And the Beautiful Blogger Award Goes to. . .

Me!  I am certainly enjoying an embarrassment of riches lately!  Just last month I thoroughly enjoyed a game of blog tag initiated by the engaging Kathy Lashley, and the now I have been nominated by the lovely What Jane Read Next for the Beautiful Blogger Award!  I picture myself gliding across the stage in an elegant Marchesa gown to accept my award, which is a glittering Swarovski crystal laptop (jeez, this thing is heavy) as the crowd shouts out my name – “Mom? Mom??  MOM!!”  Oh wait, that’s my son. . . well, back to reality!

The rules of this game are simple: share seven things about yourself and then nominate seven other bloggers.

First, I’ll share:

•  I love action movies – Transformers, Mission Impossible, Die Hard – anything with heroes, villains, explosions, aliens, totally improbable plot lines, etc., and I’m in.
• My favorite flower is the peony, and they’re in season right now. Their lush blooms and delicate scent are so evocative of spring for me.

• I don’t like getting manicures; I’d rather do it myself.  But I would get a pedicure every day of the week if I could.  Go figure.
•  Unlike What Jane Read Next, I love listening to the Gotye song “Somebody That I Used to Know” precisely because it reminds me of somebody that I used to know.
•  My favorite place to be is the beach, and I would love to have a house by the ocean someday.
•  Last summer when I went to Rome on vacation, I fell in love with burrata, a delicious cheese that originates from Puglia – delizioso!

•  It is very unfortunate that I am allergic to both dogs and cats, (I had to take my son to the allergist with me so the doctor could explain it to him because he wouldn’t believe me) so we have fish – sometimes.

 Now, the nominations for the Beautiful Blogger Award go to:

• Salt and Serenity
• Signature Moms
• BRIDGE*Parenting
• Peaches and Pumpkin
• Vicky. . .the Northern Chicky
• Sally’s Baking Addiction
• Fancy Function

I look forward to learning more about these great bloggers and thanks again to What Jane Read Next for thinking of me!

Photos courtesy of theKitchn.com and Google Images

Fifty Shades of Nutella

I’m standing at the kitchen counter about to start dinner.  I open the cabinet to round up the ingredients for this evening’s meal and I see it, that seemingly innocent white-lidded jar, beckoning my attention.  I look away and continue gathering my supplies, but its call is too great to ignore.  I remove the Nutella  from the cabinet and slowly twist off its lid.  I open the drawer below and remove a spoon.  I put  the jar on the counter and hold it in place with one hand as I dip the spoon into the jar with the other, its contents yielding against the touch of the stainless steel.  I raise the spoon to my lips, closing my eyes and inhaling its familiar, delicate fragrance.  As it finds its way into my mouth, this intoxicating concoction slides off the spoon and onto my tongue, enveloping it like a silky blanket, the hint of hazelnut providing the perfect counterpoint to the smooth, velvety chocolate.  I open my eyes and, staring into the cabinet, inspiration strikes – dare I take out the peanut butter?  My taste buds shiver at the thought.  No, I decide as my inner goddess pouts, that’s too much for now.  “Perhaps another time”, I can almost hear the peanut butter grinning salaciously.  I plunge the spoon into the jar again and again, greedily devouring the Nutella like a . . .

A small voice shakes me out of my reverie.  “Is dinner almost ready?” my son calls out from the living room.  I look down sheepishly at the jar and realize I’ve just consumed 600 calories worth of Nutella and we haven’t even had dinner yet.  I put the jar down and knot my fingers on the counter, chastising myself for my loss of control.  As I bite my lower lip, my subconscious smirks at me over her half-moon specs and clucks “A moment on the lips, no matter how sweet, a lifetime on the hips.”

I roll my eyes at her and angrily throw the spoon into the sink.  I shove the jar back in the cabinet, vowing to never lose control like that again (at least until the next time I open the cabinet).  Oh Nutella, you are a cruel master. . .

Photos courtesy of Pinterest and nutellachocolate.com

I Was a Cereal Killer – One Mom’s Cautionary Tale

What have I done?

I know my 11-year-old son is a capable child.  He likes to help his dad out at the store and recently our neighbors hired him to look after their cats while they are away on vacation.  He does well in school, is a brown belt in karate, loves to play everything from “Bach Minuet in G Major” to “Moves Likes Jagger” on the piano, puts his dirty clothes in the hamper (mostly), keeps his room fairly neat, is always up and dressed for school on time, is helpful, polite, and is never ever sick at sea.

So I was a little thrown this morning when I found him looking at a YouTube video on how to make a bowl of cereal.  Really??  He doesn’t know how to fix a bowl of cereal?  How did this happen?  I looked at the computer screen, fairly surprised that there must be other kids in the same situation because there were several videos available on this subject.

