Things That Are Cold

So this morning was our very first class at the art museum. I woke up bright and early, peeked out the window and saw that it was snowing! No, no, no! No way!

Then I turned on the Weather Channel and they said it was 38 degrees outside, so I decided that the snow could go screw itself because I'd been looking forward to this too long and we were going.

And then Mikey got up and saw that it was snowing and I was afraid he'd try to stop us because he's so anal about safety issues, but I told him that it wasn't cold enough to be icy so he didn't put up much of a fuss and, sure enough, we had no trouble at all getting there.

We started with apple juice and animal crackers while we got our aprons on and waited for all the kids to show up, then we listened to a story about a snowy day, then we played with ice cubes (Britt ate hers), and then we went on a gallery tour. And this is where it got dicey.

We didn't go look at paintings hung up on a wall or sculptures made of metal. Nah, that would be too easy, wouldn't it? We had to go look at the Chihuly glass exhibit, where things are, you know, made out of glass and are extremely breakable! And lots of the pieces sat on platforms that were only about a foot high. And Britt went into high-energy mode and ran me ragged, trying to keep her from touching, climbing, bumping and/or running out of sight.

Happily, the Chihuly exhibit was left unscathed by the time we returned to the classroom, other than some fingerprints on the platforms. And then it was time to paint!

I knew Britt would love it, and she did:



and then we washed up. And still somehow we managed to walk out of there with paint all over us (washable, so the instructor said -- we'll see) with a huge piece of paper covered in wet paint that flapped in the wind all the way to the car.

Anyway, we made it home safely and the picture is drying out in the garage (where Britt can't get hold of it and transfer paint all over the house). Our next class is February 24 and is titled "Chihuly's Colors." But of course.

This week we have playtime at the library on Wednesday and then next Saturday is our first class at the zoo. That one is titled "Scaled Down," but there's no course description so I'm not sure what we'll be doing. I'm assuming there will be animals with scales involved (snakes? fish?), but Britt is leery of creepy-crawly things so perhaps this is not the best class to start her off with, but we're going to anyway.

It'll be my revenge for that heart-stopping Chihuly tour today.

Weighty issues

We went to Mikey's birthday party at his folks' house last night, had some awesome BBQ brisket and a huge chocolate cake, and learned that Mikey (who was born when his parents were both 18 years old) was conceived in the back seat of a 1966 Mustang Fastback.

Anyway, I had Britt's weight on my mind since I'd just been looking at booster seats and there was a scale (I don't own one) at my in-laws' house, so I weighed myself, had a minor heart attack, then picked up Britt and weighed myself again, and did the math. She weighs 39 pounds, almost nine pounds heavier than at her two-year checkup in September. I'm not saying what I weighed, except that it's a three-digit number that does not start with a 2. Or a 3.

When we got home, I asked Mikey what his optimum weight was (he's 6'2") and then I told him I weighed more than that. And then I told him seriously to quit buying the fucking chips already! Because if they're there, I will eat them! He finally agreed that we have to quit it with the cookies and the chips and the cakes and the chocolate, because he's packing several extra pounds his own dang self.

And then I measured Britt -- she's 35 inches tall now, almost two inches taller than she was at her two-year checkup -- and looked up a height/weight chart for her age and saw that she needs to quit it with the cookies and the chips and the cakes and the chocolate, too. She really doesn't look overweight to me, but I don't want to get her headed down that road already.

If I wasn't so happy about having my car back, I'd be feeling really depressed about all this.

Busy day

We had to go shopping today because it had recently (very recently) come to my attention that Mikey's birthday is TOMORROW (yikes!). He's turning 37, which just astonishes me to no end. We've been together since he was a young and tender 23. And I was a cradle-robbing 31.

Something I've noticed since getting my car back: Britt's gotten a lot taller and heavier in the past six months; now it's hard to hoist her up into her car seat because its sides are so high, and sometimes I even bang her head on the roof. My car is tiny and there just isn't much room to maneuver back there. So today I looked at booster seats, and guess what? They have arms! That flip up! Which ought to make it easier to get her in and out of the car. Also, their recommended weight ranges start at 30 pounds and I know she's heavier than that so I think we'll be getting one very soon.

When we left the house today I fixed her up with a CD Walkman (my 1995 Zipmobile still has only a cassette player) so she could listen to her new Baby Einstein music CDs. It cracked me up to watch her in the rear-view mirror, bopping her head and clapping along to music I couldn't even hear.

Today was our first day back at baby/toddler playtime at the library; I only had to tell Britt once not to take a toy away from another kid, so that was good; I was afraid she'd be more aggressive since she's pretty demanding at home. She did great until the end of the session, which closes with a story and lap games. She didn't want to sit on my lap; she wanted to run around gathering and stacking books like she does at home, so she had a mini-meltdown when I had to put the iron grip on her.

