I'm no fan of Mondays

I write a very boring blog lately. I'm sorry. I have been a bit blue, no not depressed, Mom, but I have been blue. It's hard for me to know what to talk about when I'm feeling that way. I don't want to bitch and moan and poor-me all over the page. I want to write stimulating and interesting words. I can't think of any, so I write nothing.

It's all silly, the blue-ness. I feel this broken-hearteded and that annoys the hell out of me. Part of it is Steve stuff and part is Bailey stuff. I love the two of them so much, but I can't make them treat me with respect or caring or courtesy. They've got to do that on their own. They don't. Instead they yell (Bay) or ignore me (Steve) and I feel foolish.

I'm always going to Bay's Mom and I love her, so in her case, I keep on keeping on no matter how tricky and prickly things get.

Steve, now that's a different story. Today I changed my My Space to single. I haven't heard from him in two months. Sounds like I'm single, right? Feels that way, too. I liked being not single after so many years on my own. I liked being Steve and me again, after twenty plus years of being Steve-less. I'm so angry with him for f-ing this up. He is a stupid selfish bastard. I wish I could pluck him out of my heart and out of my memory.

I will do my best to think of something to write about. I could write about the Travolta's. I've been thinking about them a lot. I saw a photo today where John Travolta was smiling up into his son's face and it was both beautiful and painful to see. Raising a special boy, it's this........it's hard to explain what it is. It's like all these emotions and fears and thoughts are all wanting to burst out, explode outward and at all times the lid is down, but it's not fastened tightly and at any time it could lift and all that stuff could come flying out and streaming down and make a big mess.

Honestly, I want to go into my room and have a good cry, but Bay is doing her homework on my bed with her boyfriend and it's time to make dinner anyway.

I want to be like that All American Reject song......When you see my face, I hope it gives you hell.......you know build up some righteous indignation, but I'm just out of energy. It took all I had to get through the holidays. Now I'm hanging on and dreaming of Spring.

Baby's 1st Christmas

I was playing around with my camera the other day, something that I've not had a lot of time to do lately. I was trying to take a shot of a candle that I was reviewing, I wanted to show it lit because the holder was so pretty.

I don't know the trick to taking low light photos. I tried changing the shutter speed and that was interesting. Then, because I had the camera in my hand, I started pointing it at pretty much anything in the room. Do you do that? It reminds me of when I start watering the garden and pretty soon I've sprayed off the entire patio, including the overhead spiderwebs because it's just so darn much fun to play with the house.

Later, after I drove Bay over to Greg's house, I held the phone in my lap and would put it up and shoot blindly down the dark road in front of me. The lights looked like streams, slippery, swirly, stripes.
I decided to try some closer shots of my tree, which got tricky because I couldn't tell if the camera was fully in focus. Can you see me in the pink bulb below?

One of our family traditions is the Baby's 1st Christmas ornaments. Here is Sarah's ornament, from 1998.

And Bailey's little bear from 1992.

Max's ornament is a little harder to see. It's a white baby bottle. Can you see it? It's in the middle. Max's first Christmas was 1990. That was probably my most exciting Christmas ever. I can remember opening all my presents with my tiny little boy in my lap.

Mom got all the ornaments for me. I'm very excited about the holidays this year. I think we are going to do a bunch of baking this weekend. We make chocolate chip cookies, decorated sugar cookies, snickerdoodles, fudge....... and I think we'll do something else, something new. Maybe some sort of brittle. Any suggestions?

I still haven't heard from Steve. I have an ad up at Match.com, thinking that if he doesn't want me, doesn't want to continue to pursue a committed relationship maybe it's time to move on. But he never said he didn't want one, he just said he did not know about the future right now. I'm so confused. I want him, but he does this out of contact thing that makes me crazy. It hurts to be ignored. For days. For weeks. Doesn't he feel that I'm interesting? I don't want anyone else, but I feel like an ass sitting up here on the shelf for so long.

So, I made an ad and I really think I'm very relieved that nobody else wants me either and that's why I'm baking and taking picture after picture of my tree. I'm focusing on Christmas. I bought Max a little iPod Shuffle. Shh, don't tell him. He's going to love it. I hope.

Max's Fever

Just a short post tonight. Max came down with something last night and developed a temperature of 103.4 F. It was very scary.

