Holiday Kids

Kids back at school today after a week off. I have a whole new sympathy for teachers or anyone else who works with children who has to try to wrangle them after a week (or more) of being off schedule. I suppose professionals have tricks and experience I’m not privy to. But yeah, the struggle is real. 

The good news is I survived a full week of full time momming, cooking Thanksgiving for eight with no kitchen, and entertaining visiting relatives without screaming in anyone’s face “I’m trying to make your holidays fucking magical!!!” despite occasionally feeling the urge to. 

I had a gig the night before Thanksgiving at which I was able to retrieve a set of Fiesta Ware a friend sold me earlier that day - I had been debating about getting new dishes for the new kitchen but wasn’t sure which direction to go; I’m kind of over the plain white dishes I bought when I moved here in 1993. I think this set will add a nice pop of color to an otherwise subdued kitchen palate. And let me tell you how the serving dishes and extra flatware saved the big dinner!

We had a nice day at Huntington Gardens, saw the lights at Descanso Gardens, drove up Mt Wilson, decorated the house for Christmas. It was a busy and exhausting weekend. The boys’ energy was off the charts. This is something I also now get as a parent that I never understood before - those whiny, bratty, combative kids you see around the holidays that make you never want to spawn? Yeah, those kids are not like that all the time. These are Holiday Kids - hopped up on sugar and presents and new people and no structure or schedules. They’re a hot mess. I’m a pretty regimented person and even I struggle to keep the kids in any normalcy during these times. At least over Christmas break they have winter camp most of the days. By then I will have returned from my trip, I’ll be grounded for four months, the kitchen will be wrapping up, and everything will be better. 

Two holidays down, one to go!!

Kitchen halfway mark

Tomorrow they wrap up drywall and mudding the kitchen. I had hoped to not have work being done this week while the kids are off school, but it hasn’t been so bad. I think I put so much energy into anticipating the annoyance of not having a kitchen that now that it’s here, it’s inconvenient but not terrible. This is the kitchen today:

It still looks like nothing. I know how these projects are - it’s a whole lot of nothing for a long time, then it all comes together at the end. It won’t really look like much until I’m back from my trip and they start tiling and installing cabinets. It’s hard to imagine we’ll ever have a kitchen again. But we will, and it’ll be awesome. 

So far the week with no school has gone ok - this is the first time I haven’t had at least one kid in preschool at least some of the time. But the kids are so independent now - they can play up in the attic space unattended, we can go to the Y and they can go to the childcare area contentedly, they can watch cartoons in the morning until I feel like dragging my carcass out of bed. Yesterday we did our very first geocache hunt - we found two, then couldn’t find three and called it a day at a new park.

Geocaching is something I’ve wanted to try for ages and I felt like they were finally old enough. There was a lot of whining and fretful getting in and out of the car, but it ended up being pretty fun. I want to start placing some, too. I think they’d enjoy that more. 

So in two days I cook Thanksgiving dinner for possibly nine people on my hot plate and in my microwave. It’s going to be an adventure for sure, especially bringing the furniture back out of the shed and trying to find all the linens and plates I packed away. But everyone knows we’re operating at a major handicap, so hopefully it’ll be fun. Sometimes when everyone knows it’s not going to be perfect it takes the pressure off. 

Then the following Friday I leave for Thailand. Looking forward to/dreading it. 

Winter break solutions

So once again I thought I could manage the epic three week winter break with no childcare - two kids and me, 24 hours a day, with no plans - and then caved and booked a winter camp late last night instead. Sigh. But also, sigh of relief. The biggest obstacle this year was the fact that Theo is frustratingly just three months shy of five (by mid-Dec) which means he couldn’t take part in any winter camps except the one at his afterschool which doesn’t appeal to me for reasons I’ll get into. And Bobby didn’t want to join him there, and I figured two rambunctious kids were better than one lonely miserable kid, so the original plan was to just keep them both home.

One thing parents and I always marvel at is how little support there is for people with kids under five - right when you need it the most. No public programs, few paid programs. Then magically when your kid turns five the world is your oyster. Seems backwards to me.

Anyway, a quick google last night found me a winter camp that takes kids four and up (huzzah) from 9-3:30 each day, reasonably priced. There’s still a lot of down time - all weekends, plus Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, and NYE and day. I’m cringing at spending more money right now but also relieved I’m not going to lose my goddamned mind. 

I had a brief stint in San Francisco this weekend - just one night - then I leave for Austin on Friday and that’s the last of my band travel until April. I have to say...I’m going to miss it. Even though the kids are so much easier now than they were a year ago, still, getting those little breaks are key. And by January (hopefully) the kitchen will be done, which will make it a lot easier to hang out at home. 

In the middle of all this is Thanksgiving, followed by my ten day trip to Thailand which I am simultaneously looking forward to and dreading. I wish the trip were in February or March instead of in two weeks. But it is what it is. 

Today we have the day off school. I took Theo to the dentist, then we all went to a wreath making party (fun but crazy stressful - based on the amount of whining kids and snapping mothers, I was not alone in this assessment). It’s only 2 pm and it already feels like midnight. I can’t wait for school tomorrow so I can tackle the massive pile of work waiting for me. 

