The Week in Moments: Spring Break

Last week the kids were off for Spring Break. We spent half the week at home and half the week at my parents' house in Encinitas. (And my Nana's Del Mar garden wonderland. Linking to all posts by/about Nana in three... two... one, zero, etc, here's a guest post Nana wrote once ...) Last Sunday, we surprised the kids with a bounce house just because and it was one of THE greatest ideas I have ever had in my life. (We are going to make this "surprise! there's a bounce house in the front yard!" a thing in our house, we've decided. Because this is the stuff memories are made of and sometimes, you just have to jump jump for your love, jump in...)

Other week highlights include watching butterflies mate (heyyaaaa!) at The Natural History Museum/forgetting to bring a change of clothes/forgetting that there was a water feature/driving home with naked children, visiting Quail Gardens San Diego Botanic Gardens and forgetting ONCE AGAIN to bring a change of clothes, beach days, finding a perfectly symmetrical heart-shaped kelp float that seems to be a genetic anomaly and felt like one of those magical heart-shaped signs... of what, I don't know, but even Fable agreed.

"This is an amazing sign, Mama!" she said.

"Right!?? I was thinking the same thing!"

All these years of being my daughter are starting to rub off on her. Also, Yoga. (Fable is taking Yoga after school and it has changed her life. And mine because I was never a Yoga person but now that Fable is so into it, I have become her Yoga student and am learning all sorts of amazing things about mindful eating and peaceful warrior...ness.)

Namaste.

As for Archer, I bought him Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone on Tuesday and by Thursday morning he was on book two.

He had no intention of reading them because everyone else is reading them and then, last night he turned to Hal and said, "These are the greatest books of all time."

My parents have a pool and kindly heated it for the kids so they could swim. Bo is literally diving off the sides into the deep end and giving us all a heart attack even though she has her trusty Puddle Jumper floatation device strapped to her everywhere. Meanwhile, Revi refuses to go anywhere near the pool but will happily float around in her fishy raft in the jacuzzi, so long as someone is very very close to her.

We managed to survive our first candy-free Easter. Mostly everyone ate eggs and my Nana's French Toast. And bacon much to my chagrin. Bo called Bacon "meat chips" and asked for "ten more, please" after trying one when I wasn't looking.

And then I sobbed in the corner and my Nana was like, "but they come from happy pigs! Sustainably raised!"

"MEAT CHIPS, MAMA! TRY IT!"

Anyway. We had a really lovely week. Lots of adventures and sandy scalps, skipped naps and skinned knees.

These photos were taken from the other side of this post. Totally worth the unpleasant moments because, man, is there ever some beauty up in this piece. Post-it notes, abound.

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GGC

201/200

 via Pinterest

I don't know if you caught Morgan's Marijuana post a few weeks back but if you have not, I highly recommend you hop over to her site today and check it out.

I mean, hasheesh louieesh. There are more pot dispensaries in my neighborhood than there are restaurants AKA everyone is doing it. And yet... shhhhhh.... don't you dare tell a soul that I'm am a medical marijuana patient. Meanwhile "xanax" and "valium" are name-dropped in professional bios like badges of honor while WEED remains a four-letter word. Even when it's being legally consumed, prescribed and purchased. How is this so?

In Morgan's words:

Why do we have to create parenting identities out of our vices anyway? Wine-swilling Mom. Cursing Mom. Pill-popping Mom. Is being a parent so terribly uncool that we must compensate by showing the world how hard we can party regardless of who is under our supervision?

The stigma is a real problem for many reasons and Morgan breaks it down in her post:

We have so far to go in this country with just the simple stigma of Marijuana as street drug rather than beneficial natural medicine which as an added bonus can also be made in to useful cloth, paper, oil, and is easily renewable. We stand by as children have life-threatening seizures and give them drugs so strong they risk shutting down their brain stem when just a few drops of CBD extract (a non psychoactive element in marijuana — meaning it doesn’t make you feel “stoned”) can give them something closer to a normal life than many of their families have ever dreamed. We watch as pregnant women lose babies and risk death from illnesses like hyperemesis gravidarum while science has shown time and time again that marijuana could have wildly positive effects on morning sickness of all severities with no negative effects on the unborn child. Instead, we continue a manufactured war on a valuable renewable resource that’s been portrayed by the US Government as a class I drug while they are simultaneously funding studies that determine that marijuana has medical value....

(As a parent, I would far rather my kids use cannabis for their anxiety than pop a xanax and many of my friends and family members regularly use LEGALLY, thanks to California law, and are happier and healthier because of it.)

If we’re going to have a conversation about pot, medicinal or otherwise, I think it needs to start with the stigma even those of us who support it and benefit from its medicinal properties have trouble shaking. For me that starts with the decision that there doesn’t need to big a big secret or a big confession. I’m a Mom. I’m a card carrying medical marijuana patient. Those are just two of about a million things about me.

A (to the) men. (Read her whole essay, here.)

