Scene: Yesterday after school, Bug, Bear and I are siting around the kitchen table having a snack.
Bear: Mom? How come you and Mrs. Best Friend are always talking lahk thees?
Me (calmly): Because it's hysterically funny.
Bear: No, it's not.
Me: Yes, eet eez.
Bug: *giggles*
Me: See? Hilarious.
Bear: Mooooooooom. It's embarrassing and really annoying.
Me: Huh. So yew don't wunt me doin' thees in frunna yer frenz? Nope, still funny. Sorry.
Bear: Arrrrg!
Aww, she's embarrassed by her mother... a true milestone on the road to teenagerdom. Being mortified by your parents' behavior is practically a rite of passage. Next will come criticism of how I dress! I can hardly wait!
And, for the record, her friends think I'm quite amusing.
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Boredom Is Not An Option: Plimoth Plantation
In the time-honored tradition of kids everywhere, my daughters often come to me complaining that they're "bored" or "don't know what to do", like I'm going to whip out a tap dance or performing monkeys to enliven their drab little lives. Nothing frustrates me more. While we're certainly not the Rockefellers, these kids have a yard, creek, woods, swingset, and pretty much every indoor and outdoor toy on the market, not to mention shelves and shelves of books and art supplies. They're usually hinting around the fact that they'd like to watch TV or play a video game, but because I'm a wretched inhumane kind of mother, those activities are off the table when the weather is nice. It's Maine. You have to take advantage of the nice. It's fleeting; before you can say "mosquito", you're back to gray skies and frost in the mornings.So when the opportunity arose to visit Plimoth Plantation, I seized it, thinking A-ha! Let's give these 21st century kids a peek at the hardscrabble reality of a Pilgrim kid's life...
We took
Nana
and Papa
along.
Plimoth Plantation is divided into two sections: a Wampanoag village and a Pilgrim village. Both of them are staffed with people dressed in period costume who behave as if they were living in the 1620's. You are encouraged to walk right up to them and ask questions as they go about their daily lives. Historically accurate, down to the clothes, pottery, and nails used to build the homes, it is a fascinating experience.
This Native American Man was working on a canoe, from a tree he had personally cut down, carved, burned out and scraped. It took months, he told us, and would still be several more weeks before it had cured in the sun and they could put it in the water to see if it was sea-worthy. The kids were mildly interested. I felt a pang of conscience, thinking of how I've been putting off vacuuming my van because it's SO time-consuming and boring. As in I'd have to dig out an extension cord and run the hand-vac for twenty minutes and maybe I'll just sit here and flip through People magazine instead. Ahem. Maybe the kids aren't the only spoiled ones?
This really kind of sums it up, doesn't it? Bear, the 21st century kid, taking pictures with her cell phone of a 17th century Native American woman planting crops.
Walking into one of the homes, we found a Pilgrim woman cooking a venison stew in the fireplace and I asked the question I'd been saving up since we first decided to do this trip, "What sort of work do the children of the village do?" I inquired sweetly, and within clear earshot of my kids.
This really kind of sums it up, doesn't it? Bear, the 21st century kid, taking pictures with her cell phone of a 17th century Native American woman planting crops. Walking into one of the homes, we found a Pilgrim woman cooking a venison stew in the fireplace and I asked the question I'd been saving up since we first decided to do this trip, "What sort of work do the children of the village do?" I inquired sweetly, and within clear earshot of my kids."The same work as the adults, miss," she shot right back, "When I go to the fields to help my husband, I take my little ones along. Of course, when they're small, they just play near me."
I saw Bug smiling and just knew that in her mind, she was a Pilgrim girl skipping merrily through the corn fields and weaving daisy chains. Then the woman indicated a little boy of about four standing near us, "Of course, by the time they are as big as that one, they are working." And the smile died on Bug's face.
The houses were simple and small. I tried to imagine how on earth they were heated sufficiently during a New England winter. I failed. 
Inside this tiny dwelling, I pointed out the clothesline of four simple garments along the wall to Bear, "See that, honey? That would be your closet." Then I savored the look of horror on her face.
Spoiled or no, I do plan to keep them, since they're kind of cute and all. But maybe now they won't moan quite so loudly when I ask them to put away their laundry? Hush. Let me dream.
The Pilgrims might have had an ocean view, but they also had roofs made of grass and sticks, no insulation, no feminine hygiene products (imagine!), and neighbors that resented the hell out of them. We're sticking with the 21st century and our pansy-ass little problems like what shade to repaint the bathroom and how to get the cat to stop flipping her water bowl over every ten minutes. 
Monday, April 27, 2009
My Loving, Supportive Husband
Scene: driving home from Salem, Massachusetts. We had just taken a tour of The House of the Seven Gables.
