The Freegas Band

Posted on September 4, 2013July 22, 2016 by Amy

For Part 2 of my Live! at Lake Thunderhead 2013 series I’d like to write a little bit about the band.

There is much about the band that shall remain a mystery, as I am not privy to its inner workings. Though I am sort of in the band in that I sing songs with them at the Labor Day Party, I’m not really in the band in that I’m a girl.

See, this band is not a functioning band except for one weekend of the year. They (we) don’t play together except for Labor Day weekend. This year we had two practice sessions (Friday and Saturday), only one of which included all of the band members. The rest of the time they’re just a bunch of brothers, cousins, and friends who like to send each other dirty, crap-talking emails and get together about once a year outside of Labor Day for “band practice.”

Naturally, being a female, I don’t get invited to these “Freegas Weekends,” which once upon a time were supposedly an opportunity during the year for the guys to get together and “practice” but are really just a thinly-veiled cover for a free-for-all guys weekend. They haven’t even bothered to take their musical instruments to these get togethers since 2009.

Please don’t read that to mean I’m bitter about not being invited. It would be weird if I was (invited I mean). I have zero interest in crashing the male bonding time my hubby gets with his best peeps, and I love that they get to do it. I only mention it to illustrate why I’m not really in the-band-that-most-of-the-time-isn’t-actually-a-band but is rather a bunch of middle aged men who like to get together and drink beer and play frisbee golf and um, do other manly stuff.

But I digress. Let me introduce you to the four originals.

The Horse:

My brother-in-law. He obviously plays multiple musical instruments as well as singing. He is a voice of reason among the other guys.

Zebulous Prime:

Bass player, vocalist, and sometimes drummer. Performer extraordinaire. He can harmonize like you wouldn’t believe.

Pestoika:

The mastermind, he comes up with most of the songs the band will sing each year. He plays every instrument the band uses and has showmanship to spare.

Benois (aka my hubby)

He can play the guitar, though he hasn’t done so at The Party in several years. He has a beautiful voice and is just a total rock star. Plus, he’s hot.

The four of these guys parade around the front of the stage, dancing and singing and playing and putting on a show like you’ve never seen before. They are all talented musicians, but more than that they know how to perform.

As I mentioned in yesterday’s post, there were two additions to the band in 2004.

J Holla

An amazing drummer. He is usually in the back of course, but occasionally graces the front of the stage or even the dance floor.

And last but most certainly not least, The Boy Wonder:

He is by far the youngest of the group and was only about 16 when he started playing at the party. He is a crazy good guitar player. Crazy good.

And then there’s one other honorary “band member.” J-Dub:

He does not participate in the musical performance. To my knowledge he has no musical talent whatsoever. He is more like a band manager/chief dirty joke teller/director of pointless banter. He and his wife also cook the wings on Saturday night. And he gets invited to the Freegas Weekends.

Finally, there’s me.

I’m an occasional add-in vocalist. Some years (like this year) I sing a lot, some years not so much. This year I got to do some really fun songs, including Love Shack, We Got the Beat, and my personal favorite of all time, Poker Face.

And I can’t leave out that for the past two years we’ve had another member, The Prodigy:

He plays violin on two songs and trumpet on one. And he’s only 14.

It’s hard to explain in a few words this unusual group of guys who, mostly, are all related. They are wacky and funny and talented and I wish I could adequately describe what happens when they all get up on stage together to perform.

The music is sometimes awesome, sometimes awful, but it doesn’t really even matter because when the wheels start to come off they just crank up the crazy and it all works out. If the crowd isn’t in a dancing frenzy they’re laughing hysterically, like at this year’s performances of “Business Time” and “Lunch Lady Land.”

Most of the time the crowd is dancing and jumping and clapping and singing along.

The guys take themselves just seriously enough that the music is good, but no so seriously that they don’t enjoy themselves even when it’s not. When one of the band members messes up of forgets the lyrics they just make something up or bust out some wicked dance moves. They welcome family members and friends up to the stage to sing along, whether they know the words (or melody) to the songs or not.

It’s not about putting on a perfect show, it’s about family.

These guys work hard to play music for their people. The band plays one show per year, for the reunion of their kin.

It doesn’t get any better than that.

I am so thankful that I can be a part of this. Part of the party. Part of the band. But most of all, part of this funny, hard-working, sometimes-totally-crazy-but-always-loveable family.

A History of Live! at Lake Thunderhead

Posted on September 3, 2013September 3, 2013 by Amy

I’m trying to figure out where to begin writing about the weekend we just had. If you haven’t read it yet, maybe you could start by checking out last year’s post, titled “How to Have the Best. Party. Ever.”, about the Labor Day Party/family reunion my in-laws do every year.

