Back from Portland

Passion’s choir went to Portland for a competition and I have volunteered to be one of the chaperons. It was a loooong trip. The bus ride was four hours each way and even though it was a very roomy, comfortable bus, there was a lot of complaining, mostly from my own kid.  Which makes me rethink the whole 10 hrs plane ride this summer. The seats on the plane won’t be as big and comfortable, there will definitely not be so much foot room, nor will there be all the extra friends to distract my kidlets for a while. I’m thinking we should start making use of the ‘plane minibar’. And since I think I am allergic to alcohol, I’ll have the kids do the drinking. Either way, my trip is guaranteed to be painless.

Here is a picture from the trip. Passion is in the first standing row, third from the left, with her hair flying in the wind.

Scarce today

Just got home and am having a quick lunch. No time to write, so I’ll leave you with a short video from the Easter Egg Hunt in our very weedy, unfinished backyard.

I guess it’s also a good time to put up a post from my old blog. Ta ta for now!

*Shudder*  

Yesterday I was pulling out a couple of boxes of books from the game closet and behind them I saw this GIANT spider. I couldn’t tell if it was dead or just poised to leap out at me. Well, I gave it long enough to move if it was alive, while I was going through the books for donation. When I have decided that it was indeed dead, I got brave enough to scoop it up on a dustpan. I couldn’t help having a really close look at the creature, which gave me some strong shivers. I had to kill some of these giants before and I could never get a close look since they seem to run faster than my first car did. And once they were killed, all there was left to see was some leg fragments in a gooey mass. You see, I had to make sure I really stomped hard on them and then, for extra assurance, drag my foot on the ground too. I didn’t want the freaky looking thing to just push my foot off itself, grab it and fling me down. It totally looked like it could do that! I was hoping these big ones don’t come in the house, since the only place I found them before was the garage. Although, there was that one time after we have just replaced the carpet that I had the misfortune of running into one in the hallway. You see, I was just going to my bedroom, and I didn’t bother to turn the hallway light on, since there was enough light coming in from the kitchen. I just happened to see from the corner of my eye something on the ground that looked like some of that black furry yarn I was using to knit a scarf. I automatically bent down to pick it, as my brain was screaming ‘Stop! It can’t be yarn, you just finished vacuuming!!!’ So I straightened up and turned the light on. I was horrified to see that it was a giant spider. I just stood there frozen, thinking, this thing would have REALLY loved for me to pick it up, right? We would’ve just bonded and become such good buds, he would’ve started to pick ME up, just for laughs. I had no clue what to do next. My way of disposing of this kind of spider would not have work so well on my new carpet. The way I kill spiders in the house is by swooping down on them with a paper towel, pick’em up and squish them in the paper towel while doing a stomping dance, feeling totally violated. Sometimes I also apologize to the poor creatures for not being willing to share my house. But, it IS my house, after all… Well, anyway, assuming that I could get close enough to the spider, without making it bolt full speed into the kids’ bedroom, I would need something bigger than a paper towel, maybe a pillowcase and both hands to scoop it off the floor. I was not willing to try that, so I went for reinforcements. I brought Mike over to ask what he would recommend, while I was telling him about the amazing speed of these things and how I didn’t want to have to wash spider guts off my new carpet. He wasn’t saying anything, so I looked up at him to see this revolted, yet incredulous look on his face. Well, so much for help from him! Actually, he snapped out of his shock and saved the day. He got an Ikea catalog and I was thinking you’ll never get close enough to use that as a club and even if you do, there is still the carpet to think about. Well, he never went any closer, he just threw the catalog on top of the spider from about four feet away. I stood there, expecting to see the catalog start to crawl away. I was thinking the spider’s gotta be REALLY pissed now, he’ll just toss the catalog off and totally come for us. Mike went to check and the spider was just stunned, no gooey mess, so he picked it up with a paper towel and flushed. And all I could think was ‘you should’ve squished it first’, ‘do spiders swim?’, ‘he could come back or is that rats that could crawl right out of the toilets?’ Let me tell you, it took a long time to get back to feeling normal! *shudder*

Could be a curse…

Passion believes her dentist is out to get her. I think she is right. 

Here is a conversation from her last appointment:

Dentist: Hi Passion. Our new assistant here will learn how to check your braces now.

Passion (sarcastically, while rolling her eyes): GREAT!

She’s also realizing at this point that the dentist must save all of the new assistants to train them on her at her monthly appointments.

