old vs new

Picture this if you will:

A girl, nah- a young woman. It's Friday Night. Just out of the shower, picking out a hot little dress, killer heals, tiny handbag. Doing her hair and makeup. A last minute spritz of perfume before she heads out the door to meet a few friends for cocktails before heading to the club. At the club she and her friends will wait 10, maybe 15 minutes, to get in. Where they will dance the night away, never break a sweat and stumble home around 2am. Fall into bed, maybe taking off the killer heals, maybe not. Sleep. Wakes up at 1pm on Saturday afternoon, showers, drinks coffee, and goes back to bed.

Now picture this:
A girl, nah- a woman. It's Friday Night. Hair pulled back in a ponytail, jeans, tank top, flip flops. Reading "Good Night Moon" for the 70th time, singing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" and tucking in her daughter. Goes downstairs, checking off homework, washing dishes, sweeping the floor. Around 10pm falling into bed, turning on "Dirty Dancing" to just remember one more time... and then passing out around midnight. 7am Saturday, she gets up, makes breakfast, gets the kids ready for the day, drags them all to the gym, where she waits in line for childcare for 32 minutes, goes into the weight room, works up a sweat in 6.7 nano seconds flat. Works her arse off to not see any difference in her body. Grabs the kids from childcare, drops one off at soccer practice, another at art class, heads to the store to get a weeks worth of grocery shopping done in 45 minutes, with a toddler in tow. Picks up the kids from their class, goes home, and puts away all the groceries. It is now, 11:00am.

When did I exchange waiting 10 minutes to get into a club for 32 minutes waiting for childcare?

*all or none of these stories are based in truth*

**but I do wait 30+ minutes for childcare at the gym. Maybe if I went to a more $$$ gym, I wouldn't have to wait so long, and that might get me to the gym more. Maybe.**

Girlie Craziness!

It's not Christmas time. It's not Thanksgiving time. It's not even Halloween time. It's Halloween costumer making time! Some moms are all homemade all the time. Other are rockin' the store bought. I swing both ways. Looks like this year, I will be going the homemade route. Normally I would cringe a little here, say a little prayer, and take some pain killer pill for the on coming headache.
But this year, this year seems to be different. I am excited to make costumes. I am researching early. I am ordering materials online. I am embellishing costumes and adding accessories already! With only girls to dress for trick or treating, it's all girlie craziness. Tulle and sparkles. Pink and purple. Ribbons and wands.
So I'll let you know, I'll post pictures. Fingers crossed this girlie craziness continues enough for me to have the motivation to finish strong. Other wise, I'll be buying costumes.

Back to School?

Tis the season! Sending the kids back to school! It's the most wonderful time of year! More teachers, more books, and not to mention new back to school supplies. I'm a sucker for new pencils and pens! The first day of school we get up a little bit earlier then necessary, cook a big breakfast and take a few pictures, I even make the kids lunches, and drive the kids to school. The whole nine yards. The kids might spend an extra few minutes picking out their clothes. Or grab a few extra looks in the mirror. Just to make sure.

The question at the end of all of this; when does the new school year euphoria end? When do I get to sleep in again? When do the kids start walking to school again? When do the kids take over the responsibility of making their own lunch again? When does the 'shiny new school year' turn into just another school year? The second day? The second week? The second month?

I wish I could remember how long the smell of the new school year lasting on me. But for the life of me, I just can't recall. I also can't seem to recall what we have done in the past years. What I do know about Back to School... it's great the kids are back at school. The house is quiet for some time during the day. I get some chores done. I get to hang our with my friends again! And there may or may not be a nap happening in the afternoon again. I also know that I am 4 days into the new school year, and already I am tired of pampering the kids in their back to school newness. It is time for them to make their own lunch again!

French Braider? Me?

I taught myself out of necessity in high school, how to french braid my own hair. I have never been able to come anywhere near close to doing a good french braid on someone else's head. Not from lack of effort. Tonight, after my little miss's bath, I was brushing her hair, just like normal, and just gave it a shot. She was letting me try, and I wasn't doing so bad. In fact- I was doing good. No better then good, enough that I would let her leave the house with that braid! I will add pictures soon. I am so proud of her, and of me! Sad slightly, that is was 10 minutes before bed- and it won't last until tomorrow morning, but maybe she and I can do it together again!

One Cup~ Two Cups

Yesterday I had a double dose of fun.

