The Unhappiest Place on Earth and Other Vacation Tales

Curlytop is NOT down with Disney.

For children with Sensory Processing Disorder (SPD), Disneyland may not be the carefree wonderland promoters would have parents believe. In fact, for some SPD kids, it may be something closer to one giant house of horrors.

We weren’t thinking about that when we forked over a month’s worth of grocery money at the hallowed gates of the theme park. We were thinking about the memories we were creating with our children.

Memories, indeed.

I’ll never forget Curlytop and Snugglebug screaming in terror at the sweet face of the wooden puppet who came to life during a gently ambling journey through a darkened ride which featured a blissfully beautiful good fairy and a kindly old man. Snugglebug reviewed the Pinocchio ride with carefully-crafted restraint. “It was scary, and I hated it.”

Next up was a ride so sweet and mild, adults dread it and children adore it. After all, it really is a small, small world, and if the syrupy song doesn’t give you a toothache, the angelic faces of children from around the globe certainly will.

Unfortunately, our mid-November visit meant the ride was outfitted for Christmas, and played not only that most-dreaded song but a Christmas carol in alternating blasts—and sometimes in tandem. The usually charming children were all but hidden behind blinking, glimmering, aggressively-featured holiday decorations. Add all that visual and audio busyness to chilling blasts of air to simulate snowfall, and it’s the perfect recipe for SPD meltdowns.

Oh, yes. We were “that family” on the Small World ride. The family with the shrieking kid who just won’t shut up? That’s us.

I got Curlytop to agree to board a carousel—on the condition that we’d sit on a bench, not a moving horse—only to have her burst into tears as the music started, resulting in an emergency disembarkation.

The crowds, smells, larger-than-life cartoon characters, noise, lights and general chaos of Disneyland must have felt like the equivalent of a straight-to-video horror flick for my girls. I’m ashamed to say I drank the Disney kool-aid, and never considered my children would be anything but thrilled to see Mickey’s stomping grounds.

The next day of our vacation was exceptional, by comparison. We hit Knott’s Berry Farm, with its old-school, carnival-type rides and games. The park lacks the hologram-filled adventure rides of Disneyland, but Curlytop and Snugglebug loved “driving” race cars and semi-trucks around a tiny track without sensory assault, and were perfectly content to hang at Camp Snoopy for hours.

Plus? It’s half the price of Disneyland.

While the little girls played with Mr. Wright, the older girls and I embarked on a quest to ride every rollercoaster in the park. While Princess loves a good ‘coaster, she’s a bit more selective than the rest of us—no vertical drops, and no rocket launches.

That put her on snack patrol with Curlytop and Snugglebug, while Mr. Wright begrudgingly agreed to be my seatmate while Pepper rode with GirlWonder on the Xcelerator—a ‘coaster which starts like a pinball machine, pulling the car back, then launching it at 82 miles per hour in 2.3 seconds to a height of 205 feet, then drops essentially straight down before hitting two overbanked turns and gliding to a stop. To top it off, it’s pink. It looks for all the world like the Barbie Dream ‘Coaster—not an encouraging thought.

Xcelerator at dusk.

It was amazing, and no one soiled their pants.

The coup de grâce was the notorious GhostRider wooden rollercoaster, which my fellow junkies and I waited two hours in line to board, due to a sudden cloudburst. Apparently, the ride can’t be run in the rain and, while we love a good shot of adrenaline, we’re more than happy to leave such judgments to the professionals. We’d like to stay on the track, and make it to the end in one piece, thank you very much.

It was dark by the time we finally boarded our car. Riding the rails in the dark made the experience even more exhilarating, and sealed our status as Knott’s devotees.

The drive back home to Washington featured a near-brawl in a supermarket parking lot, a highway flooded with spilled port-a-potties, sing-a-longs to Fleetwood Mac, carsickness, drive-thrus, and 1,100 miles of memories I wouldn’t trade for a month of Disney.

Eat your heart out, Mickey… The happiest place on earth is where is my family is.

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You Know You're a Great Role Model When...

