I got snubbed by my kid

Yesterday was the gut-wrenching day that all working mothers abhor. The first day of dropping my sweet baby off with a trusted friend and returning to the office to work. It went like this...

Me: She probably needs to go down for a nap soon. Here's her food. You'll know when she gets tired because she will fall down a lot and she might start getting kind of slappy, and biting.

Stacy (the babysitter who has a daughter and knows exactly what she's doing...): OK, we'll be fine! Don't worry, I've disinfected the whole house, everything is childproofed, and I have this lovely brand new pack and play and high chair for Lakeland. It's going to be great!

Me: Maybe I should try to put her down for a nap...?

Stacy (sensing I need reassurance): OK, if you want to, but I can totally put her down.

Me (tentatively, and really trying to stall): Well, OK, let me just feed her quick.

Meanwhile, Lakeland was laughing and playing with the cats and dog and checking out her new environment with the kind of fervor only a 15 month old who still wakes up many times per night can muster. Of course I thought that she was going to be as devastated as I was when I left. She just didn't know it yet. (Prfffft)

I finally made my way towards the door, after an outburst of tears (from me, not Lakeland) and headed to work. Where I watched the clock and wondered "Is she napping OK?" and other motherly stuff like that.

Throughout the day, I received text message updates and pictures of Lakeland playing with Haily, Stacy's daughter, looking happy as can be, and my worry subsided a bit.

Later, another picture of Lakeland sleeping peacefully further reassured me. But still, I was antsy to get back to her. I was sure Lakeland was missing me as much as I was missing her... (Prfffft)

Finally, when I burst through Stacy's door, expecting a huge hug and enthusiastic waves and extended cuddle time from my daughter, I was instead greeted with an almost disregard for my presence. Lakeland sort of looked at me as if I have been gone for just moments, and proceeded to race after the cat, squealing and laughing and pointing. I barely got a glance. Feeling both relieved and rebuffed, I made plans to bring her back next week.

I'm a battered wife...

It's the weirdest. Every time Seth and I go through a drive-thru, I end up feeling like a battered wife.
It goes like this:

Drive thru guy: Can I take your order?
Seth (quickly & efficiently): Yep, I'll have a double stack, a large iced tea, a chicken nugget and a fry.
Drive thru guy: Is that all?
Seth: Nope, we also need...(and then he looks at me expectantly)
Me: Ummmmm....I'lllllllllll....haaaaaaaaaaave....theeeeeeeeeeee....ummmm......a......
Seth (all super annoyed with me) - to the drive thru guy: Hang on! (trying to prompt me by looking at me and bobbing his head like how chickens peck at grain)
Me: (kind of nervous, feeling rushed, and trying to frantically read the dollar menu before I get yelled at...) OK, I want a............um.........junior bacon cheeseburger....and.........
Seth - (whispering without whispering, in that quiet but loud way) to me: Oh my god, seriously? It's the same menu as always.
Me: I know, but you are making me all nervous. I cannot make a decision when I'm nervous. Just let me look a second. It' not that big of a deal.
Seth - (kind of apologetically) to the drive thru guy: Hang on! She doesn't know what she wants.
Me: And, I'll have spicy chicken nuggets...
Drive thru guy: What kind of sauce?
Me (all frantic again, trying to remember what my choices are): Um.....the mustard...the sweet...the honey mustard! And fries, please.
Drive thru guy: Is that all?
Seth (rolling his eyes at me like we've been in the drive through for an hour and a half, when it's really only been 2 minutes): Yes, that's it.

And then, when we get up to the window and we are waiting for stuff, I say to Seth, "Hey, can you get me a sweet and sour sauce too when the guy opens the window?"

Seth, in this highfaluting way says "No! If you wanted sweet and sour, you should have ordered it at the first window where you were supposed to order it...I'm not going to make that guy do extra work just because you didn't order what you wanted. "

To which I respond, "I did it on purpose Seth, because if you order extra sauce right away, you have to get in a big stupid argument with the drive thru guy over the goddamn microphone about how the nuggets only come with one sauce. Then you have to explain how you don't care, you need two sauces, and then they say 'well, you're gonna have to pay extra for that', and it's just a big hassle. But if you just wait until your food comes out, then ask real nice if you can get a sweet and sour sauce, it's not like they are going to ask you for a quarter. And it only takes one second for them to get the sauce for you."