Dentist (to the assistant): So, you wrap the rubber band on the pliers and…

New Assistant (in a perky voice): Oh, so THAT’S how you do it!

Dentist: That’s not how you do it. You got her lip.

New Assistant: But I put the rubber band on.

Dentist: You’ve also got her lip!!

Passion(thinking): Why am I stuck with these idiots? (out loud): Grrrr!!!!

I think she has inherited my luck with dentists. Since I moved to US I have had THE. WORST. dentist appointments. In Canada, I absolutely LOVED going to the dentist! That might have also had something to do with the fact that it was probably the only place I could escape from my two very young and demanding children. Spending an hour in a reclined position with nothing to do and no demands on you (except for keeping your mouth open)…I used to call that bliss.

 My first dentist here was a complete idiot! He totally messed up two of my teeth. At two different times. He insisted that my fillings which were older than 10 years needed to be replaced, which lead to the haziest two weeks of my life. I ended up on some heavy duty pain killers taken every two hours for the next fourteen days. I don’t even like to take an ibuprofen when I have a headache! This was followed by an emergency root canal (done by a different dentist) and a crown for the tooth. So I ended up paying about ten times what I should’ve spent on that filling replacement, not to mention all the pain and annoyance I had to go through. 

I guess, since I was so drugged up, I didn’t learn my lesson because I went back to the same guy for the second filling. During this time he dropped these heavy metal pliers they use to clip the rubber dam to the back teeth, smack down on my mouth from waaaay above. Granted I was already numb at the time, but the sickening sound of the metal hitting my front teeth and the thought that I’ll end up with a fat lip made me quite queasy. Of course, I was not lucky enough to have this little procedure go right from the first, so when I called the next day in pain they told me to come on over, they could fix it, no problem. They made the filling too high, so all they needed was to file it down in places. I got hooked up with a newbie who, get this! CATCHES MY TONGUE in the electric file. The woman is lucky she is still alive! I now have a new dentist, but I still get almost sick with apprehension before each appointment.

 

Monday again!

I’m still around just spending all the computer time reading everything I can find about scoliosis.

We had a pretty fun weekend. On Friday we went to our favourite seafood restaurant with Mike’s sister-in-law who was in Seattle for the day. On Saturday we went to a Bar-B-Q birthday party for Mike’s boss. These parties are the place to get my baby fix. There is always at least one little one that the parents are more than happy to hand to me. This time I had to fight my two girls over who gets to hold the baby! Sunday we just spent it lazying around the house, not even picking up after ourselves. I should go and tidy up right now, but I’m sure it can wait a little longer.

The remodelling is still not done. We keep running into all kinds of snafus. The new windows won’t be done until middle of June, which means I can’t get the carpet before then either. So, all the little things that still need to be done seem to take a lot longer, since there is no looming deadline in sight. The bathroom should be done this week if we can find the right parts we need. Having two functional bathrooms would sure make it easier to get along.

I’ll leave you with some recent pictures. (click to enlarge)

BEFORE Laura and Melody

AFTER Passion, Laura and Melody

Dining Room

Dining Room (no more bathroom door)

Before the egg hunt

Passion on Good Friday

Hristos A Înviat!

Să aveţi un Paşte fericit!

Am primit aceste frumoase rînduri şi m-am gîndit că poate şi alţii au nevoie să le audă…