Last year my husband’s cousin and his wife hosted the party.

This year, it returned to the place of its inception. The Farm.

The weekend was so great. So special. So much. I just can’t write about it all in one post. So, I just decided this will be a little series of posts over the next few days.

Today? The history of Live! at Lake Thunderhead (L@LT) as best I know it.

I think it was 1999 when my husband, his brother, and their two cousins got together and played music for the first Labor Day shindig at the Farm. I hadn’t met my husband yet at that point, so my knowledge of this event comes only through the party lore, passed among family members over the years. As I understand it, the band, “Freegas” as they have come to be called, didn’t have a drum set at the time, or at least didn’t have it at the Farm for their impromptu jam session. They used an overturned 5-gallon bucket and a Tonka truck to bang out some drum sounds while they played music and drank beer. I believe that the name of the party, “Live! at Lake Thunderhead” comes from the intro to a recording that was made that evening of the band’s musical stylings.

I don’t know much about how the party happened the two years after that.

My first time at The Party was in 2002.

The Freegas boys had planned ahead and brought their drum set, some mics, and a crummy sound system. Many more family members had begun to join the festivities. It became a weekend-long party with guests (hubby and I included) camping in a “tent city,” (we were too poor then for RVs).

There was a weenie roast on Friday night, wings and fries and home brew made by close family friends on Saturday night, and The Party on Sunday, preceded by a shrimp boil (the traditions of these evening meals continue to this day).

The party took place on one small end of the dock.

Beginning in 2003 the three boat slips of the dock were filled in so the entire dock could be used for the festivities.

In 2003 and 2004 it poured rain, but the party went on anyway with tarps around the perimeter to keep things (mostly) dry.

2004 was a year of many changes for the party.

In 2004 my brother- and sister-in-law got married before the party, so the whole thing got stepped up a few notches.

There were changes for me that year. Up until that point, I had sung a few songs with the band each year. “Joker” and “Sweet Home Alabama” were my usual contributions. That year I started to become a bit more part of the band, as I sang more songs and even played the bass on a couple. I didn’t play it well, but I did it (yes, I’m wearing a muumuu in the photo below; not a good choice in retrospect, but see commentary below about the theme of the party…).

2004 also saw the addition of two new members to the band, another cousin on guitar and a family friend on drums. And it was the beginning of the themed party. That year the theme was “Hawaiian.”

2004 was the “epic” wedding/party. Most people don’t have a very clear memory of the specifics, but it was an awesome time. I mentioned in my post about last year’s party that it was one of the best parties I had ever been to. The 2004 party might rank #1. It was the year of “Wild Thing.” When the band was flogging and flailing with this song, Holla, the drummer took it over and singlehandedly delivered one of the best party performances ever.

To give you an idea of the momentum of that party, there was a huge thunderstorm with tornado warnings that began to roll in shortly after the party got started.

After the storm started getting really bad, my mother-in-law suggested we move the party up to their Morton building for safety reasons (Hello? We were on a dock. In a thunderstorm. I think she was the only sober person there), but there was just no stopping the freight train that was that party. I recall some yelling by the band and the crowd to the effect of, “Hell no!!” “Keep playing!” “Paaaarty!” And then my father-in-law threw up his hands, laughed, and said something like, “Screw it! We’re staying here!” The party went on.

Epic I tell you.

2005 was themed “Western.”

2006 was “Decades”

We had 80s

60s

50s

70s, 20s (!!), 80s, 60s:

I think that was my favorite theme.

2006 was also the first year the party moved from the dock to the building. This change was made, in spite of lots of kicking and screaming from some folks, for logistical (what a nightmare to fill all three of the boat slips and tarp around the whole dock; plus the dock is really far from the house, making it hard for family members with small children to put kids to bed and continue partying) and safety reasons (kids near water, lots of electrical equipment near water, etc).

2007 was “Hollywood”

2008 was “Bad Bridesmaids”

This theme involved dressing in the worst wedding/bridesmaid attire one could find, in honor of my mother- and father-in-law’s 40th wedding anniversary.

I think 2008 might have also been the year the band acquired decent speakers/sound system.

2009 was “Redneck/Hillbilly”

This was a great year for costumes but a bad year for the band/party. Instead of having it in the building, we had it on the lower deck (see Rule #1 from last year’s post) and it just wasn’t the same.

And Freegas didn’t perform to their abilities. Still fun, but nowhere near up to the standards of years prior. I don’t know exactly why it was a less-than-stellar event in 2009, but it seemed The Party had kind of imploded and needed a little breather.