Me (thinking over the iron teakettle we'd just seen that weighed 25 lbs. empty): I'd have made a really sucky Colonial woman, what with my bad back and all.
Daddy Shortbread: True.
Me (musing): Of course, I'd probably have died in childbirth, so there wouldn't have been too many years of kettle-lifting for me anyway.
Daddy Shortbread: Oh, hon. They'd have burned you at the stake LONG before you'd made it to childbirth.
Me (thinking over the iron teakettle we'd just seen that weighed 25 lbs. empty): I'd have made a really sucky Colonial woman, what with my bad back and all.
Daddy Shortbread: True.
Me (musing): Of course, I'd probably have died in childbirth, so there wouldn't have been too many years of kettle-lifting for me anyway.
Daddy Shortbread: Oh, hon. They'd have burned you at the stake LONG before you'd made it to childbirth.
Friday, April 24, 2009
Spring Break
We're tooling around Massachusetts for a few days as Spring Break week winds down. We'll be back home tomorrow night, so details of our wanderings will be posted once I wade through the thousand or so pictures I've shot... suffice it to say: Pilgrims were seen, a ship was boarded, beaches were strolled, and hotel pools have been swum. Coming up tomorrow: a town known for its policy on witches. Where are we going??Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Easter...Spring...well, Close Enough
We host an Easter Egg Hunt every year for some of our girls' friends. In their early years I took Bug and Bear to some community egg hunts. They sucked. For one thing, Easter in Maine is a dicey proposition. There is often still snow on the ground, and if the snow is melted, it's a muddy mess. Therefore, egg hunts are usually held on parking lots.
There were never enough eggs for the number of kids that show up. My girls would net maybe six eggs, one of which had been stepped on. They frequently got knocked down to the pavement by the crush of kids stampeding for eggs. But the year that really did it for me was the year that Parks and Rec enlisted the help of the senior center to fill the plastic eggs for the egg hunt. Nice, right?
When the girls opened their eggs that year, we discovered that the candy inside were three bare jellybeans per egg, wrapped in a hand-twisted piece of foil. Gross. Even more so because that year's egg hunt had been held in a misty rain, and the jellybeans in the foil were wet and melty. I vowed that the next year we would hold our own egg hunt and we would do it RIGHT.
This year was our sixth annual Spring Egg Hunt. I don't bother with trying to hold it in time for Easter. I wait for the weather, and the kids don't seem to give a hoot.
My mother and I filled 1250 eggs with candy. Papa was on hand this year to assist Daddy Shortbread in distributing them around our three acre yard. It has to be done early, but not too early, the morning of the hunt. An hour before the hunt is about right. We've learned through sad experience that curious squirrels will bite right through the shiny plastic eggs to check out what's inside if the eggs are out for too long.
We even hang them from the trees.
In case you were wondering, it takes forty kids about four minutes to hoover up 1250 eggs. It's impressive. They've learned over the years not to bring any of those twee little Easter baskets to our egg hunts. Most of them show up with tote bags and sturdy footwear. They mean business. 
After the eggs are picked up, the kids cluster around the Egg Return Box in the driveway, feverishly opening plastic eggs with the nimble fingers of 19th century child factory workers. Why? Well, some of the eggs contain candy, but others hold highly valued paper slips of Bunny Money. Once the kids have their Bunny Money in hand, they head into the garage to....
THE BUNNY STORE! This is the highlight of the egg hunt. As the self-declared Queen of the Target Dollar Aisle & Oriental Trading Company, I spend the year snatching up bargains on all types of toys, school supplies, and craft items. Each item on the table costs $1, $2, or $3 of Bunny Money. The kids usually scores $20 - $30 in their eggs, and the National Bank of Daddy Shortbread is wandering around with a pocket full of Bunny Money to provide "stimulus packages" to any kid that got shafted on Bunny Money. We run a Socialist egg hunt.
Nana, several of the moms, and I work behind the table filling the kids' orders. When they've spent $5 Bunny Money, the kids head to the back of the line. This ensures that the first kids in line don't buy up all the good stuff. I guess that also makes it a Communist egg hunt. Whatever.
I thought these pencils were supercute.
But year after year, the hottest item in the Bunny Store is these ridiculous, cheap-as-dirt chenille chicks the size of my thumbnail. Don't ask me why, but the kids love 'em. My kids have whole families of little chicks. Bug and Bear spend hours crafting houses for them out of shoeboxes. One of Bug's chicks even has a flat-screen TV made out of popsicle sticks and foil. She glued a picture of a drumstick to the screen. I vascillate between thinking that's adorable and being concerned.
Once every kid has spent their bunny money, it's time to eat. With moms and dads helping to ferry the food out from the kitchen, while I sweep the toys and prizes into plastic tubs for next year, the Bunny Store is transformed into a brunch buffet. Each family brings a brunch dish to the hunt, and the amount of food is truly staggering. The frenetic pace of the morning slows down, and the adults get a chance to eat, sip coffee, and chat.
