Gratitude (and the 5 G's revisited)

I have often told both my daughters that I want them to live by the Five G's. These are Gracious, Grateful, Generous, Gentle and Good. (The Golden Rule is mixed in there among the five.)

I figure that what's good for the children is also good for me. So, I've determined that I need to work on the Five G's as well.

Recently, on separate occasions, I've been told that I am gracious. It's embarrassing, but it brings me great pleasure to hear that. I know I'm generous--that's why I'm always broke! I try to be gentle. I don't know if I'll ever think I'm good...never quite good enough is my life's experience but that's a story for another time. Now I'm working on Gratitude. Here are five things I am grateful for today:

1. I have a terrific, wonderful, brilliant group of friends.

2. I have two beautiful (inside and out) daughters that constantly bring me pride and joy.

3. I have a bad memory that tends to forget when my daughters do not bring me great pride and joy.

4. My husband is off work for a little while, but healthy, so we get to do a couple of fun things together during the day (like have breakfast or lunch at the beach, alone).

5. Even though dh is not working, his severance package has allowed us to pay the mortgage and my car payments for awhile longer.

Oh, there is one more: I am so very happy and excited and grateful that my longest-time friend Dianne who has had a very tough life for about the last 25 years, just yesterday bought a brand new convertible. I get a vicarious thrill, too...it's the car I want, and now I can ride in it whenever she lets me, plus, I won't have to spend all the money! It's a Toyota Solana. It's beautiful. I'm going to go have lunch with her right now--she's driving!

The Mission Report

Wow. What a torment to endure for a fourth grader. In California, nearly every 4th grade student, in the process of learning California history, must turn in a "Mission Report." We have the dubious "honor" of being the state that has 21 missions, which brought a certain Father Junipero Serra ("hu-NI-pero Sayra") a great deal of fame, both good and bad.

Students here are assigned either a report or a project--some can be video'd or a model can be built of the mission they've been assigned. In any case, the students and their parents as well as all their family members and neighbors get quite an education on the mission and the whole mission system.

Without telling the whole story, my eldest got assigned the Mission named "Holy Cross" or Santa Cruz. She has worked on this project for about 3 weeks and a few days ago became frustrated, so much so that her voice rose to a very high pitch and she teared up over this report. She was so very worried she'd not get it done in time. I had been helping her; her father had been helping her; but now our assistance intensified--including doing research along with her, printing quotes for her to use, learning how to site web sites in a bibliography, yada yada.

We could not find anything on Mission Santa Cruz's education of children, the music the mission used, or the artwork. (Most of it was stolen during a threatened pirate's raid, that didn't happen, but while all the mission residents were evacuated and hiding, the people entrusted with saving the icons and valuables stole them for themselves!)

So, we took all of our documentation and the report-in-progress to the teacher. Ms. Teacher said, with a smile, "then don't write about that part of the mission." I wanted to punch somebody. Neither Sarah nor I knew that we could omit sections of the assignment. Wouldn't that have been nice in college? Oh, I can't find information, so I'm not going to include that point of my thesis.

So with great relief, Sarah went on to class, and I brought all the paperwork home. She's done so very well on this report, that if she does get it done on time, we'll celebrate with a special dinner somewhere.

On to other things...

Ten on Tuesday

Well, 10 on Wednesday just doesn't sound right.

This week's Ten is: 10 Things You Would Do if You Were Younger

1. get my Bachelor's degree right out of high school, and my Master's degree right after that. I could be a rich lawyer right now, and ready to retire!

2. get my pilot's license (I still may do this)

3. have two more children

4. acquire career skills that transfer all over the world.

5. work for a company that has world wide offices and transfer. A lot.

6. take that Mediterranean cruise that included beautiful Yugoslavia before the Serbs and Croats went to war.

7. leave the Gas Company a lot sooner than I did.

8. work more on my art and taken the more challenging road.

9. reaching....reaching...find a way to ski more

10. feel better about myself (which if it were #1, all the other things I would really have done.) 8^) I wish the drugs available now had been available then--I could have been a contender!

