The Crab Chronicles

Lemonade and Postcards

We headed out to Red Lobster last night for dinner, as we were tired of cooking.

When Mother and I diet - oops, I mean try to eat healthfully - it takes time and effort. Fixing food from scratch involves washing, peeling, and chopping veggies and preparing meat and whatever else we have. A quick, bad dinner like pizza takes 5 minutes - just the phonecall. A decent meal takes time.

I must confess I was somewhat bad yesterday. I ate half the bowl of my taco salad. No, I wasn't chewing pottery, it was one of those bowls made of some crunchy stuff that's edible. Don't ask me what. I was hungry. At dinner, I ate about half my rice pilaf, in addition to drinking some of the yummy raspberry lemonade. I was muy thirsty. I had just pulled a bunch of weeds out of the garden and I was sweating - that's how close Red Lobster is to us - I was still sweating when I sat down. And the water tastes yucky. Those are my excuses and I'm sticking to them, anyway.

We did hang tough on one thing - both kids wanted dessert and we said NO.

I have found over my years of yo yo dieting, that one must forgive onself. I have to forgive myself or I won't be able to keep going. There are going to be days I am super good, and days I am not. But I have to keep going, and not allow the setbacks to derail my whole process.

Sort of a metaphor for everything in life, huh?!

I want my kids to see me overcome obesity. I want to show them what it looks like to change your life. I want to show them how even huge mistakes can be corrected, with patience and fortitude. I think, in a weird way, I want to show Alesia how to work around a problem, not let it ruin one's life. She has to accept her learning and memory issues and develop a "can do" attitude. Right now she doesn't have it. I so hope the therapist can help. However, maybe I can inspire her, too.

My friend Apryl with the Antares Foundation sent me a wonderful link, and I'd like to share it with you all:

Check out a project that Antares will be doing the next few weeks:  http://antarespostcards.blogspot.com

(I just posted it!) 

Wednesday Night Drama

We didn't have a Netflix movie last night, so instead of arguing about what DVD to choose from my permanent collection, we just drew names. Alesia won. She chose The Ghost and the Darkness, a movie about two lions who decimate a construction site in Africa in 1898. Not your usual chick flick. Good film, though.

Michael had, without too much fussing, watched a chick flick on Tuesday night. I had ordered Top Gun [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0092099/] but the disk was damaged. I firmly believe every boy should watch Top Gun because it's such a guy movie [but with a love story] and it's a good story. It's pro-military, always good in our family. It has pretty good music, too [except for the nauseating power love ballad]. It has Tom Cruise when he was young and hunky and before he lost his mind. It also has young Anthony Edwards and young Val Kilmer - big hunky blonde guys. Just my type. I can happily watch with the sound off. But that's just me.

There are boys and men in this world who revere Top Gun with a religious fervor. I think that's plan weird and I do not understand it. Then again, I have read Gone With the Wind about 20 times, and seen the movie so many times I can say the lines - a feat that annoyed the heck out of my kids when we watched it the other day.

We had some real life drama last night. When I got home, there were police cars racing past me, lights flashing, to stop in front of a neighbor's house. The owner, a man in a wheelchair, was convinced he had seen or heard burglars breaking in. Good to know the police responded so quickly.

My neighbor Brian called when we were eating to tell us that he had seen two small deer in his yard, down by the creek. Right after dinner, Alesia took off for the creek, to see if she could spot them. I grabbed the deer repellant spray and sprayed my garden and all the pots with flowers in them. Mike stayed close to me.

I tried something new with Alesia last night and I am not sure how I feel about it. I asked her to break down some cardboard boxes in my room and put them in the recycling box, and her response was "No." She was sitting in my room at the time and knew that the boxes had held some shipments of her birthday presents, so it really annoyed me. I needed to get dinner going. I didn't say a word, though, just went downstairs. A few minutes later she came down and asked if I would play cards with her. I said "Well, since you wouldn't do what I asked a few minutes ago, I will have to say NO. When I ask you to do something and you tell me no, I will tell you no the next time you ask me for something." I didn't yell or lose it. I made the statement and went outside to check on my garden. However, as soon as I said no, she had a look of great disappointment on her face and I felt like Meanest Mommy In The World. Michael played cards with her, though.