>RUGACIUNE DE LA IEROM. RAFAIL NOICA

>Nu-mi spune nimic…Îti cunosc mizeria, necazurile, luptele si ispitele
>sufletului tau, asa cum esti tu. Da-mi inima ta!
>Daca o sa astepti sa devii un înger ca sa mi te daruiesti întru iubire,
>atunci n-o sa ma iubesti niciodata. Chiar când esti las, fricos,
>neîncrezator în împlinirea dragostei si în savârsirea dragostei si a
>sfinteniei, chiar când ai sa recazi în acele pacate pe care nu ai vrea sa
>le mai faci, Eu nu îti dau voie sa nu ma iubesti. Iubeste-ma asa cum esti
>tu! În orice moment si în orice situatie te-ai afla, în credinciosie sau în
>tradare, în râvna sau în uscaciune, tu iubeste-Ma asa cum esti. Eu vreau sa
>Ma poti iubi din putina si saraca ta inima. Daca voi astepta pâna vei fi
>desavârsit, atunci n-ai sa Ma iubesti niciodata. N-as putea Eu oare sa fac
>din fiecare fir de nisip un serafim? Un înger care sa straluceasca de
>curatie si dragoste? Nu sunt Eu Domnul Dumnezeul Care am creat toate si pot
>totul? Omule, ti-ai dat tu viata pentru lume din dragoste pentru oameni;
>sau ai murit din iubire pentru Mine? Atunci din ce motiv nu ma lasi sa te
>iubesc?
>Fiul Meu, lasa-ma sa te iubesc, Eu îti vreau inima care este locasul Meu.
>Desigur, cu timpul am sa te shimb, însa, chiar pâna atunci, iubeste-Ma asa
>cum esti tu, fiindca Eu te iubesc cu toate ca esti asa. Eu vreau ca
>dragostea ta pentru Mine sa se nasca din putina si saraca ta inima; din
>adâncul neputintei si al murdariei tale.
>Eu te iubesc si când esti slab si necurat. Nu vreau o dragoste izvorâta si
>hranita din mândria “virtutilor” tale, ci dintr-o inima smerita pe care o
>pot curati oricând.
>N-am nevoie de “virtutile” tale, de “talentele” tale, de “întelepciunea”
>ta. Eu vreau doar sa ma iubesti si sa lucrezi cu dragoste pentru Mine. Nu
>”virtutile” tale doresc; daca ti le-as da, tu esti asa de slab si mândru,
>încât as hrani amorul tau propriu si nu M-ai cinsti pe Mine. Deci ele sa nu
>fie un motiv pentru care Tu nu ma cauti si stai departe de Mine.
>Apropie-te cu dragoste!
>Unui fier negru flacarile unui foc nu numai i-ar curata rugina, dar l-ar
>face incandescent.
>Iubeste-Ma, deci, si pacatele se vor arde, iar tu vei fi fericit!
>Iubeste-Ma nu numai ca sa fi curat, asta ar fi din nou o mândrie pentru
>tine, ci pentru ca Eu vreau sa ma odihnesc în inima ta. Deci nu te mai
>îngrijora de asta.
>As putea sa fac prin tine lucruri mari pentru mintea omeneasca, dar nu; tu
>ai sa fii sluga rea si nefolositoare si neputincioasa.
>Am sa-ti iau si putinul pe care tu te încrezi ca-l ai.
>Eu te-am facut din iubire si pentru ca sa-ti dau iubirea, fara ca tu sa-mi
>poti da ceva. Nu încerca sa-Mi platesti iubirea prin nimic. Asta Ma doare
>atât de mult la tine!
>Iubeste-Ma în dragostea Duhului Meu si fara motive! Nu mai sta departe de
>Mine! Îti lipseste nu sfintenia - pe care numai Eu ti-o pot da - ci o inima
>gata sa ma iubeasca oricând si pâna la capat. Astazi Eu stau la usa inimii
>tale ca un cersetor, Eu singurul si adevaratul Împarat si Domn. Eu bat si
>astept.
>Grabeste-te sa-Mi deschizi prin smerenie; nu mai aduce motiv întinaciunea
>si saracia ta. Daca ti-ai cunoaste-o pâna în acânc si deplin, ai muri de
>durere.
>Dar, ceea ce m-ar durea pe Mine, ar fi ca tu, si acum, sa te îndoiesti de
>dragostea ce o am pentru tine. Crede ca Eu pot totul si tu nu poti nimic
>fara Mine; doar pacatul esti în stare sa-l faci fara ajutorul Meu. Sa nu te
>încrezi în tine fara Mine, caci altfel voi fi nevoit sa te las în cadere în
>masura cu care tu te apreciezi. Nu te framânta ca n-ai virtuti. Am sa-ti
>dau Eu sfintenia Mea. Deschide-ti inima pentru pocainta si Ma primeste în
>potirul sufletului tau prin Trupul si Sângele Meu, pe care ti-l dau în dar
>la Sfânta Liturghie. Atunci o sa te fac sa întelegi totul si sa Ma iubesti
>mai mult decât îti poti închipui. Lasa sa curga Sângele Meu în sângele tau
>si sa bata inima Mea în inima ta. Eu ti-am dat-o pe Sfânta si Preacurata
>Mea Maica. Lasa sa treaca totul prin inima ei curata, încât sa poata
>mijloci pentru tine.
>Orice s-ar întâmpla, nu astepta nicidecum sa devii sfânt, ca pe urma sa ma
>iubesti. În acest fel, tu nu m-ai iubi niciodata.
>Si acum du-te!
>Eu sunt cu tine!