I’m having misgivings about Theo’s afterschool. I can hang with its loose nature (that’s how he was admitted at four, after all), but it’s the bathrooms that scare me. At first I thought the kids used the open public bathrooms - which in this neighborhood are usually full of homeless people taking baths in the sink. They assured me they didn’t use those - not unsupervised, anyway - but used some on the inside of the building. I felt a little better about this...until I saw that even those inside buildings were open to the public and mostly used by the random men that wander off the street to use the basketball courts. I am not ok with my four year old wandering off alone to use a public bathroom with strange men, not one bit. I’m going to talk to them about it tomorrow, but even if they give me the assurance that he’ll only use a bathroom with supervision, how do I know that’s actually going to happen? Am I overreacting? Is it fine? It’s been haunting me ever since I saw that inside bathroom last week and realized it was not for the exclusive use of children. I may have to pull him out of there. 

Be of good cheer

So, our blue wave has come. I had a very anxious flight home from Budapest on Election Day, the last leg of which had no access to live tv when all the results were pouring in. Then when we finally touched down and I was able to furtively switch my phone off of airplane mode, I was so tired, hungry and gassy that I could only focus on the losses - Beto, senate seats, a dead guy getting elected - and was pretty bummed. But after further investigation in the light of day today, it seems we lost some battles but only ones we expected to lose; the most important thing is we won the house and some key positions are in our hands. 

Be of good cheer. The Republican vice grip on this country is crumbling. 

But also - what the fuck, white women?!? Seriously!

In other news, the band had a really delightful trip to Budapest. It was similar to our Korean trips in that the audience was mostly made up of people who had heard our CDs for years and never dreamed of seeing us live, and so were crazy enthusiastic. They bought every last piece of our merchandise, wanted autographs and Facebook friendships. We had our fifteen minutes of fame.

And the city. The city! Budapest has earned a spot as one of my favorite places. Beautiful, historic, walkable, tourist friendly without being a tourist trap. On our final day I decided to brave public transport alone and parboil myself at one of the many hot springs - 

I felt entirely unprepared for my visit - I really should have done more research into the history of Hungary and its people. It’s pretty fascinating. It was my first visit to Eastern Europe and I hope not my last. 

The boyfriend watched the kids for almost a full week in my absence. Other than a couple of mistakes, I think he did a good job. It’s easy to pick away at little things because nobody will ever parent your kids the way you do, but as with the election results I’m trying to focus on the positive. I have a wonderful man in my life who takes care of my kids like his own while I travel, saving me thousands of dollars. Be of good cheer. 

The kids are still in underwear at night and are still peeing their beds every night. I told Bobby he has to train his brain to hold his pee while he sleeps. He asked, “how do I do that?” I honestly don’t know. Most people would tell me they’ll do it when they’re ready...but come on. This kid is almost seven. I’m pretty sure he’d be happy to be in pull ups until adulthood. Most other kids have this mastered by three or four. I don’t get it. What am I doing wrong? What should I be doing? The nighttime training rages on. At least B has stopped the daily pants pooping by going at school after lunch. Is that what this has been about, all this time? Whatever it is, I’ll take it. I can only handle one continence problem at a time, thank you very much. 

 

No tenemos kandies

Is there such a thing as being a grinch about Halloween? I didn’t hate it; it just seemed to drag on and on this year (the kids wore their shitty “costume in a bag” Black Panther and Bumble Bee transformer costumes for some event or other pretty much every day for the last week, undermining the actual holiday). Also, I’m being pulled in a million directions at the moment and am distracted and discombobulated - the kitchen demo started on Halloween, see below:

So I am currently testing out our tiny enclosed porch laundry room/satellite kitchen with mixed results. It will take some doing to get a groove going in there. Right now I don’t really know where anything is, everything is at odd heights, and my routines are still off. And I’m the kind of person who does not do well without routines. 

Also I leave for Budapest in about twenty minutes. I have not had much time to mentally prepare for that undertaking - a lengthy, complex European trip and singing three nights in a row...it’s a lot. I mean, I’m glad of the break, and I’m sure it’ll be an adventure, but...with the kitchen just started I’m leaving a lot of loose ends here. Trying my best not to be anxious. 

Sadly, I had to sign Theo out of school early and miss his school’s Halloween parade to go to Bobby’s instead because they were at the same time. Yep, once again the older sibling wins, solely by virtue of the fact that Bobby would remember missing his while Theo wouldn’t. Also, Bobby’s school is bigger, nicer, and the parade is more epic (last year the “Watch Me Whip” guys showed up and did an impromptu performance). After school we futzed around at a playground, then the BF got home from work and we all went trick or treating in the same Eagle Rock neighborhood we went to last year, and it was great. It’s such a pleasure to have kids that can walk up to the door by themselves, say thank you, and be polite. I remember struggling with strollers and toddlers constantly tripping and falling in the dark (although we kept count and Theo tripped and spilled the contents of his trick or treat pumpkin five times, so maybe he’s not as sure on his feet as I thought!).

Next year both boys will be at the same school and everything will be so much easier. I’ll have a new kitchen, and everything will be grand. As with all things, the struggles of today are an investment in a brighter tomorrow.