Happy Peaster!

PURIM + EASTER = PEASTER

I love a good three-costume weekend. Luckily, the third one really just involved a pair of ears and a lot of chocolate.

Malena's school had a Purim parade on Friday, and all the kids dressed up. We borrowed a ladybug costume, because I just knew there would be 3,000 princesses or Queen Esthers.

Saturday she had a princess party to go to. All the girls dressed like princesses, and all the boys dressed like pirates. I'm posting photos of her hair to irritate Jackie. I braided ribbon into her hair and tied it in a bow in the back. I also bought a curling iron and tried to get all Toddler Beauty Queen'd up, but it was raining, and the curls fell the instant I opened the front door. She loved her sparkly shoes. We also had a playdate at my favorite park, which was nice for some quiet time, and we went for noodles later at my favorite noodle shop.

Sunday was Easter. Lamb, wine, and candy. You can't go wrong there.

Now it's Sunday night, it's raining softly outside my window, and I'm packing for a three-day conference. Three days. Nice hotel room. Good food. Expense account.

This is going to be the best week, ever.

"If a child is to keep alive his inborn sense of wonder, he needs the companionship of at least one adult who can share it, rediscovering with him the joy, excitement and mystery of the world we live in."
-- Rachel Louise Carson

Wednesdays is open play at the local kiddie gym, and we like to go with Malena's friend Maya. Maya's mom is super cool, and Maya and Malena share a deep love of each other and All Things Pink.

PEEEEEENK!!!!!

They love pink. I have no idea where she gets that from. Her father, maybe.

We spent an hour jumping and sliding and hopping and swinging, and then decided to get something to eat at a nearby restaurant, where they had kid's facepainting on Wednesday nights. Maya's mom knows these things. I only know when there are hurricane warnings in the Caribbean or Gordon Ramsey's on TV. We wound up in a scattered group of 10-15 people, and Malena and I were the only non-Israelis. Actually, that may not be true. There were a couple of moms that I spoke Spanish with, but they happened to speak fluent Hebrew as well. So maybe we were the only non-Hebrew speakers. But I swear, after a while, you really think you're understanding what's being said. I think they just gesture a lot.

There were babies, babies, everywhere. Maya and Malena both wanted their faces painted as pink tigers. They sat with each other and chatted like old ladies and hopped up and down on the seats. I don't think Malena actually ate anything. They also got balloons. The four of us stopped off at a puppy store to look at the puppies, but I always think a stop like that is more depressing than happy.

When Malena and I finally got in the car, it was almost 9pm. She was cranky, and I was tired and thinking about some reports I still needed to run, but she has so much fun with Maya that it's all worth it.

We pulled onto the highway, I turned on the radio, and since it's 80 degrees out, pushed the button to open the sunroof. I heard a small scream and turned to see Malena holding a limp string tied to her wrist.

Shit, I forgot about the balloon. It was gone. The tears were streaming down her pink tigery face. I'm usually the staid defender of my child's universe, but that really was a mommy blonde moment. I apologized a million times.

"But Mommy!" she screamed. "Why did you open the sunroof??"

"Because Mommy is a moron", I explained. "Can we go get you another one? Please?"

And that is how I wound up at the supermarket at 9:30pm on a weekday with a tear-streaked three-year old in the middle of my own insomnia phase.

I may never sleep again.

But at least my baby is happy. (cough. cough. thunk.)

I'd like to thank the Academy, and.... well, that's pretty much it.

The other day, I dropped my beloved child off at daycare, and took a moment to check out some new artwork that was posted on the wall outside her classroom.

The children all drew their version of a happy face. The teacher asked, "What makes you happy?" and wrote each child's answer under their drawing.

HAPPY FACE

Here we have Maya's picture. Very happy-looking face with a nice button nose. Maya's mommy makes her happy.

This is Taylor's picture, with both eyes on the left side of the head. A little on the abstract side. (Flounderish, even.) Little Picasso! Taylor's daddy makes her happy.


Darian's picture. Slightly disturbing. It's a face inside a face, like Kuato from Total Recall (OPEN YOUR MIND!), or those people on Discovery Health who have a tumor removed and it turns out to have hair and teeth and be a long-lost absorbed twin. Anyhoo, Darian's mommy makes her happy.


My little buddy Mariah is a free, wild spirit. With a cheerful flick of the wrist, she gives her happy face some free-form eyes and a nice, lopsided grin. Mariah's mommy makes her happy.

Oh, Noam. Noam's happy face kind of looks like Elmo. Or, if you're as old as I am, Grover. Nice round little nose. Comforting. Like a fuzzy Muppet hug. What makes Noam happy? You guessed it. Her mommy.

....................

And then we have the child who spends a lot of her time looking at a deranged, exhausted, and overly-caffeinated parental unit. In other words, my child. And what makes her happy?

Her bicycle.

That is one kooky-looking happy face. I don't look like that. Do I look like that?

The child was a floating head.

Is it TOO MUCH TO ASK.