2010 and 2011 were the Years-of-No-Live-at-Lake-Thunderhead.

Last year The Party returned as an add-on to a family gathering for an auction of my husband’s grandmother’s belongings. It was the first year the party was held someplace other than the Farm. And you know about how that went (or if you don’t, you really should read this, it will prepare you for what’s to come).

Next up will be a little bit about The Freegas Band.

A Horse-Themed Birthday Party, With Sparkly Tail Tutorial

Posted on August 28, 2013August 28, 2013 by Amy

I always love the process of planning themed birthday parties for my kids. I enjoy looking around for fun and inexpensive ways to bring a theme into a party. I realize that makes me sound like a big dork. I’m sure my girls probably wouldn’t really care if their parties were themed or not, but I like having them pick one anyway.

And though Lass later decided she wanted an okapi-themed party, she had originally requested a horse theme. So that’s what she got. It was a cute theme, and I found lots of good stuff to make it fun.

(Note: if you don’t care to read about how I planned the horse party and made glittery tails for seven kids under 6, feel free to skip this post. It’s all I’ve got for you tonight:)

One of my favorite finds was this personalized “Pin the Tail On the Horse” game poster. It was huge, sturdy, and only $10! I just used double-sided tape for the kids to stick on the tails that came with the game, and I had a simple paperback book about horses for the winner’s “prize.”

I also got a pack of these ride-on horses for the kids to color and put together. I considered putting out glitter glue and paints for these, along with yarn to make manes and tails, but in the end opted for easy and not too messy – markers and some googly eyes I helped the kids glue on.

The horses ended up being kind of chintzy and hardly any of the kids actually pretended to “ride” their horses once made, but it was a fun enough activity and I was glad I had a little craft for them to do.

I also had some horse tattoos for the kids to pick and put on during the party.

And those three activities were the only “structured” parts of the party, other than eating pizza and cake. The rest of the time the kids just played, mostly on our trampoline.

At the end I had Lass pass out these favor boxes. She and Miss helped me make them by decorating them with stamps and stickers.

Inside each of the boxes were more horse tattoos, a booklet of horse stickers, some horse-shaped lollipops, a horse finger puppet (which looks a little creepy in person), and a couple of little plastic horses.

My favorite part of the horse theme though, was the sparkly horse tails I made for the kids to clip on their shorts (or in their hair, but they all wanted them on their shorts).

(This horse balloon and the cups/plates I got here)

I originally saw the idea for this here (lots more ideas here). A mom made tails for kids kids to use in the “Pin the Tail” game (I had originally planned to use them for our game too, but sticking with my keep-it-easy plan, I made a last-minute decision to use the little cardboard ones that came with the game instead). She used rubber bands instead of clips, so the girls could put the tails in their hair after pinning them in the game. But she didn’t provide instructions for how she did it other than to say she used different types of yarn.

So. I came up with my own way of making tails. I didn’t want to use rubber bands because I knew we would have some boys at the party. And I thought just using yarn would leave them a little flat, so I wanted to add some other textures too.

Here’s what I came up with:

1. Materials used – Different colors of yarn, including some that was sparkly, silver, and fuzzy, 3/8-inch ribbon in different colors (I got ribbon scrap packs at Hobby Lobby because I didn’t want to buy a bunch of whole rolls of ribbon), 7/8-inch ribbon (I used some gros grain I had from a previous project), double-sided tape, 1-inch alligator clips, and tacky glue (I also tried Elmer’s, but the tacky worked better).

2. Start by cutting about 7 to 8 inches of 7/8-inch wide ribbon. Lay it down flat and put a piece of double-sided tape down the length of it.

3. Cut pieces of yarn and 3/8-inch wide ribbon to the length you want your tails (ours were probably about 12 inches), and start randomly placing the top part of these pieces along the tape, very closely together.

4. After you have about 6 inches of yarn and ribbon laid out, stop adding and leave about 1.5 to 2 inches of the wide ribbon for wrapping up at the end.

5. Place another strip of double-sided tape over the top of the yarn and ribbon.

6. Start rolling at the end where you don’t have extra ribbon left (the left side in my pictures). Roll the tops of the ribbon pieces all up in the 7/8-inch ribbon and tape.

7. When you get close to the end of the tape and the yarn/ribbon, put your alligator clip on.

8. Keep rolling right over the inner part of the clip. When you get to the point of having about an inch of the wide ribbon left to roll, put some tacky glue on it and then roll it the rest of the way. Of course make sure you open the clip and roll it underneath so you don’t glue your clip closed in the roll of ribbon.

