Tag Archives: Family

1976

Posted on December 9, 2011 | 4 comments

Our nation’s bicentennial.  A gallon of gas was 59 cents.  Taxi Driver was a hit at the box office.  The Muppet Show was on television.  The Eagles released Hotel California.  You’d have had to wait in line to get a Stretch Armstrong that Christmas.  Nadia Comăneci scored the first perfect “10” in the Olympic games.

And I was born.

There is an unwritten law that states that when a child is born in to a family you must have a Christmas ornament to commemorate their arrival.  And this is mine.

I don’t know that you can buy an ornament like this anymore.  At one time you could get a whole box of balls that were decorated with shiny polyester feeling filaments.  This is one of those, shrink wrapped with an image of a baby and the year of my birth.

1976.

I bought my first album at Waxie Maxie’s in Springfield.  KC & The Sunshine Band.  I rode a Big Wheel with a hand brake.  And I did it without a helmet.

I wanted to marry Tom Selleck . And have the Solid Gold dancers as my bridesmaids.

I didn’t mind black and white tv shows because one of the tvs in our house was black and white anyway.  I Love Lucy was the funniest show and it was on every morning.  The Love Boat seemed very risque to me, with all those unmarried, beautiful people vacationing together.  I wasn’t sure if I liked Chrissy or Janet better.  Chrissy had better clothes, but Janet was smarter.

I will never forget the episode of “Real People” where Sarah Purcell interviewed the woman with Lobster Claw Syndrome.  For years one whole side of my basement smelled like Strawberry Shortcake.  I made mixed tapes with songs I taped off the radio.

When I was very little I was afraid of Libya,  an economic recession and my father’s unemployment.  I knew that groceries were cheaper at Shopper’s Food Warehouse, because they didn’t give you any bags.  I have waited more than an hour at a video store to get a new release on VHS.

Pantyhose came in a plastic egg and the underwear section of a magazine was embarrassing.  I wanted to smell like Prell shampoo and Love’s Baby Soft and wear my dad’s old fraternity baseball jerseys.

I thought Parkay was fancy.  Sodas were for grownups. Fruit roll ups were for special treats and fast food restaurants gave out tiny orange juice glasses that were going to be collector’s items.  Everybody’s thermos smelled weird and their milk was lukewarm, but no one ever got sick.  I never met a kid with an allergy.

Because I was born in 1976.

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Simply Red

Posted on December 8, 2011 | 3 comments

Cherries in the Snow.  Raven Red.  Cha Cha Cherry.  Really Red.  Love that Red. Fire and Ice.  Ravish Me Red.

I was not always faithful to a single shade.  But I was a Revlon red lipstick girl for a long, long time.

In high school it was a look  I dabbled with.  There was a Degenerate Art exhibit at the National Gallery in the early 90’s.  I had the tshirt.  It was black.  It said simply DEGENERATE ART.  And I had new black cowboy boots.  Red lipstick completed the look.  It goes without saying that I wish I still had that shirt.

Cowboy boots were eventually  traded for Chuck Taylor’s and overalls, the red lips came and went.

In college I was the girl that didn’t wear shoes very often. I still wore Osh Kosh overalls almost every day.  But low maintenance I was not.

I fell in love with two things early in my college career.  Getting a wee bit baked and acrylic nails.  The hours I spent watching syndicated Beverly Hills 90210 on the WB (the only channel one could get in the dorms without cable) and sculpting the perfect red fingernail out of acrylic were  immeasurable.

To any and all concerned about the effects marijuana can have on a young mind I assure you the acrylic I inhaled in my dorm room did more damage.  Red lips completed the look.  Perfect red nails.  Red lipstick.  Overalls that haven’t been washed in who knows how long.  I was ready to go.

The latter half of my college career had me on my way to or from dinner theatre more often than not.  My “casual attire” moved from overalls to Ben & Jerry’s tshirts, tie dyes and pajama pants.

But the red lips remained.  In large part because the cold cream required to remove the make up I had spackled on for the evening was too time consuming.  And if you have a good reason to sport a painted on mole all night I have always been one to encourage you to go for it.

Bonus points for pearls and a red pageboy wig.

In summary, red lipstick and I go way back.

Red lipstick.  You can open a fashion magazine from nearly any decade and see at least one of the models wearing it.  It is timeless.  Classic.  But it’s only half of the equation.

Red lips without a pout?  You might as well be half dressed.  Ever since I was a little girl my mother has remarked upon my cupid’s bow lips.  (And my heart shaped butt, but that is a post for another day.  One perhaps not so rich with images.)  The first piece of art in her now vast art collection was a Tarkay.  She remarked then that the red pouty lips on all of the women in his paintings remind her of me.