I've been trying to get across to the members of my family that Curlytop and Snugglebug are like over-sized camcorders these days. Anything we say or do is likely to be played back for us by one of our little cinematographers - most likely at the most humiliating or improper moment.

So far, this has included choice phrases uttered by adults and teens in the household (not terribly appropriate for either set, and definitely inappropriate coming out of the mouth of a kindergarten student). Sometimes, it includes an interesting pose or gesture.

Sometimes, it includes both.

Yesterday, Snugglebug walked up behind Curlytop, grabbed her sister's posterior and declared, "Ooooh... that's NICE!"

Pepper and I stared at Snuggle in disbelief, then looked at each other. "Did she just do what I think she did?" Pepper asked. I nodded. "Where did she learn THAT?" Pepper wondered aloud as I explained to Snugglebug we don't do that and it's not okay and her sister's bottom is her sister's bottom, and we don't touch it.

I knew the answer, of course, but Pepper confirmed it when her father came home, entered the kitchen, kissed my cheek and copped a squeeze. "Ooooh... that's NICE!" he announced to everyone within earshot and a decent line of vision.

Then, he scooped up the four-year old attached to my leg.

Where did she learn that, indeed?

“My Dog Ate It” and Other Weird Explanations

I made the earth-friendly choice, and qualified for a full-body search.

As you might imagine, seven kids, two adults, three dogs and two cats generate a lot of trips to the grocery store. In an effort to make my appointment to our city’s sustainability steering committee a slightly less laughable matter, I’ve been trying to “green up” my family’s shopping habits by reducing the number of plastic and paper bags we tote out of stores, and increasing the amount of items we buy in bulk in order to consume less packaging.

Last week I picked up a few baggies of dried culinary herbs and spices at our local natural foods store. At the register, I tossed the small bulk packages into my oversized purse instead of accepting a paper bag. When I got home, I refilled each and every spice jar in my pantry, except one. One of the herbs was missing.

Fortunately, the rogue baggie was located in a corner of my purse a few days later by a security guard at the county clerk’s office during my bag check. He was extremely interested in the cut green herb inside.

It was oregano. I swear!

It’s not the first time I’ve been mistakenly suspected of “holding.” A few years ago, I went through a period of passionate green tea consumption. While driving solo through another state in the wee hours of the morning, I accidentally floated slightly over the fog line and was pulled over on suspicion of driving under the influence. Knowing I hadn’t consumed any alcohol, I confidently rolled down my window to speak with the trooper.

He caught one whiff of my breath, called for backup, and asked me to step out of the car.

He confiscated my travel mug, took a hearty sniff of it, and requested permission to search my vehicle as three additional patrol cars pulled in behind me, and I stood, bawling and shivering, on the side of the highway while red and blue lights whirled around my head.

Green tea, my friends, has a very “grassy” smell.

I’m not the only one in my family who finds herself in uncomfortable situations with harmless or ironic explanations. Pepper recently found herself facing a library fine for a book she misplaced. “I don’t know what I did with it,” she said. “I put it… somewhere… and now I can’t find it. I’ve looked everywhere!”

The book’s title? “Airhead.”

When our black Lab, Perseus, was a puppy, he had a chewing habit. A big one. Our friend, Bullet Bob, kept Persey for a few days while we were out of town. A frantic cross-country telephone call from Bob informed us that the pup had chewed through a bag of grass seed and followed with a bag of concrete mix for dessert. Persey lived, but the week that followed caused me to view topiary yard ornaments in an entirely new way.

Not long afterward, Princess brought me a book, chewed to pieces. It was no mystery who the culprit was, and as Perseus slunk into the back yard, it was evident that even our budding veterinarian daughter was beginning to lose her patience with our canine’s insatiable appetite for non-food items.

That book’s subject, of course, was dog obedience training.

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/axis/101184905/

Somebody is Always Broken or Bleeding

Last night I cut my finger while slicing a loaf of bread. It’s not an unusual event. In fact, I fillet myself quite frequently. If Mr. Wright had his way, my kitchen tools would be pared down to rolling pins and spoons, though I frequently manage to find a way to injure myself with those, as well.