And that’s it! They were so easy and I love how they turned out. Most of the kids seemed to get a kick out of them too.

Miss is already asking for a turtle theme for her next birthday. I kind of want to get started on it, but I suppose I should wait to make sure she doesn’t change her mind, since her birthday isn’t until February 🙂

Birthday Party Success!

Posted on August 25, 2013 by Amy

My girl had a wonderful birthday yesterday.

In fact, they all seemed to have a fun day.

I’m happy to report that her horse-themed party was a success.

We had balloons, and sparkly horse tails to wear, and foam ride-on horses to make, and horse tattoos, and Pin-the-Tail-on-the-Horse, and pizza and cake, and it was great.

I didn’t take many photos because I was in full-on Hostess-with-the-Mostest mode. My goal was to keep everything running smoothly without seeming over-manage-y. I didn’t have a clue how to do that going in, but I think it all worked out pretty well.

Chaos ensued with the gift opening.

All kids were engaged in assisting the gift opening, and all grown ups were engaged in getting gifts out of the tornado-proof packaging.

We had a happy birthday girl at the end of the day, and lots of new horses with which to play!

She also finally got her very own “Wendy dress” nightgown. She requested green.

It was a happy celebration of 3 years with this precious girl.

I am blessed beyond words.

The Mom Comparison Game

Posted on August 22, 2013 by Amy

A few weeks ago I went to a play date at another mom’s home. Let’s call her Fancy Friend. She’s a lovely mom, and we’d had quite a few play dates before our trip to her house: a few at neutral places and one at my house.

When Fancy Friend and her sweet littles came to my house, I made lunch for the kids. It was just mac-n-cheese (ahem, from scratch), because that’s really all my kids want whenever I allow them to have it, and it’s easy so I can make it without sacrificing visiting time with my friend. I think I had some intention of throwing together a salad for us moms to eat, but I didn’t quite get to it that day, so Fancy and I ate some mac-n-cheese too. We had a fun play date. It was good.

Everything was good.

Until I went for a play date at her house. Um, can I just say that she went all out with three different things for the kids to eat for lunch, plus a separate lunch for us moms, which she prepared with my preference for paleo food in mind, plus she baked stuff!!!! Some yummy fluffy pastry things and an almond torte or something like that. I mean, it was fancy. What the heck?

Ugh. So now I’m kind of mad at Fancy, because I just felt like such. a. loser. the whole time I was at her house. I mean, she fed us awesome, delicious food with our dietary preferences in mind and used her OVEN in the process. Who does that?

Just kidding. I’m not at all mad at Fancy Friend. Because that would be ridiculous. But. I did feel like a loser while at her house. I was kicking myself the entire time. “Geez, why didn’t I bake something when they came over? I should have served fresh fruit on the side with the mac-n-cheese. Look at how freaking domestic she is!”

Anyway, after that play date, I started thinking about how I sometimes compare myself to other moms. It’s not a game of “I’m-better-than-her.” Oh no. When I get into the Mom Comparison Game, I tend to find myself lacking. I get this vague sort of guilty/not-good-enough feeling that sucks and is totally stupid.

It is totally stupid. But I do it anyway.

So, after my fun play date at Fancy’s house I started wondering why in the heck I do that comparison thing.

And here’s what I figured out:

I am surrounded by amazing moms.

It’s true. Friends, family, acquaintances… So many wonderful mothers cross my path or go through my mind on a daily basis. So I can’t help it.

I sometimes look at my friends who are mothering little ones right along with me, and I think that they seem to have it together so much more than I do.

I see FB updates from acquaintances, and I think they just seem to be awesome at doing the Mom Thing.

Heck, sometimes I see total strangers and think, “Gosh, that mom is really with it. Why don’t I ever….”

Then there are my family members who are done with their mothering-of-small-children years. Comparing myself to these ladies is really not fair, because mostly what I’m comparing myself to in these cases are the Successful-Offspring-Outcomes these moms have as the result of many years of in-the-trenches mothering.

I compare myself to my own mom of course, all. the. time. Or to my Auntie. Or even to people whom I never actually observed directly as mothers of small children, like my Mother-in-Law, or my Grandma, or my husband’s aunt who has five awesome young-adult daughters and I totally want to be like her.

The end result for these moms is pretty darn great, so for some reason I feel the need to wonder “Why can’t I be more like them???”

Weird, right?

I know. I find it so odd that I look at these wonderful women who surround me and somehow end up feeling like I’m not quite up to snuff.

I’m not like this all the time. Most of the time I feel pretty confident that I am doing a darn good job being Mom to my sweet girls. I’m not perfect by any means, but I’m good.

