Twas the Voicemail before Thanksgiving

OMG. So apparently, every time I leave my husband a voicemail at work, his office's phone system transcribes my message. And he just told me today that this so called "system" actually makes me sound insane every single time. No one else. Just me. 

I was like "What the hell are you talking about?"

And he read me the transcription of the message I left this morning. 

Just to put this all in context, that is not what I said. I called him as I was leaving Target, where I tried unsuccessfully to pick up some last minute items he'd told me that we needed. That makes me a nice person because it's the day before Thanksgiving and that place is a shit show.

Here's the transcript. The first sentence is pretty accurate but after that... It's like his voicemail is trying to make me sound borderline demented. And I mean - SCREW YOU, VOICEMAIL TRANSCRIPTION. I have three kids and it's the holidays. I can look crazy without your help. 

"It's Julie, I'm I was not able to find all the stuff that you texted me this morning. So I'm just gonna do the best they can, Korea. I'm one of the things that I was going to do. It's me stock. It's for you to cook with because the stuff that I could be stopping you could drink, but I don't get a chicken salad mixed chocolate. So I was just gonna cut the crap out of it and the pressure cooker and make it really gets back and you can either drink that or you can use it for cooking. Hopefully it will make you feel better. I'm running. Please go to come in and I'm going to go anyway for an hour or so to volunteer to pot luck and then. We should be home about I don't know too. Okay. Let me back."

(c) Mommyland Blogs 2013-2018

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What's it like to write a book, Julie? (part 1)

WHAT’S IT LIKE TO WRITE A BOOK, JULIE?

It’s like this! First, you drink all the coffee in the whole house because of your deadline. Then you realize you’re out of coffee but you won’t go to the store because that’s time you won’t be writing and you magically find some hidden coffee, lurking among the tea, and brew a huge pot and drink it and then your teenage daughter says “OMG why is this coffee so gross? MOM IT EXPIRED IN JANUARY 2016 WHAT ARE YOU EVEN DOING?” and you’re like “whatever, it’s fine” and keep typing out terrible words.

(c) Mommyland Blogs 2013-2018

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The Sunday Morning Crap Collection Process

Every Sunday morning, I do this fun thing where I walk around my house picking up random and assorted debris. Today's haul of random crap included 1 full bag of garbage, 14 hair elastics, 11 cootie catchers, 13 shoes (shouldn't this be an even number?), my good scissors, the phone charger no one will admit to moving, some crumpled up homework assignments that I'm pretty sure were due last week, and a large collection of magnets.  

Also, I'm not sure why so many crumb-filled paper plates were in the bathroom trash because does that mean they're eating in there? When and how is this occurring? And also why? JK, I don't actually want to know. 

10 Things I Have Cried About in the Past 24 Hours

Things I Have Cried About Because of PMS in the Past 24 Hours (no particular order):

1) How much I love my dogs
2) Puerto Rico
3) Because my brand new nephew is so tiny and beautiful
4) That choreography video I saw on Facebook to Kendrick Lamar's Humble because those young dancers are so talented and passionate about their art
5) Because for once I had a really productive day and maybe I CAN DO THIS
6) Why do kids have to have anxiety? It's not fair.
7) Accidentally listened to religious/praise music in the car and lasted 15 seconds into the song before weeping
8) Husband was very considerate and thoughtful and was momentarily overwhelmed with gratitude
9) My brother is still dead
10) **looked around at the whole world and was like what in the actual hell is happening to us all right now**

People in our Facebook Community left some really amazing comments in response to this and I love them so much:

https://www.facebook.com/RantsFromMommyLand/posts/10155853087794248

(c) Mommyland Blogs 2013-2018

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Back to School Takes 6 Weeks, You Guys.

A long time ago my friend Kate told me that "back to school" is actually a six week transition period. I’ve outlined below how it works at my house with my three kids. 

Week One: The Pregame (the week before school starts)

• Kids are generally feeling excited, happy, and slightly anxious.
• Find out about teachers, schedules, classmates, and lockers.
• Celebrate or freak out accordingly.
• Hemorrhage money on last-minute items for school/sports/fashion that are suddenly required.
• Look around the house and shake your head sadly about all the long term projects that did not get done this summer.
• Savor those last moments sleeping in and going to the pool.
• Fill out approximately 4,567 pages of forms.
• Go back and forth about putting kids to bed early/waking them up early to prepare them for the coming schedule change.
• Give up on that shit because it’s all a goat rodeo at this point in August.
• JUST TRY TO STAY POSITIVE. 

The Last Good Race

When your children stop doing a sport or an activity that your family has been part of for a long time, it's a milestone. We've been on a swim team for eight years and now my kids are ready to move on (even if I'm not). Being on that team is what made the amorphous collection of pre-planned subdivisions where we live feel like a community. It was also something that we did together - all the kids on the same team and the parents serving as volunteers. It was a shared experience. 

At our last swim meet, my friends and I alternately cheered as our kids competed, ate italian ice, and fanned ourselves in folding chairs trying to stay cool in the merciless mid-Atlantic heat. After four hours, we were tired and impatient for the last event of the night. 

When it was time, we stood by the fence to watch. I'd been fine the whole evening, anticipating this moment. This was when I'd let myself get emotional. This was when I'd savor every second because the ending of it all was going to feel real. I braced myself.

