SacMomsClub.com

With the first month of 2009 coming to a close (and a few more gray hairs to hide), here’s some Momservations for each day of January:

• It is a beautiful sight to behold watching your children head back into the halls of education – after Christmas break.
• It is a good day if your butt hits a chair before bedtime – car seats and toilet seats excluded.
• A grocery list lives on in perpetuity.
• Siblings: Live to fight, Fight to live.
• People would rather complain than give a compliment. Teach your children differently.
• Comedians are born at the dinner table.
• Nothing says love more than a homemade birthday card that uses all your tape and loses your scissors.
• You’ll have to come up with something better than boogers, vomit and diarrhea to gross out a mom.
• If mom ain’t happy, no one’s happy. It’s just a fact.
• Nothing puts the breaks on a productive day like a phone call from the school nurse.
• You can teach the lesson by letting them clean up the spill, or you can save a bigger mess and clean it up yourself.
• Don’t cry over spilled milk – yell and demand it be cleaned up before it soaks into the rug.
• There is a special place in heaven for mothers who still love their teenage children.
• A panic attack will pass, but gray hairs are forever.
• If an uneaten lunch gets thrown away at school and Mom doesn’t see it, does it still count as consumed?
• The Freedom of Information Act holds no authority over a pre-teen girl avoiding the consequences of being caught in a lie.
• A seasoned mom can detect the sound from behind a closed door of pee splattering all over a freshly cleaned toilet because a young man is being careless with his aim.
• What is dessert if not a bargaining tool?
• The person who invented mobile DVD players deserves the Nobel Peace Prize.
• Anyone who wants proof that life isn’t fair should check the pay stub for the job of motherhood.
• The smell of a baby, a freshly bathed child (who really did wash their hair) and brownies are scents of heaven.
• A boy and his XBox are soon parted when a note from a teacher comes home.
• A girl and her Hannah Montana/Jonas Brothers/Radio Disney CD’s are soon parted after a phone call from a former BFF’s mother.
• Definition of a miracle: Getting everyone in one household to agree on which TV program to watch.
• Adding a second bathroom is worth the money and will add years to your life (and possibly save a marriage).
• Thank you Lord for:

-         doors that shuts (and lock)

-         a 7-hour school day

-         baby wipes

-         bedtime

-         wine

It entered the house through the youngest and presumably weakest child.

She had it long enough to almost immediately infect her caretaker, the normally strong and impervious, Mom. But Mom was no match for this silent foe and went down quick and hard while Baby Girl youthfully rebounded.

Dad tagged in next, valiantly taking over household chores and responsibilities, struggling under the immense expectations, but managing nonetheless. The kids might be having chicken nuggets and Jell-O for dinner every night, but they were eating. He fed Mom a steady stream of pharmaceuticals to temper her misery. He, would protect them all.

He stood strong and tall like a majestic redwood as others fell around him, parents, friends, neighbors, until he was chopped at the knees by the voracious bug and the mighty giant crashed into bed as well.

Their hope now lied in the oldest boy child, too stubborn to get sick, too busy to sit still long enough to catch ill, and in the end too confident to bother washing his hands regularly.

Little Man began coughing, the first tell-tale signs. But he said he felt fine. His head started to pound – another indicator the illness was taking hold. But after some aspirin, he said he felt fine. He woke a recuperating Mom up several times one night with a fever causing hallucinations, but in the morning, he said he felt fine. He assured Mom he had no body aches, no sinus congestion, no debilitating aches and pains. He believed he would survive this flu pandemic that had taken hold of his house, his neighborhood, his community.

And he did.

That ugly bug took some shots at him, but he slammed it to the mat and said, “Take that!” He kicked flu butt and soon health was restored once again! As brother and sister resumed to fighting and playing like puppies, Mom rose again to take back over the house, weaker yet stronger for surviving, and Dad humbled by defeat vowed never again to let a virus attack his family so savagely again.

Next year – flu shots!

(Um, sidebar note: Except, that even with a flu shot, we all still would’ve gotten sick anyway since this strain of virus was resistant.)

Okay then, next year – Hawaii! Nobody gets sick in Hawaii! And if you do, who the heck cares – you’re in Hawaii!

I don’t know if you noticed, but I like to talk (for what is blogging, but an electronic way to keep talking after everyone’s stopped listening?). Hubby is often telling me, “I just asked for the time, not how to build a watch.”

He also likes to point out to our poor daughter who got the talking gene, “You got it honestly, kid. You’re mom’s a talker, your Gammy’s a talker, and her Aunt Jackie will keep talking to you even after you’ve rolled up the car window and are driving away.”

I’m just glad I have a partner in crime. Even if we are constantly talking over each other.