Our next scheduled activity is Saturday morning at the OKC Museum of Art, where we're supposed to explore "Things That Are Cold" and then paint with chilled finger paints. Britt's never painted before except with, like, pudding and melted ice cream and stuff, but I think it'll be right up her alley.

Speaking of art, she drew this on her Doodle-Pro today:



Can you tell it's a puppy? Britt says it's a puppy. I say it's a puppy hiking its leg.

Sprung, briefly

Mikey decided to go grocery shopping on his way home from work last night, so he didn't make it home in time to take me to the libarary. This is probably because I called and told him I had nothing to fix for dinner. He asked if there was anything we especially needed, and I said, "Yes. Toilet paper and hot chocolate mix."

(I've been keeping the toilet paper at the back of the bathroom counter instead on the holder and I still had to use the toilet plunger handle to fish two more of Britt's paper piles out of the potty yesterday.)

Then he called from the grocery store and asked if there was anything we especially needed, and I said, "Yes. Toilet paper and hot chocolate mix." Also, I asked him what he already got. He rattled off a list that started with chips, donuts and Little Debbie cakes and I almost sprained something rolling my eyes. "Did you get any meat?" I asked. No, but he'd go by the meat aisle and see what they had.

When he got home and I started unloading groceries, I decided that he was never going grocery shopping alone again, because he always gets stuff that we already have (or don't need, i.e. chips, donuts and Little Debbie cakes). So now we have five bags of fries, three bags of hash browns and three half-gallons of Bluebell ice cream (two of them are Moo-llenium Crunch, which I'm not crazy about) in our freezer, four packages of spaghetti noodles, four cans of Progresso chicken corn chowder, two full jars of Parmesan cheese, etc. You get the picture.

But he didn't get any toilet paper or hot chocolate mix.

Also, I had a small conniption while trying to wedge all the frozen stuff into the tall, narrow and tightly-packed freezer compartment of my fridge, and rather testily pointed out that if my big, beautiful freezer that sits in the middle of the garage was pushed over to the wall and plugged in, I wouldn't have to go through all that wrestling and rearranging after every shopping trip.

So tonight, after I thawed a package of chicken breasts, I remembered that he also brought KFC for dinner last night so I wouldn't have to cook. And I then had leftover KFC for lunch today. And somehow I completely forgot all about that when I decided to fry some chicken tonight. So tonight we're having hot dogs.

Anyway, the sun was shining this afternoon and the temperature was 38 degrees, so I went outside and poked my toe around the yard, the driveway and the street and it was slushy! Woo-hoo! So me and Britt piled into the car and went to the library. And now I have five new books to read, which should do me until this time next week, which should give the snow we're supposed to get this weekend a chance to melt. So, I'm good.

Except that I have no hot chocolate mix and we're damn near out of toilet paper.

O cruel twist of fate

I had one week of blessed freedom before the Arctic Circle apparently decided to move south for the winter. And now I'm shut down again.

I kinda heard that it was supposed to stay really cold through the end of the month, but I didn't think the ice would last that long. There was 24/7 weather coverage on all the local stations this weekend, but I was burned out on the whole thing after the first couple of hours, so I didn't watch another weather forecast until yesterday and, guess what?

It's not supposed to get above 32 degrees for at least two weeks. And more icy shit is coming this weekend!

This is so not fair!

Fortunately, Britt's only scheduled (and paid-for) activity is an art lesson on January 27; maybe the ice will be gone by then. But we did miss storytime at the library this morning.

Speaking of the library, I'll tell you what's really freaking me out: I have nothing left to read! I finished all my library books and most of the books that Cathy left here last month to clear some space in the back seat of her car. All that's left from that stack is a Jean Auel caveman book and a copy of "The Thorn Birds." Which, I don't even want to go there. I did read Jane Pauley's autobiography, which was the fluffiest piece of nothing ever, and two Reader's Digest Condensed Books, which should tell you how desperate I am for reading material.

I wonder if I can get Mikey to drive me to the library tonight? It's only like a mile away, but still...

Icebound

Stuck at home but this time it's only for a few days -- I hope. The streets are pretty slickery and my trusty little zipmobile would turn into a skatemobile on the ice, so me and Britt are waiting for things to clear up before we venture out again.

Bridgie had cabin fever and came over to visit this afternoon; after she'd been here a couple of hours, she glanced out the window and saw that her car had slid down the ice on the driveway and into the street.

Not much else going on lately, except that potty-training has once again come to a complete standstill. When I try to put a pull-up on Britt, she grabs it and puts it back in the package, hollering, "No, no, NO!" Then she grabs a diaper, slams it down in front of me and firmly insists, "Dopper!"

