Category Archives: Luke

Baseball

I was at a baseball game the other day (every day) and I heard a mom say, “I have to send the family to Noodles just to have time to go to the grocery store!” And I was like, “I hear ya sister!” But I only said that it my head because I had never seen any of these parents before, which is weird. Then I heard a dad say, “Ugh! Noodles! I refuse to go there! You can buy 4 pounds of noodles for what it costs for one meal. It drives me crazy, etc.” And I said, “Those dry noodles aren’t going to cook themselves, jerk.” Just in my head again. Clearly, I needed to move someplace else, which I waited to do until one of the parents said Luke just made a lucky catch to tag a kid out as he stole home.

What is my point? I have been watching a lot of baseball. In the picture above, I am doing the pitch count during one rainy game. So focused. Jack was playing with my phone and clearly, I have been so busy with baseball, I have not had time to blog, or get my eyebrows waxed.

Birthday Baking

As I may have mentioned before, I’m not good at baking in moderation. My friend Laura sometimes bakes a batch of cookies after dinner, and I mean, who has time for that? Just finish dinner, and bake a batch of cookies? No. Once a year, I bake 17 dozen cookies. It takes a month of preparation, weeks of baking, days of decorating, minutes of eating, and so on. Then I take 10.5 months off. Or, I volunteer to bring in pancakes for Luke’s class and the day before they say, “Thanks, be here at 7:00 am, there are 60 kids.” What? I was going to send 20 pancakes in a ziplock bag.

When Luke was in kindergarten, I was overcompensating for not being a stay at home mom, and I made elaborate cupcakes for his class. But as you all know, Luke really prefers pie to anything else, and a while ago I saw a recipe for hand pies, and then I thought, “Why not make tiny individual pies for all the kids in Luke’s class this year?” I bet lots of people could think of reasons not to do that, but before I could come to my sense, Luke’s friends were saying things like, “Only 30 days until we all get pie!” and it was too late to back out.

Have I mentioned the 10 stages of excessive baking?

1.) Announcing my grand plan

2.) Planning, browsing blog posts, imagining an extremely large group of people being delighted my beautiful pastries.

3.) Kind of wishing I hadn’t ever said anything about anything related to baking some crazy dessert

4.) Actually planning, deciding on a recipe, shopping without a list

5.) False start, realizing I don’t have all the ingredients I need

6.) Second trip to the grocery store

7.) Making the dough that needs to chill for some period of time

8.) Worrying that I won’t have enough/procrastinating

9.) Making the dessert, making extra just in case

10.) Having way too much of a dessert that tastes fine, and looks ok.

I’m sure you can guess where I am now, with 30 hours left to go. Dough is in the fridge, and there probably isn’t enough!

Mas Tequila Boss

When we were in Mexico, Luke decided to participate in a ping pong tournament. And by that I mean he said, “I’m going to win the ping pong tournament.” Well, the only issue was that the tournament was at 4:30, and none of us had watches, and there were no clocks anywhere. So, we just decided that after lunch we would spend the rest of the day at the pool nearest to the ping pong table. That plan worked well and before we knew it, Luke had won the ping pong tournament and all was right with the world. Oh, except for one little thing. The activities directory had told Luke there was a prize and then he faded away into the sunset before any prizes were awarded. I told Luke that we’d just find Luis tomorrow, and that he should just be happy with the bragging rights as an award.

That night we went to dinner at the fancy resort restaurant, and got on a 1 hour wait list. So I ran the kids over to the buffet for an appetizer while Dave held our spot. On the way back, we saw Luis, and he said, “I’ll be right back!” Into his office he went to rifle through drawers for a prize. I told the kids he was saying, “Shot glass? No. T-shirt? No. etc.” He came out with a tee-shirt, a plastic sun visor and a shot glass. We said, “Thanks!” and went off to find Dave. I told Jack to wear the visor and act like it was no big deal. This translated into Jack putting the sun visor on upside down, hair everywhere, arms raised, head bobbing from side to side saying, “WHAT!? It’s no big deal?!?!”