Still, I have times of insecurity. The job of Mom is so darned important, and it really can be disastrous if you screw it up. My mother-in-law often quotes Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis as having said, “If you bungle raising your children, I don’t think whatever else you do well matters very much.”

So. True.

And so much freaking pressure!!

So yes, I tend to compare, and sometimes think myself lacking.

I used to get annoyed with myself about this, because it’s not productive.

But then I realized that insecurity is only bad if you let it limit your life. Almost everyone has some moments of insecurity. The important thing is recognizing these for what they are and not getting all uptight about them, right?

I mean, if I look at other moms and think about how they might be doing or have done things better than me, and then I freak out and throw a pity party and think I’m the worst mother ever and leave it at that, well then I’m letting insecurity make me miserable. And that will probably make my children miserable too.

Or if I feel insecure when looking at how good another mom is and blame that on her, as in, “OMG, I can’t believe Fancy Friend made all that delicious food! Now my kids are going to think they should get a meal like that every day. She is soooo inconsiderate. And I know she was just trying to make me feel like a loser after I only made mac-n-cheese. What a jerk. My kids are going to think she’s a better mom than me. We are never coming here again.” Well. That just wouldn’t be very beneficial to anyone.

So instead, what I learned from my little introspective journey into the Mom Comparison Game is that I should be grateful for the fact that I have so many wonderful moms around me. I learn from other moms every day, as well as from my own experiences. I have decades of mothering experience in those around me. I choose to think of it as an awesome foundation, rather than as something that makes me feel small in my short little four years of motherhood.

I think that helps me to be a good mom and to continue becoming a better mom all the time.

I’m still not likely to bake from scratch for play dates though.

P.S. My sweet Lass is turning 3 on Saturday. I am throwing my first ever birthday party at our home, with other kids and games and stuff. I’m terrified. So I will be spending the next 48 hours going totally overboard with crafting and organizing The Most-Fun-Horse-Themed-Birthday-Party-Ever-for-a-Girl-Who-Now-Wants-an-Okapi-Party. Yes, you read that right.

So I won’t be posting tomorrow. I will share the details of the party ASAP though. It’s gonna be good.

Our Week in Review

Posted on August 16, 2013 by Amy

Linking up with Conversion Diary again.

1. When we went to Des Moines for the fair, we had a little pre-birthday party for Lass. She was so cute and so excited about the whole thing. Each time she opened a gift she said a sweet, breathless little “Fank you!!” accompanied by a tiny giggle. She melts me.

2. Speaking of birthdays, my Dad turned 70 on Wednesday. We couldn’t be with him, but my girls drew him some pictures:

Lass drew two caribou and one “caribou-snake” and Miss drew a dinosaur (“Grandpa loves dinosaurs, doesn’t he?”), and a “snake-eel.” Sis mostly just likes to hold the crayons.

3. After Labor Day Lass will be starting swimming lessons with Miss. She has been begging to do this for the past year. Each time I took her to the drop in care at the YMCA when taking Miss to her lesson, she asked to take swimming lessons too. I told her she had to wait until she was three. She is so excited to start in a few weeks.

4. We have a swing set/play structure thing at our house. It’s sort of a cheap one, and we won’t take it with us when we move.

I have decided that when we build our new house, I’m not going to get a new “play system.” My girls’ favorite outdoor play spaces are old trees and big rocks and tall grasses. Those are much cheaper.

5. I always forget to pack bathing suits when we travel. In July, when we went to my parents’ house, I packed the girls’ suits, but forgot my own, so I had to run to the only store they have in their town, Dollar General, to grab a suit when we took them to the beach.

This week I forgot everyone’s suits. When the girls played on the beach, I didn’t really care. They just got their clothes wet and sandy and it was no big deal. But when we went to my sister-in-law’s house, I knew the kids would be swimming in her pool. I figured we would all need suits, so I ran into Target on the way to her house to pick some up. The suits weren’t quite the right size since the selection was pitiful, but at least they were on sale. Happily, my husband was merciful and let me out of wearing my ill-fitting, mismatched suit, saying he could handle the two older girls since we didn’t go in the pool until after Sis was in bed. He’s the best. Plus he was the only one in a suit that fit…

6. Cuteness:

7. Last weekend my husband’s whole family (almost) was here to help get things cleaned up. That’s because the annual Labor Day Party/Family reunion that used to be hosted here at the Farm is back this year.

Last year it was at a different venue, and it was amazing. But I’m excited for it to be at the Farm again. It’s a costume party and the theme is “Jobs.” I have no idea what my costume is going to be, let alone for my three little ones. Any suggestions?