I quickly wrapped a paper towel around my bloody digit and set off in search of an adhesive bandage. An hour later, I gave up the search for the elusive bandage. The bleeding had pretty much stopped by then, anyway.

There are few things I can count on in my chaotic life, but there are two facts I’ve come to accept as the noble truths of The Gonzo Mama’s world. The first is that I’ll never find an adhesive bandage when I cut myself. The second is that if one of our kids is going to get hurt, it’s going to be on my watch.

Sure, there have been rare exceptions. Pockets was hit by a car in a crosswalk during a visit with my ex-husband. Curlytop was bit by a dog and Mr. Wright had to spend the night with her in the hospital while she received intravenous antibiotics while I was out of town making the cake for my friend’s 50th birthday party. The Dude cracked his collarbone while sledding with friends.

Still, the majority of the blood and busted bones occur when I’m the only adult in the house.

I have an almost pathological fear of blood and broken body parts. I was the first student in my school district to challenge the dissection requirement in sophomore Biology. At the time, I cited my vegetarian and animal rights principles, but the truth was much simpler. I just can’t stand the sight of blood, incisions or anatomical parts not being where they are supposed to be.

When Pepper executed a poorly-landed flip on the bars at the park and broke her nose, there was a lot of blood. I mean, slasher film amounts of blood; buckets of it. Somehow, I hadn’t properly planned for a broken nose when packing the car for our outing to the park. All I could offer poor Pepper en route to the emergency room was a handful of Taco Bell napkins and a very dirty beach towel.

Luckily for us – and those unfortunate enough to be traveling on the roads that day – I only had to drive about six blocks with the radio drowning out the sound of hysterical shrieking.

Pepper, however, stayed pretty calm.

When we burst through the doors of the ER, the staff responded in a rapid, practiced manner. “Let’s get that kid into the back for some x-rays, and for the love of God, give the mom a sedative!”

GirlWonder’s name might imply that she has superpowers. I’m not denying that she does. Flying just doesn’t happen to be one of them. When GirlWonder was seven, she fell out of the neighbors’ tree house, compound fracturing her arm. She ran home, holding her grotesquely disfigured arm in front of her. (Insert Sesame Street™ closing line: “Today’s arm is brought to you by the letter Z!”)

Something about broken bones triggers my gag reflex like nothing else. It’s hard to convince a child that everything is going to be okay when you’re alternately dry-heaving and screaming like a banshee.

The ER visit was short, and revealed that GirlWonder would need immediate surgery. The doctor summoned the anesthesiologist. “When you’re done with the mom,” the ER doc suggested, “why don’t you stick around and put the kid out for surgery?”

Curlytop has more nosebleeds than a boxer with a bad block, but the little dickens only gets them when Daddy is gone. I’m starting to develop a conspiracy theory.

The problem is, we never have minor injuries. If my family is going to get hurt, they’re going to warrant inhuman amounts of direct pressure, an emergency room visit, surgery, or all of the above. Why bother with adhesive bandages?

I would have received better results if I’d actually severed the finger. Clearly, it’s time to sharpen that bread knife.

Photo credit:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/scherre/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

Orange You Glad I Didn't Say "Banana?"

This is the dawning of the Age of the Knock-Knock Joke
the Age of the Knock-Knock Joke

the Age of the Knock-Knock Joooooooke...

And so, it begins.

At the age of four, Pockets started making up his own knock-knock jokes. They were really good, too, like:

Knock-knock!

Who's there?

Moo!

Moo who?

It's me, A COW! *cracks self up*

I don't remember the knock-knock jokes that Pepper and GirlWonder used to tell at that age, but I'm pretty sure the punchlines involved the physical act of biting the "Who's there?" party. My girls were biters. They were pretty serious about it, too, achieving a lifetime forty percent return on attempts to draw blood.

Their middle school vampire-worshiping friends would be impressed!