The king of subtlety.

Bonus Jack story, because I never want to forget the period of time (currently happening) where Jack wrote BOSS on everything. When we were doing our Christmas cards, I gave one to Jack to write for his teachers at daycare, to go with some cookies. He can write most of his letters, but he can’t really read or spell much. So when he wants to write something, he tells me what he wants to write, and I tell him how to do it, letter by letter. When he can’t remember how to do a letter, I draw it in the air, or try to form it with my fingers. This explains why some of his letters look a little odd. ANYWAY, he said he wanted the card to say, “To the boss of <Daycare name redacted>” I told him how to spell it, and that was that. But somehow, he remembered how to write BOSS, and now he writes it on everything. His drawings from school say “JACK BOSS” on them, doodles say “BOSS” etc. Dave and Luke and I find this to be totally hilarious, and we want to call him boss, and start using boss as a synonym for awesome, and everything else. But, unfortunately, Jack thinks we are making fun of him, and he doesn’t like it. And yet, BOSS lives.

I just want to hold onto this phase. Pretty soon he’ll be reading and writing, and leaving for college. But for now, I am loving this BOSS phase.

A Long Time Coming

When I found out that we needed to be at a baseball tournament at 7:15 this morning, I suddenly felt so sorry for my parents and all the early Saturdays they went through for me. When I shared my feelings with my mom she said, “Well, that was a long time coming!”

This is a picture if Jack and I this morning – it was windy and 35. Jack is hidden under the sleeping bag that we luckily had in the car.

It warmed up quite a bit though – Here is Jack a mere 6 hours later. He’s still not interested in posing.

Dave and I both brought a sweatshirt and a jacket for Jack and he wore all 4 layers.

Baseball Mom, Baseball Pants

Upfront Disclaimer: I have no complaints about doing laundry in general. Dave and I have a pretty egalitarian marriage, in which I completely do not feel that I do all the chores, or more than 50% of the chores. So I am having a hard time with this blog post because I want it to be about how annoying it is that laundry detergent commercials are targeted to women, and how annoyed I was that all the information about the laundering of baseball pants was directed at me. But in real life I do the laundry. And Dave wasn’t even at the baseball meeting where they talked about the pants.

So what is going on with me? I am writing a blog post about how I feel about writing a blog post about laundry. Meta-MetaMegan.

Let’s start at the beginning. I have always been annoyed at the way laundry, and cleaning products in general are marketed towards women. Like waaaay back when I could first articulate a thought it was, “Why does the TV woman have to do all the laundry and cleaning?” I was going to explain the whole thing – but come on. Who doesn’t think those commercials with the one dimensional mom whose emotional life ranges from mock-exasperation-at-her-family-of-stain-generating-knuckleheads to pure-joy-at-the-removal-of-a-stain? Plus, it’s already been done, and better than I could do.

So here we are. I married a great chore-doing husband, my life is perfect, I only watch TV on netflix and the DVR so I don’t even see commercials anymore. In fact, when I tried to find an image for this post, all I could find were scary pictures of some man with oxyclean. And yet. And yet…

When Luke was ordering his baseball uniform, I was giving a very long, very intense lesson on the laundering of the white baseball pants. My eyes glazed over, I went to another place in my mind where I am someone other than “baseball mom in charge of laundry” and I contemplated responding with, “Um yeah. Thanks. Laundry isn’t really my “thing” if you know what I mean. I have a very challenging job, I read, I sometimes write.” And, “Why are you telling all this to me?” (Reminder:Dave wasn’t there.) Instead, I mumbled “Oxyclean? Got it. Your wife drip dries the jersey? Good to know.” Then I proceeded to joke about the laundering of baseball pants for a month, and laughed and laughed about it. And by that I mean, I became obsessed with whether or not I would win at getting the pants as white as possible.

At some point during all this, Luke tried on his entire uniform several times and was unable to stop smiling the entire time he wore it. Dave mentioned that maybe the pressure to maintain the baseball pants came not from other moms, but from the kids. Laundry obsession went up to 11.