The Fair

Posted on August 15, 2013 by Amy

I just love the Iowa State Fair.

We live in Wisconsin, but I’m not a big fan of our fair. It feels too urban, being located in Milwaukee. I only went once, when I was pregnant with Miss, and don’t care to go back. The Iowa State Fair, on the other hand, is just delightful.

When we go, we don’t do some of the typical fair things, like riding rides and playing games on the midway. My girls are a little too small for most of them, and I am a little iffy about fair rides. So we don’t even go down that way.

Mostly, we look at animals.

My girls are crazy about animals.

The girls listed their favorites from the day to include ostriches, elk, fish, cows, horses, swans, and wood ducks.

And the Big Yellow Slide, of course.

My favorite part of the day with them was our time in the DNR building. They were fascinated by the tanks full of fish and asked what types of fish were in each one.

Sis had fallen asleep in the stroller so we had lots of time to look at and talk about all the fish.

In the same building there was also an area with many animal pelts hanging together. We went through them all, and I asked the girls to name the animals. They were able to name every one except the woodchuck (which I couldn’t name either). They got obvious ones like the beaver, skunk, and raccoon. But also the bobcat, otter, badger (once I showed them the head), red and grey foxes, and opossum.

I don’t know why, but it tickled me immensely that they were able to name those animal hides.

And to top it off, we went outside to the DNR’s “pond” and had a blast watching the swans, geese, and ducks as they splashed and played in the water. This seemed like the biggest hit of the day in terms of the time the girls wanted to spend there.

Or maybe the biggest hit of the day was the food.

These girls have never had so much “junk food” in one day in their lives.

It was such a special day.

I Wonder if They’ll Remember This?

Posted on August 14, 2013 by Amy

We are at the Farm this week. We’re wearing ourselves out, and having fun, and doing All The Things.

The other day I went for a ride on Great Big Mable with my older girls.

That’s this thing, if you’re not familiar:

For some reason, as we were riding along, having a good old time, I got all nostalgic and started thinking, “I wonder if my girls are going to remember these times when they get older…”

I was thinking about all the trips we take so they can spend time with their grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins and all the fun things we do.

It got me thinking of my own childhood and my own memories of grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins.

I had a major walk down memory lane while riding old Mable.

I got to thinking about when I was a kid, playing with cousins, pool parties at my aunt and uncle’s house, family gatherings at my other aunt and uncles house, watching Dukes of Hazard with my cousins at my other aunt and uncle’s house. I remember singing a lot with my Grandma B., rocking in the old chairs on my Grandma and Papa’s front porch, going up north with them. I remember playing in my Grandma C.’s jewelry box, sitting on my Grandpa’s lap naming all my aunts and uncles as I touched each of their birthstones on his tie clip, climbing the tree in their backyard.

I thought about all these things on the Big Mable. And I’ve been thinking about them since. I’ve gone on an extended search of my childhood memories accompanied by lots of thoughts about my own kids.

“Will my girls remember when we did this?”

“Or this?”

“Will Lass remember finding that cool caterpillar?”

Some of my own memories are vague. Some are crystal clear.

Sometimes it’s just a sense memory. I remember smells, like my Grandma C.’s chicken cacciatore cooking. Sounds, like my Papa’s laughter. Tastes, like the sharp bitterness of martini (was this vodka? vermouth? I don’t know) on an olive out of my Grandpa’s drink, pancakes made more tasty because Grandma C. poured them in animal shapes, and the extra delicious grilled cheese my Grandma B. made. I can distinctly remember the feeling of rocking in those old rocking chairs on her porch.

I don’t know if I have many memories from when I was four or younger, as my kids are. Maybe a few around 4 or 5 years old. Being a flower girl in a wedding. Getting (accidentally) hit in the face with a baseball bat and needing stitches. Riding a carousel with my Dad.

My girls probably won’t remember much of what we’ve done this trip. They probably won’t remember today clearly. But maybe they’ll remember the smell of the fish they caught with their Dad. The sound of rocks plopping when tossed in the pond. The feel of the water and the sun.

Who knows? Maybe Miss will remember a sense of some of the things we’ve done this week or this summer. Lass probably won’t and Sis certainly won’t.

It doesn’t really matter I guess, because we’ll keep doing all these things, spending time with family, going to cool places, doing fun activities together, as they grow. And eventually they will be old enough to remember.

And happily, even if they don’t remember, they’ll know. Because it’s all documented here.

Still Dirty, Still Weird, Still Fun

Posted on August 9, 2013April 4, 2014 by Amy

Linking up with Conversion Diary again.

