Outtakes

We decided to give the grandparents an updated, good picture of all the kids for Christmas, as well as individual photos of their smiling faces.

Simple, right?

After about a million "takes" and getting scolded at the conservatory for not having a photography permit (hmph!) we did manage to capture this:

Clearly, a Christmas miracle!

Wading in a Winter Wonderland

Like most Midwesterners, I am accustomed to meteorologists predicting bigger, badder, storms than what actually ever occur. Weather guys are like excited puppies whenever there’s the slightest hint of drama: they can barely contain themselves and eventually they piddle from the excitement (I'm sure of it). So you can understand why last week, when our local weather puppy started squeaking about predicted “sno-mageddon” (10 to 16 inches and whiteout conditions) I was pretty skeptical.

Well – today I stand corrected. Right behind a five-foot snow bank, that's me, eating my words. Almost 18-inches of snow fell, and the drifts are waist deep.

The weekend was supposed to be one of our insane sports weekends, with multiple basketball and soccer games scheduled. Instead, nothing. Nearly everything in our snowy metropolis shut down, even busses and plows. Driving was treacherous, even for us seasoned northerners, so we stayed in – and out, as was the case. Randy shoveled five or six times, and the kids played outside in the big snow. Ethan strapped his Nordic skis on and took advantage of the deserted streets, until the powdery stuff got too deep.

Ethan gave Abby a lesson on his skis.

I had been wondering when we were going to fit our annual Christmas cookie baking marathon in this month. Randy and I bundled up and waded through the snow on foot to the grocery store and bought three bags of ingredients, and the whole family helped bake for two days. I’ll tell you, pushing through the snow with ice stinging our eyes and visibility less than half a block, I thought a lot about Pa. Not my dad, Charles Ingalls, tying a rope from the house to the barn. Ah, I get it!

Cookie making with Madame “I DO!” (“I insist on doing every single thing my siblings do”) was... entertaining. She is an experienced little dough handler from her hours spent with Playdoh, but rolling round balls instead of long worms proved difficult for those chubby little mitts. The older girls had to do a little reshaping. But Mira was remarkably good about not putting her fingers in her mouth. I don’t think she realized that the clumpy substance caked between her fingers was really yummy until after we were done.

And if that photo didn’t destroy your appetite, nothing will.

What else might one do when snowed-in, if one were, say, a bored teenage boy?

I am quite sure this is not how I set up my Christmas village.

A Mind Like a Steel Trap. Or Not.

If time management skills and a sharp memory were pre-requisites for raising kids, I’d definitely be childless. As it is, I am probably a poor candidate for parenting four active kids with my fly-by-the-seat-of-your pants approach to organizing our lives. Despite my best efforts to keep everything straight (PostIt notes, online calendar) I am regularly caught off-guard by statements like “You remember that daycare is closed next week, right?” or “Mom, I’m so glad we don’t have school tomorrow.” (Gracie made the latter pronouncement at dinner just last week. I contradicted, “Yes, you do have school” and all three of the older kids responded in unison, “No we don’t!” …Oh.)

My absentmindedness extends beyond where are we going/when do we need to be there, unfortunately. I am a Loser of Items, especially gloves and sunglasses. Despite knowing full well that a snowstorm was imminent recently, when I left work and my car was covered with icy snow, I had to resort to scraping my window with a car bingo card, wearing this lovely “hand with no skin” glove on one hand (the other was bare).

(Why the skinless hand was in the van is a mystery, but I was glad to have it, since my gloves and scraper had apparently run off together).

My mental deficit is the source of a series of recurring dreams, which all share the same theme: unpreparedness. The most common version is my pumpkin dream. I am not exaggerating when I say that I have had this dream no less than 50 times. I dream it at least once a month throughout the year, and it’s always the same, simple plot: it’s Halloween night and as darkness falls I realize that we have forgotten to buy and carve pumpkins. I’ve had the dream so many times that now a main component of it is me exclaiming in disbelief, “I can’t believe it! I’ve had that dream so many times and now it’s actually happening!” Other recurring dreams are "I’m hosting a huge gathering and realize I don’t have ingredients for the meal"; or "It’s prom night and I forgot to get a dress" (I always am rifling through my mom’s closet in this dream, hoping that one of her business outfits will look good for the big dance). Naturally, like many other people I know, I also experience variations of the “It’s the end of the semester and I totally forgot to attend a class” dream. Apparently, though, my psyche has ranked the importance of pumpkin carving above academics, since the pumpkin dream is much more frequent.

So why, at 42, is my memory like swiss cheese? I’ve determined it’s simply misallocation of brain space. Somehow, I managed to stuff my brain completely full by about age 14, leaving no room to retain anything new. What important facts are etched in my memory instead of “Abby has an orthodontist appointment today”? Why, the name of the child actor who guest-starred as Oliver on The Brady Bunch (Robbie Rist). Entire verbatim paragraphs from “On the Banks of Plum Creek.” The lyrics from “Saturday Night” ("S-A-T-U-R-D-A-Y – Night!”) and the groovy roller skating moves that went along with it at Cheapskate. And, as I demonstrated to my own dismay last weekend, Every. Single. Word. from the Dukes of Hazzard theme song – a show I swear I didn’t even watch!

Oh, how I wish I could take out the mental garbage and clear up some space so I could remember my own name. Unfortunately, I think I’m stuck with “Just'a good ol' boys / Never meanin' no harm…”