At the beach/ Julie and Julia

Hi to all five of you out there, ok maybe I have picked up a few more readers lately but that is beside the point. I never started this blog with the intention of having a wide audience one day. I just enjoy it. I am at the beach with my crew and in-laws and it is ohh say, 6:30 AM. Yikes, who is dumb enough to be up at 6:30 AM writing on a blog at the beach on "vacation" no less?


Me that's who. *** Side note - to anyone foolish enough to wonder why I put quotes around the word vacation, you must not be a mom. If you want to know why they are there, go ask one.





I was sleeping somewhat peacefully when I was awakened by a screaming, annoyed 17 month old in the pack and play nearby, evidently he was also annoyed - thus the screaming. This in turn set off the other alarm which is my doodle. She was sleeping in the king size bed with me and one of her sisters. So I get fussy baby settled in with me and he calms down, miraculously my Doodle does too, only now, I can't sleep anymore. So I pick up my headset and commence listening to the last CD of the book I have been listening to for the past 3 days - Julie and Julia. You may have heard of the movie that is now out with MerylStreep playing Julia Childs and Amy Adams playing Julie. Anyway, it was entertaining enough to keep me listening to the end but annoying as all get out at the same time.





I don't want to spend a lot of time on going over the plot but you can go here and watch a trailer if you are that interested. I may or may not go see the movie but I do love Meryl so that is a remote possibility. The remoteness is due to the fact that I


A. Love movies more than almost anything and therefore have a line up that is pretty extensive so Julie and Julia falls pretty far down the line and


B. I have five kids and only get to see movies when my parents are in town and


C. My entertainment budget has been severely cut back due to recent economy and current beach trip which we really can't afford but I am oh so grateful to be at.





Anyway, I love cooking but by no stretch of the imagination could I ever believe that I would be capable of accomplishing what the author set out to do which is cook her way through Julia Child's famous book Mastering the Art of French Cooking, every single recipe in one year. First of all time, second money, third I refuse to eat organ meat. Anything that is used by the body to think, collect toxins, deliver waste or purify blood is off limits. Maybe I am as culinary as a vanilla wafer but I have a healthy respect for the limits my stomach can handle.





So, Julie Powell, the author has a few things in common with me, however, there are two huge differences that really cut me off from empathizing with the "heroine" of this story -


One, she is an atheist, though not so much in a "How stupid can you all be?" kind of way, but more of a "whatever, I haven't got time for that mess" which is almost as bad. But, when I read things by nonbelievers it doesn't necessarily anger me it just means that any insight I glean from said book is worthless since its not coming from a greater place. It means no words in her writing have truly been inspired because what is inspiration if it doesn't come from the greatest Author of all times?


And, almost as bad- she is staunchly anti-republican.


Why I don't know? I am not staunchly anti-democrat. They have their few points. I don't beleaguer them that. They are green and sympathetic and have a couple of other redeeming qualities right? ( I can hear two people in my head screaming at me that this is NOT TRUE!, my dad and my best friend's husband.) So why the anti R hatred? Her parents live in TEXAS. That's a pretty conservative state right? She calls Republicans various insulting things throughout the book which I won't dignify by repeating here. But I kept thinking to myself, she has most-likely been dumped by one somewhere in her history. I don't know and it doesn't matter anyway. The author seems genuinely off-put at the end of the book because Julia is offended or critical of her project/blog and I wonder if it has anything to do with the two points mentioned above. I say, HELLO, course she is offended you twit, she was 91 when she read your blog and you say F*** every other line. 91 year olds don't like that word very much and neither do most civilized people, even if we occasionally yell it out in frustration when the kids aren't around.





Oh well, so she doesn't like Republicans, but she has effectively snubbed potentially half of her readership whom she says "don't read the Dining Section of the paper" I beg to differ, I do read that section and I have no idea where she got that idea? Just because I am against murdering unborn babies, believe in families, the sanctity of life, responsibility for oneself, keeping the money I earn to spend as I see fit, choosing which charities I donate to, smaller government and of course SARAH PALIN, this, this qualifies me as some old stogy cigar-smoking rich buracrat? Huh?