While I admired his initiative to find an answer to his dilemma (is there anything you can’t learn to do via YouTube?) I wondered why he just didn’t ask me to pour him a bowl of cereal.  The truth is, whenever he says “I’m hungry”, I jump like some Pavlovian dog, ready to fix him a snack or get him a drink or start dinner a little earlier.  It’s well known that hearing your baby cry during the early weeks of life can cause a mother’s breasts to leak milk – his call for food just speaks to my primal instinct as a mom to make sure my baby is fed.

But the fact is, he’s not a baby anymore.  He knows where the kitchen is, but thanks to me I realized that it’s a bit of a mystery to him how the food magically appears on a plate or in a bowl.  It became obvious why he didn’t ask for my help.  His quest to figure out how to fix his own breakfast is an assertion of his increasing self-reliance.  He’s letting me know that he’s now capable of fixing his own breakfast/snack/whatever.  Maybe next he’ll let me know that he’s capable of doing his own laundry.

I watched him silently as he fixed his own cereal, poured his own juice and sat down at the table to eat breakfast.  It’s a kitchen, I reminded myself, it’s not like he has to go out and forage for nuts and berries.  I smiled, happy and a little sad that my baby son is becoming more self-sufficient by the minute, before my very eyes.

You know, this could be a very good thing.  I wonder if he can learn to whip up breakfast in bed in time for Mother’s Day?  I’m sure there must be a YouTube video for that. . .

Images courtesy of YouTube and Google Images

The “It” Girl

Tag, looks like I’m It!  The other day I was “tagged” by the engaging Kathy Lashley.  Turnabout is fair play and now. . .

TAG, YOU’RE IT!

To play, please follow and post these rules:

• Answer the question the “tagger” listed for you in their post
• Create 11 new questions for the people you tag to answer
• Choose 11 people to tag and link to them in the post
• Let each blogger know that you have tagged them

Kathy’s question for me was, “How’s those tweezers been treating you lately?”  And the answer is that Tweezy and I are still BFFs.  As I lamented in my post “Oh the Hairs on my Chinny, Chin Chin”, I have reached a point on the midlife merry-go-round where chin hair has become a fact of my grooming life and my tweezers are a vital part of that ritual.  Lately it’s become an all-out turf war, and I’m not giving up without a fight.  I can’t stand to see those delinquent whiskers just hanging out there on my chin like street hoods on the local corner, mocking me, daring me to make the first move.  “Do you feel lucky punks. . . well do you???” my inner Clint Eastwood challenges as I reach for my trusty Tweezerman and in a few swift, expert plucks I pop a cap into those bad boys – well, at least until the next growth cycle, and then the gang sweep starts all over again.  Maybe next time I’ll channel The Terminator.

Let’s play Tag Toss Up.  I’ve asked 11 questions and tagged 11 great bloggers.  They can choose to answer any question they wish; also, anyone else reading this post can answer a question if they are so inclined.  Ready?

Here are the tagged:

1. iliketheworldfuzzy
2. Laurie J. Long
3. The Small Investor
4. Hike. Blog. Love.
5. help4yourfamily
6. When the Kids Go to Bed
7. CarrieLouWho
8. Truth and Cake
9. Diary of a Girl Dad
10. Grammaniac
11. DENY Designs

And these are the questions:

1.  What is your best memory from childhood?
2. If you could eliminate any household chore, what would it be?
3. What’s your favorite color and how does it make you feel?
4. How has your life been different from what you’d imagined when you were a child?
5. Was there a teacher who had a particularly strong influence in your life?
6. Where would you like to be in 10 years?
7. What has been the proudest moment in your life so far?
8. What are you allergic to?
9. What is your favorite travel destination?
10. What is your favorite scent/smell?
11. If you died tomorrow, what would you regret leaving undone?

I look forward to reading some interesting responses.  Thanks to Kathy for asking me to come out and play!

Photo courtesy of Google Images

Boy Meets Italy

Dad gets slimed. . .

Last summer my husband, son and I went to Italy.  After two summers of vacationing with Spongebob Squarepants – one year on the Nickelodeon Cruise, and the next year at the Nick Resort in Orlando – I felt the need to plan a vacation that didn’t include cartoon character breakfasts, poolside shaving cream fights, and getting slimed (ok, my husband took the hit for the team and endured the majority of  the slime).  I wanted to stroll along ancient streets, marvel at sights I’d only read about or seen on television, dine on delicious food al fresco, and unwind with an authentic cappuccino and biscotti after a day of shopping in Rome.  In short, I wanted – no, needed – to have a grown up vacation, and prayed that my then- 10 year old might enjoy it too.  After taking him to see the Pompeii exhibit at Discovery Times Square, my son was intrigued enough to have a go at Rome, as long as we planned a day trip to Pompeii.  With the extra assurance that he could indeed get Lego minifigures outside of the United States and watch Spongebob Squarepants on TV (in Italian, of course) I booked the trip and we were on our way.  I’ve assembled a photo journal of our trip through my son’s 10 year old eyes (and sometimes smart mouth):

Rome Cavalieri Hotel

“Well, it’s not the Nick Resort, but this hotel’s okay. . .”