Luckily, Steve was the hero of the night and ran out to buy me some additional fever reducer when the Ibuprofen didn't phase the fever. In the past, I've tried staggering doses of acetaminophen and ibuprofen for a high fever and last night, it only reduced 2 degrees. See, scary kid sometimes. It was enough to stop his shivering. This was the first time in 17 years that I was able to turn to a partner for some support. It was wonderful.

Today, I took Max to the Dr and he was given two shots of antibiotics. He's been resting every since. He is such a tough kid.

Well, I'm off to make some brownies. Sarah and I are going to stir milk chocolate chips, white chocolate chips, and crushed Heath bars into them. Steve is on a short trip with his dad, so I have to sleep without him next to me. It's surprising how quickly I grow to rely on that. He's so warm. I back up to him and he's like a full-length heating pad. Plus he smells good.

Getting Through the Day

This little beauty is one of my friends from school. She is showing off her school carnival tattoo here. :D

Every day, when she finishes lunch and heads into the go-to-recess line, she stops by and gives me a hug. Sometimes, when I'm walking around the playground, she will come up behind me and slip her hand into mine. This child is so sweet, so loving. She is a joy to be around.

Last Spring, I posted a picture of one of her brothers - she has two at our school. I don't get a chance to visit with him much this year. He's got a lot of friends and he's busy. I like to see that.

One of my co-workers didn't show up for work today. Our principal had to do her job. I'm hoping that by doing what Tammy has to do every day, she will have more respect for what Tammy accomplishes. Tammy is not always treated with a lot of respect. This evening, I was going through my messages and I found one from Tammy. I'm not sure, but I think she must have left it today. I feel bad that I missed her - she sounded very upset. I hope that she's better this evening.

I'm so out of sorts right now. I'm worried about money. I'm worried about my relationship with my boyfriend. I'm worried about my relationship with my daughter. It's interesting, but no less distressing to me, that I have noticed that they both treat me carelessly in very much the same way. They are quick to judge each other on this bad behavior, but seem unable to recognize it in themselves. I love them both very much, but they are not always easy to love. Somtimes I feel that all I can do is to get through one day at a time, not think too much about the future beyond that.

Well, it's getting late here and I need to get something together for the kids to eat. I can't wait to climb into my bed.

Sarah is Running For Office

Less than 28 hours ago, my boyfriend left us to return to his home in Oregon. We had a great visit, but as all visits go, it was too short. I appreciate the time he takes, driving 6 hours down, then 6 hours up, in order to visit us for about 36 hours. I've spoken with Sarah about the visits, about how we should try to wait until he's gone before we cry. It's hard to do that, but I don't want to make him feel guilty about leaving. Sarah did pretty good until he was out of sight. Saying goodbye is never easy.




As Sarah cried, she told me that she was sad about Steve, sad about Taylor next door moving to Washington, and sad about Grandpa's death. She was sad and it all sort of hit her at once. I can remember Bay doing the same thing. She'd start crying and it would go on until she'd fall asleep, exhausted.

Tomorrow, Sarah is running for the Student Council. She is excited. I am scared. She's so bold, I follow her lead, try my best not to let her know that I'm worried. She isn't worried about losing, she wants to give it a try. We worked together on her poster and speech. So much fun.

I ran for Student Council in the 8th grade. I didn't run in the big election, the one at the end of the 7th grade school year. I ran in a special small election because we were short 3 homeroom representatives. I don't think I gave a speech. They just put my name on a ballot with 5 other people and 3 of us won.

Student Council was fun. We took turns doing these inspections of the hallways and the restrooms. We'd rate the way they were left, if there was garbage on the floor, that kind of thing. If there wasn't, we'd give a good rating and with a week of good ratings, we'd get out early on Friday afternoon. It was called.... well, I can't remember. I'll have to ask Leah and Jackie if they remember. Anyway, it was fun. I can remember that we were all really tough with the inspections, we took our responsibility seriously.

Sarah would be that way. She loves her school and she has some good ideas about what would make a good homeroom representative. Here's a quote from her speech, "... I will do my best to make sure that your voice and your ideas are heard..."
Well, it's late and I've got a new book, New Moon, to read. After that, I'm pretty sure that I'll be dreaming of this guy.

Here's My Kitchen

Busy day today. Do you want to see what my kitchen looks like?

