Putrid, pink, pukalicious party

Today i have hung pink garland, purchased pink balloons, and I know that you are going to have a hard time believing this, but I had to go purchase pink garments. I owned nothing pink, except one old bulky sweater from my super chubby days. I have taken one special birthday girl out to lunch and I am currently softening butter for strawberry icing for pink cupcakes.

Why must they love only what we hate? I am going to pour myself a big, black coffee and a huge chunk of black chocolate cake and watch a Tim Burton movie or something.

In the Bag

In my constant pursuit to stop using the plastic I have picked picked up a few of these beauties in the dollar section of the Target. They are lightweight, durable and best of all they zip up tiny and go right in my purse so I never am without an extra bag. Martha would call it a good thing, I will call it a lazy girl's guide to saving the environment.

Sister Act

I alluded in the last post to the fact that my brother and sister had been to visit along with parents and I have to admit, we had a good time. I always express surprise at having a good time with my siblings because they are eleven and thirteen years younger than me. That makes my sister a junior in high school, let's just say that most days it is a stretch to find something in common with them. They grew up thinking of me as their mother. My mom worked the night shift most of my junior high and high school years so I picked them up from daycare off the school bus, cooked dinner, sometimes baths depending on how late my dad was getting home. I did nighttime feedings when my mom worked doubles, I took them with me to school events. This sucked. However, now that I am a parent I have been able to make peace with the knowledge that making ends meet was hard and my parents were doing the best they could.

However, now I am younger, more energetic and therefore, still posses the ability to be strict, unlike my older, more worn down parents. My parents exploit this by using my monthly visits to actually get my sibling to do their chores. This is counteracted by the guilt I felt about going away to college and missing out on a lot of their childhood. So we have this warped relationship where I am constantly riding them about school, work, friends, life choices, but I simultaneously act as an ATM to anything they think they can milk out of me. Chad is very tolerant of this. We went through a stage when Olivia turned one and still wasn't sleeping though the night and I was just trying get my brother through his last semester of English in high school that turned very ugly.

Anyway, I am not saying that we have a ton more in common with them these days, but we have a little. More importantly, they are turning into real, live adult-like people. They make funny jokes, they are real aunts and uncles to their niece, they never forget a birthday, and actually try hard to buy real gifts with the $6 they pool together between the two of them. Even though all I did was take them shopping around town on Saturday, I was impressed about how much they knew about me. It gave me hope that someday I will not just be their sister, I will be their friend.

Happy Birthday To My Pink Princess

So in all the frenzy of Oscars and the cat, my parents coming to visit and Olivia's last week of school (where, of course, they are having a week long celebration of their anniversary which requires me to be there for events in the morning and afternoon) somewhere in there my kid turned four. This was a very emotional birthday for me because I really had to say goodbye to my baby this year. Olivia has always been very independent, but the last of the things that she needed my help for disappeared over the past few months. She zips her own coat, no longer allows me into the stall in the public restroom and even used turning four as impetus to conquer her fear of the very large macaw at the pet store, without any prompting from me. I am a proud mama these days, even if it has been a little trying with the attitude and the boundry-pushing and the negotiating, oh and the scheming. I know that I get to hang on a little longer, though, because when I asked her today how she felt about tomorrow being her last day at school she said, "Good, I like being at home with you." Me too kiddo.

So I am going to work hard this year to treasure what is left of my little baby, to try not to complain, and really document the last of my time with her before she goes off into the world to become a big girl.

Confessions of a person who thinks about drowning this cat

Wondering why I haven't been blogging in awhile? You are looking at it. Olivia's 4th birthday gift was a cat. While I contend that she would have been just as happy with a fish, her father wouldn't have been so now we have a kitten. What I really have is another baby. The thing poops everywhere, follows me everywhere and has my kid wound up higher than a kite which is what I needed on the week of her pink pajama pizza party. I hate to say this because probably everyone reading this blog is and I know this because I get your Christmas cards with your animals on them, but I am not an animal lover. I had many, many pets as a kid and I liked exactly one, my box turtle. I like my space, my quiet time and when my kid is gone I don't want to be climbed on my something that smells.

But i love my husband so I caved, again. At least it is not a freaking dog.

Domo Arigato, Mr. Roboto

So for Japanese night i knew I had no choice but to let Chad take us out for sushi. Japanese cuisine is where I really fall down on the chic, bourgeois mother-unit. Sushi makes me gag. I cannot stomach uncooked meat, be it tartare, any kind of raw egg, or raw fish. I feel a little self-conscious about it because every time I say I don't eat sushi people look at me like an uncouth hick. So when faced with the thought of trying to gag down another California roll, I knew what had to be done. And that thing is hibachi.

I did not feel guilty at all about giving Olivia a semi-authentic (hibachi actually did originate in Japan, at hotel to entertain American guests) experience if it meant I did not have to eat fish eggs. The upside was that we were able to talk to the chef and try out our new Japanese phrases, and what kid wouldn't love hibachi?

So arigatou gozaimasu and on to India!

My Friends Do Cool Stuff

One of my best friends, Sarah, works here and her boss was on the Bryant Park Project today. I would love to do a longer post on this and will soon, but this is a great organziation and resource for cancer patients and their families.