Overheard from Hayley’s room as I sit here doing some work in the bedroom:

Hayley: Let’s play!
Breanna: YAY!
Hayley: Let’s play Mommy and Daddy. I’ll be the Mommy and you can be the Daddy.
Breanna: Okay Hayley!

I can’t stop giggling.

We’re expecting to turn on the radio or my favorite news show on Monday morning to hear that there’s another snow day at the school (and all the other ones too). When we had the snow day the week before last we had gotten about 20 cm of snow. This weekend, starting on Sunday, we’re expected to start seeing snow through until Monday for a total accumulation of anywhere between 15 and 40 cm. That’s 5 to 15 inches, for Americans. And that’s one forecast; last night I heard on the local news that it could be up to 60 cm, which is 23 inches. I don’t think we’ll get quite that much but I do think it will be enough to close the schools down again. And honestly, yay because who wants to deal with all that?!

The biggest issue with the coming snow is whether it will cause trouble for us tomorrow. We’re fine for food – we have leftover spaghetti sauce, leftover grilled pork chops, two whole chickens, ground beef, black beans, and sides all on the menu and all in our fridge or pantry. We could use some more milk, but we have two and a half loaves of bread and eggs. Even with storm warnings, we’re definitely not in dire straits for food (though I don’t have any chips, and that’s somewhat alarming…).

However, we’re getting a new entertainment/wall unit. Well, sort of. Our friends got a new TV which is too big for the wall unit they have so they offered it to us. It’s a nice wood and I’m not crazy about the one we have now so we said yes. I think we’re supposed to be getting it tomorrow since they now have their new stuff and the old unit (haha, unit, haha… sorry) all crammed together, but obviously that will be a problem if it’s a massive snowstorm. Hopefully it will hold off (or not start at all) until it’s all done.

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Muffin Watch 2007 – last night’s fresh dozen of Cinnamon Muffins are now whittled down to only two remaining, both of which will likely be devoured by Hayley for breakfast tomorrow. I may need to make more AGAIN.

Mike is one of my favorite dad blog authors. This, in particular is a beautiful and touching entry.

Yesterday I realized that we needed to do groceries because we had nothing suitable to send with Hayley for her morning snack or dessert (it was pizza day today so lunch was covered). I walked down to the pharmacy because we had no time for groceries and picked up a pack of fruit salad cups and some granola bars.

When I arrived home, I looked at the box and realized the granola bars had whole almonds in them. It’s a nut-free school (well, except for the nutty kids, ha!) so those were out. Concerned about what I could send, I decided to make my cinnamon muffins. I hadn’t made them for quite awhile, at least a year. Now I remember why.

I made them at supper time last night, and by 7 pm I was putting the topping on them. By the time Hayley came home from school, all 12 were gone. I even packed an extra one in her lunch because George’s drummer works in the lunch room so I asked her to give him one. She claims she didn’t see him and so she “had to eat it herself”. Uh-huh.

I made another batch tonight after supper. So far, two are gone because I ate them with my tea. I’m pretty sure that it will be a miracle if the remaining muffins last until this time tomorrow night.

Easy, fast, and really delicious:

1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1 egg, beaten
1/2 cup milk
1/3 cup vegetable oil

TOPPING

2 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 cup butter, melted

Mix flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and ginger. Mix the egg, milk and oil in another bowl, then stir into the dry ingredients to moisten. Spoon into greased or paper lined muffin cups. Bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes or until done.

For topping combine the sugar and cinnamon. Brush the tops of the warm muffins with butter and dip the top of muffin into sugar/cinnamon mixture.

Most people will have all of those ingredients in their kitchen already. What are you waiting for? Go make some muffins!

Whenever I leave home, I almost always have at least one bag with me, and if it’s just one then it’s my camera bag. Sometimes I take my purse too, depending on where I’m going. But I usually have at least the one, and as far as Breanna is concerned, a bag is a bag. She must have gotten the habit from me, but now if we’re going out somewhere, she wants to take her own bag with her.

When we got loot bags for her birthday party, George got all the girls little Princess-theme purses that hang on your wrist, and he got a Dora motif for Breanna. That is her “bag”. She always asks, “Where my bag? Oh! My bag!” The other day she was ticked off at having to leave the bag in the car because we were going into the store where it had been purchased and we didn’t want to deal with people thinking we were stealing it. On the other hand, a glimpse inside would have certainly demonstrated it truly belonged to someone already.

What does a two year old girl carry in her “BAG” when she goes out? (Or just goes room to room while shouting “bye! Bye Mommy!”)

Her Dora bag:

A little peek inside. What could all this be?

The necessities that every girl needs in her “BAG!” A string of beads, a plastic lemon, a couple of hair ties, an unused but crumpled up tissue, a tiny piece of blue construction paper, and a ceramic cat with a broken ear.

I know I like to keep some strange things in my purse too sometimes, so I guess I can’t fault her for the necessities in her life.