1. Went to the Dirty Weird Zoo yesterday. It just wouldn’t be summer without a visit to the DWZ.

When we visited last year my girls were timid about feeding the animals, and Lass just wouldn’t do it at all.

Not so this year.

We ran out of bread, but they were determined to feed grass to the cows.

Still dirty and weird. I just love that place.

2. What do you do if someone rings your doorbell at 9:30 at night, when your husband is working nights, and you know that the night before your garage door had accidentally been left open all night?

Do you assume a murderer has come for you (and politely rung your doorbell)? Turn off all the lights inside? Turn on all the lights outside? Turn on your alarm system?

Do you go to your garage door after realizing there’s no one at your front door (which you can see through) and yell, “Who is it??” “WHO IS IT?!”

Do you look around for a weapon and then grab your husband’s hunting knife and stalk around the house looking out all the windows?

No?

Yeah, me neither.

But if I did do all that stuff I would have felt kind of silly when I called my husband to double check that the garage doors were all closed when he left, and realized that my mysterious doorbell-ringer was probably one of the neighborhood kids messing around.

If I hadn’t been terrified to open my door I would have gone out there and rung those kids’ necks! I mean, if all that had actually happened, of course.

3. Okay. Obviously, #2 is an account of exactly what I did last night when my doorbell rang shortly after my husband had left for work. Since there was no one at my front door (little jerk ran away!) and I couldn’t see through the door into the garage (note to self to have peephole in new house), I was convinced that someone was lurking in my garage, waiting for me to open the door so he could murder me. I kept the hunting knife on the chair next to me for the rest of the night, even though after talking to my husband and then hearing kids getting up to some foolishness outside, I knew that our garage doors were securely closed and that said kids were responsible for my panic. Or at least for setting it in motion. I guess I can’t blame them for my craziness.

I don’t know why I automatically go into extreme-plan-to-confront-crazed-killer mode whenever there is the slightest indication of shady business going on.

Like the other day when a guy came to deliver something for my husband. I had forgotten he was coming, and he wasn’t wearing an obvious uniform. So in my mind all I saw was a strange man at my door with no business there. I quickly assessed the situation, considered how quickly I could press the panic button on my alarm panel, looked for an easily reachable weapon (a heavy vase was the closest thing I saw), thought of a few different ways I could inflict pain with my hands/knees/feet, and then cautiously opened the door a tiny crack with my foot wedged behind it to hopefully impede an attempt at forced entry. Yes. I do know this is crazy.

Or the time my husband and I were in the drive through of Starbucks after church and a girl, who was probably around 20-ish and all of maybe 110 lbs, started walking along the side of our car. She was a little close for (my) comfort so I automatically scanned to be sure the car doors were locked, looked for the best way for my husband to drive the car out of the danger lane, and thought about how I would punch her in the nose and the put my knee into her face if she tried to carjack us.

I don’t mean to come up with this stuff. I’m not at all a violent person. It just happens automatically. I don’t know if it’s because I grew up just outside Detroit in the days when carjacking became a thing. Or because I read a few too many true-crime novels in my early 20s. Or because I worked in prisons for several years. Probably it’s all those things combined, plus a hyper-protective don’t-you-even-think-you’re-going-to-mess-with-my-kids Mama-Bear instinct. Plus a little bit of insanity for good measure.

It’s what I do.

4. We got the first draft of the plans for our new house yesterday. We have a few changes to make, but I’m very happy with the initial drawings.

5. I have some serious stroller envy.

Super Friend has all the good stuff. She brought this double jogger today for both of our stroller-size littles to ride in:

I’ve never had a jogging stroller, because I have had a total of zero interest in jogging since running my last marathon in 2008. But I want it.

Super Friend is also loaning us her Super Stroller again. We used it for our trip to Disney World, and though I carried sis the whole time it is capable of carrying all three girls.

She’s letting us take it on our trip to the Iowa State Fair next week. I need to get one of these:

6. I don’t think there’s any worse feeling in the world than needing to take your child to the emergency room to assess a potentially serious health threat.

I got KFC for dinner last night, because we had to eat quickly between a doctor’s appointment and our Baptism class. As dinner was just getting started I noticed that Lass had bitten off the end of her chicken drumstick and swallowed it. The remaining end was pretty jagged looking so hubby called the ER and they told us to bring her in for X-rays. If they saw the chunk of or shards of bone in her stomach they would have to do a procedure to try to get it out.

Well, I was freaking out the whole way to the hospital, knowing they were going to see this thing in her stomach, because I knew she had swallowed it and praying that it had not yet moved into her duodenum or beyond.

