The Big Reveal

Yesterday Hannah decided she wanted to dress up.

A quick trip to the fabric store and $3.14 worth of felt later...

she is a sashimi.

The cast is the wasabi!

Here is the big reveal on Bubba's toilet costume.

He was a HUGE hit,

and brought home 6.4 pounds of candy from our little neighborhood.

He was photographed 14 times and 

even asked for his autograph.

Some of the neighbors are saying he has the best

costumes year after year.

Maybe I could pawn myself out as a costume designer?

Dear Next Door Neighbors,

Dear Next Door Neighbors,

Thank you so much for single handedly supporting the economy with your Halloween spending and DP and L usage.  I, too, had to support the economy and buy black out curtains for my windows so I could sleep.

Let me guess.  Your favorite movie is Christmas Vacation.  Because I think I may write National Lampoon and tell them to sue you for copyright infringement (whatever that is), because Halloween Vacation?  That is what your yard looks like.  But unlike the happy go lucky Santa characters, and smiling reindeer, you chose to put out your full size cocooned body hanging upside down from a tree.  Sure, there are smiling witches, hundreds of pumpkins, and Casper-ish ghosts, but the bodies hanging from trees always make me cross to the other side of the street during my pre-dawn dog walking.

The beacon illuminating the witch to make a pretty shadow on the side of your house?  Shines into my house illuminating the entire top floor.

I love how you had the forethought to think about taking weird odds and ends, with no obvious theme, saving them for years in big boxes, and then dumping those boxes of crap on your front lawn.  It is now suddenly clear to me why you have a STUFFED FULL three car garage AND a barn on your property. I think after I write National Lampoon, I may call Hoarders and out you.

Hugs and spooky kisses,

Careless

Dear Eyes Part Two,

Dear Eyes,


I know that you are feeling left out in the bling department, after all my teeth have had some recent bling, my butt has had some new pants, my feet new shoes, and my hair a new cut...but new glasses?  Come on!


Really?  We can't get by with reading glasses from CVS?  You have to go all "two different PROGRESSIVE lenses" on me?  Seriously?  I know that I am 42 now, but progressives?  That is just a nice way to say bifocals (like reader Eileen said).  


First my hair decides to go all grey, then my hips decide that exercising is so passe', now YOU, eyes, are requesting progressive lenses?  Do I have any dignity left?


Then...I start looking at frames, that I have to wear EVERYDAY, and everything is all bedazzled.  What on earth would indicate that a 40-something year old woman would want rhinestones on the sides of her glasses?  What in the hell says Hannah Montana like bedazzled hearts?  Butterflies?  Then there are the cheetah prints, Coach logos (no thank you), and gold lame'd circles.  Seriously?


Of coarse the non-bedazzled ones are the "Vera Wang" glasses and the $400 danish something or others.


And how am I supposed to make a choice like this when my eyes are dilated?  It is a racket, I tell you a racket!  So for now, no glasses.


Blurry kisses,


Careless

Thumbs Up

My eldest got her first cast today.

It seems that soccer is a little dirtier when you play in high school.

This season?  

Two head injuries. One concussion.  One bruised cheekbone.

One goose egg on her shin.  One knee injury.

Various bruises and cuts.

And one Salter fracture.

Thumbs up!

Her exact words upon arriving home?

"In hindsight I think lime green may have been a poor choice."

Brains AND brawn.

A Strange Thing...

I am nuts about costumes.  Nuts!  I love making costumes, and "things" and the bigger the challenge, the better.


Every year around Bubba's birthday we start discussing Halloween costumes.  I am a "make it" costume gal, and the thought of running to Target to buy the last ghoul mask on the shelf the day of, makes me ill.  I hate hum drum costumes.  I H*A*T*E ghoul stuff.


So, this year?  Bubba decided he wanted to be a toilet.  Yes, you heard me correctly.  A toilet.


Of coarse the natural joke was that he was the toilet, and his sister? The "turd."   But alas, Hannah is no longer in the costume trick or treating game.  Entrance to High School grants you a "No trick or treating" pass in my book.  You are welcome to dress up, but you are not going around taking candy from babies, as it were.


So...our process began with a trip to Sam's Club where I riffled thru the box bin and came up with the "tank."  A bowl, paper mache'd into "the bowl" and a piece of poster board paper into the pedestal, and this is what we have so far...

We are still tweeking it, and the lid and rim have to be constructed and mache'd, but we are right on track for the 31st.

Today we bought the handle (from Home Depot).  We also decided today that we couldn't extend the pedestal back any further (like a real toilet) because of Bubba's legs.


The idea is that we will construct the rim and lid this week, around soccer and homework, and fasten those so we can spray it white this weekend.  Bubba is installing a fishing line to pull the seat up when he says trick or treat so the candy can be deposited into the bowl.  But he is VERY worried the bowl is too small.