However, I was sort of mentally patting myself on the back. Then, as soon as dinner was ready, I totally lost it. Michael was pretend kicking Alesia as she was trying to fix her plate for dinner. I had had to tell him about 6 times to get in the shower, and then had to fuss at him for shadowboxing with Alesia in my room when she didn't want to participate. He was just being a pest, but thinking he was so cute. I told him to get himself a glass of milk and instead he tried to play kick his sister. I didn't yell but I raised my voice and said "Michael, that's ENOUGH. I am TIRED of your antics tonight. If you don't calm down, you will spend the entire day tomorrow in bed, alone, doing nothing." I glared as I spoke.

Mike's next words were "That's OK. I don't mind spending the day in bed."

That infuriated me even further. "OK. So we know that's not a punishment. How about a 1 hour Time Out on your knees?!" He was quiet after that.

I felt like a garden hose. I maintained calm with one kid and sprang a leak [in my calm] with the other one.

I hate disciplining either one of them, but I am pretty strict. I don't allow disrespect or roughhousing in the house, and I insist on good manners. My kids do chores. They are frequently told things like this:

"I don't care if everyone has a Wii - I am not made of money and I cannot afford one, so forget about it."

"You are a member of this family and we all contribute in our house. So yes, you will clean up the kitchen [or your room, or whatever] - right NOW."

"Excuse me?" - This is used when they forget to say "M'am." I don't ever allow them to say "Yeah" to me or Mother. It's "Yes M'am" and "No M'am" or on rare occasions "Sir."

"You need to stay in your room and be quiet for an hour so Granny can nap."

"I'm not going to order that movie because it's a HORRIBLE movie, not because it's inappropriate. I am not going to waste time watching a bad movie. Rent it when you grow up and move out."

However, the two phrases you hear, without fail, around my house are these:

"Heavenly father, thank you..."

"I love you."

Growing and Processing

Thanks, Jane, for your comment about yesterday's post. I started to not post anything about eating for a while then I thought nah, it's a major part of my life, I need to talk about it.

I have a friend who I haven't seen in a while, but she has lost 32 lbs! I am so tickled for her. Someone who has never been overweight cannot imagine how difficult that is to accomplish.

I was so delighted last night to see that my garden is just going gangbusters. I need to do some weeding and get some cucumber vines trained right [LOL] but otherwise it's coming along. We have several small cucumbers, a small green pepper, a LOT of green tomatoes, and hopefully some beets and radishes coming along underground. I try to weed it and water it when I can but otherwise, it's in God's hands. I would love to plant more, if I can ever find the time and the energy to make new beds.

We had our first appointment with the therapist today. It was intense. I won't reveal what was said. However, I feel very good about it. I feel like it's going to be really beneficial to me and Alesia. Alesia has always been reluctant to go to a therapist, thus my delay. She's been home 3 1/2 years. However, I am optimistic she is going to cooperate with this process.

It occurred to me when I was driving in to work that I may well [hopefully] look back on this day in years to come and say ah, that was a corner I turned in my life, that day.  Do you ever do that? Sometimes I realize it right away, and sometimes not.

That realization is easy, though. The hard part is processing it all. When my father died, even though I cried a lot at first, I didn't fully grasp the event for a while. I was a walking zombie for 8 months. It took me that long to really process that loss. The hardest thing to process is when you have to change yourself, from the inside out. I am a quick learner in a lot of ways, but I am a slow emotional processor. In some ways, I am still processing missing Dad. Time has helped, of course.

I know now I am still processing becoming a mom. I have been a mom less than 4 years. It feels like I have always done it in some ways, but in others, I feel like a novice. Maybe some of that is is connected to the fact that not only did I have to learn how to mother, I had to learn how to mother a traumatized adolescent child. Alesia has never been violent or shown some of the real acting out I've heard about from other families, but she presented challenges. She has made a lot of progress, but there's room for more.

