April 15, 2012
rain on rose
105:365
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April 14, 2012
munchkin
104:365Zozo's preschool pal Niya is a munchkin in a local community theater production of The Wizard of Oz, so we went tonight. We love the story anyway, but these kids did such a phenomenal job. Dorothy and the Tin Man sang so beautifully that they brought tears to my eyes. And the Wicked Witch! Her laugh was positively diabolical!We had a great evening, running into "old" friends from preschool and "new" friends from kindergarten. It makes me marvel at how much richer my life has become simply because I have a child. Not only do I have her to fill my days with laughter and my heart with love, but her experiences through school have given me such a rich patchwork of friends that I think I must be about the luckiest girl in the world. How blessed I am to be surrounded by so many truly wonderful people who care about my daughter and indeed my whole family. These people…these friends…they're like a gift from the Wizard.(Niya is second from the right, with the blue skirt. Adorable munchkin!)
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April 13, 2012
paper pusher
103:395I am the princess of paper. The queen of contracts. The doyenne of deeds.I have telephoned, emailed, and hounded in person. I have searched nearly every packed box in my summer cottage for paperwork, and researched dozens of websites. I have dropped off, picked up, questioned, and answered. Tomorrow morning I meet with my builder to review and sign the final contract. Then I meet with my banker at 3 to turn over final copies of that last required document. Seriously. I'm about ready to go over to the broken house and start swinging a sledgehammer myself, just to have some movement that's more than just pushing paper. Today I met with my architect, who kindly took time to review the AIA contract with me and answer questions. I was reminded once again how lucky we are to have retained him over the hundreds of other architects in St. Louis. In the process of explaining something he showed me the binder for another house nearing completion in a small community nearby. The binder was one inch thick. Later, as I used his copier, I glanced over to an associate's desk and saw our binder, neatly labeled and already filling with documents. It's three inches thick. We got another good laugh at just how detail-oriented M and I have been. My fervent hope is that all that detailing will pay off in the end, with no change orders and no cost overruns. Because really, in all this, if I've missed something major I'm gonna be pissed as hell.
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April 12, 2012
deposit
Shhhh. An American president and a Danish queen are sleeping together under a pillow. It's only a matter of time before the paparazzi get here.
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April 12, 2012
gap
102:365She finally lost her first tooth today. Came out during snack time at After Care, which I found out when I arrived to pick her up. "Holy cow, Zo! That's awesome! Where is it?""In my tummy!"She was eating something crunchy and thought the tooth was just a really really crunchy piece. "It's okay Mommy. You know why? The Tooth Fairy brings you a GOLDEN coin when you swallow your tooth!"F*ck. Where the hell am I gonna get a golden coin at 5:15 on a Wednesday night? Scratch that…7:30 on a Wednesday night because I gotta wait until she goes to bed. Enter M: superdad extraordinaire, even when he's not here. I raided the mug on his desk where he dumps all his leftover foreign currency after international trips. Tooth Fairy is kickin' it Denmark style and droppin' a 20 Kroner under Zoe's pillow tonight (it's golden, after all). Along with a few good ol' American greenbacks, of course. We called M using FaceTime so he could see the gap for himself. (That one call made the iPad worth every single penny.) We watched his eyes light up with recognition that there was something missing, and saw the look of awe on his face. It was really special. I was supposed to be in Kansas today. I was supposed to be gone. I blew the trip off for a number of reasons, one of them being that I was terrified at the idea of missing the loss of her first tooth. I realize as a working mom that I'll miss a lot of things. I've resigned myself to that fact. But I for damn sure was NOT going to miss this milestone. I want to be her first Tooth Fairy, and I want to celebrate with her, and I want to be here to mourn the physical loss of her babyness. I want to be here to witness how her smile changes, and how her speech changes (it's subtle, but you can hear that she's missing a tooth). No job is worth missing that, especially the one in which I am currently trapped. So here I sit, exhausted after a day of working, corralling all the various entities required to tear down a house and rebuild, researching summer camps for The Bug and then getting her registered with the right schedule to ensure maximum coverage, plus the various mundane tasks that make up a regular everyday life. And at the same time, I'm absolutely thrilled to play Tooth Fairy to the most awesome kid in the world.