Mommy to the rescue / Dă la mama să fixeze!

I don’t have time to post today, so I’ll just copy a post from my old blog before it gets deleted. My appologies if you have already read it.

The other day, I just walked into the bathroom when I heard this stampede, laughter and smothered yells that sounded sometimes like ‘Daddy!’, sometimes like ’Nummy!’. I was hoping the girls were just playing since Mike wasn’t home and I wasn’t really in a position of checking what was going on. There was no need anyways, as they both burst into the bathroom, the time of their early years when I was never alone in there being forcefully brought back to mind. Passion was holding a round cushion in front of her face trying to say something, while Melody was laughing madly behind her. Turns out they were playing and Melody tossed the cushion at Passion’s face where it promptly attached itself to her braces. When I finally understood what was happening I broke out into laughter as well. While I was separating my daughter from the cushion I remembered her dentist’s warning not to french kiss a boy with braces, now that she was wearing braces. At least I didn’t have to untangle some boy’s face off her teeth!

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Ăsta e un post copiat de pe vechiul meu blog, care va fi şters curînd…

 

Numa’ ce intru în baie cînd aud rîsete, tropăieli şi nişte ţipăte înăbuşite care păreau a fi “Daddy!” sau “Nami!”. Ştiind că Daddy nu e acasă, speram că e vreun joc, ceva, dar fiind ocupată în acel moment, nu am avut o şansă să verific ce se întîmplă. Nici nu a fost nevoie de aşa ceva, căci amîndouă fetele izbucnesc dintr-o dată în baie, şi cu ele şi amintirile mele de cînd erau mici şi nu puteam merge vreodată la baie fără compania lor. Melody rîdea ca un maniac, în timp ce Passion încerca să zică ceva dar nu înţelegeam ce, fiincă ţinea o perinuţă în faţa gurii. Pe cînd am înţeles ce se întîmplă, m-a pufnit şi pe mine rîsul. În joacă, Melody aruncase perinuţa, care s-a ataşat imediat de brace-urile dentare (?nu ştiu să traduc în româneşte!) ale lui Passion. În timp ce o deznodam mi-am amintit că dentistul a avertizat-o să nu se sărute cu baieţi care au şi ei braces. Cel puţin nu a trebuit să deznod faţa vreunui tip de pe dinţii fetei mele!

Parenting: not for the weak of heart!

I don’t know about you, but I feel I had been sadly deceived in this whole parenting thing. I mean no-one warns you how unpredictable kids can be. Just when you think you have it all figured out, they go and change on you. Take food for instance. You just dicovered that your young child LOVES peas. Go ahead and stock up on that just to find out that next time you offer them the same, they wouldn’t have it no matter what. Sitting there saying dumbfoundedly ‘But you love peas!’ won’t do you any good. Neither will forcing the kid to take a bite, only to have said kid gag on it. It’s obvious that this particular food couldn’t be more repulsive to the wee one. And this is only one example. You can’t count on ANYTHING from one day to the next. Everything is a phase with them, the lenghth of which is indirectly related to how much you wish it to last.

I have just made my peace with the fact that my girls might never get along, ever again! It reached the point of as soon as they would lay eyes on each other they will start yelling about something. Soon after, one or both would become so shrill, that only dogs in the neighborhood would still hear them. My ears were happy for the break, but the hairs on my arms would feel charged somehow, standing straight up. No clue why!

So, anyway, last night as I was scrubbing the bathroom counter I kept yelling at them to get in bed already so I can tuck them in. All I could hear was a lot of loud talking and laughter. After about ten minutes of yelling at them while keeping an eye on Passion’s empty bed, my yelling changed to ‘you-better-take-me-seriously-now-or-you’ll-be-sorry’ tone. “But we’re already in bed!” came from amidst more laughter. Since I could see Passion’s bed was sill empty, that could only mean they were going to sleep together in Melody’s bed, which they used to do quite often before. I should’ve totally expected this! So, I go in to kiss them good-night. For some weird reason they were in a very silly mood, they kept giggling and being loud. Not to mention being hard to pin down. I was trying to hug Melody at the same time as she was kicking Passion and slipping out of my arms. She would pucker up for a kiss and by the time I would reach her mouth it would be wide open in some kind of wailing laughter. Anything anyone did would just make them dissolve into a fit of giggles. Trying to tuck them in felt more like wrestling an octopus into an eight-sleeved jacked. I really feel for those poor mother octopi that need to get their kids ready to go anywhere! The commotion got so bad that it brought Mike to their room saying: “Someone better be bleeding profusely to explain all this noise!”