I did some rearranging around my place today. I now have a bar - not much of a drinker, but I think it's pretty. Hard to capture it well in a picture, the flash comes on and washes it a out, but you can kind of get the idea. My margarita glasses blend into the back ground. Can you see the purple martini shaker? I got that for my birthday from my sister, along with the tall glasses next to it. The shelf is meant for a microwave, but I've always felt that a microwave up high is dangerous for kids and Sarah's the one who uses it the most, for her cocoa and popcorn.
Here is another shot of the counter. I have two things from the girls up there. One is a jar of soup mix that Bay gave me and the other is a bottle that Sarah decoupaged - they are all the way to the left, on top of the stove. There's a little dog next to the kitchen witch, right there by the salt shaker. Sarah gave me the dog for.... Christmas or maybe my birthday. She loves dogs so much. Today she went through a stack of t-shirts, trying them on, and putting those that did not fit in a box of donation things that I was clearing out (like the dehydrator that I haven't used in 12 years). A lot of the t-shirts had dogs on them and she was so torn. She wanted to donate them, but they were dogs. I suggested saving some of the shorter shirts for sleeping in. No need to get rid of all her favorites.
This is where the microwave used to sit, right where the plate and the candle are now. Oops, don't look at the messy craft and hallway - I'll get to them tomorrow. It looks like somebody is hanging on Sarah's coat rack. Ooh, creepy. It's her hat and backpack, I think.
Here's a close-up of the girl's pictures. They both did the same art project, different years, with the same teacher. Her name is Mrs. S and she's been the art teacher at our school for as long as I've had a child there. She's a little lady and this year she doesn't have her own class, so she has to push all her art supplies around in this cart-unit. She needs, but this year we've got the budget thing and we've absorbed kids from a small school in the next town - we are packed in pretty tight. Sarah's boot is on the left and Bay's is on the right. I love these boots. Bay's has been hanging in my kitchen (the previous one and now this one for 4 years) since........ probably about 2000.
I'm tired. I got down on my hands and knees and scrubbed the carpet today, then I moved things around the kitchen, 3 shelving units, which formed my "pantry" areas. I moved the fridge and cleaned underneath, the coils, and the sides. I moved all my cookbooks from what is now the "bar." I've got a lot cookbooks- used to get them for free when I did book reviews and worked for the vegetarian magazine. I did a lot of laundry and took about 4 loads to either the garbage or the recycling. I vacumed and scrubbed and cleaned most of my glass candle holders. I talked to my friends and my daughter and my grandma and my daughter and my boyfriend and my daughter on the phone (tricky me - I even talked to Jackie while I bathed Max). My new partner taught me how to better set up my posts (using bolding) and what each thing on the post toolbox is for.

Tomorrow I tackle the craft area. I want to clear out the items that my kids don't use anymore and get them ready for Ashlee. She loves art and I think she will like to do some of the crafts. I have to clean my room, set up my new bookshelf (one of the old "pantry" shelves), change my sheets, and vacum, because Steve is coming tomorrow night. I'm going to remake Bay's bed, clean the guniea pig's cage, vacum, and tidy things up in her room before she gets home tomorrow.

I'm watching Kitchen Impossible with chef Michael Symon - I think that's how he spells it. He's a pretty hot chef - great voice, bald head, black shirt, my favorite kind of facial hair - the little bit under his lip, and a goofy laugh. I love a goofy laugh. One of the things that they are making is lobster and goat cheese pizza. He says a lot of words that I associate with Guy Fieri (again - sp??). He says "money" and "sexy" to describe his dishes. He's one of my favorites, behind first Jamie Oliver, then Bobbie Flay. What did I watch before cooking shows?

I love to cook with Steve when he's here. He's going to have more room to do his thing now that I've cleared the counters off. I love to watch him cook. And sleep. And interact with Sarah. And pretty much anything. He does this thing before he kisses me, he licks his lips and leans down and forward - he's a lot taller than me. For days I've been picturing him doing that. My head is full of him. I'm definitely ready for a good visit. We will get about 34 hours - he drives 12 hours to visit for that long (6 down here, 6 back up).

Goodnight.

A Little Bit Wordy With the Wordless Wednesday

Not very wordless, but I still wanted to take part. I'm trying to think of new things to shoot, but it's hard because I'm sort of tethered to home, so I'm shooting things that are just outside the door. I like to try to get the insects - got a bee here - but I saw some incredible insect photos today. I have got to get another lens. I want to be able to see his wings.

My daughter is currently sitting outside, on the grass, looking at the moon, with a boy. And older boy. A senior boy. This is a first around here. I'm worried about the boy riding his bike home in the dark. I went out and asked about a light - truly mortifying my daughter. Sorry honey, I just want the boy to get home safely. I asked him to please think about getting one before he rides at night again. They are snuggle-ish. She is turning 16 in a couple of weeks.

