School Daze

This morning was the big day!  Merlin and Starling headed back to school bright and early this morning.  Cari and I decided it was important that we show up and let the parents know that we are in charge this year, so I had to get up at 7:30 AM in order to get my hair and makeup done for my first meet & greet with my constituents.  It is practically still dark out that early!

We stood in the cafeteria with some coffee and cookies that the cafeteria ladies had provided and people could come in and meet us if they chose to.  Krystyn, Cari and I couldn’t stop laughing about an overweight woman we had seen at barre yesterday and, while a few women poked their noses in, no one seemed to want to stay.  It’s just as well; they all seemed pretty dreary.  Speaking of dreary, Margie was hanging out with the cafeteria ladies and, of course knows all of their names and asked them about their families.  What a show-off.

Röbert got a quick photo of the kids before we left for school.

Several people mentioned how skinny Starling looks and Krystyn called her “emaciated”. She was thrilled, of course!

We already knew that Ty would be Merlin’s teacher again, but Starling has Miss Cole, who is known for being pretty strict.  I am sure Starling will charm the strict right out of her.  LOL!  Poor Amber got a new teacher named Mrs. Dingus.  LOL LOL!  How will the children keep a straight face?  If your last name is Dingus you should prroabably change it before you start teaching.  Starling and Amber were making up funny little songs about Mrs. Dingus the whole way home from school.  Adorable!  Merlin couldn’t stop talking about some special project he is starting with mentoring or something.  Oh well, at least it makes him happy.

Hummus apparently slept his morning away at the gym.  That kid must be growing, because he just can’t quit sleeping.

Amber is staying for dinner so Cari can finish packing for their little trip to the desert.  We sure are going to miss them.

 

 

Away He Goes

Last night Merlin got a phone call from his favorite teacher, Mr. Williams.  It turns out that he is going to be a”facilitator” (LOL!  What the hell does that mean!?) at the the nerd camp Merlin is attending this week and he called to offer Merlin a ride to camp.  It is a few hours away, so it was a relief to me not to have to drive him (and listen to him) all that way, plus Merlin was so excited to be going with Ty!  It really is nice that he has taken such a special interest in my child.  Everyone does tell me how much like me Merlin is.

Anywho, we decided to meet at the library this morning to hand off Merlin to him.  It was nice to see Ty and, while I didn’t get a chance to speak to him about Renata, I think that I was able to communicate quite a bit with my eyes.

My two buddies were happy to be together again, and Ty had some god awful sounding audio book to listen to on the ride. Better him than me!

He did say that we should pick him up next weekend because we won’t want to miss the awards ceremony.  Ugh.  Awards ceremony?  You wouldn’t want to bet on whether I would be willing to miss that, Ty!

Röbert took the other two kids with him to some dog show thing for Beefeater this afternoon, so I have been hanging out, looking at Pinterest pages and making plans for this week while Starling is also in camp (Her art day camp, I couldn’t stand to have her away for a whole week!)  I looked out my back window to check on the progress at Karen’s pool (still disgusting) and guess who appears to have a new bestie?  Apparently snakes like to lie around in the sun with other snakes.  How convenient for me.

Where on earth did she even find a two piece? She is delusional if she thinks a tan will help!

I have to run and call Cari about this latest development.

Injustice Towards Women!

I am fired up right now!  Starling just told me that she did not place first in the science fair.  Once again some dopey boy from the genius class won with some ridiculously boring project that he had spent months holed up in his basement working on.  Starling’s board looked absolutely darling.  We hired a photographer to take pictures of her looking sciency to include on it and I put it together for her so it would be profesh and nice.

Believe it or not, this is not an actual experiment!

If they had allowed Starling to continue with her original experiment I am sure she would have gone on to nationals!

Meanwhile, I guess I’d better confess that the nerdy kid who won the science fair is my own lil’ Merlin.  Why does he want to be so weird and unpopular?  His boards had way too many words on them. and the whole project was so boring that I can’t even deal.

He tried to explain this to me but just, ugh!

I didn’t make it to the science fair last night because I forgot all about it, and of course Merlin never mentioned his win to me.  He said that Mr. Williams and his girlfriend were planning to take him out to lunch to celebrate today, but I put the kibosh on that.  I don’t need that Renata person being cruel to another one of my children.  I explained to Merlin that we can’t really celebrate because Starling didn’t win and she would feel bad.  Of course he understood.

Do we have to go to the regionals?  That just sounds like such a bummer.  Why can’t girls win in science sometimes?