First was a scheduled play date with PJ's friends, Shae and Sullivan, and their wonderful mommy, Jo. http://twotinyterrors.blogspot.com/ It was intended as a play in the pool, play date, but oddly it was cold here in 'Sunny So. Cali' so the kidlets played inside. Dress up, dolls, princesses, etc. All while these two mommies shared a much needed cup of tea and long chat!

On my way home, I got a call from an old friend, who happened to be in town. Usually she and I chat about boys over a cup o' joe. She arrived at my home, just after I laid PJ down for her afternoon nap. No boy chatting, more family gossip, and this time- it was all over a cup of afternoon tea.

Now I thought one cup of tea a day was good. Two cups was GREAT!

If you are feeling sad or lonely: anything besides happy; this Mommy recommends a double dose of cups of tea and friends.

Peace, Love, and Drink Tea!

Blanche we will remember...

Another icon has left us today, for the great big stage in the sky. Rue McClanahan passed away this morning. I never had the privilege of meeting her. I still hope that I will someday. Rue McClanahan is best known for her portrayal of Blanche Devereaux, Golden Girls.

Golden Girls has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. Very specifically the girls helped me come full circle. As I was sitting at my mother's kitchen table preparing my wedding dress I was also watching Golden Girls reruns. My mother was going thru an old box of my art work and school work from elementary school. In that box was a time line, of my favorite things in 4th grade. Listed as my fav tv show, The Golden Girls.

The Golden Girls helped many of us little girls. The ladies were our friends, our mothers, and grandmothers- when ours were unavailable. The ladies still are, thank you reruns.

The Golden Girls was the original Sex and The City.

Safe Journey...

Peace~ Ms. McClanahan~ Peace

SandBox Play Grounds

I recently read an article about the nastiest grossest things that we let our kids do. On that list was playing in playground sandboxes- listed as major gross. I think the words they used were, "playing in a used litter box". It makes sense- animals running around our urban neighborhoods- don't differentiate between wooded areas and areas where our kids play. I get it. Gross. and when I think about it EW! double gross!!

I am a frequent resident of neighborhood playgrounds. In all our playground hopping (this action has replaced bar hopping in my mommy-age) we have only found one playground with an honest to goodness sandbox. Mind you this sandbox doesn't make any sense to me... the WHOLE playground is sand, and then there in the middle of the playground is four pieces of wood thus giving the illusion of a sandbox.

This brings me to my point, and I do have one, ALL the playgrounds are each a GIANT sandbox, as all the playgrounds are sand filled. I know there are other options for ground cover at playgrounds, shredded tires & shoes (my personal favorite). My daughters love to play with their sand toys at the playground- so here it is: How do I keep my kids out of the 'used litter box' covered playground, and still let them run off their energy, work out their large muscles, develop coordination, and more importantly tire themselves out, so they and I can take a nap when we get home, and still keep them safe from the gross germs?

Wilderness Ride?

I could not sleep last night- all I did was toss and turn for hours. So when the sun was up and the fog had burned off enough, I strapped on my tennie-runners and went for a bike ride. Remember the show Men in Trees? Remember how Marin would ride her bike thru the tiny Alaskan town and see beautiful parts of this great country? I did that today. Only not in Alaska. I rode down the street, and had to stop for the passing herd(?) of deer. Further on I was met with a field full of horses. A couple blocks later, I was chased a bit by a rooster, who had a lot of early morning sounds to be making. Finally there were these beautiful birds that were flying over me. The ends of their feathers were white, just something I noticed, while I was worried they were going to poop on me. They didn't. Whew! I rode about 2 miles, and made it home in time to eat breakfast! That was one crazy wilderness ride- if country back roads counts as wilderness.

PLEASE! I'll be your best friend

Dear World~
I would very much like this bag.
Thank You
Yours Truly,
Mandi

http://www.onlineshoes.com/womens-sherpani-sojourn-tote-bag-raspberry-p_id177147

Day One~

Off to a great start! I woke up extremely early. The only people that are awake at the time I woke up today, are up to no good and God. I entered the kitchen, turned on the light, and the grinder on the coffee maker started. It was kismet! I savored my delicious cup of coffee. Then I busted out the Zumba! and then my daily yoga and meditation practice. And started on water! Time to get the last sleeping girl up and share a yummy breakfast! Day one is going fantastic so far!

*disclaimer* you don't get to remind me of how fantastic this day started, when I fall off the bandwagon- the key is getting back on*

Bright, Bright, Bright Sun Shiny Day!