Now, it's Curlytop's time. She hasn't quite picked up on the give-and-take line delivery yet, but she's getting the idea...

Knock-knock!

Who--

IT'S ME!

It's me, wh--

Oh, look! Grandma's here! *cracks self up*

Photo credits:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/wafflechomper/ / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

http://www.flickr.com/photos/artolog/ / CC BY-NC 2.0

What's YOUR favorite knock-knock joke?

God Bless the TSA

My kids are no strangers to air travel and the finer points of airport security. It’s one of those things that are taught by repetition, like potty training and shoelace tying. If you see a kid in the security checkpoint line at the airport with their shoes already off, there’s a pretty good chance the child belongs to me.

As a family, we don’t typically miss flights, but we are near-famous for almost missing flights. In spite of the fact that post-9/11 airport security takes longer to get through, some members of our family (the kids and me) still seem to have trouble getting out the door, and still others (Mr. Wright) make a mantra of “We’ll make it, no problem,” with a foot firmly applied to the gas pedal en route to the airport.

With less than a quarter mile to go, I verbally ran through the checklist: Necklaces? Bracelets? Metal barrettes? Yes, Pepper, bobby pins are metal, and must come out. Liquids in a quart-sized zipper bag and easily accessible? Check, check, check.

Mr. Wright always goes through security first, followed by the kids, and I go last. It’s an attempt to corral the children between us, with a responsible adult on either side of the herd of youngsters. I did a time check. We had twenty minutes until our flight boarded, and the line at security wasn’t terribly long. We could do it, provided no one was carrying a pocketknife and I remembered to take my netbook out of my purse and send it through in its own bin.

Mr. Wright got through the metal detector and started pulling bags off the conveyor belt. Pepper was up next, and handed me her purse. “Some of my liquids are in here, and some of them are in my backpack.”

Gah! All that training, for this? “No, Pepper. Your liquids all need to go into your zipper bag, and the bag has to be out of your backpack. Rearrange. Do it. Quickly.”

In the meantime, GirlWonder pulled her zipper bag of liquids out, put them into a bin, plopped her backpack on the conveyor, and stepped through the metal detector. Pepper had finally sorted her liquids and complied with the security measures when a Transportation Security Administration agent held up GirlWonder’s backpack. “Whose is this?” She was looking at me.

“That’s my daughter’s. Is there a problem?” I was still taking my computer out of my purse and locating an empty bin.

“There’s a drink in the bottom of it. Drinks are liquids.”

Of course they are. I chastised GirlWonder from the opposite side of the metal detector. “How did you manage to forget an entire sports drink in your bag? You know the rules.” I tossed my backpack onto the conveyor, stepped through the metal detector and kept going. “How many times have we done this? How many times have we gone through security? You know better, Honey. We shouldn’t have these kinds of mistakes.”

GirlWonder was appropriately sorry. She’d forgotten the drink was in her bag. The TSA agent simply asked that the bottle be thrown away, and GirlWonder complied. My computer came through the x-ray machine, but my purse was taking a long time. It would start to emerge, then get pulled back in for another look.

Finally, the belt started up again and my purse came out. The TSA worker opened it and peeked in. “I’m really sorry about the drink,” I was explaining. “I don’t know how it happened. Our kids have done this many, many times. It was just careless…”

“This is your purse?” the agent asked.

“Yes,” I answered. I stood on my toes to look inside with her. There, in the top of my bag, was my entire quart-sized bag of liquids. In all the drama about the sports drink and my tirade about the rules for liquids, I’d forgotten to take them out of my purse.

The TSA worker winked at me. “Have a good flight, ma’am.”

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/billypalooza/ / CC BY-SA 2.0

Mommy Masochism: Piece of Cake?

What kind of an insomnia-plagued masochist would work through the night, forgoing sleep and the promise of sweet dreams, baking and decorating custom cakes for four children who probably aren’t as interested in the cakes’ appearance as in the cakes’ taste?

A mother; that’s what kind of masochist.