Luckily the hair ties won’t be as necessary. Which is good because for a kid who used to love having her hair combed and even once fell asleep standing up while I combed it, she hates having anything done to it now. You should see the magic I must perform for the occasional pigtails. Even regular straight-up brushing elicits a worried, “all doned Mommy? All doned?!”

However, her hair was insane. It had never ever been cut and it was constantly hanging in her face. She wouldn’t keep a barrette in to keep it off her face and she wouldn’t even keep a hair band in anymore. Tonight at bath time, I couldn’t take it anymore as I watched her trying to brush her hair aside so she could see her bath toys.

So after her bath, I got a comb, some hairdressing scissors, and I gave her bangs.

She was a little concerned, still asking her breathless, “all doned?!” and she said “ouch!” every time I snipped, but luckily it didn’t take long, she held still, and I managed to get the cut straight.

I am so tempted to go do mine too because they’re also hanging in my eyes and driving me nuts. Alas, I don’t think I’ll look as cute as she does.

We finally decorated our tree yesterday. I cursed the entire time I strung the lights and I can not tell you how badly I want to buy a pre-lit tree after this season when they’re all on sale so I can pitch our tree and lights straight off the balcony. Lights are NOT the key to getting me into a festive mood, let’s just put it that way.

Once I was done though, they looked great. I made a cup of peppermint tea, found a streaming online radio station that plays Christmas songs, and got the decorations out. I put a few on, but mostly I just let the girls do it because they were doing such a great job on their own. Breanna needed a bit of help understanding not to put ten decorations onto one branch, but she caught on quickly. They’re pros.

And it looked great when they were done!

I also hung lights in our window and set them to flash. I managed to leave them for a half hour before the flashing made me crazy and that was the end of that. Back to solid they went!

I have always loved having white lights on the china cabinet so I was glad we had a spare set.

Our home is finally holiday ready!

These people at Improv Everywhere are hilarious!

I feel like I’m surrounded by stupid people lately. Not the people that I know and love, just the random strangers. First there were all the idiots yesterday who were so appalled that a two year old would *gasp* cry and shriek (and they were subjected to it for under two minutes) in a freakin’ family doctor’s office, god forbid.

Then today I crossed paths with two winners. One was a guy collecting money for some organization. I didn’t quite catch which one because I was hurrying to get into the store. He held out the can and asked for a donation. I had $15 on me, a ten dollar bill and a five. I sort of needed them. I had no change. I apologized and said I had no change. He sneered at me and barked, “oh of COURSE you don’t, how lucky for you!”

You know, I might have gone back and dropped a buck in his can on my way out. But not after that crap! Way to charm people, buddy!

The other guy pissed me off so much that I may or may not have gotten rude. I had to go out in the early afternoon. The sidewalks aren’t knee deep in snow, but there’s enough of it and the slush that my little umbrella stroller won’t cut it. We do have a larger one but we don’t have it here (George keeps it in his parents’ garage) because I can’t carry it and Breanna down all our stairs.

So, I took her out in the little sled we have. I bought it for five bucks when Hayley was about this age and strangely, this is the first time I used it. Breanna freaked out at first whenever cars would go by but then she enjoyed herself and had a great time grabbing at the snow as we zipped along.

I was purposely walking on the inside of the sidewalk for two reasons – one, if she happened to topple out, she wouldn’t roll into the street, and two, it would help protect her from getting sprayed by any slush that might get thrown off the street by cars. As we’re heading along the sidewalk, a man was walking towards us. He wasn’t an elderly man, he was maybe ten years older than me, if that. And he was walking on the inside.

He was also looking straight at us. I’d cut him some slack if he was just unaware of our presence, but no. He saw me, he saw that I was pulling a sled, and he saw that I was turning around to talk to Breanna. I, being a decent person who would do this very thing if roles were reversed, expected him to step towards the outside of the sidewalk and go around us.

No.

He kept walking towards us and then he stopped dead in front of me and looked at me with the full expectation that I would move because GOD FUCKING FORBID he should have to go out of his way by a couple of inches to accomodate someone with a small child on a sled.

I looked at him and said, “oh no, PLEASE don’t trouble yourself to MOVE, I’ll just go around you as soon as I drag this SLED WITH MY KID IN IT out of your goddamn way.”

And he turned as I passed him, smirked, and shrugged his shoulders before continuing on his way.

I may have called him a fucking asshole as his important self walked off, but I won’t admit to such a thing. Ahem.

Seriously, it’s the holiday season. Where’s the holly jolly? Is everyone drinking expired eggnog?

Being sick was a nightmare but what’s frustrating after the fact is all the catching up you have to try to do. I missed a couple of days of work so I had to catch up on that. The apartment which had been so clean post-party was experiencing that, er, “not so fresh feeling” so I had to catch up on housework (George was awesome about helping keep things under control but he was also under the weather at the time). I fear I may never catch up on laundry unless I just throw everything out and start over.

