They are shinning my Mom of the Year award as we speak!

A few things you should know before reading this post.  1) Being parents of three daughters, the hubs and I have a house rule for our girls - no alone time with boys... ever! This is like the Eleventh Commandment.  [Thou shalt not canoodle alone with boys because they are icky] - see icky boy post. 2) I have very smart daughters who almost always, usually sometimes make good decisions.  This time does not count.

As you know, I’m vying for Mom of the Year, until when this conversation took place via text. 

Daughter: Last night, I was asked to watch a movie with A tonight after work. A is a clever representation of said icky boy.

Me: Who’s A? A movie theater or video, when, where? Gathering intel, see... mom of the year. 

Daughter: Friend from work.  His house. Video, no theater, no one else over. Ugh!

Me: So let me get this straight, you wanna go to a guys house.  Alone? At this point, the shooting pain begins in my right temple.

Daughter: Ya.  Double,Ugh!

Me: I would prefer not alone. And what I mean by prefer is no.

Daughter: He lives alone.  As far as I know he only invited me over.  He may have invited a few friends too, but I don’t know for sure. Really, he lives alone?  You mean like a serial killer?

Me: Well, you need to find out.  I know you wanna go, but you know how I feel about alone time with boys.  Sorta like how I feel about cutting off my own toe or watching the Lifetime network. Not good.

Clearly I need to make enough money to hire a chauffeur.

Apparently today, I forgot to remove my “GO AHEAD.  PULL OUT IN FRONT OF ME… NO, REALLY.  IT’S OK.  YEAH, SERIOUSLY, FORCE ME TO SLOW DOWN TO A NEAR CRAWL JUST SO YOU CAN SAVE A NANOSECOND,  CLEARLY YOUR TIME IS MUCH MORE VALUABLE THAN MINE. NO, DON’T BE SILLY. IT’S NOT IRRESPONSIBLE AND INCONVENIENT TO ME” sign from the roof of my car.  Not one, but two vehicles pulled out in front of me today.  The second impatient driver not only pulled out with very little room, but there was no one- NO ONE behind me.  What the….?!? 

I know what you are thinking.  Female drivers always over reacting.  Yea, us poor women with our irrational fear of bugs, unpredictable PMS and bad driving.  Yea.  Both impatient drivers were men.  Yep.  Men.  So I really don’t wanna hear about women drivers. 

I never claimed to be a good driver.  There are three um, I mean two  could be some side mirrors that are missing from my vehicles.  So what if I like to see how fast I can make it into/out of the garage – or how close to the ascending door I can get without touching it.  So what if over the weekend I was the only one who wrecked their go-cart – and daughter number two was with me.   So what!  It doesn’t mean that I’m a terrible driver. Ok, maybe it does. It definitely does.  But the take away here is that I never CLAIMED to be a good driver. 

Blog here, blog there, everywhere a blog, blog….

So I’ve decided to be a better blogger. I’m going to try to be more consistent and try to keep my posts shorter.  Turns out people don’t really want to read a novel on a blog page.  (who knew?)

In preparing this new, bigger, better blog, I’ve been blog surfing to steal  find new ideas.  See? see what I did there?  That mark thru thing is a new found idea and one that I enjoy reading.   So I am going to add it to my blog.  I won’t insult your intelligence and try to fib that it’s my idea, but sooner or later I’d have thought of it… ok, well maybe not. 

Next I learned about internal comments.  Essentially this is a side comment of what the blogger is thinking, often times the opposite of what is spoken.  This internal monolog is pretty constant in my real life, so it’s a natural go to for me.  I will, however, keep this inner monolog nice – as opposed to the real life comments, which tend to run rather hateful at times.

And lastly, I’ve decided that most bloggers are rather self-absorbed.  Writing incessantly about their diets, their kids, their pets.  One lady even has an ongoing conversation with her cat – who may or may not be an English alcoholic, I’m not sure.  So as I’m reading these, all I can think of is how narcissistic and selfish these people are… who thinks that much of themselves that they believe it necessary to share every minor detail of their lives with others?

Well, I’ll tell ya who…. Me.  Clearly I’m in the right place.  I am one of those self-absorbed, narcissistic, selfish people!  I'm totally in the right place!

Hey - don't judge. At least I can identify and deal with my issues.  That obnoxious boozehound of a cat… she has real problems!

There are times you feel like a great mom, and then there's the remaining 364.9 days of the year.

I have two teenagers and a pre-teen.  All girls.  And yet somehow I manage to NOT lose my mind. I didn’t say that I manage that greatly….

In my house, just this past week, you would have heard me make good parenting statements like these golden nuggets:

“please try to keep your swimsuit on this time”

“don’t make me smack your sunburn!”

 “please, please don’t dress like a hussy – we are on our way to church!”

“your spelling is terrible… seriously, you gotta work on that!”

“boys are icky”

“honey, go away, mommy needs some quiet time”

Earlier in this month, Daughter #2 (almost 18) says – in front of several of her friends and two of my fellow softball mom friends – “My mom is awesome. She’s mom of the year.”  I don’t recall the reason, but I have to assume I gave her money or something.  And while the compliment was nice, I was held to this high and very distinguished honor at all times.  Oh, the pressure!!!!

But the comment made me feel good.  Despite what everyone thinks, I try very hard to be a good mom. And I don’t think I’m terrible.  I don’t allow them to play in the road and I always make sure their dates will protect them from zombies should the zombie apocalypse occur during the date.  See, good parenting.

Then there are the other times. Like this week when I forgot that daughter #3 was going with a friend to the movies, and I didn’t tell her. Until said friend was knocking on the door.  Then there was the time that I almost forgot a girl at the babysitter house… I said almost!  Then there was the time that Daughter #2 had the misconception that her middle name contained two “L’s” rather than one.  And said daughter argued with me incessantly until I showed her the birth certificate – she was 14 when this discussion took place.  (I totally won that argument, by the way).

So I will continue to practice my mom-of-the-year quality parenting skills.  I hope by reading this post, you can glean some wonderful tips to use in your own family. 

Why does he put up with me?

The term “high maintenance” has been used to describe me.  And I take issue with this description. Maybe I am difficult at times, but I always have good intentions. Ok, maybe not always…. or ever.  Well, judge for yourself.  This is a partial conversation I had with the Hubs the other day:

Hubs: I have a headache.

Me: I’m sorry, you should take a decongestant.

Hubs: I don’t think its sinus.

Me: I’m sure it is…. Sinuses can cause pain all over if they are swollen.  My Dr. told me.  (ok, maybe not in so many words, but I know what he meant!)

Hubs: I’m still not sure.

Me: ok, well maybe it’s rabies.

Hubs: Rabies? Really?

Me: Well headaches are a common side effect of many things.  Have you been bitten by a really wild and vicious rabbit?  ….or…. have you battled any zombies lately?
Hubs: none of the above.

Me: what about werewolves or vampires?

Hubs: Nope

Me (somewhat disappointed- as I fancy myself as an expert on zombies, werewolves and vampires): Well, then I defer to the sinus again.

Hubs: Maybe it’s just a headache for another reason… that is possible. (I assume he’s implying that I am the source of said headache here… but who knows.  Can’t trust him if he’s turning into a zombie or a werewolf!).

Me: Now you’re just talkin’ crazy.

Hubs: I know… it must be from the pain in my head.

And I’m high maintenance!  At least I’m not a zombie!

Perhaps we should all pray for him.