Christmas in July

I haven't really talked about the weather in an out and out 'talking about the weather' kind of way for a while, so I'm going to talk about the weather in this here, short little post.

Disclaimer:  I am FULLY aware that the rest of the country is experiencing sweltering, unbearable, and evenly deadly heat.  I feel awful for them and hope it passes soon.

I, on the other hand, am experiencing the coldest, grayest summer of my life.  Granted, I lived in Southern California for the first 18 years of said life, and summers there are pretty fabulous as a rule.  But, as long as I've lived in the Pacific Northwest the summers have been pretty good.  Occasional rainy periods but always long bouts of sun with temps exceeding 80 degrees for extended periods of time.  Perfect really.  This summer on the other hand, went AWOL.  I'm freezing most of the time.  I have a space heater aimed at myself every morning and evening.  Yesterday it was 83 degrees, the pool was filled and we spent the whole day on the deck basking in what would be a fluke, cuz we are back to the northwest gloom today.  I awoke to booms of thunder and gray skies.  Ack.  It's killing me.  I have SAD (seasonal affective disorder) so I NEED the summer more than anyone else in the whole entire world.  I wait and wait, I anticipate the sun's glorious rays shooing away the darkness in my head.  Not good.  I can't wait to get out of this God-forsaken place in August and head towards warmth, desert, dryness.   If things don't improve soon around here I'm just going to get the Halloween decorations out and call it a lost cause.  Ho-ho-ho.

With my mouth still hanging open...

One of my children, who shall remain nameless because he would kill me if I named him, is about to enter high school.  He is also about to enter puberty, he's a late bloomer.  Anyone who has children of both genders knows that both boys and girls become hormonal messes at this stage in life.  Girls get the bad rap for going crazy during puberty, and again later in life when going through peri and full on menopause.  But, you know what, that's crap.  I have two boys and three girls and I can tell you, my boys cried more and had more breakdowns during this time that all my girls combined.  My friends with boys can attest to this fact. Is this supposed to be some unspoken secret?

Last night I thought I had planned a lovely little summer night outing here in the Arctic Seattle.  We walked down to our local outdoor mall to watch a concert and grab dinner.  This is apparently where things started to go terribly wrong, although I'm not sure why.  First he sits there sullenly with his fingers in his ears because he doesn't approve of the music, I say "hey, why don't you two go into the Apple store and look around while we have a drink and enjoy the music for a while."  Great idea, they head in.  I did not have my cell with me but Mike did.  The "unnamed one" apparently tried calling a million times (twice) but Mike didn't pick up (loud music, duh).  Keep in mind that we never left the place we last saw them, still sitting in the same place and able to see the Apple store from where we are.  Here they come, one looking adorable and perky, the other looking like what I imagine the Menendez brothers looked like just before they murdered their parents.  Really?  Soooo, then I say "let's go get dinner, where do you want to go?"  Grace says buoyantly "Blue C Sushi", I say to the "unnamed one" where would you like to go "unnamed one"?  "I don't care" is the response, still looking like he was born to Satan incarnate.  "Okay, sushi it is"...oops, wrong again.  He sat at the booth glaring at the food as it passed him on the conveyor belt and then occasionally glanced at Satan accusingly.  I say "You know what, it looks like you aren't happy with our choice, we pass McDonald's on the way home, we'll just stop in and get you a burger".  I'm so incredibly nice I can't stand myself.  (I'm tired of using quote marks so I'm going to stop that now)  I bet you can guess what happens next.  We go into McDonald's and the unnamed one isn't hungry, but he's still really mad, about what I'm still not sure.  I'm loosing my cool now and saying some of those evil motherly things that occasionally come from my mouth.    I won't repeat.  Then he says to me that I'm one more word away from him going to live with his father.  Oh, and he isn't going on the road trip with us next month.  Seriously.  Then he runs ahead, over the hill toward home.  It's now dark and I'm pretty sure he is going to pretend that he ran away or something, he'll be hiding somewhere just to teach me a lesson.  As usual, I am correct. He's no where.  I've been a mother for quite some time so I know that the manual states that I am to pretend I'm not concerned.  Turn on the TV and kick back like I don't care. I did that and he did slink in about 15 minutes later, not even a mean looking glance was cast my direction, up the stairs he went and he hasn't spoken to me since.