The closure of Beebe Bridge delayed the birthday celebrations for Curlytop, who turned four on August 19th; Pepper, who turned thirteen on September 3rd; and Snugglebug, who turned three on September 13th. After more than three years, the adoptions for Curlytop and Snugglebug finalized on September 22nd, and Pockets turned 15 the day after.

Clearly, a party of epic proportions was in order, once the bridge reopened and all our beloved friends and family were able to reach our home with minimal inconvenience.We decided on a Saturday, so as not to interfere with Pockets’s football games on Fridays. Pepper, of course, wanted a slumber party. How could we deny her? A girl only turns thirteen once, and if she wishes to celebrate by having seventeen girls stay the night, so be it.

I stocked my pantry with flour, sugar, food coloring, sugar, cocoa powder, and more sugar. My plan was to bake the cakes during the day on Friday, and decorate them Friday night. Of course, my plan failed to allocate time for the appointments I’d scheduled on Friday and the football game that night. As a result, I started baking at around 10:30 p.m.

Curlytop and Snugglebug each needed a birthday cake, of course, as did Pepper and Pockets. What about the adoption? Surely we needed a cake to celebrate the adoption! That’s how I found myself, at 4:00 a.m., baking a fifth cake and mixing up ten pounds or so of vegan “buttercream” frosting.

Curse my vegan principles, which prevent me from using a standard cake mix and canned frosting! After all, why spend all night making cakes I can’t eat?

Deciding on the decoration for Pockets’s cake was a no-brainer: football, of course. I dyed a batch of frosting green, fashioned goal posts out of pipe cleaners, and placed a small toy football in the center. Done!

Pepper plays volleyball, but I had no idea how to draw a volleyball, let alone frost one. In a stroke of brilliance, I mixed two more cakes at 4:15, planning a glorious tower of alternating chocolate and vanilla layers, with strawberry filling and raspberry frosting, with rosebuds creeping from the bottom to the top of the third layer. It took about three hours, and the resulting creation looked not unlike a matrimonial monstrosity.

(Indeed, upon seeing the finished product, one of Pepper’s friends exclaimed, “I want my wedding cake to look just like that!”)

Okay. Maybe I got carried away.

Determined to keep things simple for the “adoption cake,” I brainstormed what I could do with the heart-shaped strawberry cake I’d baked. I mean, a heart is just a heart, right? What can a person do with a heart? Unless…

I turned the cake upside-down, placing the point upward. Two hours later, two chubby-cheeked princesses with pointed hats meeting at the tip of the heart, complete with trailing satin ribbons, resided on top of the cake.

(I have a step-by-step how-to with photos for this cake here)

By 9:30 a.m., the sun was glaring in my kitchen window. The kids were up. Mr. Wright was up. Me? I was on my seventh cup of coffee, covered in flour, with two more cakes to frost and quite a few clumps of frosting in my hair. I covered the two small star-shaped cakes for Curlytop and Snugglebug with pink frosting, piped their names on top, and collapsed into bed.

It’s inevitable that, when I decorate custom cakes for my kids, some party guest will ask me if I’d be willing to make the cake for their kid’s birthday.

Yeah, right.

This special kind of self-torture is something I only perform for my own kids, thank you very much.

By the way, can anyone tell me how long leftover cake can be frozen? Or rent me some freezer space?

Kind of Sexy, in that "I-Caught-a-Serial-Killer" Sort of Way

Somehow, Mr. Wright and I switched Palms today. To tell the truth, it's not a mysterious "somehow," but easily explained by a "someone" who raced out the door without actually looking at the device he plucked from the nightstand. Ahem.

I decided to make the best of it and swipe the drag queen video I promised you many days ago. Alas, the video is MIA.

It's not a total loss, though. Just look at the goodies I found on his MicroSD card:

Perhaps the most adorably goofy pic taken of Snugglebug, ever


Princess's graduation

The video of belly dancing on Earth Day: Watch as I lose my sense of direction and turn the wrong way; not once, but twice! I would be the peacock in the back. My beautiful 12 year-old daughter, Pepper, is in front of me. I made her choli (small cropped top worn in belly dance) the night before!


