Category - Family Life

Ok, so Boo and Pumpkin Girl are both taking ballet folklorico lessons. I’m sure you’ve seen Mexican folk dancing before, at least on TV. I grew up enjoying various folklorico companies perform at the fiesta in Santa Barbara. I was even a flower girl. But somehow, it never occurred to me or my parents to have me take folklorico lessons.

So all these years later, I have children who are at the right age to start lessons AND we live in a city large enough to actually have folklorico companies. Late last summer I sent out a couple of emails, asking about lessons for Pumpkin Girl. Neither company responded to me, so she started ballet classes instead, which is what she really wanted.

Then out of the blue, last August, I got an email informing me of the upcoming annual auditions for one of the company. Pumpkin Girl was excited to go, especially when I reminded her of the big beautiful dresses that the girls wear. The email encouraged boys to come along, too. Just for fun, I asked Boo if he wanted to go to the audition. Surprisingly, he said yes! He was hoping to learn the dance with the machetes.

Off to the auditions we went. It was less an audition than it was a “try it” class, and both children had a great time. One of the moms there sold me some new folklorico shoes for Pumpkin. If you’ve seen any folklorico performances, you’ll notice that they seem to do a lot of stomping. Part of that is the wooden stage they perform on, part of if is that that toes and heels of the shoes are embedded with a ton of nail heads.

Boo’s shoes took a little longer to get. First of all, we can’t buy them locally. Second, he’s got a very small foot and most of the places would have had to special order his size. Poor Boo was feeling very self-conscious not having the right shoes and not being able to make any noise while dancing in his tennis shoes. He would come home complaining of sore feet because he’d been stomping. But the correct boots have been obtained and in his words, he’s “gone from not making any noise at all to being the loudest!”

I searched around the internet looking for folklorico videos to share with the children. They particularly liked this one, which you will know as the Mexican hat dance.

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I’ve created a bit of a sensation over at the Sonlight Forums. It all started innocently enough. Sarah was reaching the end of her pregnancy and she was just done. If you’ve ever given birth, you know exactly how she felt. Tired, big, achy, uncomfortable and big. She wanted that baby out. I casually mentioned that she could try an induction technique that worked for me: Reese Peanut Butter Cups.

What?!

When I was pregnant with Rebecca and due December 28, I was worried that I would have her before Christmas and she and I wouldn’t make it home to celebrate with the rest of the family. On the other hand, I was anxious for her to arrive. Someone on another online forum recommended eating peanut butter cups to bring on labor. I thought it was a bit odd, but I stored it in the back of my mind. I not-so-patiently waited for labor to begin and finally started eating mini peanut butter cups.

I ate a few handfuls at a time, over the course of a couple of days, with the last round being in the evening before going to bed. The next morning my water broke and Rebecca arrived on December 22, with just enough time for us both to come home on Christmas Eve.

A coincidence? Perhaps.

At the end of my pregnancy with Bip, I was feeling much like Sarah. It was August in Virginia, need I say more? This time I wasn’t dragging things out. I ate half a bag of miniature peanut butter cups in one sitting after the older children went to bed. I finished the bag sometime after lunch the next day, then took a nap.

Philip arrived home around 5:45. He asked me what I’d been doing and I told him that I finished up the peanut butter cups. He said, “uh-oh!” While we were talking, my water broke and Bip arrived an hour later.

Another coincidence?

I told all of this to Sarah, whose interest was peaked at my suggestion. She didn’t believe it any more than I did at first. But she tried the peanut butter cups and her baby arrived within 24 hours. Since then, she and I have been encouraging other end of pregnancy moms on the SL Forums to give it a try. I think we are up to 3 success stories now. As it turns out, at least two other moms have piped in with their positive experiences with peanut butter cup induced labor. We’ve got several others who say they’ll give it a try when they approach their due date.

Some skeptics on the board claim that all that chocolate clears out your digestive tract, thus triggering labor. Personally, I didn’t have any ill effects, bowel or otherwise, from eating all those peanut butter cups. Either way, castor oil is often recommended to jump start labor, with the warning not to stray too far from the potty. All things considered, I’ll take the peanut butter cups, thank you.

From the anecdotal evidence on the SL Forums, it does seem like the peanut butter cup minis work best. You should try to eat as many as you can in one sitting. Like all “natural” induction methods this works best if you are close to full term anyway and are looking for a jump start.

So have you ever heard of the magic of peanut butter cups?

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First, Bip did not sleep well last night. Well, he’s not a baby anymore and the boy needs to sleep. MAMA needs to sleep. Argh with that kid already.

Next, we’re all out of wipes. So first thing this morning of course, the above mentioned non-sleeping toddler has a giant, green, gross poop. The only good thing about having to use toilet paper for clean up is that it went right down the toilet. I’m wondering if the green poop is related to him being up all night, like maybe his belly hurt?

Then, as I’m in the middle of this diaper change, the phone rings. On my way to the bathroom, I check the caller ID and it’s an 800 number. It’s also 8:30 in the morning. So I didn’t answer it and I start thinking bad thoughts about companies who call before 9 am.

So, toddler all fresh smelling and clean again, I go down to finally eat my breakfast. The mystery 800 caller has left a message. It’s my credit card company and they want me to call them back.

