Oh, hey. Do you want to read YET ANOTHER post about finding balance? I don’t blame you. Do you want to instead talk about LOOT? OKAY!

I won Amy Quarry‘s contest (here’s her shop), and when the package arrived yesterday I would describe my reaction as “ZOMG.” I even thought maybe I shouldn’t show it to you, because deliberately taunting people is MEAN.

Also, my camera is on the fritz. I need to replace it, but have been lazy about that, especially since the camera sometimes works. Today it works but not if I use the flash, so I brought everything out to the new dining room where there’s good light. So you can see my painting stuff in the background, and also the boxes of flooring. Artistic!

First, take a look at this dress for Elizabeth. I GASPED. Those are EMBROIDERED DESIGNS

Then I just kept pulling out one thing after another. I’d pull out an awesome little container with a fabric lid, and INSIDE the container would be MORE THINGS. There’s a necklace with TWO different pendants. A flower keyring made of buttons. Two magnets made out of bottlecaps. Two of those things that pinch big stacks of paper, but with pretty fabric on them instead of the usual plain black plastic. A little zippered fabric pouch. A barrette. Two ponytail holders.

There was also this headband, which is not in the photo above because Elizabeth wouldn’t let me take it off of her. And this is a girl who says every morning as I’m combing her rat’s nest hair, “NO ponytails! NO barrettes!”

If you have Facebook, you can join Amy Quarry’s fan page and be automatically entered for a monthly drawing of a surprise package. This month she’s doing a handbag. Do you remember the handbag she did for the Guess Swistle contests? DROOL.

This was not TECHNICALLY a pay-it-forward contest, but I’m turning it into one because I’ve been moody and crabby and it seems like a pay-it-forward contest is a cheering thing. But! You should not expect anything as good as the package I got from Amy, because GEEZ! I mean, honestly. I am only human, and I am not an artist. The package I put together will be more along the lines of “Things I find at Target while thinking of you,” and will probably include brownies and/or fudge. And then if you win, you’ll throw a contest yourself, and the prize for YOUR contest needn’t be so astonishing, either. A typical pay-it-forward prize is significantly smaller: some brownies and some trinkets, say, or a paperback and some candy.

Leave a comment on this post, ANY comment but if you freeze up in that kind of situation why don’t you tell me if I will be getting a NIECE or a NEPHEW in February? Contest will close on Sunday, September 21st, at noon U.S. Pacific time.

It was so nice to have all that helpful feedback on the difficult musical instrument choice! I barely know the difference between a trumpet and a trombone (I have to say to myself, “slide ____” and see which word leaps into the gap; then I can picture the trombone, and know it isn’t the trumpet), so practically all the information was new to me.

I answered some frequently-asked questions in the comment section, but then the comment section got kind of large and so here they are:

Q: What exactly makes reeds “disgusting”?
A: My mom, back when she played the clarinet, thought it was pretty gross to have to suck on the reed until it was saturated with spit, then screw it onto the mouthpiece and put the spit-soaked reed back in her mouth. But many of you didn’t find this gross, and a few of you couldn’t imagine what could possibly be gross about it, and I think that’s a very good sign for reed instruments.

Q: Instruments with spit valves are way more disgusting than reeds! Way more!
A: Okay! I believe you! My mom didn’t play any spit-valve instruments, so the “reeds are icky” opinion was stand-alone, not relative. I’m going on what I’ve got, here.

Q: You said no to drums because of the noise! You are wrong! They are actually the quietest! All instruments are loud! Let him play drums! THIS FACTORY UNFAIR TO DRUMS!!
A: I think there was more feedback on this than on anything else, even though I didn’t say anything about drums being loud, or about why I was rejecting them. The actual reasons I rejected them were: (1) Rob has near-zero interest in playing them, and (2) I think one of the most enriching parts of learning a musical instrument is learning to read music. I asked him again about it, though, after reading all the appealing comments about what an easy/small/quiet instrument they can be to practice on, but he still says he’s not interested.