Game time came this past weekend and I made Luke hand me his pants as soon as we walked into the house. I rinsed in the sink, then made a paste of oxyclean and put it on the stain. Then I started making dinner (more women’s work! Disclaimer – I love cooking, and Dave does more than I do, and he does the grocery shopping.) Then I googled “white baseball pants” and read a million things about what to do to get the stains out: rust cleaner, carpet cleaner, dish soap, zout, oxyclean, some purple thing, bleach, etc.” For every blog comment about what worked, there was one that said, “that didn’t work at all for me.” And every once in a while someone would say, “The kids want their pants to look dirty!” Big relaxed sigh. Then Luke popped his head in to see if I had any luck getting the stains out. Wash, rinse, repeat! I decided to forget everything I read online and just go with what I had been told in baseball pants meeting. Oxyclean. I may have thrown in some Palmolive for good measure. I may have started to hallucinate from the fumes. I may have reached some sort of inner peace, but that is only because I try to turn chores that I don’t want to do into opportunities for meditation. I read a lot of magazines, and according to Oprah and Real Simple, I need to be meditating, and I like to multi-task.

The only instruction I didn’t follow was to soak the pants overnight in oxyclean. And that is because our bathtub doesn’t hold water for that long because the drain won’t stay closed, and all the other sinks are required for hand washing or cooking, and I can’t figure out how to soak something in the front load washer.

Long story short, the pants are perfect. Me on the other hand? I am a mess, but I win at white baseball pants. This week at least.

Then and Now: Cookie Baking

Jack and I kicked off the Cookie Baking Extravaganza yesterday. We made tollhouse chocoloate chip cookies, just to get things rolling. Then we made the dough for sugar cookies, and we made chewy chocolate gingerbread cookies. Then we tried to take a nap, but for some reason… couldn’t seem to settle down.

This pose reminded me of my first year baking with Jack, in 2008.

Aww. And I can’t have a Then and Now, without a Luke picture too, circa 2005, when he was 2, going on 3.

The plan is to make at least one dough, or one cookie recipe per night this week.

Boulder Cup

Check out these two kids strategizing before the race:

I like this picture of the start because Luke told me his strategy was to never look behind you. He must have been getting it out of the way ahead of time.

And here is the start – Luke is number nine, sponsored by SpongeBob.

Here is Luke right before he got his jersey signed by Tom Danielson. Does that mean I can’t wash that jersey? It was in sharpie. I jokingly said I would embroider over the signature because he really doesn’t want me to wash it. Problem: Luke only has two jerseys and the other one is small enough that Jack can also wear it. Problem number 2: I do not know how to embroider.

I was wondering who that lady was that Luke was talking to in the picture, but then I realized it was me. I never wear baseball hats so I didn’t recognize myself.

And hey, look who came in third!

I chose this picture because you can see the Valmonster sticker on Luke’s bike. We sure do love Valmont Bike Park!

I’ve been checking 303cycling.com for pictures, and I found this great collection. Much better than the ones I took with my iphone.

Thanks http://dmoynihan.smugmug.com/Cycling2011-6/Boulder-Cup-2011 !!!

The Sands of Time

Sand. I always assumed that pockets are filled with sand over the course of the day through extreme and rugged playing. From wallowing in sandboxes, and rolling through dirt.

But I learned otherwise on a hike through the Black Hills in Custer State Park.

We drive the Needles Highway one day and did a hike to the Cathedral Spires.

Jack picked up a piece of wood that was slightly curved, perfect for scooping sand, and there was a lot of sand and dirt to scoop. Jack was a very good hiker that day, almost too determined, not wanting any help over some of the serious rock scrambles. But on the way down, he asked me to carry his piece of wood filled with sand, because he was having trouble keeping the sand from spilling out on the way down. I said he should just dump the sand and then fill it up again at the bottom of the hike. Logical. Subtext: Please lose that piece of wood on the way down. Then I turned forward and started walking again, confident that Jack would dump the sand and follow. After a few steps, I turned around to see him using the wood like a funnel, and filling his pockets with sand. Filling his pockets with sand, on purpose. New insight into the mind of a boy.