Ok, this was a really long post on a seriously random topic but it had to be done. I couldn't sleep anyway, what with the drooling monkey and his two sisters next to him in my bed.
Psst, Julie Powell, they are probably going to be REPUBLICAN CATHOLICS TOO. And well fed I might add.

My secret self

I am going to share something that only a few of you know about me. I secretly long to be . . dun dun dun - a REALLY good housewife! It has become an obsession of mine. I can't even believe I just wrote that. But I actually can cook, when I have time. I love to bake and try new recipies. I have a sewing machine that I know how to use but haven't in a while, again the time thing. I love it when my house is clean but getting it there is exhausting and never ending. IT just totally cracks me up where I have ended up and how much I enjoy the exact opposite of what I always thought I would be doing. I never wanted to do this stuff when I was little. I guess I always thought I would be a mom but never thought I would be happy with out a fabulous career and travels. I so long to travel and oneday, God willing, I will but for now I have tons to do around here and I get such a strange sense of satisfaction from it. I think its because I have never really been great at anything. I have always been okay at this and that but never really top notch so I never found a niche anywhere. But I am pretty good at this being a mom with too much to do and too much to worry about. I think it may be because I am realizing I can't do it alone so I lean harder on God and that always helps. I try to glean wisdom from my friends and their different areas of expertise. I seriously have one for each area of the whole mom/housewife/home manager/faith thing and they are fabulous. Some are friends from 20 years back and some are newer friends from church, say the past four years or so. I am lucky to have so many good friends and they make my life richer in so many ways. I am rambling.

I am having blog envy today. I have been surfing for homemaking blogs and there are soooo many. Some are Catholic, some are secular but they are all really amazing and these women don't seem like the mousy 1950's image that springs to your mind when you hear the word housewife. I just love my house and my family and it feels so good to finally feel content. Anyone know of any great blogs or websites along this line? Send them my way. Now, where's my apron?

Hope I did the right thing . . .

My motives were pure. I waited until today to tell my kids about Aunt Becky passing away. The time seemed right. We spent a week at Vacation Bible School and they were fresh full of Jesus so I told them. We listened to her music in the car. She had a CD she made at CafePress. One of the songs, which I will post later, is called Stories. Well I have heard it many times but never really listened you know? It has a line in it that says "Some stories just end before they unfold" or something like that. How profound and prophetic. She really had a way with words and the more I listen to it the more I realize that I did not give her near enough credit for being such a great guitar player. The woman just picked it up one day and decided to teach herself, she never had a lesson in her life. Her songs became increasingly complex in chords and melodies that were wonderful even if I didn't always get the words. A lot of it was autobiographical. Anyway, after I told the kids and we talked about going to heaven and how she would be there waiting on us I found a CD she made for the quads first birthday. She never had money but she always had something for them. I haven't listened to it in years and the first song on the album is a Lullaby she wrote just for them and it really tugs at my heart now that she is gone. I want to link it here but not sure how. I will try. In July I will go up to my parents home in the mountains and finally go through her few remaining possessions. I think that is when I will finally be able to cry. As for my kids, they cried when they heard the lullaby because she says in it that if they ever need her, she will be right there. They asked me if they could write her notes and tie them to balloons to send them up to Heaven. I thought that was a great idea since they weren't involved in the funeral, so we will be doing that tomorrow. Six year olds shouldn't have to learn about death this early but I know they aren't the first and sadly aren't the last.

So she thinks she can dance . . .

*** Warning - do NOT watch this if your bladder is full.

She is unabashedly unique. Nothing more needs to be said about my Bunny.!

Have a great day!

The Wisdom of a Child

Tonight Doodle was overstimulated. She always has trouble winding down to sleep and those of you who have or know a child with Autism probably know what I mean. Yes the experts say, they need a routine, blah blah blah. Well routine shmootine - IT DON'T WORK. Our routine is in place for the rest of the quads but with her, it all depends on so many variables during the day and now that we are Potty training (big Yay!!) it is even more interesting. So she was bouncing off the walls with no thought of drifting off to the Land of Nod. So we went outside, on the deck and turned the lights off. We sat on the steps, her in my lap, counting stars and feeling that wonderful early summer nighttime breeze - light and cool, yet not chilly at all. Star-gazing, watching airplanes and the trees swaying gently. We were just absorbed in all the goodness of God's world.
Finally, I told her we needed to go inside so we did. No sooner had I sat down than she came to me and grabbed my hand, pointing to the window, and pulling on my she says, "Night- Stars"