So I do, and lo and behold, my credit card has been compromised. Two charges at Amazon.com were made this morning, before I even got up. So my oatmeal’s getting colder as I go through each charge I’ve made in the last 2 weeks. Sigh. Now I’m getting a new card and I’ve got to try to remember where my card is used for automatic payments. The cc person seemed to think that my number was stolen at Amazon.com.

And why, why does Bip need to crush his goldfish crackers before dumping them on to the newly vacuumed carpet?

I can’t imagine what else the Lord has in store for me today. Guess I’m not going shopping. I think I’m going back to bed.

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Today’s post has an optional musical accompaniment. Click “play” below to listen while you read.

Pumpkin Girl takes the cake, she really does. Somehow she always manages to win a prize. Not necessarily for feats of skill or academic excellence, but in contests that have to do with luck.Today was our church’s annual Mass in the Grass and parish picnic. I think it’s a military thing. At our base here, mass was held along the banks of the Potomac river. Even though the forecast was for another hot and humid day, it was pleasantly warm and breezy. After mass we enjoyed a veritable cornucopia of culinary delights otherwise known as everyone’s best potluck dishes. Yum!

We stuck around for the children’s activities, including a jump tent, dunk tank, beading necklaces and face painting. We were sitting around watching the action at the dunk tank and getting ready to leave when they announced the cake walk. Now, I know what a cake walk is, musically speaking, having once learned to play “Golliwog’s Cakewalk” on the piano, which is what you’re listening to. But I didn’t know what sort of game it was going to be today. But I asked Boo and Pumpkin Girl if they wanted to do the cakewalk, and only Pumpkin wanted to. Off she went and I followed to watch.

Today, the cakewalk amounted to a game of hot potato, using a paper “cake” plate. The children were a little confused about the instructions and there were some 2 year olds who really didn’t understand what to do. But they gave it a shot and by the time the plate came around the second time, everyone knew how to play. And then the music stopped and would you believe it, Pumpkin was holding the plate.

Woohoo, she won and she was taken out of the circle and led to a table full of cakes. She was told she could pick one, then the organizer went back to get the next round started. Pumpkin picked the prettiest cake she could find, of course, then we stood there for a moment, wondering if she won a piece of cake or the whole cake. For all the other games, every participant got a tiny prize, like candy or a noise maker. But the organizer came back, asked Pumpkin which cake she wanted, then handed us the whole thing!

We couldn’t believe her luck! In the past, she has won a $25 gift certificate to the commissary and a pre-made Easter basket containing a stuffed Tweety Bird wearing a pink hat. But this time, she really did take the cake.

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I got my hair cut today. It’s been awhile because finding a good stylist is so hard. Especially when you live on a military base located in what we’ll call one of the not so desirable DC neighborhoods. Let’s just say it’s no Georgetown and leave it at that. But recently a stay-at-home haircutting dad moved on base. His wife is active duty Air Force, he’s decided to homeschool this year and already he’s quite the hit with the ladies. He did a wonderful job with my hair, which is super thick and super straight. It’s been a while since I’ve had a hair cut worth talking about. In fact, my last great cut was the one in my old blog avatar picture. Like most things in my life, it has A Story. Do you want to hear it?

It was October 2004 and we were living in Korea. We were busy doing who knows what one afternoon when there was a knock on our door. It was an MP, telling us that we needed to get everyone out of the house and go across the street. Turns out that unexploded ordnance from the Korean War had been found in our neighbor’s backyard. Why they thought we’d be safe on the other side of our cul-de-sac is beyond me. But there we waited for further instruction. Then an explosive ordnance disposal team was going to be brought in from another base, which was about an hour away, so we needed to go away for awhile. They allowed us 15 minutes back into our houses to gather what we needed. I guess the possibility of being blown to bits was mitigated by the fact that none of us had our keys or wallets and many of the children weren’t wearing shoes.

Most of us ended up going to the Dragon Hill Lodge, a beautiful, resort style hotel on base. In many ways it was the social hub of the base. Its amenities included 3 restaurants, a bakery, tailor, tavern and a salon (I think we were actually sitting at that same table in the picture). As we were sitting in one of the lobbies, I was complaining about my hair, which at the time was straight down my back. My friend recommended I go to her girl, who worked right there at the salon. So we walked over and it turns out she was able to get me in that afternoon. And what else did I have going on that afternoon, besides wondering how long we were going to be stranded, how they were going to let us know it was safe to return and if there was even going to be anything to return to.

Turns out this girl (sorry, she was quite a bit younger than me) had trained with Vidal Sassoon in London and was the type of stylist who could look at your hair and your face shape and come up with a great cut. I loved what she did so much that I had Philip take my picture as soon as we got back home. Here it is…
Oh, and as for the rest of the story, one of our evacuated neighbors was also an MP and kept in contact with them so he was able to tell us when it was safe to return to our homes.

Isn’t that a funny story? Or do you all have unexploded ordnance in your backyards, too? I really don’t make this stuff up. You can read the for-real account of it here: Unexploded mortar shell… But as you read it, remember that I told you the true story, where we were just told to leave and no one told us where to go or how we’d know when to return. I guess someone decided in hindsight that we should have been taken to a central location and taken great care of and that’s the story they told the paper.

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