Barcaccia Fountain

“This water tastes awesome. . . and I can drink from any fountain????”

Spanish Steps

“Wait, we have to walk up all these steps???”

Colosseum

“That Colosseum was kind of cool. . .”

“Too much walking and talking at the Vatican. . . “

"Lacoonte" - Vatican Museum

“But that snake biting the guy statue  is pretty cool. . .”

“These bumpy streets are hurting my feet. . .”

Lighting candles. . .

“There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home. . .”

A final resting place. . .

“Wait, somebody’s buried in the floor???  AWESOME!!”

Pompeii

“Ok, I have to admit. . . “

More Pompeii. . .

“Pompeii was REALLY cool. . . “

“Shopping???   NOOOOO!!!!”

Delizioso!

“The food is pretty good too. . .”

“Alright guys, Italy wasn’t so bad, but next year we’re going back to the Nick Resort. . . um, can I have another gelato?”

All photos are the personal property of Mom Meets Blog 

Welcome to Nike Town!

Okay, so my 11-year-old son’s feet grew.  A lot.

He’s been wearing the same pair of sneakers for the last 7 months.  I kept asking him if they felt too tight or if he was uncomfortable, and he kept telling me they felt fine.  I’ve offered several times to buy him a new pair of sneakers, but he’s declined.  Being a creature of habit, he likes to wear the same things over and over again, especially his shoes.  Plus, he hates any kind of shopping.  And with the mild winter we’ve had, there was no need to go out and buy new boots, so I hadn’t had his foot measured since the beginning of the school year.

Until today.  He measured in at a size four.  The sneakers he’s been wearing are a size two.  “Why didn’t you tell me your sneakers felt too small?”  I questioned my son.  He just shrugged his shoulders.  “Don’t worry about it,” the clerk at Modell’s said.  “Their old sneakers stretch as their feet grow, he probably didn’t feel any difference.”

Maybe he didn’t feel any difference, but I felt like the most horrible mom on earth.  Who takes their kid’s word for it that their shoes fit?  Who doesn’t get their kid’s foot measured more regularly?  Why don’t I have a Brannock device at home???

We looked around the store for a new pair of sneakers.  I managed to talk him out of a high-top basketball shoe; he doesn’t play basketball and I could hear the complaints that they were bothering his ankles already.  And for the price, I wasn’t taking a chance that it was something he would decide felt uncomfortable in 3 days’ time.  He didn’t see anything he liked, so we headed on over to Foot Locker, with its clerks dressed in striped ref shirts, questionable rap music blaring over the speakers, and boys drooling over the latest overpriced kicks – a pre-teen boy’s footwear mecca.  No more Skechers.  No more Stride Rite.  Straight into Nike town.

And then the sticker shock set in – $65, $85, $100 and more!  Am I that out of touch?  I’d heard the rumors of boys’ sneakers costing as much as a month’s worth of groceries, but I thought that was an urban legend.  These are sneakers, after all, not Jimmy Choo‘s, which as everyone knows are an investment, or so I’ve read (but how would I fit them into my portfolio?).  These shoes are likely to be outgrown and forgotten in 6 months.  Hoping to cut my losses, I grabbed a pair of $65 Nike Air Max shoes and asked the clerk to bring me a size four.  My son slipped his feet into them and immediately felt the difference (damn you, clerk at Modell’s!) – he said they weren’t tight, and the side of his foot wasn’t hurting anymore (what??).  “Do you like them?” I asked, before he could look at anything else.  “Yeah, they’re cool,” he pronounced.  I threw the old ones in the new sneaker box and headed for the register, happy to be getting out of there for less than a hundred bucks.

At check out the cashier informed me that the total was $99.16.  “What?  No, the price on this shoe is $65, I saw it on the floor,” I exclaimed.  “Yes, that’s for size 3 and under; size four starts at $95,” the cashier explained.  Considering that the sneakers were already on my son’s feet and factoring in his pain and suffering at wearing sneakers two sizes too small for God knows how long, I handed over my credit card.

What was I complaining about?  I was, after all, getting out of there for under $100.

Are you as clueless as I am about pre-teen boy’s sneakers?  Are they really overpriced, or am I just out of touch?  What else do I have to look out for?  Will I ever own a pair of Jimmy Choo’s?  If you have answers to any of these questions, please, let me know!

Some photos courtesy of Google images

Quotes about Moms

Reblogged from More than Mothers:

For the life of me I can’t remember where I got these great quotes about mothers!  As soon as I recall the source I’ll let you know.  If you’re a mom, or have a mom, or have ever met a mom, you’ll love these!  My personal faves are the hilarious #10, 15, and 59, while number 20 made me choke back tears…

Read more… 1,421 more words

I reblogged these quotes about Moms from More than Mothers. My favorites are  #4, 13, 16, and 34. Which are your favorites?