Most people get to start with an infant and work their way up. I feel kind of like I skipped all the classwork and went right to the test. 

Reprogramming Food Habits

I got up this morning a bit late, and didn't have time to eat at home, so I ate a banana while I was dressing. It actually stuck to me until I could come in and get some eggs and tea in the cafeteria. Bananas are super foods. Great source of potassium.

We told Michael yesterday we were eliminating junk food in our house, except on special occasions. He clutched a bag of Doritos as if it were a lifeline. I told him from now on, snacks are fruit, nuts, yogurt, etc. Alesia likes dried prunes, and she was munching those. We all had some green grapes after dinner.

My recent downfall was that I felt so strongly that my kids were malnourished and needed food, all kinds of food, that I failed to regulate them very well. The result is they both have little stomachs now. So Mother and I decided to de-junk the house. Alesia was a great help, but as I said, Mike is resistant. As Mother and I told them, we do NOT want y'all to grow up and be fat like us. It's best to get into healthy eating habits now, while you're young.

I am struggling, but I am trying to stay off the junk food. I am fatter now than I've ever been, and I am hating this girth. I can't keep eating and eating. Time to get a grip.

There was a day, not too long ago, when I was a LOT smaller than I am now, and I worked out every day. Yep, every day. Swimming, aerobics, raquetball, etc. I was also always on a diet so I could Catch A Man. Then I gave up the manhunt and decided to be a mama. All southern mamas tend to be a bit overweight, some downright pillowy.

Stress makes me eat. The past few years have been stressful. The only thing to do is forgive myself, and move on.

Don't ask me about my "diet." I'm not no a diet. I am trying to eat better. I don't expect lbs. to magically melt off. I won't be jumping on the scale every day obsessively. I will guage how I feel and try to modify what I eat accordingly. It's not about looking like a size 2 fashion model. It's about a weight I can live with, one that means I can stop worrying about whether my butt will fit into a chair in a public place.

I am basically just trying to not eat processed foods and/or junk foods. I'm sticking to meats, fruits, veggies, and maybe nuts and yogurt. No rice, potatoes, or pasta. No more Reese cups at teatimes. No more ice cream after dinner.

I have been a yo-yo dieter all my life. This time I have to make permanent changes. Time to grow up. Eating to live, not living to eat, that's my new philosophy.

Yet, I LOVE LOVE LOVE to eat. I am a Food Addict.

Pray for me! : )

Setting an Example

At various times in my life, usually when I am stressed out due to a major transition, I have been subjected to what I call the "school dreams." Last night I had one that was particularly disturbing.

Usually, in my school dreams I am in a place that looks like a combination of the three colleges I attended [2 for undergrad, 1 for grad] and I am facing a test in a class where I haven't attended, ever, or I am trying to find a class where I have a test and I can't find it on the vast campus, or there's some anxiety due to something I've not done and should have done. They are quite unpleasant dreams. I wake up panicky.

Last night, I dreamed I was looking at apartments in student housing. I was alone. I knew I was facing school, yet again, a Ph.D. this time, which I have never really wanted - and I looked at the cheap, bleak little apartment and felt a terrible sense of loss. My children weren't with me. I don't know where they were, but I remember thinking, I cannot do this. I cannot go to school without them. This is horrifying. Where are they? Why do I have to do this, to put my life on hold to get this degree I don't want? It made no sense whatsoever. I felt like I was being forced to learn more, and I didn't want it.

I feel I am on the precipice of some major learning experience of my life, and it will not be an easy lesson, more of a baptism by fire type of deal. Even though I have a strong faith in God, it's scary. I hope I am wrong. I do have some gifts of precognition, though. Dreams of mine often herald big events, like my dreaming of Alesia the night before I met her. I am praying about it.