We got to the hospital, got the X-rays, and found…

Nothing.

(She got that ostrich toy after her X-ray.)

Nothing was visible in her stomach or further along her digestive tract. I texted my babysitter and had her look around for the piece of bone, thinking that maybe she had just spit it out.

Nothing.

The mystery was solved when we got home. Hubby picked up another piece of chicken and chomped the end off. He proceeded to chew it right up like nothing. It was super soft and broke right up in his mouth. He had me try it with yet another drumstick. Yeah, I bit right through that bone. And then proceeded to gag and spit it right out. It was disgusting, and I have a thing about textures.

Apparently my middle child doesn’t. I’m so relieved she’s okay.

7. Today Super Friend and I are driving an hour to attend a Scholastic Warehouse Sale. With only one child (her littlest). Do I need to tell you that I’m way more excited about uninterrupted Mommy Friend time than about the book sale? No. I don’t. But the book sale should be good too.

Hoping you have a great Friday and a wonderful weekend. We’re heading to the Farm today after my Mommy date.

So Um, This is the Bible…

Posted on August 7, 2013 by Amy

I have started trying to incorporate some religion into our homeschool lessons.

I have to laugh a bit at myself as I think about it, because it’s been a little awkward so far.

I end up saying things like, “So while we’re talking about the letter Z, let’s learn about St. Zita! Okay, soooo she was a saint. And um, a saint is someone who’s, well uh, really holy, and, um dead. And so, you can ask a saint to pray for you. So yeah, St. Zita!” And then I read something to them from a book or our new curriculum supplement from Catholic Icing that allows me to actually sound as though I know what I’m talking about for a minute. But I pretty much don’t.

I am totally learning all of this stuff with my kids as I teach them. But I’m cool with that. I kind of like learning through teaching. I’ve been doing it all along anyway. I learned a ton of stuff about groundhogs when we did letter G, and about horses when we did letter H.

Our new curriculum helps me to add some religious teaching to what we’ve already been doing, keeping with the letter we’re working on and adding some other things.

We just did our first Catholic craft. Presenting, St Zita:

I am so proud (the idea for this also came from Catholic Icing, I just used some different materials).

I’ve been having a lot of fun with this new aspect of our school. Even when I know I’m stuttering and fumbling awkwardly to describe something that I don’t fully understand myself, I’m enjoying the process. And the girls don’t seem to notice my stumbles, or care. I’ve even discussed with them how I’m learning lots of these things right along with them. Miss was very understanding. She said, “That’s okay Mama. I’m just a kid and I really have a lot to learn, so you know more than me.” At least she thinks so.

The Bible is another topic I’m kind of faltering through with them. Each lesson from the curriculum has a Bible verse that goes with the letter we’re doing. So today I even took my Bible (which I just bought a week ago) into our school room and read and “discussed” a verse with them.

It went something like this:

Me: “So this is the Bible. It’s the book that, uh, tells us lots of important stuff that God wants us to know.”

Them: Blinking.

Me: “And so the Bible is full of um, well look at all these words in here (fanning pages). This is a really big book!”

Them: Leaning in to look at pages. They seemed interested!

Me: “And this, um, tells us how God wants us to act and lots of other things. And there are different books in here, see this is the book of Wisdom… Huh. There’s a book of Wisdom? I didn’t know that. Okay so then here’s Proverbs, and here’s Psalms. Yeah. And the verse we’re reading today is from Psalms… Let’s see Psalm 97:8, ‘Zion,’ oh, what letter does that start with?”

Them: “Z!”

Me: “Yes! Okay, ‘Zion hears and is glad, and the daughters of Judah rejoice because of your judgements, O Lord.'” (In my head, “crap, what does that mean?”)

Them: Blinking. Smiling. Waiting.

Me: “Right, so um, that means that, uh, the people in Zion were happy. Uh huh. Because of what God said.”

They were content with that. Thankfully, though they actually did seem to be listening (which usually means 1000 inquiries), they didn’t ask me any questions about my oh-so-vague first Bible lesson. Thanks God.

What was learned:

For them: 1. Zita starts with Z; 2. That Bible is a big book!

For me: 1. I have a lot to learn; 2. Read Bible verse and figure out what the heck it means ahead of time.

So there you have it. The baby-steps implementation of religion into our homeschool.

I’ve also been talking with the girls to try to help them understand the idea of Baptism, since theirs is coming up (one month from today!). I was botching that one too, so I got a few books to help me out and I have a few craft ideas as well. My husband and I have a class to attend tomorrow night about their Baptism, so hopefully I’ll be better equipped to discuss it with them after that.

So much to learn…