Going commando on Mufti Day

My big boys go to the local village school and like most English children wear uniforms to school.  I have to say I am a big fan of the uniform gig.  So simple--they get up and put on grey trousers, a white polo, their school-logo ‘jumper’ (read: sweatshirt for my American friends), and their black shoes.  Some schools even have school-logo jackets and book bags.  It’s a great equalizer and it’s easier on my laundry and my nerves since despite my best efforts my boys prefer their clothes ragged and filthy.

Today however was ‘Super Hero Day’ at school.  Every once in a while the school council will decide they want to raise money for a charity and they sponsor a ‘Mufti Day.‘    Last time this happened I asked every single one of my English friends what in the world “Mufti” stood for and none of them had any idea.  The responses were all along the lines of “You know, MUFTI.  It means the kids pay a pound and get to wear whatever they want.  A MUFTI Day.”  This was about as helpful as answering that cheese tastes, you know, cheesy when asked to describe its flavor.  No fear!  I looked it up on the faithful Wikipedia!  Phew.  According to wiki it’s derived from Arabic and was originally adopted by the British Army in the early 1800’s to describe some robes that the army fellas wore when they weren’t wearing uniforms.  Which works well for today.  Because B went in his bathrobe to school today (read: dressing gown for my English friends).  He was a Jedi.  Jedi (Jedies?  what is the plural form of ‘Jedi’?) wear bathrobes apparently.  Our friend Mark P. wondered if he was perhaps the incredible sleeping man.  B just showed him the lightsaber slung under his robe and gave Mark an incredulous look.  Apparently B got a lot of questions about the robe today which really surprised him.  “It’s the closest I could come to a Jedi cloak!”  Scott suggested perhaps he was Obi Wan before his first cup of coffee.

C went as a ninja.  Of course.  Several months ago he took Scott aside and let him know the news, “Dad, I have something to tell you.  I should have told you a long time ago.  I...am a ninja.”  He dresses ninja-style a lot.  Scott taught him how.  Apparently he and his best bud used to dress this way quite often when they were junior highish age, sneak out of their respective houses, and run around in the dark.  Cue my mother instinct freaking out and praying that none of my three choose to follow in their father’s footsteps.  I know.  Dream on, right?  The outfit consists all of navy or black clothes.  Today it was: navy blue trousers, black tshirt and sweatshirt worn inside out to hide the logos, with a navy blue capillene tshirt worn as a mask over his face and black socks with finger holes cut out for gloves.  Oh, and a Samari sword tucked down the back of the sweatshirt.  Gotta have the appropriate weapon at all times.  

I love C’s love for transforming into other characters--he wears his knight cloak and carries his sword when we visit castles and really wanted to wear torn jeans and eye makeup to the school disco last week so he would look like a rock star.  He has an uncanny ability to fashion costumes out of any available items.  He’s been known to be an African 'King of the Wild' (B’s lion hoody towel with a belt, bow and arrow, and sword), a Native American chief (belt, washcloth loincloth and rope around his head), and my personal favorite was the outfit that he fashioned from Scott’s brown scarf--and nothing else.  The tying job was amazing on that one.  

Last weekend C came down in what he wanted to wear for Super Hero Day.  He was bare chested in black trousers, a black belt slung diagonal across his chest and a black bandana tied rambo style on his head.  He did NOT agree that they most likely would not allow him to go bare chested to school.  So understandably I sent Scott in to approve the costumes as they were being laid out last night.  This is the conversation I overheard from the other room:  

Scott:  Under no circumstances am I letting you wear underwear on your head to school.  

C:  But DAD!  It’s part of the mask!  See, I look out of this little slit!  It looks cool!

Scott:  No.  It looks like underwear on your head.  

C:  But it helps keep the other part on.  It’s part of the mask.

Scott:  It doesn’t look like a mask.  It looks like you have underwear on your head.

C:  Ah, I don’t care!

Scott:  Under no circumstances am I letting you wear underwear on your head to school.  

The hilarious thing is this argument juxtaposed with one a couple of years ago.  I was standing in his room where Scott overheard me say:  C, you MUST wear underwear to school.  

C:  But MOM!!  I hate wearing underwear!  

Me:  I know sweetheart, but you change in your classroom with everyone there so you have to have on underwear!  

C:  I don’t mind!  

Me:  I know you don’t, but those are your private parts and you need to keep them private.  It’s not polite to show them to everyone when you change.  

C:  But do I have to wear them at night?  

Me:  Nope.  You can take them off as soon as you get home.  

C: The weekend?  

Me:  Nope.  You can go without on the weekend.  

We visited Dover Castle one time and B was shocked that one of the WWII soldiers would announce to the world that he wasn’t wearing underwear.  What do you mean, B?  I asked.  Look right there, Mama.  It says “Commando.” He’s not wearing any underwear like C.  It was one of those parenting moments where in spite of your best intentions to keep a straight face you are in fact doubled over with laughter.  

Ah those boys.  They’re good for a lot of laughs.  We love C’s creative license when it comes to dressing, but are quite thankful that when it comes to school apart from those pesky Mufti Days there’s no question about what he’s wearing.  

Potentially...

How do we do when faced with uncertainty?  My sons are an interesting case study.  One of my sons worries a lot.  He plays through every worst case scenario in his head.  Asking a lot of questions no one has answers to and hunting down guarantees.  He’s sure it’s not going to work out and as a result, he decides he doesn’t want to do whatever it is he’s uncertain about.  Usually I gently make him do it anyway.  Suggest he tell himself some different stories.  Try very hard not to say anything remotely resembling ‘I told you so’ when he actually quite enjoys whatever uncertain thing he has finally decided to embrace.

One of my sons just barrels ahead.  Plunges in.  Tries to figure out how the thing works, what it’s all about, checking it out from multiple angles.  He’s not sure about ‘it’, but he’s sure about himself.  Once when he was two he climbed nimbly up the outside of a banister of stairs.  Clinging on to the top railings he looked confidently over at me and yelled, “Mom!  Is this wise?”  He can handle whatever comes along so he blasts through the uncertainty.  Sometimes it means he doesn’t think about or take in certain crucial issues or features.  Most of the time he doesn’t let it bother him.  I try to help him with critical thinking and learning from his mistakes.  

My other son is a baby.  Uncertainty is his MO.  He doesn’t know much about the world around him, or how things work, or even how he ought to relate to it so he just tries it all out.  Confident the world is a kind place and someone will rescue him if he’s gone too far.  Eager to learn about every nook and cranny.  Excited to test and perfect each new skill.  Today he stood up for a few seconds on his own.  He didn’t know he could do that. What a rapturous look on his face when he discovered he could!

Uncertainty.  Much of our lives is uncertain.  After losing two men in our circle in the ‘too young to die’ category within a year I’m quite sure that none of us has any idea how many days we are allotted on this earth.  After having many friends lose jobs and watching the painstaking process of finding new jobs I think that it’s unwise to be over-certain of our financial standing.  A stint in England will sure drive home the point that we can never know what the weather will do.  From the simple to the profound we just don’t know what life will hold.

We can plan for this uncertainty to a certain extent.  Plan for the ‘just in cases.’  Life insurance policies.  Emergency savings funds (Scott and I have started saving for one of these).  We can bring umbrellas, but mostly...life isn’t very certain.

I’m not a gal who has ever done very well with this reality.  I like to know stuff.  I have trouble relaxing if I don’t know.  Scott and I discovered this fact on a backpacking trip through Europe.  He wanted an adventure to the tune of never making plans, never having any idea what we’d do or where we’d go until we were doing it or going there.  I thought this sounded romantic and exciting.  We learned the hard way though that I could be adventurous to a point.  I needed to know fairly early in the day that I had a place to lay my head that night, and I needed to know exactly where that was going to be.  Given that knowledge I could let the whole day go--follow where the wind led.  But not the nights.  I was afraid of the uncertainty of having nowhere to sleep.  It terrified me and led to entire days lost with obsessing and worrying (I wonder where my son gets it).  

It’s mid-February.  Three and a half months until we have to be moved out of this house.  Things are still up in the air.  Uncertain.  I know that we will be in the US for the month of June.  We’ll stay with my parents and Scott’s parents and friends along the way.  We’ll take in the mountains and some baseball and hopefully some fireworks on the 4th of July.  And then...and then I don’t know.  The timing and location of the position Scott has been asked to fill is being looked at a bit more strategically.  The stuff they were certain about are now uncertain after a deeper look.  The country we would live in is in question and new things have come to the surface that need to be looked at.  Maybe they would want us to stay here for a bit longer.  Maybe.  Possibly.  Potentially.  

Ah...there it is.  The lifeline.  The paradigm shift.  Over the years I’ve learned to let things some things go.  I’ve worked towards a more calm demeanor and chosen to obsess less.  I may never have the ‘plunge right in’ attitude of my son, but I don’t run through the worst case scenarios over and over in my head.  Well, not as often anyway.  However, ‘uncertainty’ is a fearful word for me.  I try so hard, but I need a new word.  Potentially.  Potential.  I like that.  There’s a good potential we’ll be in Asia.  There’s a potential we’ll be here.  There’s a potential we’ll return to the States.  Potential.  Potential.  Potential.  I still don’t know.  There’s still no plan.  But inside of ‘uncertainty’ I worry.  Inside of ‘potential’ I dream.  I explore.  There are possibilities instead of unknowns. There is light instead of darkness.  Inside of potential a person can realize they are able to stand on their own two feet where before they always needed something to hold on to--and enjoy the rapturous excitement that offers.  I still feel a bit afraid, but inside of ‘potential’ it feels easier to be brave.  

Three and a half months.  Three and a half months until a massive change.  To where or to what I don’t know--I’m not certain.  But I’m going to choose to relish in the potential.  

Cure for the Monday blues

Oh my Monday.  Stay-at-home moms may not exactly do what others might consider ‘returning to work’ on Mondays, but dude we have Mondays too.  Big time.  I had a doozy. A tell your child to do something a zillion times Monday.  A baby didn’t sleep all night the night before Monday.  An I had a great lunch-date with a girlfriend but in the 25 short minutes it takes to pick the boys up from school I had already worked so hard to stay calm and sweet and not rip their fingernails off that I felt like shutting myself in my bedroom Monday.  A texting my husband at 6:55 PM and saying “please come rescue me” then walking out the door at 7:15 PM saying “I may not be back” sort of Monday.  The laundry pile has taken over the kitchen.  The bathroom smells like an outhouse.  I don’t have any clean underwear, and I couldn’t figure out what to give the baby who was hugging my leg screaming for dinner sort of Monday.  

Luckily there’s a cure:

Take 50 or so women of all different shapes and sizes, ages and abilities and place them in a church or a school hall, add a couple of cutie-pie hip hop divas and turn up the music very loud.  Zumba is absolutely, hands down one of the most surprisingly fun additions to my life in 2010. I plan to do a lot more of it in 2011. Especially because it’s the only cure I know for THAT kind of Monday.  

We all gather around 7:30 at the school. Moms from the playground and the checkout from the grocery store and the rest.  There’s thin ones.  Fat ones.  Young whippersnapperish teenager ones who bare their midrifs and older greying grandmotherish ones in cute matching sweat suits.  There’s women in fantastic shape and women with a little extra squish around their middles.  The teachers gather us up and work their magic and somehow no matter how bad you are at that arms-above-your-head swirling twisting thing or how difficult that crazy ‘pony step’ seems they make us all feel like sexy latin dancers anyway.  I can tell.  Because the women have started putting flowers in their hair.  No lie.  Big bright ones on their pony tail holders and hair clips.  Several of them having started wearing sequin-sparkly tank tops with their leggings too.  Why have a workout when you can have a dance party with all your girlfriends!  And we do bring our friends.  Women were there tonight with daughters and sisters and mothers.  We gather up and for 45 minutes straight we laugh and shimmy and boogy, and I love it.  I leave there in 100% better mood every time.  I feel girly and sexy and like I had a heck of a workout.  It’s the only ‘exercise’ I’ve ever done that makes me think “Oh no!  It’s over?  Come on!  Just a few more minutes!”  Can’t beat that for a Monday for sure!  

Stuff and Things...plus a little announcement

When we put our house on the market before we moved to England I got rid of SO much stuff.  Boxes and boxes.  Truckloads actually.  I freecycled and craigslisted and donated my way through every closet and every nook and cranny of the house and garage.  I got rid of so much stuff that I remember a friend who came through one of our open houses saying, “Where is all your stuff?!?!”  I was proud in that moment.  I thought of myself as quite the little organizer.  

Then we got ready to move.  Again I purged.  Three more huge loads went to the Veterans.  A huge load went to the dump.  I sorted the stuff we were keeping into two piles--stuff to store and stuff to ship.  We shipped what felt like not very much to England and the rest we brought via Uhaul to store up in Montana.  I thought I was so meticulous.  I figured I got rid of nearly everything except the bare essentials.  Then we lived in a house for nearly 3 months with none of it (it took forever to arrive via freight) and by the time it showed up I again purged boxes and boxes and boxes of stuff and still sometimes come across things where I wonder, “Why did I bring this again?”  I cringe to think of what landed in Montana.  Except for a couple of pieces of furniture and a few boxes of memorabilia I cannot imagine I will ever need or want any of that stuff again!  

International moving and living has been a great exercise in paring down.  Paring down expectations.  Paring down what I view as ‘essential.’  It even pares down relationship clutter to a large extent because only the really essential folks keep in touch.  It’s de-cluttering on a practical, emotional, and spiritual level.  

Take the house size for example.  I was used to almost a 1/4 acre lot.  A huge playroom.  Guest room.  Large office.  Big pantry.  Huge garage.  Extra freezer.  Multiple bathrooms.  Plus--and this is the part that blows my mind--a CLOSET IN EVERY ROOM.  My goodness I had it good!!  Our current house is tiny compared to that.  I have (no lie) one closet in this entire house.  Plus this funny little nook that passes for a sort of cupboard.  My fridge is barely bigger than the one I had in my college dorm room.  A car could not fit in our garage because it’s not big enough (though I am so thankful for the storage it provides!).  The three bedrooms we have are significantly smaller and we only have one bathroom.  Funny side note: Caid regularly drew pictures for a while of ‘really big houses.‘  When asked to describe what made them ‘really big‘--lots of rooms?  on a lot of land?--he replied that they had THREE bathrooms!

to help illustrate the point:
my very tiny English fridge & freezer

Caid and our friends Marnie and Joel in our current backyard

Our backyard in Colorado

What is it with stuff?  Why do we need it?  Want it?  Keep buying so much of it?  Keep keeping so much of it?  It just makes for a lot of work!  I asked the boys recently what in the world we were going to do to get them to keep their drawers a little neater.  They kept coming down looking like they’d slept in what I knew were clean t-shirts and I was a little annoyed.  Caid’s reply?  “We should just get rid of most of our t-shirts mom.  If we didn’t have so many they’d go in the drawer nicer.”  Out of the mouths of babes.  Pretty smart.  Bridger had a similar answer to a recent “YOU HAVE TOYS EVERYWHERE!!!” blow-up (fellow moms--you know the one).  “You know Mama,” he said.  “We really only play with like two of our games, the animals, and our swords.  Maybe we should just give the rest away.”  Wise.  Very wise.  

As an expat Mama I struggle with that though, and maybe lots of other parents do too no matter where they’re living.  For me, I feel like they’re missing out.  I know there are many amazing tradeoffs, but in leaving America they had to give up their playroom and their big yard and their swingset and they didn’t get to bring so many of their toys and books and things.  Maybe that’s just ridiculous.  Maybe the paring down was just exactly what we needed.  Maybe, just maybe, it was actually liberating.  

I’m paring down again.  I got a pretty good start this evening.  In a little under an hour I filled an entire laundry basket in the boys’ room and stacked a ton of stuff from the bathroom on top. We were purging in order to move Asher in with the big boys.  It shocked me really.  What has always seemed like a tiny little room now quite comfortably holds all three boys and a decent amount of their stuff.  Afterwards when we all went around the table and said what we were thankful for at dinner Caid said, “getting our room organized.”  Bridger mentioned later how he thought if Asher could wake up in the night and see that he and Caid were both sleeping he might get a better idea of what he’s supposed to be doing and go back to sleep.  (I sure hope that’s true)!

If we lived Stateside I’m quite sure the boys would be in their own rooms.  We might have even upgraded to a bigger house in order to assure that.  Someday I hope they can have their own rooms, but this life though has lent itself very naturally to a different set of values.  To a more tribal feel.  We’re a tribe.  We look out for each other.  We live in closer proximity with less stuff.  So when neither Scott’s office nor the master bedroom seemed like a good place for Ash, the big boys seemed to agree that their room was probably the best place.  They wanted to look after him and didn’t protest the loss of space at all.  

No matter how they’ve come by it, I sure am glad they have that ‘looking out for each other’ mentality because more big change is on the horizon.  Dear readers, I have a little announcement to make.  Our lease is up at the end May.  That’s only four months.  After much discussing and waiting and thinking through it’s looking like the next big thing will be a move to East Asia.  We’re stoked for the new adventure and are anxious for things to be a little more firmly set--watch this space.  Should know more details very soon.  We do now know though that regardless of the ‘where’ another big move is coming.  Again.  Whoa.  

It’s bringing up all kinds of things for me.  Purging and organizing are occupying a lot of my thoughts (though I’m trying very hard not to obsess).  I keep looking at things and thinking, “do I really want to move this?”  It’s also causing a lot of reflection.  Thinking about our last move from Denver to England.  Thinking through all the changes that move has brought about.  How many things I’ve gotten rid of--both the physical and emotional ‘stuff.’  How it’s brought new stuff--new friendships and new recipes and new favorite places and also new actual now-I-have-to-decide-whether-it’s-worth-keeping ‘stuff’.  It’s shaped what’s important to me.  It’s lent perspective and brought order.  It’s brought us together as a tribe.   

Maybe the houses will be bigger where we’re going.  Maybe they won’t.  I bet we’ll need some different stuff there than we’ve needed here.  Just like our American life needed different stuff than our English one.  More paring down will take place.  I’ll sort things into piles.  Some relationships will deepen.  Others will fall away.  We’ll struggle as we adapt and learn to live in a new place with new types of houses and new types of people and new climates and new lots of things.  We’ll be lonesome and we’ll make new friends.  We’ll bond and pull together as a family.  I’ll get to reconnect with the stuff that’s really, truly important to me.  

Plus hopefully this time the pile of “holy cow why did I ship this?!?!” will be much, much smaller.  

New Years

My skin is brown.  My waist band expanded.  The mountain of laundry smelling of slightly sour sea water has been slowly and steadily shrinking and I’m no longer sweeping up small deposits of sand that stick to the bottoms of my feet and make me smile.  I just finally unpacked the last two suitcases.  We spent a week in Mexico and a week in Colorado.  It was a great trip, and we’re home now.

I ate my weight in Mexican food while we were away.  Happily consuming plate after all inclusive plate of chips with guacamole and pico de gallo.  Taquitos.  Tacos.  Tostados.  Plus muchos muchos margaritas.  Mmmmmmm...I can hardly figure out how to go through my day without Mexican food.  Even in Colorado I ate some form of it every single day.  These poor Brits.  They don’t know what they’re missing.  How in the world can Doritos be the only brand of plain corn chips in this country?  Where can one buy a decent jar of real salsa (not nasty gringo wannabe salsa!).  It’s just not right!

It’s always fun to return home to Colorado.  It highlights things I miss.  Like really powerful laundry stain treatment spray.  Washing machines that do a hefty load in less than half a day.  Target.  Oh how I miss Target.  One store for everything a girl could need.  I miss sliced turkey for sandwiches.  Lots of yummy gluten free and dairy free options that don’t taste like sacrificing.  Chipotle.  Guacamole.  Good tequila.  Blue corn chips.  Friendly customer service.  It always highlights the people I miss.  Picking up where I left off with my sisters and my mom and dad and our old church and Meggs and others.  So fun, but makes for an aching heart when we leave again.  I’m missing so much of their lives!  They’re missing so much of mine and my boys.  

Being there highlights what I love so much about England though too and about being away.  Flowers everywhere no matter the time of year.  A cuppa at a friend’s table or sitting on their couch.  Wellie walks.  Pub dinners.  The woods.  Village life.  Curry nights.  My friends.  The way we’ve come together as a family and how Scott and I have gelled as a couple.  It’s a sweet life, and I am so thankful for it.  Even if there isn’t any good Mexican food.

I feel in that processy-thinky place that sometimes happens around New Years.  I know it’s halfway through January already, but we were so busy and traveling and so I’m only just now getting to the real meat of what I want for this year.  It feels good to take my time with it a bit.  

It’s going to be a big year.  I can feel it.  Change looms on the not-very-distant horizon.  Our lease will be up this spring and there are rumblings of moves to further reaches of the globe.  I’m trying to just enjoy the adventure.  Not count chickens.  Relax and let all of that unfold.  (I know, who am I kidding right?  But seriously.  I’m not obsessing. Yet.  This is progress people.  Go with it.)

I’ve never been big on resolutions.  So much can change and happen in a year.  This year I’m enjoying thinking more along the lines of what I want, not what my goals are.  What would I like to look back and have accomplished this time in 2012?  What do I want to change? So, I have two main things I want to accomplish this year.  They both feel really big to me, and yet totally doable.  

I want to get our finances under our control (so far they’ve always controlled us), and I’d like to get in shape.  I’ve learned that goals are better if they’re specific and measurable.    I’ve also learned that sometimes one needs a bit of help.  After several of you suggested Dave Ramsey we took the plunge.  In terms of our finances, I want to have completed the Financial Peace University series and have accomplished the first three baby steps (more on that later) by the end of the summer.  This will include making and sticking to a budget on a regular and ongoing basis.  Which is a totally foreign tool in this house, but one that I feel quite confident we can master!  The other one I haven’t decided on any specific measurables for yet.  I’m working on that.  I’ll keep you posted.  I do know there’s a cute pair of pre-baby jeans that I’d like to fit into sometime in the near future.  

So that’s the scoop.  Been a while since I caught up with you all.  I’m slowly putting my house back in order.  Adjusting to jetlag.  Detoxing from all-inclusive binging and pondering.  Lots of pondering.  

How about you.  What do you want for 2011?  

Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow...

We hit the jackpot last week.  Another snow storm in England.  My friends were quick to point out that until we moved here they hadn’t had snow in years and years.  I told them the story of standing in my garage three summers ago with two piles.  One pile was headed to storage and the other pile to England.  B was incensed when he found the sleds in the ‘wrong’ pile.  I gently explained we wouldn’t need them in England, so we were leaving them behind.  “It doesn’t snow in England?!?!?” he said.  “Then I’m not going!”  I didn’t really blame him.  We’d had a similar conversation about baseball the week before.  Why in the world would we move to a place without baseball and snow?  He couldn’t figure it out.  I wasn’t sure even I knew the answer at the time.  

B with what we have discovered makes
an excellent makeshift sled--an old real estate sign

So here we are in England.  We’ve lived here two years and four months and we’ve had three major snow storms. Each time it happens everyone says is the worst in 30-50 years. I like to think of myself as the snow fairy, but really it’s B.  Last year we had the most beautiful white Christmas.  No one could believe it.  He’d been predicting it for a couple of days.  Said he could smell it in the air.  Everyone just smiled a bit patronizingly and patted him on the head.  I was indeed one of the unbelievers.  I was so worried he’d have a broken heart.  I just couldn’t bring myself to encourage his hope.  When it finally did snow we all wondered if he had some kind of magic snow juju.  This year that fact was confirmed.  He gives all the credit to Santa.  Last year he asked and received.  This year he wrote it in all caps on his list to Santa a few weeks ago.  He even added ‘(please)’ after it.  Yesterday I was looking at his list and I noticed he’d crossed it out and replaced the please with ‘thanks!’  So sweet.  

We got three good days of sledding in.  Built a giant snow man.  C dug himself a snow cave.  The boys even got to miss 3 days of school.  It was so fun!  It feels so good to me.  To look out my windows and see snow.  Snow on the backyard and in the fields.  These poor Brits are cranky now though, and I can’t really blame them.  There are no services.  No one clears their sidewalks--no one has snow shovels to do so!  The roads don’t really get cleared or sometimes even gritted.  No one has a clue how to drive on this stuff so driving is sketchy.   There is black ice everywhere and a lot of people have fallen or have tales of helping someone who has. 

Caid in his snow cave.
He happily worked away on this for hours.

It’s supposed to snow again this coming week, and I am stoked.  Don’t tell my neighbors.  My only complaint in all of this is that we still don’t have a sled!  Maybe I need to ask B to put the request in to Santa.     


A few more pics from the storm:

The snowman (they have their school clothes on under their snow pants.)

A's first snow!  An epic moment for an Anderberg!

After school snow fight.  

Let's Talk About Sex...

I had a list, when I became a parent.  I'm sure many of us did.  You know the one.  The "I'll Never Do It Like My Parent's Did It" list:

-I'll never wear sweatpants to drop my kids off at school.
-I'll never make healthy food for dinner when my kids have friends over.
-I'll never make my kids go to bed at a reasonable hour on a Friday night.

Things like that.

It's one of my favorite things to do and has become a regular 10 minute break with the boys every few days to watch movie trailers.  We go to apple and check out the latest releases.  Actually, we usually watch the same old trailers over and over until we have them memorized and can act them out.  Even if we never plan to attend the movie itself.  I stick to the kid ones, but sometimes an adult one will catch our eye and occasionally I'll risk it.  The boys are used to me saying no about certain ones.  "Too much adult humor mom?"  Up until recently I've generally assumed that most of the innuendo, etc. that they do occasionally encounter goes straight over their head.  Apparently not so much.

The other day we were watching one that ended up having too much 'adult humor'.  So I kind of sucked air when B asked me a few minutes later, "Mom?  What's 'sacs'?"  I did what any evolved and totally confident mother would do.  I said, "You know, B.  Like a sack that you put things in.  Grocery sacks.  That kind of thing.  I think that's what he meant."

But in the car with Aunt Noey the other day we were all totally trapped.  A conversation about her potentially getting a girl dog led to questions about why said girl dog and Arthur would make better siblings than mates because they couldn't have babies.  B wanted to know why.

"Oh, he's fixed."

"What's 'fixed'?"

"It means he's had an operation so he can't have babies."

"How do they do that?"

"Weeeeeellllll..."

We reminded him about the book we read about sperm and eggs and told him that Arthur wasn't able to make sperm.  I thought about avoiding it again, but I was very brave.  I took a deep breath and dived right in.  Penises, wombs, ovaries, fallopian tubes.  Your basic biology.  Done.  Sorted.  That wasn't so bad.  On to other topics!  But then B wanted to know, "Yeah, but HOW does that happen?"  I totally pulled the 'you'll understand better when you get older' card.  To which C replied, "Dad, we should ask your friend Peter.  The one you told us to ask about the shapes of our souls? He probably knows!"

Busted.  I said, "Well, I KNOW.  I just think it's something that you'll understand better when you're a little older."  And then Scott tried to explain that it's not that it's some big mystery, but... and Noey and I and Scott all kept saying, "well, um...see...um..."  Anyway, by the end of the conversation I could at least say it was over.  I told him he could always talk to us about sex.  Whenever he wanted.  Noey pulled a very cool Aunt move and told him since it was sometimes embarrassing to talk to your parents about sex they could always ask her anything too.

My parents took regular 'giggle breaks' whenever we had to talk about sex.  We were always allowed to giggle since it was embarrassing.  I'm finding a lot of these types of things lately.  The types of things where I kind of 'get it', for the first time and I think that how my parents did it maybe wasn't so bad after all.