A little Tuesday Catching up...(cont'd)

Yesterday's:

10 Foods I Hate (well, hate is such a strong word, but I'll try)

#1. Horseradish
2. bitter salad greens
3. sauerkraut
4. beets
5. raw onions
6. pickled eggs
7. anchovies
8. sardines
9. green bell peppers
10. splenda (if that's a food)

A little Tuesday Catching up...

Last week's:

10 Things You Worry About

North Korea
Iran
Iraq
Pakistan
my and my family's health
what kind of world my daughters will inherit
money
my weight (me, too)
the Afterlife
global warming

(Not necessarily in that order)

twist and turn and down, down down

The roller coaster rolls onward...

Last week we hired the service of a carpet repair person to repair some damages our wonder dog Hamlet caused...long story. He came over, tested the carpet and said the padding would have to be replaced, the carpet steamed and cleaned and treated, and tacked back down. Expensive, but not so bad...we made an appointment for this morning to have the work done.

When he pulled back the carpet from the wall to replace the padding, Scott and I heard gasps. He found some more damage behind where the home theater resides...not just the carpet and padding, but the wall, the concrete foundation, the baseboard...and it was all still wet. (Do you happen to remember last year when we had some parts of our 2nd bathroom repaired/replaced because it had caused great damage to the wall, the carpet and the baseboard?)

Well--it turns out that our master bathroom (4 years old) shower has a leak--and the leak has been traveling through the wall down the studs, and what wasn't absorbed by the studs went on down to the floor, getting absorbed into the concrete foundation. Yup. We're going through it again.

Last time, it was a couple hundred dollars to fix everything. This time? Oh, that is not all, oh, no, that is not all...for unrelated reasons we also need to replace the piping in the shower, since when the house was built, the copper pipe was attached to the rebar, then never detached after the copper pipe was stabilized. Evidently this is very bad, as when rebar stays in contact with copper the copper immediately begins to disintegrate.

Lucky us, it has lasted 40 years. Gee--I think it would have been better to self destruct say, 16 years ago...before we bought the house! However, the copper piping alone will cost "about" $5,000. Yep that's Five THOUSAND dollars. Let's see...add to that $2000 for the shower tile to be replaced, and sealed...we're up to about $7,000 and that's not counting the additional carpet restoration that will need doing!

So, now, our whole house is disrupted again, waiting for plumbers, drywall guys carpenters to all come and fix it. Makes me wish I was a general contractor!

It's ok--I can feel the roller coaster leveling out--we'll do like others do; throw a bunch of money (or credit cards) at it and it will be good as new. Right? Right.

I'm thankful for many things---first that we didn't find all this on the morning of the dinner with our English friends. Second and maybe even bigger, that we didn't try to have all this done before our Couples' Party! Third, and isn't this ironic, Scott learned that Hamlet was the least of our carpet worries. I'm very thankful that we won't be giving up our family dog, and I told Scott he has to be nice to our Hammy for awhile.

I'm also very grateful that we have this time together to confront challenges like this as a team, and not me alone calling Scott on the phone, hearing him get really upset and then having to deal with all the labor people by myself. Thank you, Scott.

Tomorrow will be a better day. The laundry is nearly done; dinner is cooked eaten and dishes put away; Em will play her first T-ball game this Saturday.

It's all good.

But first...

I absolutely must publicly apologize to my dearest uncle and aunt. February 14th is their wedding anniversary. This year they celebrated 54 years together. This is my ramshackle attempt to wish them a belated anniversary.

They have constantly shown by their lives together as examples how a marriage can be strong and survive the environment today that tends to tear and scratch at the institution of marriage, causing so many to end.

Don't get me wrong--if you are not the marrying type, more power to you. But, if you choose to marry, this couple is the penultimate examples of how to behave as a husband and wife. They are so sweet together toward each other, my heart warms every time I'm with them. They truly seem of one mind sometimes, and often finish each other's sentences, which, instead of irritating, brings gratitude to the one searching for the right words.

They are a beautiful couple, too. Not too different from the picture they sent me last year. Her smile lights up a room, and he is The Perfect Southern Gentleman.

My uncle has given me such great advice for dealing with life and a husband; he has helped me get through some "moments" especially since my parents departed this earth.