The Divine Miss Teri B and me, demonstrating the only thing our boobs turned out to be good for in a gay bar

In my search, I also located this dirty little secret:

Oh, I hear you. You're saying, "What's dirty about this picture? What's the secret?"

People, people... DO YOU EVEN KNOW WHO THAT IS?!

Okay, on the left is Nathan Gorton. He's the Executive Officer of Snohomish County-Camano Association of REALTORS. You're right. His presence is, at a glance, neither secretive nor dirty. Actually, you can just forget Nathan is in the picture, for dirty secret purposes.

On the right is Mr. Wright. Again, not overtly dirty or secret-y.

In the middle... In the middle is Congressman Dave Reichert. He's the author of Chasing the Devil: My Twenty-Year Quest to Capture the Green River Killer.

He's my pretend boyfriend.

Some women have a thing for Sean Connery. Not me. My older-man crushing is all targeted at the Congressman. He is my only celebrity crush; kind of sexy in that "I-caught-a-serial-killer" kind of way.

A couple of years ago, I stalked him at the Capitol and introduced myself. When I saw him a year later at the Seattle First Citizen's Award banquet, he pretended to remember me, and I let him.

So here's the dirty secret: Mr. Wright went to Washington, D.C. to meet with Senator Cantwell this past week, and while he was there, he stopped in to see my pretend boyfriend, even though I wasn't with him!

Isn't that sort of like cheating on me with my pretend boyfriend?

Daddy Got Lei'd on Father's Day...

...and boy, was he surprised!
The kids made candy leis and "sodas" for Mr. Wright at church for Father's Day. How cute are those?! The leis are mini candies, wrapped in plastic wrap and strung together with ribbon. The sodas are malt glasses, filled with unwrapped chocolates for the "soda" and topped with mini marshmallows and gummy candies for the "whipped cream and sprinkles."

After church, we headed over to my parents' house to wish my dad a happy Father's Day.

Can I insert a plug about step-families here? Can I just say that being a step-parent is infinitely harder than being a biological parent? Anyone who takes on the job is equal parts crazy and wonderful, and I am so grateful for my dad. He did, after all, raise me from a little hellion into a pretty well-adjusted woman after he married my mom.

That's Pepper, The Dude, Snugglebug, Grandpa, GirlWonder, Curlytop and Bandit (the little blurry blurb of action that Curlytop is pushing away). It's tough to get a photo with a ton of kids and two dogs running around.

"The toys at Grandpa's house make noise! Why don't we have toys at home that make noise?!"

"Grandma and Grandpa have a garden. We don't have a garden because Mommy kills plants. She's a vegan, you know... it's savage, seeing her brutally chop up a carrot! Oh, the horror!"

"We helped Grandma harvest her strawberries!"

My mom fed us (because she's amazing) and we piled the kids into the car when the whining started (because we love my parents, and want them to ask us to come back).

During the 45-minute drive home, I called my bio father, who lives three hours away. He was heading out to have dinner with my sister and her in-laws, but said he'd call me when he got back.

This morning, I looked at my missed calls. He called at 8:59 p.m. We were all already zonked out. What a busy day! I'll be giving him a very happy day-after-Father's-Day call today.

Hope your Father's Day was equally busy, and equally blessed!

Mommy Makeover

It will never happen, but sometimes I dream of signing up for one of those cosmetic surgery reality shows, and getting THE WORKS. I look way too old for my age… Motherhood years must be like dog years.

Being a mom is tough on the body, for sure. The stretch marks that cover my butt and go down to my knees don’t exactly imply, “bikini model.” No matter how many crunches or bellydance classes I agonize through, I will always have a layer of wrinkled, loose, jiggly skin over my abs, effectively proclaiming that I don’t exercise at all. Ever.

Motherhood and Gravity are great pals, and clever, too! They’ve deduced that they are much more effective in tandem. Once a woman gives birth, things start sagging at an accelerated rate.