This is AMAZING to me.
She's six and she's just begun to do things that my 15 month old is about to embark on. The things you take for granted with typical kids, like sharing an enjoyable activity or having them point to something they want you to see with them, bringing you a book they like, these are all things that kids with autism have trouble with. Heartbreakingly absent in the parent-child relationship of a child with moderate to severe autism. So when it does happen out of the blue you immediately ask yourself the following-
*How did this just happen? (Did she really just say that to me?)
*What caused this to happen? (Have I fed her something different, are the supplements working?, etc.)
*Is she "recovering"? (unlikely)
*Will it ever happen again or was it a fluke?
I am cautiously optimistic. These moments are treasures and I store them away incase it does not happen again.
My precious sweet little girl wanted to share something with me that made her happy! This is such a struggle for these kids and in fact a very early indicator of a problem. When your toddler doesn't bring things to you or point at things they want you to see, red flags should pop out. Denial never helped a child with a developmental delay. I remember the exact moment I realized she wasn't doing these things. Probably around the age of one. I think my husband and I both came to our own similar conclusions about Doodle long before we actually discussed it out loud.
But back to our evening, so I decided we would go back outside, but we went out to the front porch with the incentive being avoidance of big hairy Golden who likes to knock me down each time I open the back door. Well, boy, we were rewarded.
A bright, clear half-moon looked down on us like it had been hung, perfectly centered in front of our house. I nearly gasped. It was so lovely. I looked around. The night air was soft and the view from the gentle hill our house sits atop was like a storybook page.
She sat in my lap and started jabbering again. I mentioned some frogs singing nearby. Many times she seems to make up words or at least I can't understand them. This time, however, I did. Clear as day, I heard my little girl saying,

"Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful world."

Absolutely Doodle -
You got that right. . .

Observations of a Redneck: Becky

Observations of a Redneck: Becky

How my baby makes me laugh

*** Disclaimer**** - Lest some of you think I am heartless or in denial please know that I have a blog on my sister in the works but it is heavy and sad and right now I need funny so when my little man sat on my head last night and laughed I thought hmmm . . . maybe I will do the funny until I am ready to write the sad. If you don't know me personally, my older sister passed away last week suddenly and I will write more about that later, she was only 39, that is far too young to leave the world.



How My Baby Makes Me Laugh . . .

He sits on my head with his big old pajama clad behind and starts playing with a toy , like this is the most normal of spots to perch, he did laugh though so I think he secretly knew it was funny. Hmm, he likes to think he's funny, wonder where he gets that from???

If I lay on the floor, he uses my body like a piece of gymnastics equipment.

He likes to blow zerberts on any and all exposed flesh that he can reach so watch out if you come over - he doesn't care who it is. He once caught me just above my jeans on my back as I was squatting down to clean the toilet. Talk about a surprise you weren't expecting.

He likes to look at me right before he does one of the things he knows he is not supposed to do just to see if I am paying attention, like climbing on the fireplace, in fact he makes baby noises and calls attention to himself until I catch him doing said activity so I will come over and pick him up to move him. Manipulative little dude.

He likes to play the "Hold my arms out to other adults then psych! Immediately turn back around and hold them out for mom again" game.

When he really likes something he throws one hand in the air, looks up and says GA!! I have yet to figure out what that really means?

He thinks he is six years old like his siblings

He is extremely physically capable and I don't know if that should delight or terrify me!?

He already has a favorite book - Baby's First Word Book, isn't that a Henry James?

He has the cutest, biggest behind I have ever seen on a baby.

He likes to make this face when you, never mind I can't describe it in words you'd have to see it. It is a face that is far too intense for a 15 month old to pull off, he learned it by copying his siblings, it makes them laugh too.

It is this stuff that gets me through the day. It is why I still love him at 2 AM when he is screaming for no apparent reason for the third time in a night. It is the benefit of extra fun in my life that has never for a second made me regret having a fifth baby when everyone in my life except my husband, mom a couple of very close friends thought I was crazy.

That's the good stuff . . .