The art of surviving pumpkin carving with boys!

The poor pumpkin sat there for days, awaiting his fate.  It is a his, because my boys named him, "Turdalicious" no really, they were talking that but I made them settle on "Punky Pumpkin" boy Mom can be so boring.  So poor Punky watched as the boys came running out of the house with Psycho style knives, then after my yelling coming out again with the smaller Criminal Minds knives, the ice cream scoop (my idea).  We rounded what we needed with a stiff martini for Mom and at least two sips before the games begin.

I wonder if I should be afraid at the maniacle looks on their faces as I let them hold the knives to "sketch out" the face for Punky.  The first try at sketching involved a serious stab into the poor boy, so I banished them as Mom sipped the martini and started taking the lid off of Punky.  Once the lid was off, this is where the ice cream scoop came in, what easier way to carve out the "guys" (my boys term) than with an ice cream scoop!  The ice cream scoop along with two little arms to pull at the "gooey, chunky, yucky mass" (their words) we hallowed out Punky.  I have to keep the boys from stabbing each other, from taking off a finger as they both dig out the eye, keep them apart when they argue about who got the most "guts" out!  I can't tell if they enjoyed more the stabbing of the pumpkin or the gooey insides (is there an episode about this on Criminal Minds?)  Then we came to the face, both explained they wanted a scary, yet funny face.  A pumpkin that would have trick or treaters running screaming but would make them laugh.  How in the heck do you do that?  Another sip of the martini and I figure you're typical pumpkin face will accomplish the "look" we are going for. 

5 minutes into carving the face, I realize I'm by myself.  Both boys have disappeared to watch spaghetti cat on youtube and left me to stitch up poor Punky's wounds.  When I come in and ask them what they are doing, they simply tell me they are waiting for me to finish so they can supervise.  Aren't you supposed to supervise during the project?  And when do kids supervise the parents?

We make Punky into a true Jack o Lantern and they both say, "Our work looks good!"  Their work, their work?  I'm left with cleaning up the pumpkin goo, roasting the seeds, and finding the candle to bring Punky to life.  Little trick I learned, put the GOO in water and the pumpkin seeds will float to the top!  Punky and I high five each other and bask in the glory that is Halloween!  BOO!!

My PERFECT day!

Tomorrow will be a perfect day!


I’ll wake up tomorrow morning EARLY enough to make my wonderful family and healthy and wholesome breakfast of whole grain pancakes, turfurky bacon, AND some fresh organic fruit. While they eat and talk about everything they are excited to learn that day, I’ll put the finishing touches on 26 cupcakes made with my own homemade cake mix and then frosted with my personal frosting system for each letter of the alphabet. I include a few more cupcakes spelling out Old Richmond Elementary for the teachers lounge because we “appreciate” our teachers.

Arriving at school ON TIME, I have plenty of time to walk my boys to their classroom, delivering said cupcakes along with all the fundraising orders totaled, collected and alphabetized to help the teacher. On my way out, I stop by the office and take a minute to stuff all the take home packets for several teachers before leaving into the sunshine of the day.

I make it to my gym class early and have time to setup my bike correctly, get cold water for my bottle and stop and talk with the instructors about the proper way to do a sit up. After the gym, I’m home with plenty of time to clean the house, dust the bookshelves, clean the baseboards, collect all the money sitting in the couch AND make that batch of cookies to greet the boys when they come home from school. The bus drops them off 10 minutes late so I have PLENTY of time to sort the laundry and fold them neatly in everyone’s drawers.

The boys are home excited about their day at school. They tell me, “No Mom, we have it. Our teachers told us that we need to work on our homework by ourselves. We’ll fix ourselves a snack and sit at our desks and finish our work.” As they do their homework, I’m sorting through the paperwork – check for school pictures, early….chocolate needed for teacher gift basket-got it…

The uniforms are sitting on hangers by the door as the boys prepare for cubscouts. They cubscout books are waiting to go, the badges completed sorted and color coded according to earned, halfway through earning, on the list to earn. The scout meeting turns out is a den meeting but I’ve still got leftover cupcakes from school with a trip to the grocery store before the boys came home from school and left the bag of Cheezits sitting in the trunk.

Once home, the husband is there to kiss my cheeks-complimenting me on such a job well done on my day, he asks if there is anything he can do to help with putting the boys to bed as they take all their homework packing up their backpacks and making their lunches for the morning. They all go up and go to bed without a single, “Are you coming up?” or the 15 goodnights before they fall asleep. I sit with a good glass of wine and Criminal Minds is featuring a story all about Shemar Moore with a surprise visit by Vin Diesel. I go up and my toothbrush is charged, there’s still toothpaste in the tube AND there’s no sleeping pill needed as my head hits the pillow for some blissful slumber.

I wake at 430am, “Shit, it was just a dream.”

Athlete's Amnesia

This started at a trip report on the Knob Hill Climb in Boone, NC.  The Knob is a 2 mile run - easy peasy, right - wrong!  This is 2 miles of PURE HILL, the kind of run that has your legs burning, your lungs burning, your head aching, your mind cussing, and I stand at the bottom of this hill EVERY year!  It's athlete's amnesia, that's what it is.

Athlete's Amnesia is a cousin to Baby Amnesia, the Kelly Melang definition - that state of mind where your brain blocks the BAD and REALLY BAD parts of an experience where you are left with only the good memories.  In birth, this is the "honey, we're gonna have a baby" to "here's your son" - I can't really remember much in between thought my husband has full memories of the "I hate you's, why did you get me...."  never mind.  In Athletes Amnesia, you remember standing at the bottom of a hill, or on the shores of that lake, or on the beach looking at the ocean, then remember the medal around your neck!  You remember BEING DONE, not what it took to get to that finish line.

In Athlete's Amnesia, like a fool you sign up year after year(hopefully not too make more kids).  You come back again to that race and as you start up that hill and feel ready to heave again, the memories flood back.  "This feeling of my insides burning, it seems familiar.  And the ache in my lungs and my legs, I seem to remember this.  This is so painful.  Oh yeah!  I remember this curve, I threw up over there!" 

Standing at the start line of your Half Ironman and the memories come flooding back, "Oh yeah!  I'm out here for over 6 hours.  Why in the H%LL did I sign up for this again?"  "This is the same spot I started getting the back ache.  Did my feet hurt this bad last year, oh yeah, now I remember!"  Your mind laughs at you as you kick, claw, scratch, puke your way to that finish line.  It then conveniently takes those memories and tucks them with the labor contractions, the stinky diapers, the cleaning up dog poop, the snot, the tears, the drool.

So you're sitting at the computer and an email pops up again, "Don't forget to sign up for The Knob Hill Climb....."  Stare at that and think, "That's not too bad, it's only 2 miles..." and start signing up.  Or you watch an Ironman on TV and think, "I've done a half, I could do a whole," forgetting all about the blood, sweat and tears that went into it.    Heck, I guess it's better than thinking, "How about another baby?"  Or "A puppy isn't THAT hard...."

Ever had a case of Athlete's Amnesia?