A few years ago, I bought a short, flirty sundress. When I pulled it out last summer, I was astonished… “Honey!” I shouted to my husband. “I’ve grown, like, three inches… Look! My dress barely covers my butt now!” Mr. Wright surveyed the hem of the dress, then offered, “I don’t think you’re taller, Babe. Maybe your butt’s just a bit, um… lower.”

Certainly, genetics play a part. My crooked teeth are a gift from some European ancestor; my fine, limp hair comes from my father’s family; the puffy “perma-bags” under my eyes also grace the faces of most women in my family; my long, pointy nose comes from… Alan Alda? I never knew my mom was such a fan.

Perhaps part of the dissatisfaction with my appearance lies in the undeniable realization that I look nothing like my children. True, I did not give birth to six of the seven, but even my own son looks more like my husband’s brother than anyone in my family.

It’s not only vanity that fuels my fantasies of a makeover. (Although, to be honest, what mama doesn’t secretly desire a little “freshening up?”) The more complex truth is that I wish my outside matched my inside; the heart that knows and loves each of my children as if I had borne them all myself.

I know I’m looking in the wrong place. Scrutinizing my reflection in the mirror will never provide evidence that these children are mine, in spite of who gave birth to them. In truth, I need look no further than the kids, themselves. Princess has a compassionate heart and love for animals like me, and The Dude mirrors my reclusive nature. Pockets has my offbeat sense of humor, and Pepper is fiercely headstrong and outspoken, like her stubborn mama. GirlWonder’s developing writing skills make me proud. Dare I hope she, too, chooses to be a writer? Curlytop, like her quirky mother, sees exciting, obscure details in the mundane; and Snugglebug shares my ability to go from serious to giggling in 4.5 seconds.

I am exactly who I need to be, if I only stop looking so closely. For now, I’ll put my makeover fantasies away, along with my mirror, and be satisfied. Wait a minute – are those… crow’s feet?

Reality television, here I come!

A version of this story appears in Volume 1, Issue 3 of Gonzo Parenting. Order your copy today!

Part Time… No Problem!

Fall is always stupid-busy for the Wrights, and it’s not just the beginning of the school year… fall also means the beginning of Princess’s soccer season, Pockets’s football, and—for me—teaching journalism to fourth- and fifth-graders for six weeks.

Add to the usual chaos these new twists for 2008:

• Mr. Wright was elected President-Elect for the Washington REALTORS®. appointed to a presidential advisory group on climate change for the National Association of REALTORS® and appointed as a trustee for the Center for Real Estate Research and Development at WSU
• I decided, in all my wisdom, to begin publishing an independent parenting magazine
• Pepper started volleyball
• Curlytop started her preschool IEP at a public school in Douglas County
• Snugglebug started group therapy/preschool in south Chelan County

Naturally, the five oldest kids go to school in north Chelan County, so I’m driving all over the state every day. I openly laugh at whoever created the “10 Year/100,000 Mile Warranty.” Get real! I drove over a thousand miles this week alone.

What better time for me to take an additional job, right? I love my local librarian to the extreme—which must explain why I offered to sub for her while she was on maternity leave. Without much thought as to the impact, I became a part-time librarian. Why not? Part-time… no problem!

I knew things had changed for the kids and me when I found myself at work, stricken that I’d forgotten Pepper had a volleyball game. Mr. Wright was out of town and wouldn’t be able to attend. Someone had to go to her game! But, who?

In desperation, I sent a text message to Princess:

can u go to pepper’s game after practice? pls?

Her response?

um, i am @ my soccer game ... sorry!

Worst. Mother. Ever.

The Center for Disease… whatever.

I am pleased to inform you that my family has survived the wretched Flu Epidemic of 2008.

Hmm? What’s that? You say you didn’t hear there was an epidemic?