I’d like to think I’ve not lost my pout.  Every girl ought to keep that skill in her back pocket.  But somewhere in the last decade the red lipstick started fading.  Traded in for chapstick with sunblock.  This weekend the red lipstick made a mini comeback.  Just for the day. But a gal can not wear a red feather headband with chapstick.  It was a no-brainer.

Every year when I hang this Patience Brewster ornament I will let it serve as a reminder.  Red lipstick is a bright idea.  Merry Christmas, Red Lipstick.  You have never let me down.  

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Silver teacups and Princess Parties

Posted on December 6, 2011 | 3 comments

In case you are still staring at my words from yesterday morning in disbelief… I am back again to blow your mind.  I don’t just love my mother-in-law.

I love my ex mother-in-law, too.

It will rain on my car every time I wash it for the rest of ever because nobody gets this lucky.  I didn’t get one great mother-in-law.  I got two.

The day we found out Emily was going to be a Girl I think the Carter’s outlet in Williamsburg got a phone call.  Ready the pink clothes!!!  Pam is on on her way!!  Em’s dad is one of three boys.  And one of many male cousins. And finally the Worthys would have a GIRL!

Like many first time moms I had all kinds of ideas about how I was going to dress my little girl.  She didn’t need to wear pink just because she was a girl.  She would have a yellow bedroom.  And I would never velcro a bow to her head, even if she looked like Charlie Brown.  I stuck to my guns on a few things.  She had a yellow bedroom.  And she never did have a velcro bow.

But there was  a day in the early fall when I was nesting something fierce and doing baby laundry, preparing my home for this little girl that would change my world.  I opened the lint trap in my dryer and I laughed.  I called Pam and I said “You win!!  There is PINK lint in my lint trap.”

I had a beautiful baby girl.  That wore a lot of pink.  And it didn’t kill me.  Or her.

Merry Christmas, Pam.  Since your retirement and move to Arizona we see less of you but your presence in our life is strong.  We had Grandmama Pam’s Sweet Potato Casserole for Thanksgiving.  And I think I will have to master your Chocolate Delight here pretty soon.  Through the magic of Skype we got to see your Santa dance and sing and I was reminded of the first Christmas that Em could walk.  It was cute the first hundred times she pressed the button.

A silver cup engraved with Emily’s name hangs from our tree.  It was a gift from your father, Pop-Pop, when Em was born.  It was too sweet to put away in a box of baby memorabilia, too precious to leave out all the time. So I put it in with the Christmas decorations.  Every year it reminds me of your grace.  You loved me and your son enough to encourage us both to love ourselves and each other enough to move on and let go.  I am forever grateful that I didn’t have to let go of you, too.

Grandmama Pam's Princess Party. Just a year after Em was born Pam got another Princess, Lily!!


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In Laws & Tradition

Posted on December 5, 2011 | 4 comments

If you blog or put yourself out there on the internet in any way at all you are quite likely aware of the way that you appear to a reader, be they casual or committed.  Often bloggers are criticized for being one-dimensional, only putting certain parts of their personalities out on display, some only the very best, some only the trainwreck that is their “personal” life.

I do my best to give a pretty well-rounded view of me, of who I am.  Not so much for a reader, but because my primary purpose in keeping this record is for my own benefit.  I will be able to look back and see what I hope is a realistic picture of the past.  Even if I do choose the images, the words, the stories to remember.   I make an effort to focus on both the good times and the bad.

The last year has held more good times than any year previous, in spite of the fact that I have led a pretty charmed existence all things considered.  But I try not to make bold statements about the greatness of my life, lest they bite me in the ass.

But I can say this was confidence.

My mother-in-law is better than your mother-in-law.  Without any grandstanding or superlatives I can likely convince you that I am right with one sentence.  I really like the little gifts she has surprised us with.  You know how your in-laws come to visit or you go to see them and they say “Oh, I picked these up for you” and you smile and make a mental note  – Every time they come to see me I will use these atrocious potholders.

But not me.  Nope.  MQD’s mother has been generous all while understanding that he did not marry a 20 year old bright eyed college girl.   I have opinions on things, some of them steadfast.  For chrissake she asked me what kind of toilet paper we like before she grabbed some the last time she ran out to the store.

She asked me if I was a Wreath Person before placing an order for a Holiday Wreath.  I am so totally  a Wreath Person and anxiously awaiting its arrival.

When we were in Boston this summer Ginger said “Oh, this is for you guys, you can put it anywhere, maybe your mantle.”  Gasp.  My mantle?  A girl’s holiday mantle is like the centerpiece to her holiday decorating. She can’t be serious?!

And I LOVE it.  Five months I waited to take it out of the plastic.  14 letters spelling out MERRY CHRISTMAS.  There was no way for her to know that I kind of love anything resembling vintage type set letters.  Or that I prefer colored decorations to brass.  And yet it is perfect.