School News

Merlin came home from school with some great news today.  Mr. Williams is going to be his teacher again next year.  Apparently my pal Ty enjoys being with all of the weirdos in the Gifted Class.  Merlin adores him, so that is great news for us.  I don’t think that having such a good friend among the nerds’ parents made Ty’s decision harder either!

Amber came home with Starling to work on a Science Fair project.  They have taken photos of all of their classmates faces and are posting them on an app where other people can rate them for attractiveness.  Then they are going to personally rank them for popularity and make a chart comparing the numbers.  It should be interesting.

I wonder how Fat Alice is going to do?

They posted the pictures and then went out back to play.  They are just such happy, fun lovin’ lil’ gals!  I am sure their photos would be very popular but they said they can’t use their own pictures because of scientific principles.  Oh well!

They are both tens on my app!

He Takes After Me

In Merlin’s genius class they have been doing debating.  It sounds basically like arguing except that you can’t choose which side you argue about.  I argue a lot so I just know he takes after me. I tried to show him how to cry and flounce out of the room during an argument but he said you can’t do that when you are trying a debate.  Anywhoo, he and his teacher (my close, close friend Ty) were going to some state debating contest today.  I had no idea that this was a big deal.  i guess he has been doing a lot of debating and I just haven’t been able to make it to a single one because of my busy, busy schedule, but this one is very important.  I had to drop him at school early this morning and there were people from the newspaper there to take his picture.  i guess he is the youngest person who debates or something.

So proud!

If I had known this was such big deal I probably would have gotten him a blazer to wear like he has been asking me.

Helping Out

I am sure that most people consider me a super-mom.  I take care of my kiddies, my hubster and my home.  I just barely have time to take a quick class or two at the gym and hang out with my gal pals between all of my obligations.

Something that is VERY important to me is volunteering at the children’s school.  Their education is so important to me, and helping out in the classroom is the least I can do to support their wonderful teachers.  I do most of my volunteering in Merlin’s class because I think they probably have a hard time finding parents who are intelligent enough to keep up with the genius class.

Today I was in charge of a special “Congress of the Minds” event in their class.  I volunteered to run it last September, but of course I had to allow the other women to do SOME of the work.  Margie Harris was my co-chair and I checked in with her pretty often.  I mean, WAY more often than that bitch Margie claims I did.  Anywhoo, women are so, so competitive, aren’t they?  And I truly believe that we should be supporting each other, embracing each other, loving each other.

So today I went in for the event and it was great.  I have to say that I am a wonderful chair, because it all ran so smoothly and there was a LOT going on.  My committee had all decided to wear pants and flats because they were running around like crazy.  I hadn’t gotten that email apparently, but it was just as well.  Someone needs to be able to stand still and supervise and correct the other ladies when they don’t fulfill my vision.  Also, I know that Ty appreciated having a chance to chat with me, even though he was pretty busy too.

There is nothing wrong with caring about your appearance. Margie could take a lesson from me here!

Merlin really loved his special day with Mommy, so I feel like I have done my job.

He didn’t say much after school, but that is the way with boys. I know he totally loved everything about having me at school today.

Dive Bar Fun

I keep hearing about how the hipsters love “dive” bars and drinking dive bar beers, which come in retro cans.  OMG!  Funnnnn!  So last night I told Karen that we should have a girl’s night.  She wanted to go see a speaker at the university, something about books or some such so I told her that I would get tickets and we headed downtown.

Of course I had no intention of spending one single second trying not to fall asleep at some boring lecture.  I pretended that I had no idea what she was talking about when she brought it up and she actually had the nerve to act angry.  She was a real party pooper the rest of the night.  I was a lil’ nervous when I saw the place.  It didn’t look all that nice, but I bravely put on my hipster eyeglasses and went on in.

The neighborhood even smelled bad! Crazy.

Karen wanted to leave right away but I made her stay.  I had the car keys, after all, so it was up to me.  We ordered beer in cans, LOL.  You will never ever guess who I ran into!  Ty was there with a group of guys.  They were playing billiards in another room, which is why I didn’t see him right away.  Boy, he sure seemed surprised to see me.  Maybe it was because I was wearing my cool glasses?  Who knows.

Hipster selfie, lol!

What a fun night.  Karen had to drive home and she barely said a word the whole way.  Oh well. She needs to get over it.

Celebration Time!

Happy almost New Year!  I am so excited about our plans for tonight.  The Sullivan’s have invited us all for a party at their house and the children will come and sleep over in their sons’ bedrooms.   I was of course worried about them staying in the same home as that vicious dog, Beefeater, but Karen has promised to have him crated the entire time.