She does like to hang out in the bathroom, though; twice this week I've caught her unrolling the toilet paper and piling it into the toilet, which finally overflowed last night when Mikey flushed yet another of her paper piles. And after I go potty, she waves at the water swirling down the toilet and says, "Bye-bye, pee-pee! Bye-bye!"

Gymbo-wheeee!

I went shopping last night to augment my miniscule winter wardrobe and stumbled upon a humongo sale, so I got five new tops and a pair of tennies for only $92. Or actually $22 after cashing in one of my Christmas gift certificates.

I'm not an athletic-shoe type of person at all. I mean, I bought my last pair of sneakers on my honeymoon almost ten years ago. But my entire footwear wardrobe consisted of summer sandals, a pair of fine Italian leather boots and a few pairs of heels left over from my late, unlamented career days and I had nothing to schlep comfortably around in. So I hit the shoe department and looked doubtfully over the sneaker selection.

I really, really hate the funky-shaped soles they put on athletic shoes these days. They're hideous! They look like wads of chewed-up gum, don't they? I couldn't even bring myself to try on a pair. So I bought a pair of Vans. The brown ones. It was either that or Keds, and I'm not matronly enough for Keds. When I got home with the Vans, Mikey said, "Oh, so you're a skater now?" I don't care. They suit me.

So today was our trial Gymboree class.

We got there thirty minutes early and they were having playtime for about half a dozen younger toddlers, but they let Britt join right in. She climbed ladders, slid down slides, threw balls through a basketball hoop, walked the balance beam, jumped on the mini-trampoline and rocked on the rocking thingies. She was running here, there and everywhere at top speed and, since we have to stay within arms' length, so was I.

And then it was time for Britt's age group. Only three other kids showed up. There was more playtime and the woman leading the class would call us over occasionally for songs and parachute play, but Britt wasn't interested in that; she just wanted to play on all the cool stuff.

And that was pretty much it. I left thinking, "That was it? That's all it is?" I was expecting something more structured, more educational. So, I don't know.

They want $59 a month with a three-month minimum enrollment, plus a one-time $35 enrollment fee. So that would be $212 for Britt to play on the cool play equipment once a week for 13 weeks. According to the website we can also attend free Play Gym, but the lady who explained all this to me didn't mention that so I'm not sure what it means.

Mikey says to go ahead and do it since she enjoyed it and it does give her a chance to socialize with other kids her size, but I hate to spend that much if she isn't going to be learning anything. I really wanted to put her in Kindermusik, but the website said the class for her age group was full when I looked at it last week. I looked again today and it doesn't say that it's full anymore, so we might go try a trial class there to see what it's like.

Out and About

Me and Britt finally hit the road in my trusty zipmobile today. The good news is that I remembered how to drive a stick shift. The bad news was... well, there wasn't really any bad news, except that I had to circle the block and come back home to grab our overdue library stuff. But that was minor.

Wait, there is some bad news to report: my printer no longer works since we tried to install that software for Mikey to use to upload pictures from his camera phone. It says the cable's unhooked or something, but it isn't and I can't figure out what the problem is.

So, anyway, the first thing we did today was to go visit Mikey at the store so we could use his computer to print enrollment forms for art classes and gymnastics. And then Britt browsed the toy section, which is depleted from Christmas but she did manage to find a new spinny light-up thingy to whack herself (and me) in the head with.

And then we went grocery shopping, which I normally hate but I enjoyed it this time since it was the first time I'd been able to shop without Mikey in six months. Don't ask me why it's better to shop without Mikey; it just is.

And then I got hit up for a dollar by a scraggly woman in the grocery store parking lot who said she needed to buy a bus ticket to get to South Penn to get stitches taken out of her face. And I'm a big giant marshmallow, so I gave her the friggin' dollar.

And then we came home. Britt was so good the whole time we were out; she can be terribly two sometimes, but today she was an angel.

I just remembered one more bit of bad news: Britt's scheduled for her first Gymboree class on Wednesday and I thought I'd get to sit in a chair and watch, but that's apparently not how it works. The instructions I was given said to "come prepared to take off your shoes and play awhile in your socks." Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! I'm 44 years old and I have a bum knee and I don't want to go galumphing around in my socks in front of strangers!

But I'll do it for her. I guess.

(***sigh***)

There better be other grannies there. At least one. I don't want to be the only person there old enough to be all the other mommies' mommy. That would well and truly suck, wouldn't it?

Britt has wheels, too!

Mikey gave her a little battery-operated four-wheeler for Christmas, but she acted like she was scared of it so it's just been sitting in the toy room since then. Tonight, when he got home from work, he finally took it outside to see if he could get her to ride it.