Seems odd to have a post about Jack and his antics, but Jack wasn’t really into posing that day. As you can see.

Hot Nose!

We went to South Dakota for a long labor day weekend, and I was ecstatic to learn we’d be passing through Wheatland, Wyoming on the way there. Years ago, possibly 10 years, I had an Italian cream soda at Terra Grano in Wheatland, Wyoming and it was fantastic. (Terra Grano is Land Wheat in Italian. Possibly.) What better way to kick off a totally Americana trip to see giant heads in a rock, then by planning to have lunch where I once had a delicious drink a decade ago?

Dave was skeptical, and I have to admit, the cream soda didn’t change my life, like it did the first time. But we did have an laugh so hard you cry experience that made it more than worthwhile.

We ordered cream sodas all around, and two pizzas. Oh, and we got there after 1:00 pm, so we were all preeeeeetty hungry by the time the food arrived. Luke took a bite of his pizza, the cheese sort of flipped up onto his nose, he started fanning his face and yelling, “HOT NOSE!! HOT NOSE!!” Being the loving, nurturing, caring mother that I am, I started laughing. Then, Luke followed up with a giant belch before he got up to get some more napkins. Jack was laughing too, and he let out a world weary sigh and an, “Ooooh. This is tooooo funny for me.” The sort of thing your Great Aunt would say as she tittered and dabbed at her eye with a hankie. That made me laugh a little harder, when Luke got back with the napkins, I had already almost shed a tear. At that moment, Luke chose to say, “Excuse me” for the belch that happened so long ago, I had almost forgotten about it. Then it was all over. It was a laugh like the Big-Lebowski-quoting-coffee-spitting-great-partly-saying-wedding of 1998. The one where I had to put my head under the table so I could focus long enough to chew and swallow my food in order to fully laugh without the very real fear of choking.

We laughed, cried, pulled ourselves together, made eye contact with each other, and started again. Many times.

Hot Nose! The new family vacation memory.

Books

I added the Mary Magdalene book to my list of books read, as well as My Hollywood and Cutting for Stone. The list appears to be putting itself in alphabetical order, which I don’t love, but am too lazy to work on that right now. After I read My Hollywood, I read a review of it which made me like it more. But there is just something about reading a book about the complicated relationship between women and me, women and children and women and their nannies, that wasn’t really the type of summer read I was looking for. It was very well done, and the characters were very real, but ugh.

I can’t remember which book it was, (A Fine Balance or The God of Small Things) but something I read caused me to put a hold on all Indian literature, because it’s always more tragedy than I can handle. I bought Cutting for Stone when I was on an Amazon gift card shopping spree without knowing much about it, but since it’s been on my shelf, I think it’s been recommended to me at least three times. It takes place mostly in Ethiopia, but the characters are mostly Indian. India+Africa really takes the tragedy up a notch. (It goes to 11, as they say.) It took me maybe a week to read the 665 pages, and one night, I finished working around midnight and thought, I better not try to read just a few pages, I’ll end up staying up until 2am to finish it. And then I flopped down on the couch and started reading. Yup, at 1:59 I read the last page. I had some major problems with the main character at the end, but I have been thinking about the book ever since. So yes, I recommend it.

Luke is reading the Harry Potter series, and I am trying to keep up. He finished the first book in less than a week and he’s almost finished with the second. I have heard from a good friend who does her research (Jena!) that books 1-4 are age appropriate, and 5-7 should maybe be saved for later. Luckily, Luke received the series from his Grandparents this summer, and the one book that is missing is book 5. So we may have a natural break while we look for book 5. Of course, he saw it at the Boulder Bookstore this weekend and almost died because I didn’t buy it. Somehow I have to leapfrog in front of him, and start reading the books before he gets to them to see what I think.

So, Harry Potter fans, how am I going to get Luke to stop reading and wait a few years for book 5? Maybe school will start just in time.