I was reading another blog a few minutes ago, and there was a quote on there that made me shiver:

"My father didn't tell me how to live; he lived, and let me watch him do it." - Clarence Budington Kelland

This is a quote that ties in with my dream, in a weird way. I am living every day in front of my kids' eyes. I am letting them watch me live. What am I teaching them? Do I need to learn how to be a better student, or a better teacher?

When I try to look at myself as an outsider might see me - a wholly disconcerting exercise - I am dismayed by what I see. I am overweight. I rarely get enough sleep and sometimes it makes me quite cranky. I rant and rave about having to clean up after the dog. I get ticked off and yell sometimes. I burp too much. I get far too excited about maintaining an orderly, neat house, and not enough excited about things equally as important, if not more so. I am not rich. I am not "normal" [I hate that word] because I do not have a significant other in my life. I care absolutely nothing about how my hair looks [frequently really odd, these days] or what my clothes look like [I strive for clean, that's it, my only goal].

So, do I want my kids to be like me? Well, yes and no.

I very much want my children to finish college, and if they'd like, go to grad school. That may be impossible for Alesia, but I think it's good to strive for it.

At the same time, if my kids are happy living in a trailer and raising hamsters in the middle of the desert, if that truly makes them happy, then I hope I can accept that and not demand that they live MY way.

I very much want my children to find life partners and make long-term commitments - I am not saying marriage because I know folks who are very happy and committed without the marriage certificate. As long as it's someone who truly loves my child and is good to them, how they define the relationship is not that important.

I do not want them to spend years in hopeless romantic entanglements that leave them emotionally exhausted.

I really want my children to do what makes them happy. My example is probably too schizo to be useful. I work a job to pay bills, and write because I love to write, but I have to fit in my writing in the margins of my day.

I want my kids to be flexible. When I was young I wanted to take a year off after high school and just work. My father said no, no way. I was only 17 when I finished high school. I had been working, doing several plays, studying voice, etc. and I was exhausted. I needed a break without the pressure of college. He was completely inflexible about me not taking off a year. In hindsight, I think working for that year would've helped me mature, and been good. Maybe he didn't want me to do it because he didn't want me living at home. I don't know. I only know I wished he hadn't been so inflexible.

Sometimes I channel dad and I am just totally inflexible about something with the kids, and later regret it. As much as I feel kids need clear rules and discipline, sometimes you have to bend. Do I need to bend more? I don't know.

Do I want my kids to grow up and write a blog?! Now that's a scary thought.

These are just a few things off the top of my head. I probably need to talk, write, and think about these things a lot more. Maybe that's why I dreamed the school dream. Maybe I need to learn how to be the right example.

I take a weird sort of comfort in the fact that both my kids lived with alcoholic birthmothers, so they had to learn to forgive a lot, from early ages. When you live with an alcoholic, in order to emotionally survive, you have to watch them drink and remember, they are a different person when they drink. It's hard to not blame yourself. It's hard to not let it throw you into despair. [I lived with an alcoholic once, for a while, so I know this very well.]

They were given really dysfunctional examples of how to live, and yet they didn't become warped, bitter, angry kids. So many kids would have. My children are sweet, compassionate, and forgiving. They aren't angels, but they can forgive. They can love people who aren't perfect, or even close. They can adapt. They can survive some incredibly difficult things.

Maybe, if I love them enough, they can forgive me for not being the greatest example, too.  

Leisurely Day

I have tried all day to ignore the fact that it’s Father’s Day. I lost my dad to cancer in 1996, but we never did anything big on Father’s Day. It underscores how much I miss him, anyway.

My father and I had a sometimes contentious relationship, but we loved each other very much. I think we had a hard time getting along sometimes because we are so much alike. I get along better with Mother because her personality is so different.

I got up early this morning – well, early for me, 7:30 – and fixed a cup of tea and went outside and fertilized and watered everything.  I came in and showered before breakfast. It’s so hot [88] that in order for yard work to not be miserable, one has to start early, before full sun hits.