We still need to get the garland for the mantle.  And hooks for the stockings. But I couldn’t wait any longer.  So much of Christmas to me is about unboxing the things that I have loved for years and years, the traditions.  It is a pleasure to put up a new decoration. One I will unwrap joyfully each year and remember, this was from our first married Christmas, in our new house.

Merry Christmas, Ginger. May I never have a box in my hall closet labeled Crap To Take Out When the In-Laws Visit.  Cheers!

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Nassau and The Worst Day Ever

Posted on December 2, 2011 | 1 comment

An ornament we brought back from our honeymoon for Emily

On our honeymoon we were going to go para sailing.   MQD was excited.  So was I.  It was a very honeymoon thing to do.  I had a picture in my head, of the day, of us, holding hands high above a beautiful beach and crystal blue water.  The sun on our faces, smiling.

Only it was windy that day.  And they canceled our excursion.  There was a temptation to try and “do” something else.  Something special.  We strolled around Nassau, hand in hand.  Looking for something “to do.” We went in and out of a few shops, we thought about buying a watch.   And we laughed about how this was “the worst day ever.”  And that our honeymoon was the pits. We bought a Christmas ornament that says “Nassau” for Emily.

The dates that MQD and I plan have a way of not working out.  We have abandoned more concerts halfway through, or not gone at all, choosing instead to stay at dinner an hour or two longer, just talking.   He likes me.  And I like him.  It’s easy to have fun when you’re with your best friend.  I hope I look at him just like this for many, many years to come.

Honeymoon, May 2011

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Disco, the ornament not the music or the nap

Posted on December 1, 2011 | 3 comments

I have a tendency to attach a tremendous amount of meaning to the most trivial of things.  I remember where I got them, who I was with, how I felt.  This item, a lighter, a tshirt, a coffee cup, it becomes a touchstone to that moment in time.

It is only very occasionally that I have had something for a long time and I don’t have any recollection of where it came from.

I know I have had this disco ball ornament for a long time.  I know I bought it for myself. I can vaguely recall taking it out of the box.  I am not much of an impulse buyer of things like ornaments.  Again, always so sentimental, my ornament collection is largely made up of memories.

I know it hung on my Christmas Tree after Em and I moved to Chapel Hill and then hung from a teeny hook in my living room for the remainder of the time we lived in that apartment.  I remember it hanging on my first big Christmas Tree in our house at the beach.  And I am fairly sure it graced the tree in my dinky little duplex the first year I lived in Kill Devil Hills.

Going back in time to Williamsburg and the Christmas Trees I had in college, I don’t think I had it then.  Those years were full of disco naps and a tree decorated in Happy Meal toys.  But I don’t think I had a disco ball.

 Strangely, I can’t be sure.

Merry Christmas to you, mysterious Disco Ball.  And thanks very much to the Kelly of Christmas Past that had the good sense to snag you off the shelf.

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The Book of Love

Posted on November 29, 2011 | 20 comments

It’s no secret I am a bit of a sap.  When we packed away the many keepsakes from our wedding I was careful not to put them all in to a box.  A box we’d not see again until we sold our house or Emily had a hankering to take a nostalgic walk with me.  All too often we box up our most precious things to “keep them safe.”  I contend we should use them.  Touch them.  Let them remind us of the days long gone.

Our ringbearer carried our wedding rings on a little plate.  A plate that says “With This Ring.”  (Purchased on Etsy from Paloma’s Nest!)  I’d considered framing it in a shadow box, but instead decided to slide it in to the box of Christmas ornaments.  Every year we could take it from it’s little box and I could tell the story of how this was the bowl that held our rings before we were married, just days before (or after!) Baby D was conceived.  We would hang it on the tree and smile at one another.  Sneak a kiss amidst eye rolls and ewww’s from the kids.  (I had this all planned out,  I am both a sap and a planner.)

This year we opened the big box of ornaments and it was on top.  Em carefully removed the box and said “Mom, you should do this one” just as MQD said “Be careful with that one.”  I carried it in to the kitchen to shorten the long red strings we had used to tie our rings to it. This was when my plan started to go awry.

I dropped it on the floor in  the kitchen.  And fell to my knees as though Lee Harvey Oswald had shot it from my hands.  Stunned.  Sobbing.  Em rounded the corner and began to cry hysterically.  MQD followed, fully expecting to see a dead animal, I am certain.  One we own.

Four, maybe five seconds, I cried.  And then I stood up.  And pulled my shit together.  This was not a sign.  Our marriage did not crumble on the floor in the kitchen.  We are tougher than a ceramic plate.  And we have Liquid Nails.  I might have cried a teeny bit more as I got the glue out from the laundry room cabinets, behind the door.  Where Em couldn’t see, my face tucked in to MQD’s neck.  I think I said something profound and explanatory. Something like “I am so fucking sentimental.”   And then I got to gluing.