Boy, did she! He spent the next hour chasing her up and down our little street and around the cul-de-sac:







He had a heck of a time getting her to pull into the driveway when he was ready to quit; she'd speed up and zoom past it because she wasn't ready to quit!

I finally got my car back!

Except Mikey took it today to get an oil change and to be generally checked over to make sure we're ready to roll.

According to the invoice, it cost $68 to have Bridgie's car towed, $120 to put the stuff back together that Bob took apart, and $95 for a new battery -- which is ridiculous and Mikey's supposed to be talking to them about that today. So, if Bridgie's car had gone into the shop six months ago when it was still driveable, it only would've cost about $480 to fix. And Britt and me wouldn't have been stuck here at the house all this time.

It turned out to be a cracked radiator and a bad ignition, by the way.

Anyway, we're reserved and paid up for the February and March Toddler Two classes at the OKC zoo; the January class (which is tomorrow) was already full. I'm fixin' to sign us up for art classes at the OKC Museum of Art. Also, the Oklahoma Children's Theatre is doing Treasure Island later this month and Britt likes pirates, so we'll probably go see it.

So now that we're about to go public, I'm feeling a little bit of stage fright. I'm not sure I'll remember how to act. I need a good haircut, and I've only got two long-sleeved shirts and two pairs of jeans that fit, which was enough when I never went anywhere, so I guess I need to go shopping.

Ugh, I hate shopping.

Anyway, I'm feeling a lot better than I have in a while. We've got stuff to look forward to and interesting things to do, and I think Britt will have a lot of fun. And if she's having fun, I'll have fun just watching her.

P.S.: I've finally decided to get serious about potty-training. I kept Britt in pull-ups today and planned to sit her on the potty every two hours, but she foiled me. She kept pooping in her pants 15 minutes before her two hours were up, and at 4:00 she peeped while she was standing in her bathwater. And then I gave it up for the day. Maybe we need to try every hour and a half or something, I dunno. I really don't remember how to do this.

$762.84

That's how much it cost to get Bridgie's car fixed.

O happy day

Mikey came home last night and told me he was planning to have Bridgie's car hauled to a repair shop today.

Uh-huh, I've heard that one before.

So imagine my surprise when he spent an hour cleaning out her car before he went to work this morning. I dunno what-all she left in there, but it's been festering for about six months, and it made Mikey puke. He was not amused.

Then he went on to work and guess what happened next?

A wrecker came and took Bridgie's car away!

Hot dog!

It looks like Britt and me are finally fixin' to be sprung from our cozy little prison here, so I've been studying our options, trying to decide what we're going to do with ourselves once we're mobile again.

The Oklahoma City Museum of Art has classes once a month for Britt's age group that only cost $8. And the zoo has a Toddler Two program that's also once a month and costs $10. Storytime at the library is once a week and it's free.

And then there's Gymboree and toddler gymnastics, and I'm looking at dance schools that will take two-year-olds, but these all cost a lot more and are a bigger commitment, so I dunno yet which ones we'll be doing.

Also, Britt peeped in the potty this morning for the second time ever!

A new year, a fresh start

We were disappointed that Phil and Jamie weren't able to come down and spend New Year's Eve with us, but we still managed to end the year on a happy note, splitting a couple of bottles of Moët. We let Britt toast the new year with us, with a beverage normally forbidden to her -- a glass of Co-Co (that's what she calls Coke).

Actually, Mikey passed out after the first bottle of Moët, so I polished off the second one myself while watching Cinderella for the 117th time with Britt, and then I waxed my eyebrows, which turned out amazingly well since I'd never waxed my eyebrows before and I was pretty well toasted.

I did tell Mikey last night that if somebody doesn't do something very soon to get me my car back, I'll take matters into my own hands and call a wrecker take Bridgie's car away to be fixed, and I'll charge it all to my credit card.

Which apparently gave him fresh incentive to make me happy, because he spent today cleaning out the garage with the goal of getting my freezer (the one I got for Christmas in 2004 [or was it 2003?] ) pushed over to the wall and plugged in so I can finally use it. He took a truckload of merchandise back to the store and hauled away another load of trash/Goodwill stuff, but the freezer is still sitting in the middle of the garage and it's still not plugged in. He says he'll get it done tomorrow, but we'll see.

I gave Mikey this for Christmas so he could upload all the pictures he's taken with his camera phone, and he's tried to install it several times but never could get it to work. I've been sitting here tonight, uninstalling and reinstalling it and I can't get it to work either. Now I'm looking at customer reviews and every one of them is negative so now I feel like we got ripped off.

So that was our first day of the new year -- a little bit good and a little bit bad, but I'm feeling hopeful that most of the things that have been making me unhappy lately will be taken care of soon.

They damn well better be, anyway.