Q: Flutes are for sissies. –Anonymous
A: Since I’d just said that my brother played flute for many years, this was kind of…tactless, yes? I do see the concern with “girl instruments” vs. “boy instruments” but I don’t really LIKE it. If someone says very delicately that in their school the flutes were mostly played by girls, I hear the message loud and clear and am inclined to take it into consideration as a valuable point: I may think such divisions are ridiculous, but that doesn’t mean I want to sacrifice my child on the alter of social change. When someone says “Flutes are for sissies,” that makes me feel as if prejudices and gender stereotypes are ugly and stupid, and that the ridiculous ones should be beaten to pulps. By boys brandishing flutes, perhaps.

Q: Why not have him play [other instrument not on list]?
A: The seven instruments I listed are the only ones offered in the school program.

After several days of discussions, the decision is that he’s going to take clarinet. He ranked it at the top of his list by a wide margin, and we thought his reasons for choosing it were good: he said he liked the sound of it best, and that he preferred the kind of instrument with a lot of keys where a certain combination of keys meant a certain note, rather than a “sliding” way of finding the notes (as with the trombone and with string instruments).

This is so strange for me! I tried piano and recorder in elementary school and experienced Epic Fail with both (no interest + no talent), and so I don’t even know about practicing, or how to read music, or how to take the instrument apart and clean it, or how to suck on a reed. You can bet I’ll be asking desperate questions in the future of all you ex band members.

Hey. I have a question. For those of you who during pregnancy got the 16-week AFP screen (or the Triple Screen, or the Quad Screen, or the MSAFP) (it’s the one where they draw blood and then tell you your personal odds for a baby with Down Syndrome, spina bifida, and a couple of other things), would you please comment if you got a Scary Result and then things turned out Perfectly Fine? My sister-in-law got a Scary Result, and even though we can all see statistically that things are likely to be Perfectly Fine, it would be bolstering to hear a lot of stories along the lines of, “OMG, I got a Scary Result and I worried for my ENTIRE pregnancy, and then the baby was TOTALLY FINE!”

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Pay-it-forward updates:

Happy Dash is starting a new contest with a fun twist: she’s passing on one item from the package she received, and when you receive HER package you have to pass on one item from it with the package YOU send.

This Wonderful, Crazy Life is starting a new contest.

Scenic Overlook is showing the giftie she got.

Thank You For Not Being Perky is showing the giftie she got and starting a new contest.

Yesterday at school, the zipper of Rob’s soft lunch box got stuck. So one of the cafeteria staff SLICED THE LUNCH BOX OPEN WITH A KNIFE.

Does that seem a little…extreme? Instead of treating this as an emergency surgery situation where the clothes are cut right off the patient, why not treat it as a Forgotten Lunch situation? Call the parent or have the child buy hot lunch or do whatever is ordinarily done when a child forgets a lunch box. Because I got that zipper unstuck with less than 5 seconds of wiggling, and so I’m pretty cheesed to have the lunch box completely destroyed.

Well. Anyway. Rob is in fourth grade, and in his school that’s the year they get offered musical instrument lessons. They take them at school, so I don’t have to do anything except provide the instrument and books, make sure he brings them to school on the right day, and nag him to practice. Well, and LISTEN to him practice. Perhaps that should be Item Number One.

Paul and I have decided to let him do it, and “let” is the verb we’re using, too. Furthermore, we’re not going to rent the instrument, we’re going to buy it. Renting makes me nervous, and if we buy, we can reuse the same instrument for each child who gets all excited about band but then drops out after a year.

And so the question is, “Which instrument?” There is a list of seven instruments offered, and I’ve marked the four Rob says he’s interested in:

1. Flute. After listening to my brother practice WITH DEDICATION for years and years and YEARS, I’m not sure I can bear to hear ONE MORE NOTE from a flute. And it didn’t make Rob’s list.