We love you both so dearly, Uncle Papa and Aunt Nana--shame on us for not acknowledging your special day on time! I hope at least that my cousins treated you well that day!

A 8 day Roller Coaster

It has been a roller coaster of a week since last Wednesday.

That was when we had the brilliant visit by Karen and Jeff with their terrific ten-yr-old, Ethan. He is beautiful! It was Feb 14th, and everywhere was booked, unless we wanted to eat at 4:30 or 10:30 pm. So, as most of you may know already, I decided to cook.

I was relieved to find out that Karen and Jeff don't keep Kosher, so they didn't mind eating the bacon around the fillets. They were very tasty, if I say so myself. I had been disappointed in the way they looked, and they didn't seem too tender, at first. But after one bite, I was relieved, and nearly happy with them. We had salad, mashed potatoes and my roasted red & yellow peppers.

I sautéed the peppers in olive oil, garlic, and basil, until blackened, and served them with the steaks and mashed potatoes. I love those peppers, and I sure hope Karen, Jeff & Ethan did, too. I cheated with dessert--bought one of those Costco 4-layer chocolate fudge with fudge frosting cakes. It is something I’ve wanted to taste for so long, and this was my perfect excuse! Very quite yummy with vanilla ice cream, too!

The Green/Ward family delighted us with their company. Poor things drove from the west side of Los Angeles (right next to the airport in LA), all the way to our house in north Orange County during the time of rush hour. I do not wish that on anyone, especially this very gracious couple. They did comment that the commute to our house did teach them that they needed a home very close to Jeff’s new place of employment. 8^)

We so appreciated their visit. The girls were very enamored with Ethan…Sarah so much so that she went to her room and put on her grandmother’s earrings! That she’s never done before!
Scott and I thoroughly enjoyed meeting Karen and Jeff face to face. I hope they felt the same way we did.

Scott was again impressed meeting another December Mom. He has yet to meet one he doesn’t like. (I tell him that he ought to think they’d all be quality people--after all, I chose the Dec Moms as friends!)

-------------------------

So as the roller coaster chugs upward, we say our g’byes & so longs to the Green/Wards, and prepare ourselves for out 4th annual Couples’ Dinner Party, held Saturday the 17th. For the first time I can remember for any party we’ve thrown, our expenses stayed within our budget!

I made a green salad w/dried cranberries, walnuts, feta cheese, and a not to sweet oil and vinegar dressing, prime rib, and scalloped potatoes. I begged and got our dear cousin April to make the green beans, because she is the only one able to make them in a way that my Scott will eat them. Dessert impressed us all--the “Chocolate Fountain of Loovve” was on, and I put out cookies, fresh fruit, some pound cake as well as angel food cake. MMMMMMM!

We didn’t need entertainment, but I have a box of cards titled, “Table Topics” asking questions --some lighthearted, and some very deep. Each person had a card to read/& answer. One question, I decided, had to be answered by each person for his/her spouse. “What does your spouse complain about most?” That provided some interesting answers--all the wives said their husbands complained about clutter, and the husbands, except for one said the wives complained about the *&(*(%$*&( kids. My dh had to break the perfect record by saying that I complain about my health a lot. Well at least I don’t complain about the kids so much then, right? 8^)

I was very proud of us--we threw a pretty good party. Saturday night after everyone left, as well as all day Sunday, I gushed about how much fun we had. I was very happy with the decorations, food, the look of the house overall, the mix of people attending, the variety of wines and beverages offered, the layout of the food, and the fact that we fit 12 adults at my new dining room table!

For decorations, I used white table cloths and a deep wine/rust/red table runner. On that I placed 1 pillar candle and 2 tapers, and set along side them 6 pastel colored long stemmed live roses. Intertwined with the roses and loosely wrapped around the candles I placed white fabric ribbon with a subtly printed roses print.

I'll write the rest in my next entry...

Response to Yesterday's Rant

My favorite Uncle wrote this to me this morning...