And the way Seth looked at me, I knew he wasn't going to get me the sauce.

So then I said "Whatever. Just lean your head back when the guy comes with our food, and I'll ask him myself for the sauce. Why are you such a drive thru dick?"

Then the window opened and I got my sauce.

Team Clean Gets Mad

So twice a month, a nice young girl comes over and vacuums and dusts and cleans the kitchen and washes the floors and the disinfects the bathroom. Yes. I have a cleaning lady. I know, I know...it's incredibly self-indulgent, and I'm a little embarrassed to admit that I can't keep up. I am the leader of "Team Clean-Grand Rapids", for crying out loud, and I have a cleaning lady.

But hey! I work full time, and I'm a stay at home mom full time. How do I do both, you ask? Well, I have a cleaning lady come in once every two weeks. It's really the only way to survive in my world.

Anyway, so insert here a long story about AT & T and what bastards they are and how I hate them, and then skip to this morning...

I received a bill, which was supposed to be for $33. And it wasn't. It was for $127.37. So of course, I call customer service and start ripping into the service representative about how they purposely try to dupe people into buying things they don't want or need, etc... Insert another long story here, with ranting and raving.

Of course, the whole time I'm on the phone, LL is sitting nicely in her highchair, shoving blueberries into her mug, and the cleaning lady is dusting and wiping down tables, and presumably, listening.

I finally get off the phone, resolving the bill while simultaneously getting my gripes in, and I turn around to see a sort of wide-eyed, mop holding, sweat trickling girl looking at me with this great amount of admiration. And she says "Can you please call on my bills for me, too?"

And then she says, and this is the whole point of this story..."So...you clean when you are mad, huh?"

Sheepishly, I look at my powdery white hands and wrists, the remnants of a Comet cleanser attack on the kitchen sink. I had done all of the dishes, scrubbed the counters and disinfected the sink, all while my cleaning lady looked on...

Bromance leaps into unchartered territory...

Happy 4th anniversary!

Seth and I celebrated our 4th anniversary with flair this year...see picture, left.

Let's take a walk through anniversaries past. On our wedding day, Todd [the left ass in this picture], Seth's BFF, was the one to declare us husband and wife. It was a beautiful moment on our perfect wedding day.

On our 1st anniversary, Seth and I returned to the place of our reception, 5/3 ballpark, and took in a game after a nice dinner and some...ok many...cocktails. Followed by additional beers at a local watering hole.

On our 2nd anniversary, we were in Ohio, on Burger Family Vacation. During the day, all of the Burger girls were pampered with massages, and Seth arranged to have a bouquet waiting for me at the spa. That night, Seth and I drove into town to catch the All Star game and have some cocktails. And then we returned to the vacation house and continued with libations and laughing, in the hot-tub, until dawn.

On our 3rd anniversary, Seth talked me into going to see this Star Wars special. With Todd. Technically, it was the symphony, but it was combined with a weird and gaudy giant movie screen showing scenes from the films. And it was emceed by a guy who played either R2D2 or one of those other metal looking guys, I don't know for sure. And, after a particularly gutsy symphonic performance, Todd shot up out of his seat and yelled out "Fuck yeah!" amidst all of the children and many black tie bedecked patrons. One year later, I continue to be thankful that I had enjoyed several cocktails prior to the event.

And on our 4th anniversary***, the movie "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" was released. So I invited myself to go with Seth and Todd to the midnight showing, on our anniversary, because there was no way Seth was going to not go at midnight.

On the afternoon of our anniversary, pre-midnight movie, Seth and Todd enjoyed a nice lunch together. Followed by a trip to the parlor. The tattoo parlor. Where they each got a new tattoo. A new matching tattoo. Of the Deathly Hallows. Matching Harry Potter Deathly Hallow TRAMP STAMPS. A permanent indication and declaration of their bromance. On our 4th anniversary.