This morning I had my book group over to talk about that book that we are reading (I forget what it is called, LOL.  I didn’t even bother to purchase it this time).  We started out with a lil’ toast with some sparkly and then we ended up not talking about any books at all.  One of my friends had seen Missy getting her makeup done for tonight at Sephora and took some sneaky photos.  Hilarious!  I would post one here, but I am not that kind of person.  Take my word for it though, smokey eyes are NOT the look with a nose like hers!

Cheers! Karen and I may have had three or four glasses!

This afternoon there was a lil’ get together for the faculty at the kids’ school.  I happened to have heard about it and assumed that parents would be invited.  Oops, they weren’t.   Of course everyone was extremely happy to see me.  I am very popular with everyone I meet, and I just know that I am a great favorite with all of the teachers.  Guess who was there?  Ty!

He cleans up nicely!

We had a long talk about Merlin and teaching; very interesting.  I have a feeling that if someone showed him a necklace they really, really wanted then he would find a way to afford it.

Time to Get Away

I woke up even more upset and confused about whoever K is. I am sure Röbert would never cheat on me, but I just feel so sad and confused.

I dropped the big kids off at my mother’s but she wouldn’t let me drop off Hummus, just because he has a fever and is throwing up a tiny bit.  So he was my lil’ sidekick as I drove out of town to gather my thoughts.  I ended up in this small town next to a big state park and Just sat in front of the general store and watched Hummus sleep off some Benadryl in his carseat.

I must have drifted off too, because I was startled when I heard a knock on my car window.  You will never believe who it was!  No, not Röbert.  Not Karen or Mitch either.  It was Ty!  I had totally forgotten that he had mentioned that he was camping near here this weekend!  LOL!

His snowmobile is such fun!

What a coincidence.  I asked him if he would join me for lunch at the sweet little inn next to the river.  He took a lil’ convincing, but eventually he said yes.  I could tell he was thrilled to spend some one on one time with his favorite class mom. LOL!  Luckily I happened to have made a reservation there, so we were seated right away.  He was such a gentleman, he insisted that we bring Hummus and his carseat inside (he was still asleep) even though I am sure he would have been fine in the car.

I was glad I had taken care with my appearance, even though I was distraught. I wouldn’t want to “shock” my buddy, Ty.

After I had confessed that I was taking time to think about “things” and had no place to stay and he had checked with the inn and called several local hotels and motels to find that they were all booked, he very kindly offered to have me and Hummus stay with him.  So we all piled on his snowmobile, and off we went.

I will confess, when he said camping I was thinking more like glamping, with a big old tent and running water or even a chic, rustic Ralph Lauren cabin in the woods.  Nope, Ty takes his camping seriously and was staying in a tiny tent in the snow.  Hummus had woken up on the trip out there, and was thirsty but Ty only had water to drink.  Unbelievable.  He didn’t even have wine for later.

Can you see how small this tent is? I was really thinking it would be more like a small cozy 3 bedroom cabin.

All of a sudden I remembered something.  I was the one who had bought that ugly shirt!  It was a gift for Karen last Christmas, and then we had a fight and I never gave it to her.  I should have known who it was for when I saw how hideous it was.  Ha ha!  That explains the K on the shirt and I am sure the pajamas were just Röbert being Röbert.

Ty was, of course, disappointed, but drove me back to my car as soon as I told him that I needed to get home.  LOL, I am such a silly goose!

 

 

Black Friday

It is so much more convenient now that stores are open on Thanksgiving to do my Black Friday shopping.  It is always fun to get together with all of my gal pals but I prefer not to get out of bed too early.

As soon as dinner was done at the Sullivan’s house I had to get going to be at the mall by 6 PM.  I am sure Karen didn’t mind doing the dishes alone, she is a born hostess.

You will never guess who I saw at the mall!  Ty, Merlin’s genius teacher, was there with a group of people protesting something or another.  Maybe he was saying that people shouldn’t work on a holiday but if they don’t work, how am I supposed to get all of these bargains?  LOL!  I offered to get him something but he said that he wouldn’t spend ANY money this weekend for solidarity or something.  That is so crazy.  Going to the mall and not spending any money?

Ty was protesting shopping or something. Does not compute!

There was really nothing I needed this year, but it is just so much fun to shop and save all sorts money.  I saved literally hundreds of dollars and I have three machines that make soda out of water and mix you buy from the soda machine company.  It tastes exactly like soda!  So cool.

This is just a small portion of what I bought!

I hope everyone enjoys this most spiritual time of the year as much as I do.