Next year when we take this little ceramic bowl out from its box, there will be two stories.  The one about how this little bowl held our wedding rings.  We will still sneak a kiss and smile.  And then the three of us, Em, MQD and I will look at the baby and I will say “I dropped this bowl on the floor the Christmas I was pregnant with you.  I was all butterfingers and bat shit crazy.”

Marriages and families and even keepsakes are just one story piled on top of another.  Some good, some not so good.  But it’s a great book.  So you just keep on reading.

The book of love is long and boring
No one can lift the damn thing
It’s full of charts and facts and figures
And instructions for dancing
But I—
I love it when you read to me
And you—
You can read me anything.

~Peter Gabriel

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Adventure that’s beyond compare…

Posted on October 21, 2011 | Leave a comment

Many of you may assume I was going to write about the Gummi Bears.  But they are not the only family that is bouncing here and there and everywhere.  Or even the only family that is “Dashing and daring, courageous and caring,  faithful and friendly, with stories to share….”

I’ll cool it with the Gummi Bears.  But once it gets in your head…

I will (hopefully) be very busy this weekend prepping to (hopefully) move in to the new place on Tuesday of next week.  Fingers and toes are crossed.  So, I thought I’d point you in the direction of some entertainment for the weekend.  If you’ve been reading here than there is something that appeals to you about a good gross story, or a moment that deserves to be on candid camera, or a sappy mom that is bursting at the seams with love.

I started reading my friend Colleen’s blog at The Adventure of the Family Pants because I love a good do-over.  Colleen’s story is hers to tell, but believe me when I say that the path that led her to her family wasn’t always a picnic.  She survived.  With her humor, her grace, her potty mouth, her love of glitter all of it intact.

A few highlights –

There was the day bees attacked her kids.  And her highly allergic husband.  It’s the kind of story you hear and think “No fucking way.  Oh, man…”

And the day a baby skunk scared the shit out of her.

It’s not always the wild that gets her all worked up.  Her two year old can be his own version of a wild animal.   And her Pearls of Wisdom are to die for.

If her son was not enough of a handful, her daughter, whom she calls Ms Plum, is nine handfuls.  She is raising the world’s largest baby.  I am not a woman that wants to do things like eat babies.   Ms Plum is positively chewable.

Colleen is a special kind of woman.  She will make you laugh. And make you cry.  Her post honoring her mother and Domestic Violence Awareness Month is somehow chilling and heartwarming all at once.

Go visit her. The Adventures of The Family Pants.  Like her on facebook, follow her, bookmark her.  Just go say hello.

Because if you have ever been handed a shit sandwich or loved your kid so much you could explode or wondered if you were on a hidden camera show then you should read her.  And you’ll know you’re not alone.  Or that there are three of us, at least.

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Our girl

Posted on October 14, 2011 | 5 comments

I am cleaning up cat puke.  I may or may not have been scowling and grumbling to myself.  “You shouldn’t have to do that, Mom.  It is not your repsonsibility.”

To my credit I did not say “Really, Em?  Are you gonna do it?”  Instead I simply said “Of course it is.  Cats don’t clean up their own puke.”

“But it’s really Dad’s cat.  I mean, it is our family’s cat, but it is really Dad’s cat.”

“Well, honey, that’s not very nice.  What if Dad said you were really my kid and you weren’t his responsibility?”

It came out of my mouth and it was like I could see the words floating in the air.  I couldn’t shove them back in to my face.  So, I froze.

MQD giving me "The Face."

And in an instant I knew we were a family.  She might worry why the neighbors don’t play with her.   But she knows damn well her place.  There is a face that MQD makes.  He makes it kind of a lot.  At me. It translates to “Did you just say that?  Are you listening to yourself?  I love you, I do, but you are out of your ever loving mind.”

She made The Face.  And said “Right.  But we know that’s not true.”  And she shook her head.

We might never close on our house.  I might go insane from the boxes and the waiting.   Any one of a million things could happen with the baby.  I might not have a lot of the answers.  But we are a Family.

 

 

 

 

 

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If you go down to the woods today…

Posted on October 7, 2011 | 10 comments

We hit a snag on the closing on our house.  It happens.  We had planned to close several weeks before we needed to move just in case.

My computer at work fried.  That happens, too.  I had my data backed up because it is always a possibility.

Jer’s grandfather had an emergency surgery yesterday, he pulled through like a champ, but it was quite a scare.

I think there was something else that had me blue.  How quickly one forgets… I had a tantrum because MQD “doesn’t like me.”  All in all, I had a shit day.  Nothing permanent.  All things that I had either prepared for, could have predicted or that turned out okay in the end. Continue reading →

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Posted in Bad Mood, Parenting, Pregnancy

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