Twenty something years ago, Steve was 16 and I was 17, and we were snuggle-ish. I'm hoping that this pair is not quite as snuggle-ish as we were. I'm pretty sure that they are safe out there on the lawn - there's a whole lot of neighbors moving around out there in the evening.

Steve is hoping to come down next week. He will be bringing his older kids, but not Owen. Dang, I really like that Owen. The older kids are pretty cool, too. I'm thinking up some fun stuff to do - we will have a really limited amount of time together. I'm pretty excited.

I'm also sore. I started running in earnest again this week. I'm taking a slow pace, but putting in time and mileage. I want to get my good habits back in order before my birthday next month. I'm giving some thought to a local 10K next month - on the 2nd. Not sure though, I'm really not ready.

Oh heck, sure I am. I don't have to run a good time, just finish.

I am so glad it's not smokey anymore. I'm sitting here with the windows open and a nice breeze flowing through. Very, very nice.

Peaceful, Easy, Weekend

My weekend has really been good. No big events, just a general calm, which I greatly appreciate.

This morning was not very smokey, so I got out on the patio before the heat hit. I cleaned my litle fountain a bit, added some new rocks, and ran it for the hour plus it took me to cut back and feed my plants. Most of my petunias are a bit spent, so I cut them back. This pot is the exception. I've never grown this particular color before, but I definitely will again.
I found a praying mantis when I was cutting back dried pieces on my little patio tree. Here he is upside down. I climbed the stairs to the little landing that is barely visible in this photo and took some from overhead, as well. It was interesting to see a different view of my patio. It reminded me to take the time to try to present things in a fresh way.
I found this little bee, next to the same tree, on a red canna. Bees are tough, they are always moving and I have a hard time getting them in focus.
Duncan brought this dragonfly by to show me last night. This is the second one he's brought by. Apparently I am now the Dragonfly Lady. I can live with that. Steve explained the lifecycle of the dragonfly to me last Summer. I was so surprised - they begin life as something that lives underwater. Did you know that?
Just in case you are interested, I shared a quick stir-in type pasta recipe over at my cooking blog today. It's simple and you can adapt it in a variety of ways. I like pasta on hot days, because it's quick and doesn't heat up my kitchen too much. If you'd like to see it, it's at http://www.acooksbounty.blogspot.com

July 5th

Today feels a bit like the day after Christmas. Sarah and I, we did all this 4th prep and now it's over. We still have our flag-themed nails on, here's my feet and her hands. I'm pretty tired. Last night Sarah was wound up after the fireworks and couldn't go to sleep until after midnight. Bay called at 12:30-ish and wanted to come home, said her friend would drop her, but she needed me to unlock the door. I fell back asleep - she knocked at a bit after 1. I checked Max on my way back to bed and found him hot - as in almost 102 temp. I don't know what happened, he was only at school 2 days because of the smoke and there were hardly any other kids there. I changed him, gave him some Ibuprofen, then tried to go back to sleep. It was hard, he kept having seizures and I had to check on him or he'd call "Mom, mooom," and back I'd go again.

He is a bit more restful today, a little less warm. These are the times I wish he could speak, that he could tell me what hurts. He's laying very still.

I didn't use my camera at all yesterday, so I grabbed it and went out to look at my patio garden. I have new strawberries. Yum. I'm going to point them out to Sarah. Okay, I did, she's on her way out to grab one now. She told me that she'd been eyeing it and that Karlee told her that when it was time she had called it.

I am surprised that I don't have any green tomatoes yet. In the past I've grown Early Girls. Apparently, Heirlooms take longer. Happily, I found a lot of little buds.
Lots of mint. Hhmm.....what should I do with it? I like it's blue-green color.
I have a mini lemon tree. The first year, I had no lemons. The second year, I had two. This year, I have a ......okay, not a bunch, but a few. Yay!
Bay just got up, it's after 3pm. She is sick, too. The teenagers always seem to come down with something at the same time. They are so darn delicate.

When I woke up this morning, I was surprised that my boyfriend was not beside me. I must have dreamed that he was here for a visit. His absence, I'm really feeling it right now. I've felt so emotional lately, sort of raw, and he gives these huge hugs. When he's here, I feel like the heavy weight of my life, my responsibilities, that's it's a little lighter. He's my peace.

