself. She is so three.)

I love their globally inspired collections. They actually remind me of the new bedding I just ordered Alice from the Kukunest sample sale store. (It really belongs on her new twin bed, coming soon!)

And lately I've been going crazy for Mary Blair and It's A Small World-- the design and style and colors and whole vibe. And anyway, these things all kinda remind me of each other and I love that.

**Tea Collection provided us with the clothing. I really truly like them.

looking on

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 03:42:00 +0000

I've written fifteen posts in my head since last week. They evaporated because I didn't put them anywhere. Now they are all in clouds around me. I'll get them back eventually so I can type them out or realize how dumb they are or both.

Thank you for your many thoughtful comments and emails last week. Thank you for sharing and encouraging and hanging around. You are nice people. I am glad you are here.

Clark was sneaky with my camera today. He filled the whole memory card.

Yes, he took all of these. And also at least 40 shots of his blurry feet.

There is a chance that at some point I will remove my last post.
I wanted to get it all out but I don't know if Clark would want it out there like that.
I am trying to see from his perspective.
You know?

I am also considering a big change to the way my blog is laid out and designed and stuff. I don't even know how to do it, but I want to try.

I thought it might be like getting a new notebook and I really need a new notebook.

A new notebook might keep me from throwing this one away.

I am that mom.

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 15:34:00 +0000

I spent some time with my face smooshed against the hardwood floor tonight. Just staring. I moved a little, then to bed, where I stayed in total silence. Staring into space again. Trying to hear the quiet. I listened past the news on the television and the kids who should be sleeping but are instead telling each other jokes in bed. Past the dishwasher and the husband on the treadmill. I finally found the quiet and I caught it like a fly and I stared it in the face until it dissolved. Then I grabbed my laptop and opened it and started typing this post.

I know my blog has not been very much fun for the last six to twelve months. There have been so many things going on. Things I have talked about here and things I have not. I used to feel like not-complaining or bitching or venting or publicly giving up was a virtuous thing. But guess what? NO ONE NOTICES. You can martyr away nine lives and no one will give you a funeral for even one of them.

I will be the first to admit that having one baby was very easy for me. It was. I know I know. But it was. It just came naturally. I never had that "OH MY GOD WHAT DO I DO WITH IT?" freak out when we came home from the hospital. I fought through breastfeeding for 14 months with a smile. I 100% cloth diapered. I doted and played and danced. I was silly. It was not hard for me.

Then, when that baby was only 19 months old, I had another baby. Another baby! I did. And she was the easiest baby ever. She slept through the night the day we brought her home from the hospital. She was a natural with the nursing and easygoing and sweet as can be. I actually potty trained 21 month old Clark while all-day nursing 6 week old Alice. I did it and it was not that hard. I mean, it actually was hard but I did it anyway and pushed on through and felt very good about myself. I did that. That was me.

Then. Hal. During my pregnancy with him things with Clark got... weird. He started doing things and acting ways I had never had to deal with before. (I could elaborate here but trust me, it's too much for one blog post.) A baby is one thing; a defiant crazed three year old is an entirely different creature. Why hadn't anyone told me that babies are (sometimes) the easy part? How had I become so self confident as a mother that I was now facing life with three children while simultaneously doubting my ability, for the very first time, to care for even one?

Clark remains, to this day, difficult. In every sense of the word. Everything that goes on in this house is filtered through, "How will Clark react?" first. Last year I sent him to preschool and it didn't take long for the "ADHD" and "assessment" words to get thrown around. And I know. I mean, I know. Trying to get him washed and fed and dressed for preschool in the morning often leaves me in tears. Moving from one task to another, transitioning, it's just flat out horrible. He is brilliant (he is reading small words! and writing words on his own! and memorizes everything! and jokes like an adult! And sings every note to every theme song from Star Wars while playing out the corresponding scene with his action figures!) and sweet as can be and totally wonderful and I am so happy to be his mom. But he is also draining me. It is just hard. And no one is here to go through it with me and see how agonizing each step of our day can be. Whenever I try to explain him and his quirks to someone else I stop after a few sentences, silenced by the realization that there is no way to make my listener understand.