And I finally caught up on photos. Thanks to an online friend who is of German descent, I’ve been celebrating St. Nicholaus Day since Hayley was a year old. We accidentally did it a day early but no one cared much; we set out Hayley and Breanna’s empty shoes by the door on the 4th and then when they woke up on the 5th, their shoes were full of fun little trinket type gifts. I was not well at all so Hayley had all her stuff out and open before I could even turn my damn camera on, but I managed to get Breanna. There is a small photo set over here, and then after I took the last picture I crawled back into bed.

Even better, after over a week, I finally got the birthday party photos up. That includes the Caillou cake which I did indeed draw freehand with some of those squeeze tubes of icing.

When Breanna saw the cake, she yelled, “Caillou!” so I knew I had done a decent job!

My favorite of all the gifts she got was the little Dora the Explorer nightgown and I think the cuteness of this picture explains why.

The rest of the photos are here.

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We also played doctor catch-up today. Somehow they ended up getting their check up appointments today even though Hayley has been five since September and Breanna turned two last month. Whoops. It went well and everyone is healthy. Hayley is still almost popping off the height charts for her age, and Breanna’s just above the middle of the chart for her weight so everything is pretty much status quo. Hayley did really well and Breanna did just fine until she had to have her MMR and Prevnar vaccinations.

Oh, the screaming.

Usually when there are two needles to give to a young child, they get another doctor or nurse to come in and they each take a side, doing it at the same time so that they don’t have to stick a poor little creature two times in a row. Sadly, no one was available so the doctor had to do one and then the other. If Breanna could have gotten ahold of an assault weapon… Sheesh. I’m sure she’ll be thrilled when we go back for the booster early next year.

I felt so bad for her. She completely melted down in the waiting room while I was trying to get her into her coat. That was fun because some people were giving me dirty looks. Which is why I turned to Hayley and asked her, loudly, to “please hurry up and get your coat on so we can leave so that these people can stop staring like they’ve never seen a child cry from being in pain and afraid.” Assholes.

The best part was when we got into the elevator. It was me, the girls, George’s dad, and some guy in his 20s. The door closed, we hit the button for the main floor and we promptly got stuck between floors. The guy said, “um, I don’t think we’re moving. Does it feel like it’s moving to you?” Trying not to panic I said, “no, I think you’re right.” We tried buttons and nothing happened. I looked at him and said, “this must be exactly what you’ve always wanted, to be trapped in an elevator with a screaming two-year-old.” At least he laughed. I pushed the panic button, the bell rang, and then we started moving again. Thank God. I’m not exactly claustrophobic but I’d probably freak out in a stuck elevator after about the first minute.

So far things are fine. Both girls are asleep (I can hear Breanna snoring like a machine over the monitor – there should be a law about kids catching colds right after gastro!) and I gave Breanna some Motrin because she was feeling a bit warm. She should be okay for the rest of the night.

And on that note, I think I’m going to head to Japan with my copy of Memoirs of a Geisha. It’s been a long time since a book has totally captivated me like this one has!

We know drama in this household. And while it’s occasionally funny to see the sheer amount of fury and rage that can be contained inside a tiny body, I sometimes fear for the future. There are just over three years between the two girls. At some point in time, they will both be volatile, hormonal, freaked out teenagers (like I once was) and I could just weep thinking of those days. Already, Breanna has learned a little phrase from Hayley: “Go ‘way”. We hear it regularly.

One of the most frustrating things in her life is that she wants to do everything herself but can’t actually do them all and so she lives with the internal battleground. She’ll start getting frustrated because, for instance, she can’t get a shirt on. She start stamping a foot or grunting angrily. I’ll bend down to help her. And then I hear, “NO NO NO! Go ‘way!” and she runs away. Then she gets angry because I leave her alone and she’s ticked off that I’m not helping her. Round and round we go in the endless circle of I-can-do-it-no-I-can’t-no-don’t-help-me-why-aren’t-you-helping-me?!

Eventually she hits peak tantrum level. And that’s when it’s hard not to feel a combination of amusement at the drama and terror at what that will look like at age 15. Because right now when Breanna has a tantrum, it usually ends with her running away, possibly shrieking, and then she will throw herself across something – the couch, a bed, or even onto the floor. It’s not so she can continue tantruming, rather it’s done in that teenage drama queen huff, and then she just lies there, head buried in her arms, and possibly thinking that there is nothing in this world as horribly unfair as a very lame PARENT.

I believe that particular photo was after I refused to let her have chocolate ice cream for breakfast. I am an oppressive mother, what can I say?

I look at her and I look at Hayley with her own brand of high drama flair and I can see the future with one or the other rolling her eyeballs mightily, huffing, “Mo-oooom” and flouncing to throw herself across her bed, pissed off that her damn mother won’t take her to the mall to get her bellybutton pierced like all her friends are doing.

From our home to yours.

If our family was made out of elves.

You’re welcome. I can hardly see from laughing so hard I cried.