The last few days have been cloudy and in my opinion, gorgeous. However today has been a bright, sunny shiny day! We didn't have plans, and sometimes the best plans come out of days, where there are no plans. Over our bagels and coffee breakfast, we decided to take little PJ for a bike ride! Didn't really have any plans as to where we were going, except to 7-11. We had to go there, because there was an urgent need for "'opsicle! 'opsicle". So this was our answer. We rode down to the library. There is always something new and exciting there. Then made our way across the street to the 7-11. And ended up at the giant local playground. First she started out sneaking up on squirrels and we decided it was time to go when she climbed back into her bike trailer... she was tired! Had a quick lunch and down for nap. A hopefully nice long nap. 'Cause that's where I'm headed too, a nap!

Wonderful relaxing Saturday

I had a wonderful Saturday! I woke up to a beautiful yummy pot of coffee! I then left my girls at home to play with Daddy, while I headed out shopping. It's not often I get away alone. It's even less often that I feel like shopping with that alone time. Yesterday I did. I shop, did I ever! I went to the closest mall. I'm not a big fan of any of the malls here. It's just not the concrete utopia of the malls from my hometown. So I went to the mall closest to my house. Which also happens happens to be outdoors. I heart outdoor malls. Not, strip malls. Not an area of stores. No, malls that are designed to be called Outdoor Malls. And it was raining. 2 points!
The first store I went to wasn't as successful as I was hoping but the second and third were more then I could have expected. Where I went doesn't matter. What matters, is I had fun, shopping, by myself, at the outdoor mall, and it was successful. I got what my husband calls, "All Grown Up".
I didn't look at my watch once, and I didn't think about the kids. I enjoyed my alone shopping time.

Saturday evening was an extension of a great time. We had our littlest miss scheduled for a Parents Night Out evening of care. We had hoped to put all of our misses in this facility so we could have a real Parents Only Night Out. Alas, this clearly didn't work out. The age span of our girls is proving a problem, too young, too old, etc. I was also thinking about using more than one facility to get this mecca of alone time with my husband to happen. No go. The multiple facilities don't have even one hour of over lapping time. Boo. Double boo. So we made do, with a Parents Night Out Plus. We went to dinner. Our first choice had a suuuupppper long wait, so we went next door to Panera. Bonus: we got breakfast for Sunday! We spent the whole time eating, laughing. Loudly, laughing. It was fun. I challenged our guests to see if they could pick out the actress common to tonight movie, Alice in Wonderland, and to them a classic, Harry Potter and then etc. We then ran thru the parking lot in the rain to the movie. Waiting in a giant line. At last the movie started. Roll credits: then came the guesses. They were all wrong. Not even close.

All in all I had a wonderful relaxing Saturday. Full of laughter and a tiny bit of mystery! I hope your Saturday was as fantastic as mine.

ZUMBA!!!

I went to my first zumba class on Wednesday.

I had fun, I sweat- A LOT- I felt great!

I went to my second zumba class on Thursday night. My darling husband Robert volunteered to go with me, and "see what Zumba is all about". Not many husbands would do that. He was the only gentleman in the class.

I had fun, I sweat- A Lot- I felt great, sore slightly but great!
Robert is complaining about a sore chest. (sucker!)

I did my daily yoga practice this morning... good day to do- after all that crazy dancing Zumba!

All in all- bring on the Zumba! To accompany my yoga, not to replace. :)

Girl Scouts Cookie Madness III!

Tonight's site sale did not go well.
Not at all.

Off to schedule another site sale. *sigh*

Girl Scouts Cookie Madness II!

Well- it happened, or rather it didn't happen; depends on how you look at it. I have had to sign up for another site sale. The sale that the troop had last night, that we were hoping to sell the rest of the cookies at; did not work out like we wanted. It poured all day & people were just not out.
So we still have 114 boxes to sell. That's a lot of cookies!

I feel like I have made a bad business decision and the business is now stuck with this product that we can't move. It reminds me also of a movie line, Your ego is writing checks that your body can't cash- Top Gun. eh, a little bit.

I was up all night, sick with worry. My husband has taken the girls out to do a walkabout (good olde fashioned- door to door selling) this afternoon. Tonight the cookie mom and myself, and our two girls will be at a store hoping that we hit the jackpot and SELL THOSE COOKIES!
So, if you could please cross your crossables for us. I'll let you know how it goes.

Girl Scouts Cookie Madness!