They grow way too fast! / Parcă cresc prea repede!

A good example of ‘then and ‘now’. Just three short years seem to pack a lifetime of changes. Click on the first photo to see the sweet innocence on those little faces.

Two cuties in 2005

"Do I know you, lady?"

"Really??? In my face again?!"

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Prima poză e din 2005. Da-ţi un click pe ea să vedeţi cîtă dulce inocenţă pe feţele lor! Iar acum? Se îngrozesc ca nu cumva, noi părinţii, să le facem de ruşine în public! hehehe

Again, with the bickering…

It’s Monday morning. I hate mornings! Especially when it happens to be Monday! You know what I hate more? The screeching sound two teenage girls make when they fight. You know what I had to listen to for the last two days? Yep, that annoying sound. That is all they seem to be doing at home. We go out, and they act like bestest best friends, inseparable, laughing and having fun. Go back home, and it’s like we are forcing them to co-exist with their most loathed enemy! Oh, the HORRORS!!!!!

This morning they were fighting over the bathroom. We have just one usable bathroom right now. When there were two bathrooms, they still only used this one. But now they have a reason to fight, cause how dare someone use the bathroom when one of them might want to go in for the fourth time upon noticing that one hair is misbehaving?! Jeez! You’d think they would be a little more willing to put up with this temporary inconvenience, since we ARE doing this just so they would have their own room and a second bathroom that they wouldn’t have to cringe at the thought of having to use!

It makes me wanna scream ‘Enough already! There are people with real problems in the world!’. Except, to their self-involved teenage brain this is like the most serious problem, and their life totally sucks because they have to deal with it! You gotta love this kind of drama!

End of week re-cap / La sfîrşit de săptămînă

Here we are, still alive, after yet another week of chaos. What I have learned during this past week:

1. My youngest daughter is in the throes of her first crush.
2. When I feel on the brink of loosing it (and it happens more and more often nowadays), all I have to do is say “We’re all gonna DIE!!!” in a hysterically high pitched voice and Mike swoops in like a knight in shinning armour, takes me in his arms and calmly talks me down from the ledge. I love this guy!
3. I really lucked out with the workers I have chosen for this project. They’re great and they’re willing to work with whatever quirks and change of plans I throw at them.
4. The people we bought this house from must have hired baboons on crack to built the addition. Nothing makes sense. It might start to make sense after a bottle of wine, but I haven’t yet tested THAT theory.
5. Passion must’ve been a wild feline in another life. She seems to revert to growls and hisses when pissed. Or it could just be all the paint fumes she’s been breathing.
6. You can end up with nine pair of white shoes if you fail to notice a shoe shelf when covering everything in plastic to protect it during remodelling.
7. Even though we barely get any snow during the winter here, just because it’s April and everything is green and flowering, does not mean that that we are free and clear. As I am typing this it keeps either hailing or snowing. Boy, I do miss summer!

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Ce am descoperit în săptămîna ce a trecut:

 

1. Melody are deja prieten.
2. Cînd am nevoie cel mai mult de o voce calmă, Mike mă ia în braţe şi mă face să vad că nu e sfîrşitul lumii dacă nu mai avem prosoape sau linguri curate şi că nebunia asta din casă e doar o situaţie temporară.
3. Am ales bine muncitorii pentru proiectul ăsta. Îmi place cum lucrează şi îmi place că se adaptează uşor la schimbări de planuri.
4. Oamenii de la care am cumpărat casa asta cred că au angajat maimuţe bete să construiască partea cea nouă de casă. Totul pare halandala. Poate ar începe să se vadă ceva logică după o sticlă mare de vin, dar încă nu am recurs la soluţia aceasta. J
5. Bănuiesc că Passion a fost vreo pisică sălbatică în altă viaţă că a început să comunice ca ele cînd e tracasată. Sau poate  mirosul de vopsea e de vină…
6. Dacă din greşeală uiţi să acoperi un raft de pantofi cu folie în timpul construcţiei, rezultatul va fi nouă perechi de pantofi albi.
7. Toată iarna a nins de vreo două ori, dar acum că e Aprilie cu totul verde şi înflorit, ninge sau îi dă cu grindina de numa’. Vară, vară, unde eşti?