2. Clarinet. This is Rob’s first choice, but his experience is limited to a short instrument demonstration given at school. My mother played the clarinet, and says that by the time she was done with it she never wanted to hear a clarinet again—and she’s a musically talented person. Also, she says the reeds are disgusting and keep breaking. My dad says he thinks the reeds are synthetic now (and therefore less disgusting/breakable) for student use. Another issue: Rob has an overbite, and my mom thinks the clarinet could make it worse, since the clarinet pushes firmly against the inside of the front top teeth.

3. Alto saxophone. This has some appeal, but it’s a more expensive instrument, and it’s fourth on Rob’s list. My mom says this one has the disgusting reeds problem too, though my dad again counters with the synthetic thing. My mom further declares that the sound of a child practicing on a saxophone “defies description.” Then she describes it anyway: “absolutely nightmarish.”

4. Trumpet. The dentist recommended it for overbites. It’s second on Rob’s list. But my mom points out that the trumpet is a LOUD instrument, and that we should take into account whether we want to subject the neighbors to a 30-minute daily practice session.

5. Trombone. Also recommended for overbites. Third on Rob’s list. Loudness/neighbors issues.

6. Baritone. No. It’s too large and it’s too expensive.

7. Drums. No.

This morning our internet is down, and I am writing this post in the body of an unsendable email. I am, of course, feeling antsy about the internet being down. And this reminded me of something I’ve been irritated about lately: all the buzz about how if you feel antsy without your internet connection, that means YOU ARE ADDICTED TO THE INTERNET OH NOES!!!

I think I’ve mentioned before that I have a phone phobia. But when our phone is out, do I feel intense relief? No, I feel antsy. When will it be back? What if we need it? I keep picking it up to check if there’s a dial tone yet. I HATE AND FEAR the phone, but apparently I AM ADDICTED TO MY PHONE OH NOES!!!

If my car broke down, I would feel antsy and uncomfortable until it was working again. I’d keep thinking of things to do, and then going, “Oh, wait. No car,” and feeling unhappy. I’d be stressed about not having it. I would have trouble living my life without it. I am also addicted to my car.

If the postal workers went on strike and there was no mail, I’d be very unhappy indeed. No mail? AAAAGGGHHH!! Where is my mail? When will there be mail again? What do you mean I literally can’t mail anything?? I am also addicted to the mail.

I like to read. If I wasn’t allowed to read, I would have times every day when I didn’t know what to do with myself. I like to read while supervising the kids in the playroom. Reading keeps me from interacting with my children! I am addicted.

I am addicted to so many things! Food: I have to have some SEVERAL TIMES A DAY or I get upset. My washer and dryer: if they break down, I get stressed—and I get increasingly stressed with every day that goes by. Running water: if the water gets turned off so they can work on a pipe, I hardly know how to live my life. Pens: you should see how tense I get when I can’t find one!

I don’t struggle with this one myself, but I’ve heard there are people who exercise every single day. If they can’t do it, they say they feel restless and jittery. They NEED their exercise fix. “Natural high,” my ass: they are ADDICTED and should SEEK HELP.

Some people have jobs, and they spend HOURS AND HOURS A DAY doing them. They think about work even when they’re home. Sometimes they’re eager to get back to work, even though they were JUST THERE. Addicted, clearly.

From what I hear (hi, mom and dad and many of their friends!), some people enjoy sex. They’d rather not give it up. Get this: even when they don’t want children, they STILL engage in this now-pointless activity! Often with the SAME person, again and again over YEARS! Man, they are SOOOO addicted.

It’s possible to be accustomed to something without being addicted to it. It’s possible to enjoy something—even enjoy it IMMENSELY—and not be addicted to it. It’s possible to miss something very badly when it’s gone, and yet not be addicted to it. It gets pretty tiresome to keep hearing otherwise.

I am perfectly willing to listen to Caillou whining in the background that he doesn’t WANNNT his mommy and daddy to go to work, he wants them to PLAYYY with him, as long as it means I don’t have to listen to Edward and Elizabeth whining the same thing.

The yellow is lemon muffins (they always come out a little dry; I’m still working on them) with lemon glaze, and the orange is orange bell pepper and baby carrots. I didn’t include the heaping bowl of blue cheese dressing because it’s (1) really heaped and (2) not orange.