Did you miss it on CNN? I’ll recap:

• Monday AM – Two year-old, Snugglebug, begins projectile vomiting.
• Monday PM – Three year-old, Curlytop, joins her sister. They projectile vomit in assorted colors.
• Tuesday AM – Ten year-old, GirlWonder, repaints her bedroom in stylish “vomit” scheme. Doesn’t go to school. Babies are feeling much better and celebrate by opening front door and running down block in just diapers while Mom is in shower. Mom panics and runs through neighborhood in towel.
• Tuesday PM – Fourteen and fifteen year-old sons, Pockets and The Dude, return from school. They vomit. Twelve year-old daughter, Pepper, vomits. Mom posts sign on front door: “DANGER! High-Speed Vomit!”
• Wednesday AM - Mom takes babies to appointment, since they are “fine” now. Walks into doctor’s office and two year-old vomits on wall, floor and Mom. Mom apologizes profusely to receptionist, changes two year-old into clean clothes. Two and three year-old girls synchronize filling of their pants with diarrhea, which runs down their legs. Mom grabs a baby under each arm and runs, without rescheduling. Pepper and boys still puking.
• Wednesday PM - Dad pukes… and pukes. Babies puke. Mom says she can’t stand any more puking and is running away from home. Gets to driveway and pukes.
• Thursday AM – Eighteen year-old, Princess, says she feels like puking but isn’t going to, because she’s running for ASB President and doesn’t have time. Family disowns her.

Can we even count on the Center for Disease Control to publicize these large-scale outbreaks anymore?

Eight out of nine members of my household were afflicted with this horrible virus… That’s 88.9% of the population!

I’d call that an epidemic, wouldn’t you?

Losing It

It will come as no surprise to me when I wake up one morning to find our laptop computer, our Ford Expedition, and every piece of identification my family owns have been stolen in one fell swoop. It’s a loss just waiting to happen, and there is nothing I can do about it.

We live in a technological void. No high-speed cable. No DSL. No fiber optics (“coming soon,” they tell us). The lovely little store on the hill provides wireless access to guests who sit on their wide porch with an espresso or hot fresh apple cider, and Mr. Wright brings his laptop home from the office every night; in case the children need to do homework research online.

After several morning-hustle incidents that resulted in Mr. Wright getting to work without his computer, the designated home for the machine is now in the back of the Expedition. So what if our tax and business records are on the hard drive? Some things are more important than security – like getting to work with necessary equipment.

My family is genetically programmed to lose keys. The house-locking ritual is easy enough, but requires a stringent amount of breaking and entering to unlock, because we don’t often know where the key is. We had a locking mailbox, until Mr. Wright had to bust the lock off to retrieve three weeks of mail after the key was lost. The key to the Expedition, too, serves as the source of much grief. Many frantic searches for said key have been conducted while calling Snugglebug’s therapy center to tell them she would be missing group therapy, because I lost my keys. Again.

Now, we keep the key to the Expedition in the cup holder. In the Expedition. That worked until Pepper got something out of the car, then locked it. “What were you thinking?” I shrieked. “You locked the car?” Poor Pepper. She just wanted to make sure a minimum level of security was in place. I apologized for yelling at her, while I called Curlytop’s physical therapist to report we would be missing her appointment. Again.

The Ford dealership made me a key that will open the door, but not start the car. The “spare” key is now duct taped in an inconspicuous place outside the vehicle. Should any diligent thief choose to locate the spare key, he should have no problem driving away with the ignition key found in the cup holder.

Our family loves British Columbia. The first time we planned a “run for the border,” I crashed through the house, looking for birth certificates, and came up with maybe three for our family of nine. “No problem,” I reasoned. “I’ll go to the Department of Health and order new ones!” We got over the border with no problem. By the time we planned our next trip, I’d lost four birth certificates. Once again, I ordered new ones, and declared they would never again leave the glove box.

My older kids sometimes worry – as I toss the car key into the cup holder and step over the laptop to unbuckle the babies – that someone will steal our car and, by extension, our identities. Scrutinizing the floor littered with soccer shin guards, wrestling shoes, volleyball pads, football cleats, two Tickle-Me Elmos, my bag of materials for the journalism class I teach and two sippy cups, I realize our identities really are in this car.

I assure them, “No one would take our car, darlings – they’d have to clean it.”