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April 11, 2012
lucky
101:365Coach handed out jerseys at practice tonight, in the "get what you get and you don't throw a fit" system. The girls didn't care (that comes later), but they had a blast modeling their new visors for each other. I thought it was cool that she ended up with lucky number seven. The visors are genius. I remember sweating my ass off in a hot ball cap through many a summer. Plus, it's hard to cram perky pigtails under a baseball cap. At practice tonight she did a great job with fielding, throwing and batting. She was engaged and paid attention nearly the whole time, despite the usual suspects raising a ruckus in the background. Some things never change…the same girls who were a pain in the butt to coach in soccer are equally disruptive in softball. Regardless, I think she's going to do really well, and have fun with softball. Which is good because I hear great softball players can score some awesome college scholarships. Since soccer for her primarily consists of cartwheels between bouts of running, I'm now looking towards softball for potential tuition help. (Kidding! I just want my little girl to have fun and feel good about what she's doing. I think she's got the confidence thing down. On the way home from practice tonight, I said, "That was a great hit, Zozo!" And from the back seat I heard a confident, "I know!" Whereupon we had a teaching moment on the proper way to field a compliment.)
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April 10, 2012
windows
100:365Today's fun included:
An hour on the phone with four people from AT&T in an attempt to rectify a colossal f*ck up one person at AT&T set in motion three months ago. (That fun continues tomorrow.)A trip to Zozer's dentist to see about The Baby Tooth That Won't Fall Out. (We get to wait some more. Apparently it's ok for your child to have two sets of teeth at once.)The library to return books, and check out some new ones. Steak 'n Shake for lunch, because "they have the BEST shakes, Mommy!"A run downtown to AIA, to purchase stock contracts for building a custom home. A stop by the bank to drop off my set of construction documents, because clearly everyone in the free world needs to know the layout of my home before I can build it. My plans will be FedEx'd to a couple of women in Minnesota or Wisconsin who are responsible for reviewing plans for new construction loans. "I don't like where you put the powder room – loan denied!"Multiple games of Uno. The child is obsessed. A run to Build-A-Bear, because for Zo it's the equivalent of Schiller's for me and Elco for M, and she was so patient with all my errands today that she deserved a little side trip to heaven. A blood letting at church, where I gave my pint to the Red Cross not only to help up to three people but also to get those stalkers off my call sheet. I know when I'm eligible to donate, because they blow up my phone with daily pleadings. Being O- has its privileges. All in all quite a productive day. I did manage to get a little work done, but for the most part I played hooky and hung out with my kid. It was good.
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April 9, 2012
inventory
99:365After collecting the eggs, she carefully sorted her loot. It wasn't just by candy and money, though. The candy was sub-sorted by type: jelly beans, snickers, twix, reese's, etc. Her engineer father looked on with unabashed pride.
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April 8, 2012
eggstra special memories
98:365We dyed our Easter eggs today. She made hers pink, because that's her favorite color right now. Accordingly, she made mine green and Daddy's blue. Hootie got a yellow one. Then she put an egg in all four colors, rotating it between bowls arbitrarily until she decided it was done. That one she deemed the "family egg."And then 15 minutes later she ate the family egg as part of her lunch. We don't buy fancy egg decorating kits. We don't have special wire egg holders, or disposable egg dying cups, or egg drying racks. I dye eggs with my daughter exactly how my mom dyed eggs with me: mugs, spoons, boiling water, a little bit of vinegar, white crayons, newspaper, and food coloring from a package that still looks exactly like it did when I was a kid. It may be old-fashioned, but I loved it and I hope Zozer does, too.
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April 7, 2012
fun with dandelions
The light was beautiful on them this morning, and since I was already late to work from returning the rental car…
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