We’ve all  heard about the poor over-scheduled American child, haven’t we? He has no time for imaginitve play, no downtime, no time for homework. Well I’m  hear to tell you about the poor overscheduled American mom. She has no time to watch Glee, no time to play in her soap room, no time to even get her hair cut. And no time to blog.

Starting in late April we hit a perfect storm of teeball, a boost in project requests at Sakka Studio and a flurry of travel that left this poor blog abandoned.

Here’s the thirty second scoop on what’s happened lately.

• We went to Yellowstone for a long weekend
• I worked a lot
• We went to Oklahoma for four days
• I worked even more to catch up
• Robbie played a season of teeball that consisted largely of touching his head to the ground and eating dirt
• I did a ton of laundry to keep the teeball uniform ready game after game
• Robbie went on his first real backpacking trip with Toby – hiking 1.5 miles with his own pack, uphill and not whining. We’re pretty sure that’s a world record and as soon as we figure out what we did right we’re going to patent it, sell it, and retire.
• I let the laundry get ahead of me, it collapsed on us, trapping the entire family until paramedics arrived on the scene and, using the jaws of life, freed us.
• Robbie went (and I chaperoned) on an awesome field trip to the fire station that included a ride on the top of the hose truck and meeting a fireman whose ears were burned off. As soon as I figure out what I did that prevented Robbie from saying/doing something embarrassing I am going to patent it, sell it and retire.
• I made batch after batch of lotions, lip balms, scrubs, salts and lotion bars to test various formulations.
• I worked some more.
• In the last week of teeball, which was also the last week of school, I missed all the festivities of both by contracting the worst case of strep I’ve ever had, complete with uncontrollable vomiting (which felt so cool and soothing on my throat). I begged for death but Toby refused to accommodate me and instead nursed me back to health.
• I lost seven pounds due to said illness but made sure to gain three back right away by baking myself a little batch of brownies (and a pizza for dessert) as soon as I could swallow.

I had no intention of writing a post today. It’s my birthday and I was hoping to do as little as possible beyond my obligations. But, as I was zooming through the kitchen to write something on the shopping list I keep on the fridge, I noticed this glass on the island. It stopped me in my tracks.

At first it was the silliness of the scenario; a bendy straw in a wine glass, half full of water. It came to be there because, as I’m sure you can guess, my four year old son begged to have his breakfast drink with a “fancy glass” and then begged again to have a bendy straw to drink it.

Silliness aside, the lighting appealed to me and I wanted to capture it because it’s an image that I felt embodied a day with a preschooler. The more I look at it, this picture seems like a metaphor for even more.

Dirty dishes out of focus in the background.

A flexible, silly solution born in the mind of a four year old.

A bit of “fancy” in an otherwise typical day.

Warm light filling a glass half full.

Thirty one was a good, hard, unexpected, challenging, encouraging, triumphant, disappointing, painful, harrowing, growing year.

I have high hopes for thirty two.

Sunday we took Robbie and his best bud to the movies to see How to Train Your Dragon. Before the movie began, I insisted on a pit stop at the bathrooms to help minimize during-the-movie bathroom breaks.

Two little boys walk into side-by-side stalls. The best bud closes his stall door but Robbie doesn’t.

“Hey bud, close the door.” I say.

Then from the closed stall comes “Yeah, Robbie. No one wants to see your package!”

Then last night…

We have a constant problem with Robbie wanting to drink, spray, spit or otherwise imbibe the bath water he’s sitting in. We’ve tried explaining this is not hygienically sound but he persists.  So  last night I tried pure bluntness.

“Robbie, please don’t put the water in your mouth. It’s the same water your bum is sitting in. You know, the dirty bum we’re having the bath to wash? You don’t want that in your mouth.”

“No mom, that’s the Jersey side of the tub” he said, indicate his left side. “This is the fun side.”

Not thinking I heard him right, I asked “the dirty side?”

“Nooooooo” he said slowly, as if talking to a small child “The JERSEY side. That’s the Jersey side, this is the fun side. So it’s ok.”

Honestly, how can you even frame an argument in the face of such non-logic?

Sometimes the best family photos aren’t the ones that turn out “right”. This photo was taken at a small bird sanctuary right next door the the Fred Meyer my family always grocery shopped at when I was a kid. We would often buy loaves of bread then walk across the parking lot to feed the swarms of ducks and geese.

One day we went to feed the birds right after church. There I was in my white patent leather church shoes and no doubt my white tights as well. I must have been about seven or eight. I was so engrossed in feeding the birds that I didn’t notice a mud colored thing crawling toward me across the muddy ground. I didn’t notice it, that is, until it sat its cold wet furry musk rat body right on my open topped shoe.

That’s when I started shrieking like only a little girl in church shoes can do.

Fast forward about 22 years. Visiting my family one summer we got the bright idea to take Robbie to feed the birds. Apparently eighteen month old children don’t enjoy being swarmed by geese as tall as them.

In  hindsight, I really should have seen this one coming.

But all was not lost. The next summer Robbie was very happy to feed the birds. But really, which picture is more entertaining?

And if you ever find yourself in Roseburg, Oregon be sure to visit the bird sanctuary on Garden Valley Boulevard. It’s pretty cool and totally free (besides the bread).

Pooptastrophe: A traumatic event or accident involving a preschooler or any child out of diapers and “number two.”

As in, “Robbie had a pooptastrophe at the triathlon when he used the port-a-potty. ”

No one knows what went wrong but I am told his hands were covered with the evidence when he eventually poked his head out the door to ask for help. Both his mother and the nearest sink were about 100 feet away – in opposite directions.

Shannon, I owe you big time.