We decided to “Go to ride” this afternoon. I drove down to Social Circle, Georgia, about 45 minutes away, but we couldn’t eat at the famed Blue Willow Inn – too many people there. We can try again sometime. It’s a famous restaurant because it’s in an antebellum home and they serve a feast of southern cooking. I’ve never been but I’ve always wanted to go - http://www.bluewillowinn.com/ is the website. I also want to go through some of the historic old homes in Madison, Georgia. It has a lot of old homes spared by Sherman because his girlfriend lived in Madison – at least I think that’s the legend. http://www.madisonga.org/

We ended up eating at a fairly new Ruby Tuesdays in Loganville, which was fine. Some things were good, some not. I talked Michael into trying a Bison burger, by telling him [truthfully] that Uncle Bruce always orders the weirdest thing on any menu. Mike genuinely liked the burger though – bison is delicious. I’ve had it. Ted Turner owns several bison restaurants around here.

I wanted to keep the kids out of the pool, for one day in the week, so we went to see the new Indiana Jones movie, The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. I was disappointed. I love Indiana Jones and recently purchased the first 3 movies in a set. However, this one seemed to spell the end of the franchise. Harrison Ford has always been sexy but c’mon – he’s an old man. As in, the bullet dodging was ridiculous. This one really strained credibility. Shia Laboeuf was too intense, totally unbelievable. The plot was rather complex, too. I kept wanting to stop the film and make notes – not a good sign. Like Pirates of the Caribbean At World’s End, the filmmakers seemed to think the more complex, the better, and that’s not true. Making a complex story feel simple and linear is the real feat. It wasn’t boring, but the new Indiana Jones movie is the last one I’ll see.

For dinner, we tried a new place just opened up nearby, Five Guys Burgers and Fries. The burgers were excellent. http://www.fiveguys.com/menu.html. I just wish we had eaten there instead of taking everything home. I have sort of a thing about my food being hot and fresh.

When I turned off the movie and said we was going to bed tonight, Alesia said sarcastically “Sure you are. Uh huh…” like I was some recalcitrant 3 year old. She and Michael hate the fact I say I’m going to bed, then I write. Every day. So I gave them a little lecture on how I‘ve given up all extracurricular time in my life to devote all my non-working hours to them. I explained that I NEED about 30 minutes before bed, so I can function the next day as a sane person.

Alesia said “You don’t have to do that!”

“No, you don’t get it. I WANT to spend all my non-working hours with y’all. You are my life.”

Left unspoken was my regret that I couldn’t spend time with them when they were younger. Maybe one day they’ll really know how it feels, to hate being separated from your kids.

A Trip to the Mall, and Dinner with Friends

Alesia had a babysitting job this morning from 8-10 a.m., for some neighbors, so I got her up at 7. No sleeping late around here.

I got Michael up [always a chore on weekends] and we went to Jiffy Lube to get the oil changed in my car, then to the Emissions place. In certain counties here, one has to have the emissions on the car checked every year, and send in the verification with the payment for the car tag [ad velorum] tax. It’s a pain, but not as bad as in Tennessee, where I had to go stand in line forever, every year.

Michael had his gameboy. When they were checking the emissions on the car, the guy doing the testing walked by Michael and said “Hey, man, how’s it going?” and Michael didn’t say a word. I hissed at him “Michael Thompson you have to speak to someone when they address you!” He hissed back “I didn’t feel like talking!”

When Michael got home I lectured him and took away his gameboy for the rest of the day. There’s no excuse for bad manners. He got a lecture about how his grandfather always spoke to everyone, even the janitor or a homeless person on the street. Dad was always super polite and friendly, and I want my kids to be that way.

We came home and loaded up Granny and her wheelchair in the Highlander, and headed for the mall. There is a photo place there and I wanted new photos of the kids together. It was a lot less expensive than Picture People, and I didn’t have to listen to the hard sales pitch. The results are not bad.

We also got Mother some books, wandered around the dollar store, and ate lunch at the Crescent Moon Café. When we got home, Mother said she was in a lot of pain, and we didn’t push her to do anything else. She rested the rest of the day.