I was a girl scout. I am a girl scout. I am a Mom of girl scouts. I am a girl scout leader. I strongly believe that the practice of many scouts is ruining the experience for others. I call my girl scout troop, The little troop that could. With out getting into the back story here, I took over an active troop that was losing it's leader to military moving. Probably the same way I will end of up losing the troop.

As a girl, I came to loathe selling cookies. The younger & cuter you are the easier it is to sell. Simply because it is harder to say 'No', to cute little Daisy's and Brownie's, then it is to say 'No' to older, full of attitude, pimply, 'I'm to good for this' teenagers.

As a Mom, I have tried to teach my girls it is not about the prizes they get for selling cookies. It is pure and simple a fundraiser, and about being a part of something bigger then yourself, bigger then your troop. I have always thought is was interesting that cookie sales was right around the same time as World Thinking Day.

As a Leader, I try and teach my troop the same I do as a Mom. The politics come in- as not all the parents in my troop teach their girls that same as I do. Not all the parents agree with me that it is not about the personal prizes the girls get.

At the start of cookies, my troop set a goal to sell enough cookies for each girl to earn a t-shirt incentive. They voted to pool all the cookie sales. Meaning, if it takes 115 sold cookies to earn a t-shirt, and girl A sells 110 and girl B sells 120, girl B will pool her extra 5 cookies and both girl A & B will get a t-shirt. EXCELLENT! Equality on incentives in the troop.

I am finding myself ordering 9 more cases for my troop to sell half way thru cookie sales simply because one parent does not agree with her daughter's vote. Yep- you read that right. One parent does not want to pool her daughters extra cookies. I can not, nor should I, tell this parent that in doing this, the child is taught selfish ways. Politics.

So here I sit, ordering cookies, when I want nothing more but to make my last deposit and be done with cookie sales. I even find myself contemplating signing up for another site sale (yet I still loathe them) to help the rest of the troop earn the same amount of cookies as this single girl, so I don't have to explain to them about what I see as selfish choices, and going back on her word. (be impeccable with your word) And we've come full circle...

Remember & Enjoy

If I take nothing else away from today but to remember and enjoy, I am grateful. We had a playdate at the Cabrillo National Monument tide pools today. Simple, you think. Let the kids explore during low tide, have a picnic lunch- and they nap the afternoon away. No different then going to the playground. The event was simple- the practice of the event was simple. Seeing 3- two year olds explore tide pools was fascinating! They were all interested in different parts of the tide pools. First was the lone boy- he was interested in the crawling creatures, picking up rocks and looking at what was under them. The other little girl friend, that was with us, was not interested- at all. She didn't want to get wet, get dirty, etc. Then there was PJ. Her sole interest was in playing in the water. It didn't matter how- her feet, her hands, her bottom. I tried to get her interested in picking up hermit crabs or touching the sea cucumbers, she loves those things at SeaWorld. Nope. The movement of the water is what I think she was drawn to. Watching this young group of friends, all doing their own idea of fun, while in the same area, reminded me to enjoy the small things. Enjoy just the mere presence of your friends. Enjoy the beautiful environment we are in & the beautiful weather. Enjoy the movement of the water. Enjoy the tiny crawling creatures all around us. Simply- Remember to Enjoy ____________.

Toltec Wisdom

Several years ago, a dear friend gave me don Miguel Ruiz's book, The Four Agreements. Since then I have worked daily to follow the four agreements. Set forth they are simple:

• Be Impeccable With Your Word
• Don’t Take Anything Personally
• Don’t Make Assumptions
• Always Do Your Best

Two and three have prove more difficult then one and four. What brings me to writing about Toltec Wisdom today is my constant battle with learning to not personalize my daughters behaviors and choices. I know in my head their actions, their choices, their behaviors, are not a reflection of me personally. Knowing that should make it easy to separate myself. It does not. The physical space between my head and my heart may be small, but the spiritual space is enormous. As my daughters get older I find it harder to not take their actions personally, rather then easier, as I was hoping it would be.
It is easier to struggle with this daily however then it is to live with the pain and hurt that I feel when I do 'take it personally'. So today I accept, today I proclaim, loudly, for the world to hear (read: who will listen)

I am not the reason, I am the outlet

Lather, rinse, & repeat as necessary. Remember to breathe.

Hibernation

Bears everywhere are hibernating. I have joined their ranks. We may still be having beautiful weather here in sunny southern California, but I am staying indoors, as is the rest of the family. We are choosing to play Pictureka, and eat homemade guacamole, rather than do any number of fun outdoor activities that we regularly do. I, for one, am loving the time at home!