P.S. The following song has little to do with Morgan's post but it's been on heavy rotation in our house as of late and the band is called The War on Drugs so... it... felt... somewhat... apropos.

201. Red Eyes by: The War on Drugs 

P.P.S. My mom just sent me this essay by Carl Sagan via this post when I sent her a link to Morgan's. Worth a read as well. 

Sagan ultimately concluded that it was easy to use marijuana in moderation. For that reason he wrote that "the illegality of cannabis is outrageous, an impediment to full utilization of a drug which helps produce the serenity and insight, sensitivity and fellowship so desperately needed in this increasingly mad and dangerous world."

#legalizeit

GGC

The Morning After

My alarm is the sound of a Taboo Game button which I must have accidentally packed in last night's hurry to get out my parents' door and into the car, onto the road where we would move slowwwwly up the 5, bumper to bumper, The Sound of Music soundtrack on repeat.

How do you solve a problem like Easter Sunday night after Spring Break traffffffiiiiiccccc. How do you find a word that means, Exhausted beyond measurrrreeee...

We got home just before midnight. Three of the four kids transferred into their beds. (There's always one who does not. It's like clockwork. While being transferred from carseat to bed, one child will fall completely apart.) And so, for 45 minutes, Bo cried (wailed) and "shhhhh... it's okay, you're home now" as I:

- Separated the dirty clothes from the clean.

- Spilled pockets of sand in the bed on accident.

-Hung creased dresses on hangers in the pitch darkness while singing "Let it Go" for the tenth time because that is the song that was requested.

And finally:

- Listened to her breath become heavy.

- Recognized she was finally asleep.

- Carefully lifted her out of our bed and into hers.

- High-fived Hal for a successful transfer mission.

"Nice work team, goodnight."

***

That was last night, relatively painless in comparison to this morning with this goddamn Taboo button that is killing me slowly. Archer's awake but barely. His shirt is on inside out and backwards and he becomes furious with me when I mention that, well, "your shirt is... it's cool if you want it to look like that but you may want to..."

He storms off toward the bathroom, slamming the door. 

Meanwhile, Fable is still asleep even though I've pulled every cover off of her bed, sat her up against the wall and attempted to help pull her arms out of her pajama sleeves. And Bo is pressing the Taboo button like it's the funniest thing ever.

"Good morning, kids" she says as Tamara pushes open the front door. Beep beep beeeeeeeeep.

And now Revi is screaming to be held. She was incredibly clingy all week and now, when I try to pass her over to Tamara she screams for me.

Mama only this morning.

And the taboo button goes right on beeping and somehow Archer's folder got stuck in his backpack zipper and ripped in half and it needs to be repaired and a long lost piece of homework that has not been finished emerges and "Mom? Have you seen my script?" and Fable finally wanders out of her room half-dressed and in desperate need of the rainbow sock with the hearts on it and MOM, THERE'S NO SUCH THING AS A SOCK MONSTER, STOP SAYING THAT ALL THE TIME! and Revi will not be put down and now she is screaming because she wants toast but the toast I just made her is all wrong because what she really wants is COLD TOAST NO HOT TOAST NO COLD TOAST NO HOT TOAST and I'm trying to Keep Calm and Tape Archer's Folder Back Together.

As Bo holds down the Taboo button.

And Fable needs toilet paper.

And Revi throws the toast on the ground.

And Zadie eats the toast because she's a dog.

And Revi decides the now-eaten toast is the only thing in the world she has ever wanted.

And I am suddenly in desperate need of a paper bag to breathe into and Revi, can I please put you down for two seconds so I can pee? 

No!

Mom, where's my script?

Mom, where's my sock?

Don't put me down! Don't put me down, mama!

Can you braid my hair?

Where's my water bottle?

ZADIE IS EATING MY TOAST NOO!!!!

BEEP BEEP BEEP.

"TURN OFF THAT FUCKING TABOO BUZZER!" I finally say because, seriously with that thing, what the fucking fuck.

And then, Fable appears.

She has found the sock.

The toilet paper, too. (It was on the toilet where it always is.)

And as I'm taping Archer's folder back together with Bo attached to my leg (sobbing because I have taken away her TABOO buzzer) and Revi in my arms screaming about needing a band-aid for the boo-boo she got yesterday (the toast incident was so five seconds ago), Fable presses a post-it note to my chest and walks away.

The note shows two girls high-fiving each other and it says, "YOU ROCK" in all caps and in the middle of the beeping and the crying and door-slamming and cold hot cold hot toast, and life and life and life, I have found the paper bag I've been needing to breathe into since 6:36 this morning.

And it's a neon yellow post-it.

***

The kids are ten minutes late to school. Usually this concerns me, but today I'm amazed (impressed) we made it to school at all. We're all exhausted with hair askew and swollen eyes when I park the car and fish the kids out of the backseat.

"I know, I know. Me, too. I know."

I fill out their tardy slips and hug them both goodbye, but before we go our separate ways, we bring it in for a high (low) five.

Some mornings, when survived, deserve to be celebrated. Even if just for a moment. 

GGC