You send your kid to school on Picture Day. She's not wearing her Brownie uniform or a faded "Disco Fever" tee shirt like Jackie's mom always managed to send her to school in on Picture Day. Her hair is brushed neatly. Her tiny little face is scrubbed. Grandma went to Nordstrom's for that shirt, which really does look cute with a pair of jeans.

Could you not CHANGE THE MATCHING BACKDROP.

It's like that re-enactment of Gone With the Wind on the Carol Burnett show, where she makes her dress out of the curtains. Had I known, I would have sent her to school with a little curtain rod tied to her back, just for a laugh.

Some tassels.

Something.

It's Friday night. I had a little surgery this week, and haven't been feeling too well. I grabbed my sleeping kid from her bed in lieu of a 36-lb. teddy bear, and we lay in my bed and watched movies and ate Wheat Thins and drank cranberry juice.

I thought about how simple and sweet it was to hang out in your pajamas with your kid, with nothing but a pile of pillows and a box of Wheat Thins. Single parenting has been a humbling experience for me (humbling in the sense of someone pounding on your head with a big rock for an hour, and when they finally stop your cranium is beaten to a bloody pulp, but you weakly lift your now-toothless head and smile up at the sun and think "Thank goodness that's over!" But I digress.) so when I find us in these small little happy moments, I am amazed at how wonderful it is just to be living in this moment, and how lucky I am to be this child's mother.

I gave her a big fat kiss on the cheek, happy to be hanging out with her, and asked her if she liked these crackers.

She pulled one out of her mouth and examined it intently.

"It's a hexagon".

It IS? I quickly googled "hexagon". Six sides. Wow. I'm stupider than I realized. Humbling, I tell you.

So why aren't they called hextuplets?

MALENA! WHY AREN'T THEY CALLED HEXTUPLETS?!

Poor kid never had a chance. :)



Funny, that pancake scene reminds me of my own childhood....

Today I took an extended lunch hour from work. (Only fair - I worked late yesterday, for pete's sake!) I sometimes forget that I work from home and can be a little flexible with my work hours. The constant presence of my laptop sometimes makes it difficult for me to unplug from my inbox, and I regularly work more hours than I give myself credit for.

I missed the first five minutes of the Bonnet House history, but I know it's a private piece of land that was a summer home in the 1920's for wealthy people who wanted to preserve this sanctuary in an otherwise overcrowded Fort Lauderdale. The owners were artists, and the art is still in the home, and the grounds were supposed to be lovely, so off I went. It was gorgeous.

Until the rains rolled in.

I don't mind walking in the rain. We've been having spotty showers lately, so when it started to drizzle, I cheerfully set off for the farthest reaches of the property with my camera, hoping the rain would keep the other visitors indoors. It did. You know why? Because other people are not dumb like I am.

It rained. I didn't care. Then it rained harder. I ignored it. Then it rained ever harder. I started to hope it would stop soon. Then the winds came in off the ocean and the thunder boomed over my head, and I sprinted back into a rustic-looking historical toilet I had passed a few feet back.

Ok, fine. It was an outhouse. I made several panicked, Blair Witch-type phone calls from my cell phone.

"Jackie? I took the day off from work and there was a thunderstorm, and now I'm trapped in an outhouse alone and the water level is rising... was that a racoon? Please pick up the phone...."

"Kara, I just wanted to say thank you for changing your ringer to play 'Superfreak' every time I call.... that may very well be the last piece of music I hear on this earth... I'm about to be washed out to sea in an outhouse with 'She's a very kinky girrrrl' running through my head. Kara, I gave you the best 24 years of my life... and I ... I... I think the racoon is back! Kara?! (gurgle) Sorry! I choked on my gum! Did you ever try this Mojito Mint? It's pretty good. Anyway, my battery is about to die. I always loved you.... Superfreak? Really? God, you're an asshole. Ack! Battery!"

I wasn't kidding about the rain. By the time I was able to scramble to my car in the emptying parking lot, I seriously looked like someone had thrown me into a pool with my clothes on. In the driver's seat, I tried to quickly pull my wet shirt over my head to change into a dry sweatshirt, and had a frantic Lucy Ricardo moment when the dripping wet fabric of my shirt got caught on my elbows, and I fought furiously with myself for two minutes in my bra with my arms stuck up in the air, trying to pull the shirt all the way off before someone else drove past me.

Graceful like swan.

view from outhouse

my escape route...

the road back to my house

Dead quiet Sunday.

It's been hot all day, but suddenly started to rain.

I told Malena to put on her shoes, grabbed an umbrella, and we went for a walk.

The air had the rich smell of earth and ozone. I put in my iPod and listened to some Del Amitri while she stomped in puddles. After a while, I tucked my flip flops under my arm. It was easier to walk in the rain with bare feet.

Malena danced.

Home again. I'm going to curl up with a giant mug of tea, put on some socks, listen to the rain, and enjoy Frida.

A weekend exactly like weekends should be. Friends, a good nap or two, a nice breeze, greek donuts, and a stack of library books that I'm about to go and get acquainted with.

Dammit.

:)