One Day They’ll Be Famous

I speak a lot of how I treasure long-term friendships and the joy they bring to my life.  Around New Year’s, right as we think we’ll begin a year of fresh ideas and new habits, I was reminded that the old and the familiar are what I love the most.  My dear friend, Lydia, whom I call “my gypsy friend” because she LIKES to move (A LOT), came to stay with us for a few days.  Having Lydia here is like putting on your favorite high school sweatshirt; it fits perfectly, is as warm and comfortable as you remember it being, and you think, “geez, I could wear this sweatshirt every day for the rest of my life”.

On a break from her doctoral program at Penn State, we had some rare free time to hang out at Chez Us and chill.  Drink some wine.  Take in some after Christmas sales that oddly were NOT for The Gifts War.  And talk as only friends whom have known each other forever can talk.  And by forever, I mean that we double dated when we were 14 and too young to date, but meeting boys for pizza in the Village hardly counts as “actual” dating.  I think someone would have had to have a driver’s license for it to count.  Plus, if you tell your parents you’re just meeting friends at the Flying Tomato and NOT meeting boys, then hey, no harm, no foul.

Nonetheless, there we were, with our hair over-sprayed, our make up on, and in the dead of Indiana winter, in our over-sized black coats, not quite sure if we were Ally Sheedy or Molly Ringwald from the Breakfast Club.  Both Thespians (Ally Sheedy), but also both addicted to pearl jewelry (Molly Ringwald).  Both dating Anthony Micheal Hall types, as only good dorks would do.  Honestly, so little has changed!

Now, at 36, we have more serious things to discuss.  Why do we find Justin Timberlake so enthralling?  Why is that when you tell people you don’t like Thai food, they insist that you WOULD like Thai if only you ate at THEIR THAI restaurant, creating a very Green Eggs and Ham conflict as the only two women in America who don’t like Thai?

But even more awesome was the three of us getting the girls to sleep, throwing on our sweats, making margaritas and popcorn, and watching movies through the midnight hour of New Year’s Eve.  Because after a billion years of friendship and parties and travels, we know that every year need not be Times Square.  We can be happy together, laughing and giggling, and enjoying the “knowingness” that can only come from someone who knows every story, every win, every loss over the past 22 years of friendship.  It is in being known that life becomes a rich fabric…warm and comforting.  It is in knowing that life becomes joyful and exciting.

Godspeed Lyd.  Miss you, as always, already.

Go right now to Amazon and buy this set of DVDs (Scholastic Treasury of 100 Storybook Classics).  Throw out Barney, throw out all the loud, noisy crap we’ve been patiently tolerating in our cars during the long commute to school, and BUY THIS.  I wanted to try these DVDs long ago, but they were $100 for the set, and OUCH.  I got them for $45 during an Amazon 1 hour deal, and man, I should have bought these last year.

First, I couldn’t handle the toy store my minivan had become.  What a bleepin’ mess.  The girls were bored, I was frazzled from the whining, and there’s not a lot I can do to make the commute shorter.  Santa delivered these wonderful classic children’s stories on DVD, told by James Earl Jones, Sarah Jessica Parker, and countless other welcoming voices (meaning, NOT ELMO).  They are gently told, straight from the story books we grew up loving (Curious George, Chysanthemum, Where The Wild Things Are….100 stories!).  Some are live actors, some are moving pictures, some are cartoons.  They are quiet, yet the girls are mesmerized.   They are not fancy.  They are not Disney-fied (which isn’t all bad…I love me a good dose of Disney).  They are what we know anything with the Scholastic stamp to be: quality goodness worth our money and our time.

I get my quiet coffee and news, the girls watch a few good stories, and I lose the guilt that their brains are going to mush watching nursery rhymes over and over.  I see Volume 2 arriving Christmas 2009.

Answer to Stephanie’s Question, Where do I find Amazon 1 hour deals?  I suscribe to slickdeals.net RSS feed.  I check it throughout the day because really great deals go fast.  With 2000 gifts left to purchase, I can’t miss a beat.  I am thinking there must be a better way.  Slickdeals is OK, but I suspect there is something more direct. Anyone have any suggestions?

Grandmommy cured Sara of her “constantly removing shoes” habit by saying, “no stinky Wal-Mart feet!”  Does one even dare to imagine how icky our already hideous feet would be if we were to stroll through Wal-Mart with bare feet?  Deeeesguuusting.  That same Grandmommy treated us all to pedicures as a Christmas treat.  Sara’s tiny feet are almost too tiny to see, but they are painted by golly!

Second to Last Carload, many cups of coffee, and 2 brave women who dared to shop The Gifts War with me

The Gifts War of 2009 has begun.  The true name of Sara’s school’s Santa Shop is “Gifts Galore”, but Sara’s pronunciation varies from Gips Gwore to The Gifts War.  After the first 100 or so hours of working on this project, it has truly become known as “The Gifts War” at our house.