What I Didn't Say Before Try Outs

My oldest is trying for a high school sport today. Here's what I said to her: 

• Have fun! I love you!

Here's what I wanted to say/blurt out like a crazy person but did not:

• Be confident! Even if you don't feel confident! You can do this! 
• Listen and be coachable! Make eye contact and let the coaches know you're hearing them and getting it!
• If you make a mistake, just own it and reset with a great attitude!
• I'm not going to be in the parking lot frenetically playing Candy Crush wondering how it's going. That would be super weird. 
• Give high fives and praise to your team-mates for good play! Spread a positive attitude! 
• DO NOT GET CHATTY WITH YOUR FRIENDS.
• If you have a choice between diving for a ball or a pass you probably won't get and letting it pass you by, YOU GO FOR IT.
• Ask questions and be focused!
• I AM SO PROUD OF YOU AND HOW HARD YOU HAVE WORKED.
• It may not work out and that's ok. We'll have a huge pity party for one day and eat all the chocolate and Chipotle and then regroup and move forward. 
• OMG I'M FINE I'M NOT EVEN NERVOUS WHATEVER THIS IS ABOUT YOU.
• Hydrate!
• Offer to help/say thank you/be respectful/all the things we raised to you do. 
• Know in your heart that who makes it is about the team and not about you and that's how it should be
• There's a lesson in everything and it will all be ok so just have fun and relax.
• I will be totally cool and not at all twitchy on the ride home tonight and wait for you to tell me about everything in your own time EVEN IF IT KILLS ME.
• I love you so much and I am your biggest fan and you are the most amazing kid. And these are not tears in my eyes I have allergies so shut up.

(c) Mommyland Blogs 2013-2017

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Giving Formula a Ride

For the past couple of years, I've been giving baby formula a ride. Once every month or two, I drive it from my pediatrician's office to the local family homeless shelter. The companies that make formula send it to pediatricians everywhere in the hopes that they'll give it away to their patients, who will like their products and start to buy them. The practice we go to is large and as a result, they get sent a lot of formula and they often end up with too much. 

It drove the staff crazy because sometimes they literally couldn't give it away. Once they had to throw it out because they lost track of the expiration date. That spurred one of the (amazing) nurses to ask me if I still helped with homeless families and if so, would I take several cases of formula over there for her. I was like YOU BETCHA LADY, THIS STUFF IS EXPENSIVE. GIDDY UP. So now whenever they have too much baby formula, they call me and I come pick it up. 

Today I got to drive 17 cases and that was pretty awesome so I decided to tell you about it. Not to be annoying like - oooh look what I did, I'm so fancy and helpful - but because maybe you also go to a big pediatric practice where you live and they have extra formula and you want to give it a ride. Or maybe you volunteer someplace with hungry families and you read this and thought - Hey! I could maybe get them some much-needed free stuff! 

Sending hugs & extra air conditioning (because it is too hot to function in Virginia),
J

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Orbital Space is Finite

I recently listened to a podcast about space junk, the man-made debris floating around in Earth’s orbit. It discussed how one Cold War-era rocket booster over time may break into 100 smaller pieces of debris, which eventually break into thousands of tiny bits of space junk. It all spins around the planet, occasionally crashing into things, which create exponentially more and smaller debris.

All these little pieces are not gently floating around us in a Hollywood version of zero gravity. They’re moving at incredibly high speed. Millions of tiny pieces of shrapnel, which we know will inevitably cause damage to the satellites and the things in our orbit that we view as important and useful. Like HBO.

Public Display of Costco Shopping

Since you, my internet friends, seem to really enjoy it when I embarrass myself in public (like here or here), allow to me to share this precious nugget of humiliation. I have a good friend who speaks a couple of languages and she says that occasionally she gets "ESOL brain" and the words just come out wrong. That is not my problem, however, because I'm a jackass who only speaks English and apparently not that well.

So my multi-lingual friend and I were at Costco today and she very wisely was like “We should see if they have any of those skirts.”  Well of course we scampered right over to the clothes section because Costco yoga skirts are legitimately the best thing ever. 

Note: It should already be evident that my friend and I are neither "fancy" nor "fashionable" nor "cool". Anyone who gets excited about Costco skirts needs to know that about themselves. We are aware.

40 Examples of 4th Quarter Parenting

It’s the end of the school year and I’m so done. Except I’m not done because unlike most of you lucky devils who are finishing up this week, our schools won't release the Krakken for four more weeks. 

The accumulated exhaustion from doing the exact same tasks again and again and again, combined with spring sports insanity and all of the end of year “celebrations” just becomes too much. 

In September, I was a shining example of good parenting. Now I am reduced to giving my children random slices of cheese on a torn paper towel for breakfast. I call this phenomenon Fourth Quarter Parenting. I want to be a shiny, happy, awesome mom but I just can't do it. I'm too tired. There are too many things at this stage of the school year. Sorry.

via GIPHY

As it turns out, I’m not alone. I shared a few examples of #4thQtrParenting on my Facebook page and got hundreds and hundreds of comments in response that had cracking me up. As usual, it is proven that the people who read my blog are about a million times funnier than I am.

Here are 40 examples of #4thQtrParenting: