Truth is stranger than fiction...

So here's the scoop
1.I was once trailed as a suspected target of Libyan terrorists.
true- I was living in Turkey at the time (mid 80s when the US did airstrikes in Libya) I was approached by a man after getting off the bus one day. I was watched by OSI for a while. The same month my parents were also at a wedding when Libyan terrorists showed up with hand grenades. We had to check our cars daily for bombs, etc.
2. I was filmed for a Stop and Shop Commerical.
true- one day while stocking up on apple juice
3. I was a Latin scrabble champion.
true- and i also can make a mean toga out of bed sheets- you should know i am a total nerd!
4. I made the police blotter at BYU.
false- i am risk averse and if i ever got caught by the police for something i'd cry ...but i had many friends who made police beat
5. I play lacrosse mainly because i like sports with skirts.
true- i really like lacrosse but seriously sports with skirts rock (i think it's a genetic thing- my mom played tennis, field hockey, and lacrosse)

Dreaming in blog

Yes- it's official I had my first dream in blog format last night...And no I do not take illicit drugs! I was trying to somehow put my baby in a rectangle in the sidebar (yes I was thinking of using the space literally like a crib-- I know this sounds far fatched but he was up alot last night and I didn't know what to do with him-- leave it to the creative sleeping mind to find a solution), I was thwarted in my attempts to edit the HTML so I was consulting friends, all other characters in my dream were their blogs-- and I have to say a dream of MOFstras (sorry I can't remember everyone exactly who was there or I would issue awards for MOST DREAM WORTHY BLOGS but I remember templates- dots dark, minima ochre, and those more distinctive typepad templates)- we conversed through comment sections--

Sadly my dream was cut short by my waking child who evidently did not stay in the sidebar.

So i am left to consult the great Sigmund action figure to explore the inner recesses of my troubled mind because I know interpretation of Dreams has no section on symbolism of dreaming in blog!

true true true false

in case you haven't had a chance to take multiple choice test lately here you go-- which 4 are T and 1 in F?

1.I was once trailed as a suspected target of Libyan terrorists.

2. I was filmed for a Stop and Shop Commerical.

3. I was a Latin scrabble champion.

4. I made the police blotter at BYU.

5. I play lacrosse mainly because i like sports with skirts.

let the games begin

Torino has no spectacle quite like our house at the moment after 4 years of freedom we once again have a crawler. yes as of last week, we are in full destructo crawler mode. At first, he could only go backwards which was relatively safe- but last week we master forward progression. advancing and clearing every low bookshelf is cleared in 30 seconds, overturning trashcans with reckless abdandon, sucking phone chargers (do you think they give a charge when plugged in?), crumpling paper, sampling every edible or inedible remnant found in the carpet and 3 near death choking scares (found 1 marble and 2 plastic rocks in his mouth). the last time we were in this stage we were living in a hotel waiting for our house to be finished- so i had little to no stuff and daily vacuuming--so this is a new motherhood challenge for me
the season is officially open-- let the games begin

my funny valentine

valentines day used to mean many things-- heart shaped frosted decorated sugar cookies- so sweet you could taste the love, the shoebox and milk carton mailboxes for grade school valentines, read ever so carefully so as to detect hidden interest in the subtle lines and choice of cards, the carnations and roses delivered with little notes to you during your high school english class, the dream of secret admirers--little glimmers of hope that the guy you secretly had a crush on would profess his love for you only to have the valentines pass by uneventfully, getting all dolled up for a romantic dates with a boyfriend, the excitement of "new love", wishes for some grand exotic, expensive impulsive gesture of true love.

but as the years pass and you long for some of the sweetness and romance of yesterday's valentines day. but somehow you are unable to ever go back- you have learned love is about alot more than cheap cards and chalky conversation heart and gorgeously wrapped foil candies or even grand gestures. you know its about sacrifice and good times and bad. when you'd rather put money in your kids college savings plan than spend it on roses that die in a few days, when love means less time looking glamorous and more time picking up toys, and helping others.

right now tony bennett serenades me while i play with my boys and unload the dishwasher and make creme brulee for my husband and pay the bills and today i know more about love than i ever did.

laundry- in the mind of my 5 yr old- why fold when you can make it into a giant nest?

ode to laundry

laundry is one of the great tasks of the mother world-- i have often wanted to do a fabulous installation sculpture using an entire gallery room of a museum- laundry lines strung at all angles across the room with clothes of all types hanging from all heights and laundry baskets stacked- full of clothes like bricks making walls and mazes throughout-(of course the number of baskets showing the number of loads an average mother folds in her lifetime-so therefore innumerable baskets.

the unartistic often find installations silly-- but there is often a message- a feeling the environment conjures-- I want to evoke a sense of wonder and profound thanks for mothers the world over for the thankless task of laundry and appreciate for the sheer mountains they scale and manage to tame into baskets sorted by size, and type!

(now i just have to finish my laundry, raise my kids, and go back to art school before someone steals my idea!)

to sleep to sleep perchance to dream

yes like all high schoolers i had to read hamlet (and watch the mel gibson movie- to fill 3 hs english periods) and yes memorize the famed solilquoy-- but i will abandon the death metaphor and simply take the literal line to sleep to sleep perchance to dreamevery new mother knows in what it means to be tired- we talk of sleep, we dream of sleep, we rejoice in sleep. There are few things in the world we would take over sleep.don't get me wrong, we do get to sleep- like the one time you sit down to a movie with your husband or that 45 min before you baby wakes up teething, or than 10 minutes in the afternoon when both your kids are asleep, but somehow it only whets the appetitebut to sleep perchance to dream-- that would require sleeping for long enough in one period to reach the dream part of the sleep cycle and that in itself is a dream.

all about the STRETCH

I love things that stretch- I can't tell you when the last time was that i bought pants without that touch of forgiving stretch-- like my fabulous editor pants from express (worth every dollar-get yourself a pair!)--why-- they are just better after all can take the abuse of an early pregnancy body, a post partum body, a "should be back to pre-pregnancy by now but not" body and come out none the worse. STRETCH is also the best part about being a mom-- every day you get a little stretch-- the areas aren't always the same --sometimes it is in good ways, sometimes in ways you'd rather not -- but being a mother never leaves you where you are- it requires you to cover immense spans with patience, with humilty, with courage, and simply with yourself.And as much as I love my pants for covering me in all my less than perfect spots (junk in the trunk (and i mean literal junk) and that less than taut tummy), i love being a mom for helping me overcome my less than perfect self...Stretch- i couldn't live without.

Express

As a mom you learn to do everything fast-like running errands -i hustle to the car because they are always too many places to go and not enough time before child breakdown, nursing, preschool pick-up or store closing (I don't sprint so people think i am a fleeing shoplifter- but defintely don't saunter) I am a walking multitasker (talking on the phone, holding, baby, putting on mascara at the same time) we appreciate TIME in a way others can't understand--as a mom i have shaved my morning "get ready routine down to 15 min"- yet somehow it still doesn't happen many days-- it takes my husband longer than that to get ready. Whenever we get ready at the same time i tell him- go faster- scrub faster, brush faster- such squandering!!

maybe i think if i can get himt o go faster i can steal his minutes??

lame week

anyone else having a total lame-o week-- just slow, cold, depressing, really long days full of unexciting things- like choosing a new trash carrier, renewing DL, taxes, car inspection and registration, school paperwork, new phones, closing accounts, headaches, returns, paintings that just aren't working, grocery store, sorting my desk, vacuuming, scrubbing high chairs...nothing with a speck of glamour or excitement to be found, nothing exotic as far as the eye can see..

BLAH is the definitely the flavor of the week

I love NPR

i have a 15 min drive to and from the son's preschool- yes there and back, there and back-- thats 1 hr in the car 3x a week- now when my son is with me i usually am the good mom and we listen to books on tape from the library- Freddy the Dectective, Stuart Little, Otis Spofford.

but when i am alone or at least with a sleeping baby many a lonely drive is warmed by the kindly tones BBC worldnews, On Point, and Morning Edition. It has a way of hooking you in-- usually-- someones discussion of a recently passed jazz musician, the world TB epidemic, the hamas victory, is the world "happiness quotient" increasing?, great literature on the immigrant experience. There is something appealling in the unknown-- hwat random topic will be discussed today and so for a few brief seconds in every day- the higher level thinking brain regions get activated-- its like mental caffeine- you just need that little fix everday.

So NPR I do love you- despite the fund drives.