A Duraflex and an Argoflex

A few months ago, I found some photos done Through the Viewfinder. I thought they were gorgeous and different and just ........wow. I wanted to try it myself, so yesterday Sarah and I went out on a search through the local "treasure" stores and I found two box-type cameras that I could use for the process.

Just looking down into these cameras gives me this silly sort of thrill. The picture looks so silvered and it's hard to explain if you haven't actually looked into one yourself. They remind me of an old mirror that has had part of the back scratched away.

The cameras were really inexpensive - I don't know if either of them work, you just use them for the lens - but they are so cool-looking. I'm going to have them as part of my decor when I'm not using them.

Sarah loved the treasure shops. She is fascinated with old equipment - especially typewriters. She told me a story yesterday and it went something like this....... when she was in the first grade and changing in her teacher's office for the Halloween parade, she saw an old typewriter and she admitted to me, "I might have maybe touched a key or two." I love that idea, that she was so fascinated by the typewriter, that she was tempted to touch it.

I used the cameras to take her picture yesterday. She was pissed. I don't know how I'm going to get her to let me keep practicing on her.

This was one of the first images that I took with the TTV. It's the trees out front, up through the branches, which is something that I enjoy shooting. I'm not sure why. I do it over and over.
I'm not sure which camera takes better pictures yet. I still need to figure out a better box for the camera to fit into - you shoot down the box, with the duraflex at the bottom of the box. When I get that right, then I can figure it out.

There are some huge fires in my area. The wind kept the smoke away, but made the fires really hard to contain. They had to evacuate some areas - down in the canyon where my friend Tony's family lives, up in Paradise, where Steve's dad lives. The fire burned out by my college - the campus is in large part a wildlife preserve.

This morning the wind died down and I woke up to a smokey smell in my room. Sarah just came in from playing on the patio and she smells of it. Strong of it. The people in Paradise are being allowed back into their homes. I can't imagine what these people have gone through in the past 36 hours. I feel very lucky.

In this picture, you have no clue that there's any smoke, but a little to the left, there's a huge plume of it.

Here's my son, Max, taking a nap. He lies on this big pillow called a Cloud Nine. His head is to the right, but it's hard to see.
I'm taking off now. It's time to give him his before bed medicine. Take care.

Sunday

I have so much on my mind today. My stimulus check should come some time in the next week or so. I've thought long and hard about what I want to spend it on. I worry that my biggest purchase - a good camera - is really not a wise use of my money. I want to be able to use the camera to make money, but now I'm worried that I'm fooling myself with that idea.

Is that an unrealistic dream? I don't need to make a lot of money, just some extra. I'd like to take pictures of kids and weddings and family and friends and nature. I'd like to capture something and give it to someone and have them say, wow, thanks, that's just what I've been wishing for.

I'm going to use some of the money on the girls, but there are so many things that they need. They need Summer clothes and in 2 and a half months, they are going to need school clothes. Sarah wants to go to day camp. I need to be able to drive them up and down the state for family visits and I want to get Bay something special for her 16th birthday, but honestly, there's only so much money that is going to be available.

I'm really stressing how I'm going to pay for everything that needs paying for. How am I going to be able to see Steve? He lives 6 hours away and neither one of us can afford the gas for that trip. I miss him and things have been so weird and wonky between us for the past couple of months. It would be good to be together and really see if those feelings are still there between us. I feel different, but I suspect that much of that is due to self-preservation.

Bay and I have been getting along a little better this weekend. It started with the game, she was so good-Bailey at the game. She is quite funny and charming when she wants to be. And beautiful. Look at her in this picture.

Sometimes I wonder how Todd and I made a girl so pretty. We are so average, which is fine, I have no problem with being average, but she's like a sum of all our a little above average parts. Luckily.

The weather this weekend is lovely - warm and breezy and comfortable. I've spent too much of it inside, on this couch, trying to figure out how I'm going to pay for everything. I wish I could go back to Friday nights ballgame and relive the whole thing over again, not wasting any time with worry. Worry never solved a thing.

Before the end of the day, Sarah and I are going to pack her bag for her Girl Scout camping trip - the June Jamboree. Tomorrow is her last official meeting and they are checking gear for the trip on the 6th. Camp. I wish I was going. I love to camp.

I wish I had time for a nap. Or maybe I should take a worry-break and read.......... before I know it, it's going to be bedtime and the weekend will be over.