The kids went swimming in the mid afternoon. It was sprinkling rain. When they came back we got a weird phenomena – lots of thunder, a few sprinkles, but no real rain. Very frustrating. I will have to water everything tomorrow if it doesn’t rain tonight.

We had dinner with my friend Brian and his family - his sister and her family were visiting from Florida. It was so relaxed and pleasant. The kids had a good time, too. Brian and his partner have a lovely deck on the back of the house, and it was really nice to sit out there and chat, after a delicious meal. Besides fabulous grilled burgers and hot dogs, Brian made homemade potato salad, and his baked beans with pineapple and fried onions - which is wonderful - and some lemon cheesecake squares.

After we came home, we watched “300” a really strange film about the ancient Greek battle of Thermoplae. This was based on a graphic novel. All the violence was stylized – everything was slow motion, including the spattering blood. I found it really too gory, but the kids enjoyed it.

Alesia has been sweet all day long – a breakthrough. This, after I’ve made an appointment with a therapist for next week. Oh well – one’s hair always looks best just before a haircut, I suppose.

Cutie Pies in the Backyard

I posted a few days ago about the journalist who came over last Saturday and interviewed me and 3 other moms for an article about Kazakhstan's adopted children here in America. She sent me some photos she made. Here's the best one. Larisa, the journalist, is in the middle with her arms around Michael and little Tamar. All of these children come from Kazakhstan and you can see they range from very blonde to very Kazakh. Of course, they are all completely adorable!

Tall people, left to right: Alesia, Dee, Larisa, and Shannon.

Little people, left to right: Michael, Stella, Tamar, and Libby.

Here's the group minus Larisa [who took the photo] and including Laura, Stella's mom.

Michael discovered a nest with baby birds in one of our hanging baskets out front. Every time I hang a basket there, a bird builds a nest in it. Michael was very excited. I can live without the petunia. I just hope the little birds don't fall out of the nest onto the bricks...

When I came home from work I saw a small brown bunny rabbit munching something in our side yard. I sat and watched it for a few minutes, long enough to sing "Blue Suede Shoes" which was playing on the radio. When I sneered like Elvis and sang "Uh uh honey lay offa mah SHOES!" the bunny cocked it's head and looked at me like Lady, you are nutso, and hopped off. LOL

BIG CONGRATULATIONS!!
My friend Sarah, in upstate New York, just gave birth to child #5! Little Gardner popped in the other day to join the family, and was very welcomed by his siblings, 3 of whom were adopted from Petropavlovsk. Paul, the only other boy, was a friend of Mike's at school in Kazakhstan. Here's the link to see all the cuties:
http://taylorvortex.blogspot.com/

Protecting My Chicks

I feel like such a lousy, neglectful blogger this week. It's just been really busy, at work and at home, and I should just change the name of my blog to the upbeat sounding "There Are Never Enough Hours in the Day." Yeah, that will bring in the readers, whoo hoo!

I finally posted a little review of You Don't Mess with the Zohan and Semi Pro on my Scribblerchick site - http://deescribbler.typepad.com/flick_pages/. It occurred to me I should fashion an elegant paragraph about how during these horrible economic times, we all need to relax and get silly more often, but I don't have time to compose it. Isn't it obvious, though? I don't watch movies to be reminded of the mortgage crisis or the $4 a gallon I pay for gas. Nope, I want to laugh. The 1930's had The Marx Brothers, and we have Adam Sandler and Will Ferrell.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

I was reading an interesting article in Newsweek while I ate my lunch, called Helicopter Moms v. Free Range Kids. http://www.newsweek.com/id/133103/page/1 - sorry, I don't know why this page won't look right, but maybe you can cut and past and see that article. A female writer in New York let her 9 year old son ride public transportation alone, and she was horribly criticized for it. I can see both sides of the debate.

My kids walk to the pool almost every day by themselves. The pool is about 1/4 of a mile from the house. It's a members only place, and the folks who hang out there are pretty decent middle class types. Is it totally safe? Probably not. However, it gets the kids outside and they get some exercise, and it gives my mother a break so she can take a nap. I don't see it as too risky. If we lived in a more urban area, I might not let them go, but this is a pretty decent area, with lots of middle class houses and businesses close by. It's such a struggle not to be overprotective, though.