Hal's entire first year of life was spent not sleeping, dealing with constant ear infections and doctors visits and his own issues. Even now, he screams for many hours of the day. Screams at the top of his lungs. Just because. He has amazingly high muscle tone and an opinion about everything, expressed with a scream. He can climb the slide and the couch and the beds and the dining room table. He is smart and wonderful and still tiny, but also the loudest human being I have ever met. He expresses his discomfort with such bravado that it takes me by surprise every time he does it. Which is every other minute of every single day. I can't even take him grocery shopping anymore. He lets out blood curdling screams one after another when I won't let him down to run away from me or climb the watermelon display.

Alice is three. She is easy going. She loves posing for photographs and the color pink and she wants to be a doctor when she grows up. She wants to play soccer and football and be a princess. She sings stream of consciousness songs about everything she does. Alice is so night-and-day different from my boys that it almost stings.

If I had three kids like Alice? I would still think very highly of myself. I would subconsciously pat myself on the back for the excellent job I do. I would wonder what was wrong with other parents and kids. I would never have been humbled. I know there are moms with compliant children. I know it, because I have one. And I don't mean that she is 100% complaint 100% of the time. She still can be bossy and disobedient. But unlike Clark, she doesn't constantly demand more and more and never stop. She doesn't shout at me. She doesn't fight me on every single action we have to get through together, turning things that should be routine into a battle. My gosh the difference it makes. And I want to publicly state that despite her easier personality, I absolutely do not favor her, which is a funny thing about parenthood. (And I know you know exactly what I mean because if you have read this far, chances are good that you are a parent too. And you know.)

I see and hear remarks about tantrums and screamers and bratty children. About parenting and "I don't LET my child behave like that!" HA! Every time I take my kids out in public I know there is a chance it will end horribly. I am the mom with the kid that for no reason at all loses his shit in the middle of the produce section. It doesn't have anything to do with love or patience or discipline or any of the things I used to think. It is absolutely the way Clark was born. It is the personality he was given. I can do everything "right" and not let him get his way over and over and over and... guess what? He will try again. I honestly believe he will grow into a wonderful boy and man. I am not doing everything right or well, but I keep trying to do better. Every single day I get pulled away in the tide and every single night I swim back to shore. I am not desperate or depressed, I am just fighting my way. And I felt like telling you about it.

(Reading Megan's lovely post got me in the mood to write this.)

something

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Tue, 11 Oct 2011 13:57:00 +0000

My hierarchy of needs is all messed up. There are too many levels to get to the top. Layers and layers and many staircases. No elevators.

This morning I was thinking that it would be kind of nice if I could share my brain with someone else so they could do all of the work of turning my productive thoughts and ideas into... something. Plus then I'd have someone to talk to while I sweep the floor. Any volunteers? You'd have to be pretty Type A to get it all organized and probably also a scientist, to figure out how to get in.

This blog is kind of like a way in. Not like a door, but a window. A window that is way way way up high, so you can see in a little bit if you are standing back far enough.

Can you see me in here? I am waving.

And this jumbed nonsense is what comes out when I Just Write.

Edited to add: I meant literally share my brain. Like a second personality or friend actually climbing in my head. Not just talktalktalk, like, thinkthinkthink and they just KNOW. It wasn't realistic. Just a thought I had that bounced around on the walls of my mind with no one to know it existed until I wrote it down.

cheers

noreply@blogger.com (swonderful) — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 16:00:00 +0000

My last posts lost me two followers. I don't know why I noticed. I wish I didn't notice the number, but it's right there when I log in. Maybe I should disable that. I have also gotten quite a few worried comments and emails. You all know I am just fine, right? Just fine. Happy. Reflective and tired and happy. It's the tone around this dusty place. In person I am peppy. Chipper. Bubbly, even.

The other day I drove past what appeared, from my peripheral vision, to be a makeshift shrine for a car accident victim. Teddy bears and flowers. But when I looked straight at it, it was a very overly-decorated sign for an estate sale. I love estate sales, but they had already unintentionally depressed me. Tone is everything. I hope I am not unintentionally depressing you. Am I unintentionally depressing you?

I now present with you with peppy, chipper, and bubbly.

Hearts and stars and sandwiches and strawberries! Gingham and ginger ale! Bunnies and babies! Pink and gold! Sunshine and radio!

I'mma pep things up.