I’m not sure how my in-laws are still speaking to me, but I got Carolann and Amanda up at 4:45 AM!! on the 26th to take in the after Christmas sales.  Because I must buy almost 4000 gifts, I have to balance “on sale” with “quantity available”.  I can’t do my “uzzzch” (usual) and wait for the 75% sales to begin, as there wouldn’t be enough holiday themed singing ties available.  I had every store mapped out and most pre-shopped.  I had counts.  I had categories.  Most importantly, I had coupons.

We hit JCPenney at 5:30 am where we scored mini back and neck massagers (along with a countless other holiday goodies) for $4.  Onto Kohls at 6:00 am.  Cleaned out their tin-boxed men’s themed boxer shorts.  If any man hoped to score a Guitar Hero themed pair of sleeping shorts after 7 am, he was OUT OF LUCK MAN.  I GOT THEM ALL.  Target opened at 7 am, so there was no time to waste.  It took 4 carts to get the 200 boxed men’s items out to the car.  At this point, people were actually crowding around us and following us through stores.  Buying 24 iPod speakers and 40 over-sized stuffed animals will draw attention, this much I’ve learned.

My memory grows blurry due to a very successful trip to an under-shopped Wal-Mart where we cleaned the shelves of holiday boxed jewelry, bath sets, gifts sets, lotions that look like soda cans, candles, safari themed makeup bags, latte mugs…5 carts.  It took us 5 carts to get out.  Another 2 hours and 3 carts to get to out of Old Time Pottery where we scored North Pole yard signs for 60 cents.  Teddy Bear Christmas Cookie Jars for $2.  Shall I go on?  It takes several trips to the car when one buys 72 fleece throws, another lesson learned.

13 hours, an estimated 2000 items,  and 3 van loads later, we called it a day.  Since then I’ve bought 40 rolls of wrapping paper, 2800 self sticking gift tags, 1500 sheets of tissue paper, and 800 self sticking bows.  Oh yes, it’s a war, and I’m determined to win.  I’ll spend the remainder of the year finishing the categories with great finds (as in, Libby Liu is going out of business and the manager gave me an entire stack of autographed Hannah Montana posters FOR FREE).  My last mountain to climb (oh, you mean besides cataloging everything on spreadsheets, submitting $9000 worth of expense reports, pricing every single item, safely storing it at the school, and repainting the Nabisco cardboard fireplace I’m turning into a stuffed animal selling cabinet???)…I must find affordable sleds and snowboards.  For $10 or under.  NO CLUE how I’m gonna do it.  Even an Menard’s they are $30 right now.  I’m SO open to suggestion.  Praying for a 1 hour Amazon sale at 80% off?!

The look on my face every time I am reminded that I married THE RIGHT MAN.  My favorite Christmas present.

For the New Year, I guess my wishes are simple.  Following my theme for the latter half of ‘08, I wish for all of us time:

Time to play with our children and chat with them, and hear them…

Time to be with our spouses, and hear them as well…

Time to be of use to our communities, wherever God’s hand may lead us…

Time to meet the goals that energize and sustain us…

Time to enjoy good food and good company…

Time to care for ourselves, one moment at a time…

And time to fulfill the last words GG had for my girls, written in a letter to them, “Always have time to help a friend”.

Amen, Amen.

I could write this entire post in about one sentence: my in-laws came to town and I had hot showers, hot meals, more sleep than I’ve seen in a while, a date with my husband, a day to myself, AND A PEDICURE. DONE. CLOSE THIS CHAPTER, I’ve gone to heaven. I won’t blather on about borrowing my mother-in-law’s awesome sports car, driving around town listening to 80’s music all by MYSELF….but let me say, it was wicked cool. It was like front row seats at a Janet Jackson concert circa 1993 great. Oh wait, and everyone you’re with has ID. Yeaaahhh baby.

Grandmommy and Grandaddy can steal my children for a day any time.  Actually having a moment to “miss” my children felt pretty good.

Making sugar cookies with Grandmommy

Covered in icing, ALL DONE!

The girls favorite playmates, Auntie Amanda & Uncle Randy

The Stackable Lego Family

It’s hard to see what I’m holding, but it’s Brycey’s Robot Toy.  We left it for Santa with a note, “written” by Sara with a request to drop it off at his house while he’s unloading Brycey’s presents.  So we left Santa cookies and a McDonaldland Toy, and some carrots for the reindeer.  Excitingly enough, when we scattered the glittered-filled oats all over the front lawn for the reindeers, we found a small present Santa left on his way by with a message that he’ll be back later with the rest of the presents!

I must write about what just happened, because it restores my faith in good and humanity, and my family.  By family, I’m referring to my long suffering mother.  The one who had the balls to raise a tomcat like me, and while I may call her Tigger on Crack, would take out her bones and hand them over if she thought they’d cure anything that ailed me.  She is after all, a Mother.