This project has been fun, and Bubba even made his way into big boy tools with the jigsaw when he cut the toilet bowl rim from a piece of plywood.  I wish I had a picture of his first wood working!

Dear Eyes,

Dear Eyes,


Thank you so much for forty two years of service.  Why are you failing me now?  First there was the reading glasses purchased at the airport last year, to help me get by and read the fine print.  Now it's the fact that I can't see for crap when my son holds something up for me to gaze upon, unless it is 5 feet or more from my face.  I can't read labels.  I can't read the newspaper, only the ads.


Your contribution to my well being is weakening.  After trying to thread the needle on my sewing machine today I gave up and came upstairs and made myself an appointment.  An eye appointment.  Gasp.  I am voluntarily going to the doctor IT'S THAT BAD.  After all these years of protecting you and feeding you carrots, this is what I get.


Blurry kisses,


Careless

Mommy Throws A Fit Part Deux

There is more.  After my first fit?  It got worse.


We waited all night for a text.  ALL night.  Hannah never texted us to tell us when she needed a ride.  Our texts were never answered.


Long about 10:30 I was pissed.  Unbelievably pissed.  The dance had been over since 10.  We had waited for a text to tell us what part of the evening we would be driving.  After texting the 5th unanswered text, I texted Hannah's BFF (also at the dance) and asked her where Hannah was.


Hannah called me, from the dance minutes later.  Apparently she had gotten the time wrong and the dance ended at 11.  I couldn't hear Hannah, and we were disconnected 3 times, so finally I texted her back on her BFF's phone and told her when she left the dance, she was to come straight home.


At 11:15 she knocked on the front door.  I was already in bed and went downstairs to let her in.  Silently.  I walked back upstairs and went back to bed.  Seething.


At 11:45 Hannah's BFF's Mom starts texting me.  I am asleep, or was asleep.  I walk into Hannah's room, take her phone and walk back out and go back to bed.


So this morning the poop hit the fan.  Hannah got chewed out by David, she got chewed out by me, she lost her phone.  Her phone is now only used when she is at school or at soccer practice.  The moment she walks in the door, her phone goes in a box.  Off.  


When Hannah can use her phone to communicate with her parents, and not as a social tool,  she will be allowed to use it again.  We explained it would not kill her to check in with us every once and a while.


Did I behave badly?  Yes.  Did I throw a fit?  Yup.

Mommy Throws A Fit

I threw a fit tonight.  A real whopper.


Tonight is Homecoming.  Hannah's FIRST dance, her first dance as a high school student.  We've spent hours every weekend shopping for "the" dress, shoes and accessories.  We've been working on this for weeks.  Weeks!


This afternoon we decided that Hannah needed a sweater or a jacket for her ensemble.  Her dress is pretty strappy up top, and we had a cold front move in last night.  This is the first night we will have used the furnace all season.  We both agreed she was going to freeze and should have something pretty to wear over her dress.


The plans were for Hannah to meet at a friends house at 6 p.m., then the parents would each drive a leg of the "to dinner", "to pictures," "to the dance," "home from the dance" evening.  The kids would text us parents as they needed rides.


About 3:30 I ran out to Macy's to grab Hannah a black bolo sweater, then on to Kroger to grab a bottle of fingernail polish remover so she could re-do her nails.  While at Kroger I bought a few groceries, because I'm just like that.  I was rushed, and a little frenzied, but I was finished and on my way home by 4:45, so I could help Hannah get ready.


About 4:46 my daughter texted me and told me she was heading over to her friends house.  Uh, what?  You weren't supposed to be going over until 6 p.m.  I call her and get a half distracted conversation, since she wasn't paying attention to me but yelling at her brother.


At 4:50 I get home to a full dressed and made up girl walking out the door and start FREAKING OUT.  Why?  Uh, why did this friend change the meeting time from 6 to 5?  At the last minute?  Why had I just spent the last hour running errands for Hannah?  She didn't need a sweater?  She didn't need fingernail polish remover?  I had JUST WASTED MY TIME.


And now, I was being denied the pleasure of "helping" her get ready...take pictures...because she didn't need me, and I needed to put my groceries away.  I had missed everything because she sent me on her errands.  I WENT OFF.


Cue poor behavior.  Cue swearing.  Cue slamming of doors.


Hannah left.  I walked upstairs to find the disaster of the century in her bathroom. 


More bad behavior and swearing.


And now, I am sitting here mad at myself and upset I am such a juvenile, fit throwing weenie, while Hannah is at her first dance.  Not texting me.


I hope the other parents, who did drive legs of the evening, got some good pictures.