There were never enough eggs for the number of kids that show up. My girls would net maybe six eggs, one of which had been stepped on. They frequently got knocked down to the pavement by the crush of kids stampeding for eggs. But the year that really did it for me was the year that Parks and Rec enlisted the help of the senior center to fill the plastic eggs for the egg hunt. Nice, right?
When the girls opened their eggs that year, we discovered that the candy inside were three bare jellybeans per egg, wrapped in a hand-twisted piece of foil. Gross. Even more so because that year's egg hunt had been held in a misty rain, and the jellybeans in the foil were wet and melty. I vowed that the next year we would hold our own egg hunt and we would do it RIGHT.
This year was our sixth annual Spring Egg Hunt. I don't bother with trying to hold it in time for Easter. I wait for the weather, and the kids don't seem to give a hoot.
My mother and I filled 1250 eggs with candy. Papa was on hand this year to assist Daddy Shortbread in distributing them around our three acre yard. It has to be done early, but not too early, the morning of the hunt. An hour before the hunt is about right. We've learned through sad experience that curious squirrels will bite right through the shiny plastic eggs to check out what's inside if the eggs are out for too long.
We even hang them from the trees.
In case you were wondering, it takes forty kids about four minutes to hoover up 1250 eggs. It's impressive. They've learned over the years not to bring any of those twee little Easter baskets to our egg hunts. Most of them show up with tote bags and sturdy footwear. They mean business. After the eggs are picked up, the kids cluster around the Egg Return Box in the driveway, feverishly opening plastic eggs with the nimble fingers of 19th century child factory workers. Why? Well, some of the eggs contain candy, but others hold highly valued paper slips of Bunny Money. Once the kids have their Bunny Money in hand, they head into the garage to....
THE BUNNY STORE! This is the highlight of the egg hunt. As the self-declared Queen of the Target Dollar Aisle & Oriental Trading Company, I spend the year snatching up bargains on all types of toys, school supplies, and craft items. Each item on the table costs $1, $2, or $3 of Bunny Money. The kids usually scores $20 - $30 in their eggs, and the National Bank of Daddy Shortbread is wandering around with a pocket full of Bunny Money to provide "stimulus packages" to any kid that got shafted on Bunny Money. We run a Socialist egg hunt.
Nana, several of the moms, and I work behind the table filling the kids' orders. When they've spent $5 Bunny Money, the kids head to the back of the line. This ensures that the first kids in line don't buy up all the good stuff. I guess that also makes it a Communist egg hunt. Whatever. I thought these pencils were supercute.
But year after year, the hottest item in the Bunny Store is these ridiculous, cheap-as-dirt chenille chicks the size of my thumbnail. Don't ask me why, but the kids love 'em. My kids have whole families of little chicks. Bug and Bear spend hours crafting houses for them out of shoeboxes. One of Bug's chicks even has a flat-screen TV made out of popsicle sticks and foil. She glued a picture of a drumstick to the screen. I vascillate between thinking that's adorable and being concerned. Once every kid has spent their bunny money, it's time to eat. With moms and dads helping to ferry the food out from the kitchen, while I sweep the toys and prizes into plastic tubs for next year, the Bunny Store is transformed into a brunch buffet. Each family brings a brunch dish to the hunt, and the amount of food is truly staggering. The frenetic pace of the morning slows down, and the adults get a chance to eat, sip coffee, and chat. The kids gather at the picnic tables and eat while comparing loot. They don't rest for long, though, and are up and running around again within minutes. A few will scour the yard for missed eggs, while others get up a whiffleball game in the front yard, or head to the swingset. And every single year, at least one child (usually a boy) manages to "fall" in the creek, announcing it in a cheerful enough way to lead to suspicion that it was not entirely an accident.
Good times. Great times.
Monday, April 20, 2009
Spring
...has sprung. And instead of blogging, I've been elbow-deep in dirt for the the last several, gloriously sunshiney days. I've planted blueberry bushes, apple trees, peas, and am now digging a new flower garden in front (my old ones are full).
At night, when I ease my achey muscles and sore back into bed, I can hear the peepers along the creek making a joyful racket. It's one of my top ten favorite sounds of all-time. It means that spring is definitely, irrevocably HERE. No backsies now.
Tomorrow, though, we're to get 1-2 inches of rain. I suppose it will be a good time to upload the photos from my camera and catch up.
At night, when I ease my achey muscles and sore back into bed, I can hear the peepers along the creek making a joyful racket. It's one of my top ten favorite sounds of all-time. It means that spring is definitely, irrevocably HERE. No backsies now.
Tomorrow, though, we're to get 1-2 inches of rain. I suppose it will be a good time to upload the photos from my camera and catch up.
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