Red your blog so NOW YOU KNOW WHAT YOUR POOR'OL GAN HAD BEEN GOING THROUGH FOR THE LAST 19 YEARS... NO WONDER HER HEALTH AINT SO GOOD>>>

From my experience, it's my bet that you will conform before he does..... Tell Scott I'm pulling for him and if he is going to succeed he will have to learn to DODGE, DUCK and RUN (a lot)......

Yesterday the rest of the day included emotional traumas from both my daughters. One big issue included bullying, and then some extended discussion between the other girl's mother and me. The second big issue was again my older daughter not winning the popularity contest of Sergeant At Arms in her school's student council. The third issue was from the little one, who thought her friends didn't want to play with her (I guess she didn't want to be left out of all the hugs and comforts from Mommy).

With all that and a Girl Scout leadership council meeting last night, today seems much much better. My uncle's post helped a great deal. In addition, I slept for half the day this morning, which probably gave me the alone time I needed to get out of my funk. Maybe I'll go take a nap now to finish off my "healing." (evil grin) Hubby and I have got along quite nicely together today!

Thanks for reading...

It's official:

My husband is a Bull in a China Shop.

Not that our home is made of breakable delicate alabaster things...but he can easily turn a nice place into a disaster!

Case in Point:

I asked him to move our water bottles onto the patio so we'd have more room to move about in the garage. I had already made room for his car, and cleaned out a bunch of junk to be given/thrown away.

Yes, there remains much "stuff" but, it's much nicer than it was. And, his highness can park his precious little sports car in the garage (Dorinna? sound familiar?)

So, he moves the water bottles into the patio, where we keep dog stuff--food, flea stuff, snacks, toys, blah blah.

Does he leave room to access the dog food?

Nope. Not only does he put the 7 water bottles (the delivery kind, 5-gallon size), wherever they land, he knocks over the dog food container, spilling dog food all over the floor, and now, with the water bottles there, I couldn't get back in there to save any of the dog food.

I waited a few days...the rule in the house is, you spill it, you pick it up. I guess the rule is not for him. This morning, I realized the dog had not eaten since Sunday. No one had given him any dog food. Emily tried to do it Friday...I guess that was the day the food was spilled, and she said the container was empty, and food was all over the patio floor.

Now all four of us knew Scott had done this. He had also through the floor mat across the patio so now we could not wipe our feet before coming into the family room (remember the new carpet where no one is allowed to wear shoes??).

So there I am, attempting to feed the dog, after making pancakes and bacon for the girls' breakfast...having to rearrange all the water bottles into a more neat placement, sweeping up the dog food and putting it back into the conatiner and putting it where the girls could reach it to feed the poor dog...when I was supposed to be getting read to go to the gym with him.

Since I did that, made the girls' lunches and was in the process of wiping up crumbs from the counter, he says, "well, meet you at the gym?" with this ugly fugly smiley smirk on his face.

I nearly picked him up and threw him out of the house. But it wasn't such a big deal, afterall, right, so I said--do you want crumbs cleaned off the counter? (a bitter "conversation" he's had with me before)? Same smirk, "yes"--

Well go, I said...I need to get changed anyway.

I finished the kitchen and as I sat down to the pc to just look at what had been sent, my friend calls who needs a ride home from the doc's office. So, either I go late to the gym by myself, or I don't go, like I didn't last Thursday. I'm going. Scott complained to me that the last three days he's been alone (meaning without me, since he was with the kids Saturday and with friends Sunday) for a third day, and now he's just giddy to go to the gym by himself for a couple of hours leaving me alone...where is the equity in that I ask you?

Maybe I'm just menopausal. He's beginning to bug me again. He's only been home 7 working days!!!! What will I do at the end of 2 months???? He has told a friend he may stay home SIX MONTHS!!! I nearly fainted. Bless his heart, he's a good guy most of the time, but he has no feeling of consideration for his wife, no feelings of responsibility to go make some money so we can pay the mortgage. He thinks his 60-day full pay severance will pay for everything, even through the summer. AND, he went and spent $200 on his damn computer yesterday! Plus another $100 with the kids at Wild Animal Park having a Father Daughters Day.

Just ranting. I'll be all better now. Gotta go get my friend from the doc.