I am pondering getting Alesia some sort of little cell phone, one with no internet or camera, or texting - just a phone, no frills, with only a limited number of prepaid minutes a month. I understand a lot of parents get Trac Fones. I looked at their website and it looks like a pretty decent deal. I won't get it until she goes back to school, though. I will just feel better if we have a way to get in contact with her.

Alesia asked me last night if she could go "hang out" with her friend Farida, a little girl she knows from school who is Russian. I asked her to find out a lot more information for me, and I would consider letting her visit the child. I reminded her I have rules about meeting the parents, seeing where they live, finding out as much as possible about their values. I suspect these folks, not being American, will think I am a complete nutcase. Alesia may or may not ever go over there. She looked amused by my reiteration of how cautious I am, and how reluctant I am to just let her "hang out" anywhere.

Of course, my friends with teenagers who aren't adopted like to tell me I am overprotective and unreasonable. They don't understand how incredibly naive Alesia is, and how that scares me. An American child is usually raised with parents who caution them, who talk about safety, who make it clear how to spot people who are unsavory. Alesia didn't have that. Her brithmom left her alone for hours when she was less than 6 years old. The orphanage staff let her wander all over the countryside unsupervised, not caring where she was or when she returned. She told us recently that one reason she liked to take long walks in the country was to steal food out of people's gardens, because she was always so hungry.

My son is always cautious about being in public. He grew up on the streets, living hand to mouth, and remembers how it feels to be brutally beaten by a gang. Maybe that's why he doesn't much like to be alone.

I want my children to understand that I put rules around them like fences, to keep away predators. I enclose them with rules and chores and long talks about values because they desperately need structure. They need to know I am a fanatic about safety. They need to understand and appreciate the difference between me - a caring, committed mother - and their birthmoms. I know intuitively they do understand it, but I think it's good to underscore that sometimes. After all, their birthmoms let them be taken away forever. I've told my kids I will fight to the death before I will let anyone take them from me. Nobody will ever love them as much as I do, and until they can defend themselves, I am Warrior Mama.

))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

My friend Hallie has a beautiful post on Wonderful World of Wieners, about the donation of a heart to her father a few years ago. I have tried to explain organ donation to Alesia and she has had a hard time with the idea. If I get killed in an accident, though, I want everything donated [well, except my thighs, yikes]. Hallie explains so beautifully the experience of being a family member of a recipient. I urge you to read it.

Tombstones and Sweet Taters

Another day has galloped away from me.

We had a 3.5 hour meeting at work, and it was a good meeting, with all the attorneys who represent us, but when it was over I felt like I was somehow ten times further behind in my work. I applied myself all afternoon and left with a sense of calm, fortunately.

I mailed off Bruce’s box to Iraq. I hope he gets it soon. The children each did cute drawings for him. I sent him lots of the trail mix from Trader Joe’s.

Our movie tonight was Tombstone, the version of the Wyatt Earp story with Kurt Russell in the lead. I had seen the one with Kevin Costner, but missed this one. I’m not sure which one I prefer. Both are very violent but probably pretty true to history. The kids were impressed when I told them Wyatt Earp and Doc Holliday were real people. I wanted to rent this one because I heard a deejay on a local radio station the other day saying Tombstone was his favorite movie. I cannot say the same, but I am a chick and I like chick flicks.

I made a pork roast for dinner, with mashed potatoes and salad on the side. I also tried making a sweet potato dish. I have lately developed a taste for them, although I would like to find a recipe that didn’t involve tons of brown sugar. I found a brand of sweet potato chips I like, that are similar to potato chips but I think they have more flavor. Now I can’t recall the brand name…?

Anyway, I tried a sweet potato recipes with orange juice and bourbon, that I found on the internet. It didn’t come out just like I would have liked, though – too rich. If you have a good sweet potato recipe, please send it on!