☺        ☺        ☺

Let’s say one of my strong points is I know what my faults are:

-      I talk way too much.

-      I like talking about me.

-      I have a habit of interrupting people’s stories to tell them my own similar stories.

-      I think everyone wants to know what I think.

In my defense:

-      I am a storyteller. It is my job. I get paid for it.

-      People should quit asking me, “So how are you?” or “What have you been up to?”

-      I love making people feel better about themselves, even at my own expense.

-      Doesn’t everyone want to know what I think?

So, in an effort to make this world a better place this 2009, I am starting with myself and some New Year’s resolutions. Here’s what I pledge to do this day and everyday forward and hopefully well and beyond the dawn of 2010:

-      Do more listening and less talking.

-      Find humility. Despite what my dad keeps telling me, it’s not all about me.

-      Do one thing a day that makes someone feel good about themselves (without interrupting them) or let’s them know I was thinking of them (other than myself).

-      If it’s so important, write it down. Then people have a choice if they want to know what I think by choosing whether or not they want to read it.

Then there are my every day standards. No-time-like-the-present beliefs needing no New Year to initiate and leaving no regrets if it all ends tomorrow:

-      Tomorrow is not promised. Count your blessings today.

-      Treat every day and everyone in it as a blessing good or bad. The rough patches are what make us stronger and the sweet spots even sweeter.

-      Choose to ride the roller coaster and not be a spectator of life. No matter how scared it makes you or sick to your stomach you’ll get, it’s way better than watching and wondering if you’ll like it. It also beats the monotony of standing in line waiting for life to happen, and you just might find you had fun after all.

Happy New Year and enjoy the journey.

Some families have Game Night.

Some families have Movie Night.

Our family, as announced by my son Logan last night, has Ear Wax Night.

If I haven’t completely grossed you out yet and you are intrigued enough to keep reading I will paint the pathetic picture.

The conversation over dinner dishes last night started harmless enough. Somehow we worked our way around to what could be a new Oscar category, Most Dramatic Simulated Torture Scene as Performed by a Child.

Our daughter Whitney would have won that category no contest when she once had to have her ears irrigated because of ear wax build up and a possible ear infection. You would have thought the doctor was tearing her from limb to limb the way she howled, screeched and begged for her life. It was an impressive performance indeed.

My mother-in-law (MIL), who was over for dinner, harmlessly asked the sporting question that degenerated the evening. “Does Whitney normally have excessive ear wax?”

“Good Gravy, you think she grew potatoes in her ears she generates such a field of ear wax!” I said.

“That’s why she doesn’t listen,” Hubby surmised. “Probably can’t hear a thing through all that ear wax.”

Just then Whitney came into the kitchen bringing her dinner plate to the sink. Grabbing a nearby flashlight I said, “C’mere Whit. Let’s see what you’ve got growing in there now.”

Still suffering from post traumatic stress syndrome from her last ear wax encounter, she started whimpering and backing away.

“You can have a treat if you let me just look,” I tempted.

She immediately took the bait. “Okay!” She came back, laying her head on the kitchen counter.

“Jesus, Mary and Joseph girl! How does one person generate so much ear wax?” I marveled looking at a fertile field of wax potatoes.

Hubby and MIL rushed over for a peak. Duly impressed, but needing a control group subject to compare, we all swiveled at once toward the boy child on the couch. “Hey Logan, c’mere for a second,” I said.

“What?” said Logan.

Once we got him under the flashlight we could see Whitney had some competition for potato farming. Hubby decided he did not want his kids cultivating ear wax potatoes and promptly ordered irrigation.

Logan really wanted to see what would come out of his ear so he was game. MIL decided to stay for the harvest on the pretense of medical support (she used to be a nurse), but in truth she too was morbidly fascinated. We got Whitney to go along with it by offering chocolate syrup to add to her treat.

With warm water, nasal bulb syringe left over from infant days in the kids’ medicine bag, and Tupperware to catch the run-off, the irrigation began.

And what an impressive crop it was. Logan set the bar high and it true 9 year-old fashion was giddily grossed out by his mammoth offering. I was just flat grossed out and glad I kissed their lips and not their ears at bedtime.

It was while we were flushing Whitney’s ears, all eagerly poised to see what the girl child’s ears would produce, when Logan happily announced, “It’s Family Ear Wax Night!”

At that moment I knew, we, as a family, excitedly comparing crops of ear wax potatoes, had truly either sunk to an unprecedented low or had stumbled upon a novel new family bonding ritual.

After a good laugh we decided we were all just gross.

However, I can’t help but think if I had the foresight to film it and put it on YouTube, Family Ear Wax Night would right now be the hot new sensation.

Darn. I should’ve also saved that one wax potato that looked like George Bush to put on eBay.