What the freak just happened?

I ate.

And ate, and ate some more...and gained back the 3 lbs. I lost from my green cleanse.  Oh well.  I'm going back to a low carb diet, which seems to really be the only thing that has ever worked for me.  I've been carrying around this extra 15 pounds for a few years now and I have to either accept and love it, or get rid of it.  Actually, I'm not sure I can ever love it but maybe acceptance?

I toy with the idea of having a surgery to get rid of the part of me that I really hate the most.  My husband really likes this part of me, but I've never been comfortable being a "chesty" girl and I think that if I was better proportioned I would better be able to live with the weight my body wants to be.  One of these days I will make an appointment for a consultation but I'm not quite ready yet.  I'm pretty sure that I wouldn't qualify for an insurance covered procedure, unfortunately.  I do know that I don't want to live the rest of my life struggling to find clothes that fit right or are comfortable and I would love to walk down the street not feeling as though I'm being checked out by every male (and female) that passes by.  I'm sure it's mostly in my head because I'm so self-conscious about it.  Still, it feels real to me.

We have decided on our next road trip, Silverwood and then a loop through Yellowstone.  Silverwood for the kids and Yellowstone for me.  I know they'll love it when they get there, I can't wait!  I've never been and it's been on my list for years.  Mike has a business trip in Wyoming so it works out well.  I wish we had the time and money to head down to Utah as well, maybe it will work out. 

I did it! Now what?

So I actually made it through the three days without eating any solid food except a bit of watermelon.  And, I actually had a huge burst of energy yesterday, which I am still feeling this morning.  That might be the fact that I'm drinking strong coffee on a very empty stomach, but whatever.  I had very little hunger, a little weakness here and there, but otherwise it was a piece of cake. 

I didn't clean out my system (if you know what I mean) as I'd hoped but I'm optimistic for today.  Now the problem is I don't know what the heck to do.  Should I eat?  What should I eat?  And, guess what, I don't even want to eat!  I'm going to finish off my Naked Green Machine today before foraying into solid food and then I'm just not sure.  Maybe I have acquired one of those eating disorders like I prayed for when I was a teenager.  Just a month of anorexia, that's all I ask! was my fervent prayer. 

I'm taking Gracie out for a haircut today, gonna clean out the trailer (note to self:  get tabs), and obsess about what my first solid meal in four days might consist of.  Mike is on his way back from Canada, and the sun is actually shining in Seattle...pretty much, hallejulah!

Day Two

I did it, I made it through day one of my green juice fast/cleanse.  I wasn't even hungry, which is so weird because I am always hungry.  No exaggeration. I think that stuff is thick enough and full of so much veggies and fiber that it just hangs around in there awhile.  Anyhoo, day two, I'm at work today so I'm hoping my stomach won't make scary growling noises and embarrass me.  Lost two pounds overnight, I'm not stupid, I do know that it's not "real" fat, but I don't care cuz it's the bloat I'm gunning for this time. 

I finished off the big bottle of Odwalla this morning, Liv absconded with a glass yesterday so I didn't actually drink the whole bottle myself.  I'm going to grab a Naked in the cafeteria today (can't wait to see how much that little bottle will run me down there) and start the second large bottle from home after work.  Since Mike's out of town this week it's been easier than it would have been otherwise.  The little guys are happy with whatever I put in front of them for dinner so last night they had a box of Annie's Mac and Cheese and pigs in a blanket with li'l smokies and crescent rolls.  Gross right?  At least I had absolutely no desire to eat it, although I almost shoves a spoonful of mac into my mouth before I remembered.  It would have been really sad to ruin an almost complete fasting/cleansing day with a mouthful of boxed mac and cheese.

Today...

Jack had a dental appointment and he said it "hurt sooooooo bad".  He's still not done with the dental work from his BMX accident, which was two years ago tomorrow.

That was one of those days I want a do-over on.  I would change that day by saying "No, Jack, you may not go to the skate park and knock your front tooth out and chip most of the other permanent teeth in the front of your mouth and then have expensive and painful dental procedures done for the next 5 years."  That is verbatim what I would say.