Hey, if you have Netflix, has it ever told you at the top of your queue that you’ve qualified for a bonus DVD? Not the thing where it says toward the end of the month that you can upgrade to 4-at-a-time for only $1 or whatever, but that you get one extra just as a one-time thing? It told me that for the first time today, and when I looked it up in the Help section there was nothing about it, and I don’t exactly “read mailings,” and I couldn’t find any email way to contact them: it just kept looping me back to the FAQ and a phone number. It’s probably fine, I am just a little teeny bit worried that there will be some downside to it. A secret charge! An accidental upgrade! …Now that I’m writing this out, it seems like kind of a silly thing to be worried about.

I’m in the market for a new, inexpensive but awesome camera, and also for a new, inexpensive but awesome upright vacuum. I was going to ask for advice, but…I mean, do you ever feel like you’ve hit your absolute maximum for posts about cameras (Nikon!!/Canon!!) and vacuum cleaners (Dyson!!)? I’ve read so many of them, I shouldn’t be posting about it at all, I should just search for other people’s posts. Besides, I’m probably getting the Canon PowerShot and the Hoover Tempo Widepath, and so why even START a discussion that’s going to involve Dyson and SLR?

Cup of caffeinated tea

Large glass of water

B-Complex

Eight (8) ginger snaps

A “the world is a good place” video sent to me by Laura:

[If you are here from the future: the video does not appear to exist anymore.]

This morning started out with a cat accident on the carpet.

Then I looked out the window and noticed that I got distracted and missed the pear harvest: 30 perfectly gorgeous pears were rotting on the ground. I’d been looking forward to those pears since last year, when they were so delicious I ate every single one and barely shared, and then was upset because there were no more. That kind of attention lapse can’t be taken back; I have to wait another year.

I made apple bread for my brother’s birthday. It was cooling on the counter, and I was so glad that chore was done because I hadn’t been sure when I was going to be able to do it. I got myself a drink of water. I spilled the water over both loaves of apple bread. We don’t have enough eggs or enough apples to make another batch.

My tooth is still hurting. The dentist said it might hurt for up to a week just as a result of messing with it. So maybe this is still okay. Or maybe it is a root canal. And then maybe the root canal won’t stop the pain, either, and then we’ll find that OOPS it’s actually an adjacent tooth that is the problem.

I have seasonal allergies, and even with allergy medicine I want to rip my face off.

Henry is “between naps”: he needs more than one nap a day or else he’s fussy, but if he gets two naps he doesn’t go to sleep well at night. So today he cried and fussed and cried and fussed, and finally I put him down for a morning nap when it was really too late to go down for a morning nap.

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Pay-it-forward updates:

Spuddy Buddy is starting a contest for a good cause.

A Little Left of Lost is starting a new contest.

Back from the dentist, and if that’s all I need done I’ll be happy. He said there was a little decay under an old filling, and so he redid the filling. And since the old filling was silver, and the new one is white, I am pleased about this for vanity alone. Also because all my silver fillings are old and gradually need replacing, so I’m glad that the one that needed replacing was an older filling and not a newer one.

He said that unless I keep feeling twinges, this means we’ve solved the problem. Continuing twinges = root canal. So you see this can go either way here, the Happy Path of Nice New White Filling and Not Going to the Dentist Again for Awhile—-or the Sad Path of Nice New $200 White Filling Taken Right Back Out to Make Way for Even-More-Expensive Root Canal.

Another mom at the bus stop this morning said her dentist charges $100 as soon as you walk in the door, so I thought it might be interesting to compare our dental costs. Yesterday, when he looked at the tooth and did an xray, the bill was $70. Today, with the filling, the bill was $200. I know fillings can vary in price depending on how significant they are: when they schedule one, the receptionist is always asking the dentist how much time, and for this filling the dentist said “2…no, 3,” whatever that means. So this was a 2…no, 3 filling, and it cost $200. Is this about what your fillings cost?

Today’s plan: wait for novocaine to wear off; then, eat candy.