Christmas was worth the mess, but today, after all the fanfare had passed, I looked around rather glumly at the “gom”.  It’s a term my Mom has always used to describe the mess created by children.  A mixture of sticky and Oh My God.  Gom.  Sara and Kelly can GOM with the best of them.  Once again, company is a-comin’.  But it’s Lydia, my lifelong friend who would take one look at the gom, open a bottle of wine, and tell me to worry about it another day.  She may send only Crane stationery, but that girl would cut off her foot before she’d judge my mess.  There’s some deep love between the two of us.

As I scraped something of an unusual color and texture off a kitchen chair, in through my garage door strode my red-headed Mom.  She drove 2.5 hours to help me clean.  She is leaving on vacation TOMORROW morning.  2.5 hours she drove to scrub my bathrooms, pick up toys, and start the enormous piles of Sara & Kelly laundry (both on their 3rd outfits today).  Because I needed the help.  Because she’s my Mother.  I cried all over her as she left.  In that moment, I saw her Mother in her eyes.

Sometimes I feel like I’m cleaning with a snow shovel, just piling a mess from one room into another.  But there are those rare days when even the TV is missing its signature tiny girl handprints.  The house even smells clean.  I look around, and things are where they should be.  Today has turned itself around.  Today is a very good day.

Thank you Mom.  I love you.

Time to cut the cord and let some livin’ begin…

Uncle Randy holds the record for favorite presents (yep, he got the kitchen too).

There is so much to say about the wonderful week we just shared with family…about Christmas day and all the others, about the fun, about the busy and the rest…I honestly don’t know where to start.  So I guess I’ll post a few smiles from our house to yours.  I hesitate to start with the gifts, because our season has been about so much more than the gifts;  but in truth, two little girls woke up to the magic of Santa and found a treasured art easel, scooter, and Kelly’s new trampoline.  With all the fun we’ve had, the moment children awake on Christmas morning makes for the best pictures.

That’s not a rash: it’s Sara’s new makeup.  New scooter (thanks again, Uncle Ran Man).  New sunglasses.  New Raindrop Plop boots.  I’m certain when Santa found those boots (matching the boots from Sara’s favorite book) at the consignment store in Sara’s size, he was as excited as I would be (I mean, had I found them and not SANTA).

No time to talk, Picasso is BUSY.  Thank you to Grandmommy and Grandaddy for fostering tiny Sara’s intense love of painting.

I love how Christmas starts out like a blank canvas, and so quickly becomes a great piece of “art”:

Snow White & Prince Charming 2008

I’ve been saying “Family is where you find it” for so long that I don’t even know where it came from.  I think I started saying it while living in Nantucket with my awesome friends, The Chickenbox Gang.  It means that friends are family to me.  I’ve gone through life thinking that friends happen by happenstance: a shared calculator in chemistry class, sharing a tear at the end of a workday in a daycare room, chatting together in the school lobby.  But I am wrong; that’s just geography.  As life bounces along, I’m beginning to suspect God has a plan that ties us together.  All at different times, all for different reasons.

Who knows where life will take Sara and Brycey?  Who knows?!  But in my heart, I wish for their lifelong bond to last.  I wish for Sara this brother figure who will watch over her as they grow.  Who will protect her from bullies because Mommies can’t be everywhere.  But I dare not dream it.  Real life has been much better than my dreams these past 6 years (other than the nightmarish sleep loss!).

So what does a Sara/Brycey Weekend look like after 3 LONG LONG years of friendship?

Thursday night: Brycey and Keri arrive….play until they nearly pass out standing up.

Friday: School for Sara, errands for Keri and Bryce…unite again for lunch and naps.  Awake at 3 pm to rush over to the mall for our long awaited Halloween pictures of the two munchkins in their coordinating costumes.  They turned out better than we hoped.  Quarter rides, cookies…NO TIME…RUSH HOME…

Friday night: Meet up with Noah and his entire extended family for a pizza party downtown.  Everyone suits up in many layers for a walk through the Indy Zoo at night.  The entire thing is lit up with a zillion lights.  A ZILLION…I COUNTED.  IT WAS AWESOME.

20 degrees (maybe colder) and we were sweating!

The Red Gliders Gang Unites: Keri, Me, Ana Paula (the other two are smiling, but they are Southern and freezing their arses off!)

Saturday: Up and out we head to the Model Train Exhibit at White River Gardens, and if you don’t go, you are missing out.  So very special and right there in the warm butterfly gardens (please don’t ask where the butterflies go in winter…I don’t want to spoil our mood here).

Saturday night: Noah and family come over for presents, a chicken and noodle dinner, cookie making and a ROCKIN’ DANCE PARTY.  Somewhat impromtu, but I felt the need to dance.

Stay up super late with popcorn in the basement watching “Jungle Book”.

Sunday: Everyone cries a big goodbye (Keri and I have slept off a couple of bottles of 3 Buck Chuck), and we all sleep for a week!

So much missing of Brycey and Keri, but it’s good to have friends to miss, yes?  It’s good to love people so very much that when you do get together, even the air is kissed with sugary sparkles.  I cherish the memory of last weekend.  Merry Christmas you guys; Godspeed until we meet again.