Then we came home and made 5 half pints of the bestest blueberry jam I have ever had.  No lie.  I was not aware I was an awesome canner until just this month.  I canned 8 jars of super delicious strawberry jam a couple weeks ago and now I am obsessed with thinking about some delicious combinations of fruits to make into jam.  Strawberry rhubarb is next, which I obviously did not think up myself.

Speaking of food, I started a three day green juice cleanse fast today.  So far I'm not hungry, although I did augment with a bit of watermelon.  I do not have a juicer and didn't really want to invest in a piece of kitchen equipment I may never use again.  So I'm using Naked Truth Green Machine and Odwalla Original Superfood.  They are so much better tasting than they look.  They would have to be because they look like algae sludge.  They are thick enough to make me feel not starving, so that's good.  I've been gastronomically BAD for a while now, I'm hoping to knock off a bit of the bloat before heading to Cannon Beach next week.  We are staying at the RV Resort for the week of the Fourth.  I'm excited...the weather is supposed to be lovely so I'll keep my fingers crossed.  I love Cannon Beach, literally, I Love Cannon Beach.  It's enough like a California Beach to make me feel a little bit homesick.  Yay for vacations!

Curiosities

Camping was okay.  The weather wasn't awful, it was fine.  The kids got along okay, not great, just fine.  I didn't do a great job planning meals, we didn't have a lot of money to work with and payday wasn't supposed to be until the day after we got home.  I wanted to make sure we had money left over for any emergencies so I got some real cheezy food.  Lot of hot dogs, top ramen salad, chips. Now I'm a little fatter than when I was last Friday.  We stopped at the Heidleburger on the way out of Leavenworth and chowed down on their amazing cheeseburgers and onion rings on the drive home.  Best meal of the weekend.  I was a lot unhappy when I got on the scale this morning.  Why won't those numbers ever just go down instead of up?

For some reason Mike always chooses to pick a fight with me when we are on a road trip.  I'm sure it has something to do with a captive audience, and the fact that I tend to storm off when I'm just done with the conversation.  It's hard to storm off when you are in a car going 65 mph.  So, the trip started off less than peaceful.  We got over it and moved on. 

We did climb a mountain.  Just steep and high enough to be exciting for the kids and not cause me to have a heart attack on account of my pesky fear of heights.  We walked a lot, mostly since Elke refuses to poop anywhere near our campsite, which is nice of her but it's also annoying watching her pace around waiting for someone to walk her to the pooping hill.  With all the gross people leftovers she eats while we are camping she becomes a very prolific pooper.

I'm looking forward to our next trip.  Hopefully it will be a warmer, sunnier time and place.  I'll be more creative with the camping food so I don't end up with a nasty food hangover.

I did read a great book on my Kindle, it's called In Zanesville, and is the story of a girl with a dysfunctional family growing up in the 70's.   Sound familiar? 

Update!

     It's been a while.  This blog was created to keep in touch with Liv while away at school but it morphed into a way for me to be a little creative in my mostly uncreative life.  It became a little cathartic, and I say "little" because there's really only so much you can say when you know people who know you, are reading.  My husband stumbled upon it one day and was concerned that he came across as a bumbling dork.  For that I am sorry, I just report.

     Liv has been home so much, the 1.5 hour drive isn't enough to keep her away her my awesome mothering, that I haven't needed to keep her updated on our doings.

     Liv ended  up at Western and is in fact finishing up her quarter next week.  She'll be home, back to the basement bedroom for a few months and has procured a position with the "City" as a fire hydrant painter for the summer. 

     Sam moved back home in January, down to the basement as well.  She broke up with that guy, and is a very happy, single, working 23 year-old.  I'm happy to have her back, in every way.

     Other than that, I really don't have much to report.  We are hoping for some positive changes next month, which I am not at liberty to discuss until such changes occur, which they better.  So send positive energy our direction. 

     I anxiously await a weather change, Seattle has been mired in rain and clouds all year.  We finally hit 70 degrees last week.  Seriously, end of May.  My mood is bad, I'm usually feeling a happy bump in my brain by now but this daily darkness is not working for me.  I fantasize about moving to a sunnier clime on a daily basis, but my large brood of children keep me grounded in the realization that being away from any of them for any amount of time would counter the effects of sunshine in my eyes. 

     Camping season will commence this weekend with our annual trip to Leavenworth.  I give that a sincere yahoo!  Finally!!