***I will note the following:
1. Seth wrote me a really great poem and read it to me aloud. Which is quite romantic, I think.
2. Seth took me to dinner at a restaurant we discovered when I was pregnant. Awful service and great food.
3. Before the movie, Seth went with me to Costco, and he hates Costco. That's love.
4. Seth secured a reliable babysitter. I'll give you one guess who that was...

Well, that's embarrassing

I drove through Wendy's today, and I ordered a kiddie meal for Lakeland. I've never done that before. I realized I was really embarrassed to be feeding my toddler fast food when I cut a large chunk of cheeseburger off and gave it to her. And found myself thinking, "Oh my God, what if she chokes on that? I'll have to call 911 and the paramedics will know that I was feeding my kid junk food."
I'm so ashamed...

The Best Thing Happened...

My friend Jacoba and I were talking about Real Simple magazine, and how unrealistic their "Get it Done in 15 Minutes" articles are. They have this minute by minute breakdown of how to clean your huge bookshelves in 15 minutes, or clean and detail your car in 15 minutes. It is so dumb. Who has a latter, unfolded and waiting for use, sitting in their living room, or a shop vac next to their car at all times?

Anyway, so I ordered the magazine for my friend, so that we can have monthly competitions to see who gets more crap done in 15 minutes. And I filled out the order form to be sent to:

Jacoba Clean It Alderink.

And they misread it.

And now she is receiving 12 months of Real Simple magazine addressed to:

Jacoba Cleantit Alderink

Which is worth every penny.

Jet Puffed Super Jumbo Marshmallows

The other day I discreetly followed around this grandmother and her 9ish year old grandson at the grocery store. And by "discreetly", I really mean that I tried to make my almost constant neighboring of the two of them look unintentional, not like I was invisible, which is impossible with a 1 year old [kinda loud] passenger in your shopping cart.

Anyway...

So the grandma asks her grandson, in that creaky grandmother voice "Jonathon, what would you like for breakfast tomorrow? How about pop tarts?"

And little Johnny's eye's got all big and wide and excited and he said "Really Grandma? Can I pick out any kind I want?"

And the creaky grandmother said "Of course, sweetheart. Whatever you want, and then we can go see what kind of frozen pizza you want for dinner tonight."

Johnny zoomed over to the wall of 863 different kinds of pop tarts and chose the s'mores variety, jam-packed with wholesome nutrition, I'm sure. And he cradled the pop tarts in his skinny arms as they turned to head to the frozen food section.

Together, we arrived at the frozen food freezers, me and LL pretending to check out various varieties of vegan TV dinners, and Grandma and Jonathon investigating different pizza topping and crust options. Johnny was having a hard time choosing, even with Grandma making one suggestion after another.

He finally made his selection and we were off to the salty snack aisle. Johnny's little face looked up and down, back and forth, side to side at the stacks and stacks of snacks. And then I heard the little genius say "Grandma, I'm a little freaked out by all of these choices." Wow. Good call, Johnny.

A couple of weeks ago, we were camping and one family brought the ol' campfire favorite, marshmallows. But they weren't normal marshmallows. They were these absolutely ridiculous, jet puffed, super jumbo marshmallows. They were so big that once you stuck them in the fire to roast them, they expanded from baseball to volleyball size. It was nearly impossible for them to even remain on the slim roasting stick, weighty as they were. Though somewhat entertaining, the size of these marshmallows didn't change the product. What was wrong with the 'normal' sized and mini marshmallows? Why is there a need for these Jumbo's? Why do we demand all of these packaging options for the SAME STUFF?

I think it's just overboard, overload and plain and simple over-consumption by consumers to have a need and/or demand for 91 ways to wrap up the same exact product. I'm not saying I don't fall for it. Club brand crackers makes a mini version and guess who buys them? This girl right here. With some shame. But would I buy the regular size, perforated crackers if I didn't have the mini option? Yep.

I learned a little something from Jonathon...maybe something about 'less is more', maybe something about choosing simplicity over chaos, maybe something about expressing fear of too many choices.

I don't know, but I'm glad I melted those Jet Puffed Super Jumbo Marshmallows down and made them into rice krispie treats, because the bag on top of my refrigerator kept reminding me, in an annoyingly judgmental way, of how much we really have, when we really need very little.