Kid-ding around

Remember the blog project I did in 2010 with three other women? Well, Froggie decided to resurrect it with me and we each got to invite another friend to join us. She invited a mutual friend (someone I met through her) and I invited a friend whose blog I really enjoy reading. So now it's Froggie, Mom of Many, Moma Rock and Merrylandgirl. Hope you enjoy the topics that we'll be exploring!

This week, I picked the topic: Regression time! Tell us what you were like as a little kid: quirks, fears, interests, hobbies, passions, etc.

Before reading ahead, first see what everyone else had to say on this topic:
Froggie
Mom of Many
Moma Rock

Now that I have kids of my own, it’s fun to see their little quirks come into play. They remind me of the silly things I did as a kid. This past weekend, my mom and sister told me how they found videos from when I was a kid and were pointing out the ways my older son takes after me. I’ll be interested in seeing these videos the next time we’re all together. I’m sure my kids will get a kick out of them, as well.
Instead of writing a whole essay on what I was like as a kid, I thought I’d share a list of things I can remember.

My first favorite movie was The Wizard of Oz. I’d watch it obsessively when I was about four years old. The witch didn’t even scare me. Then Annie came along and I couldn’t get enough of it. Eventually, The Parent Trap took Annie’s place in my VCR. As I got older, different movies took their place in my “Hall of Fame.” A lot were music/performance based, such as A Chorus Line, Little Shop of Horrors, Dirty Dancing and Sing.

I went through a major Smurfs phase and even had little collectible figures that I’d play with all the time. I still have those figures now and the kids enjoy playing with them.

I also loved The Muppets...and still do. Aside from the new movie with my crush object, Jason Segel, I love The Muppets Take Manhattan. Classic! It's also fun to watch old episodes of The Muppet Show.

I didn't like going to Show Biz Pizza because I was afraid of the gorilla (Fatz Geronimo...yes, I remember his name), but I lived for Chuck E. Cheese. I'm glad I've passed along my love for skee-ball to my boys!

If you think I’m a picky eater now, you should have seen me when I was a kid. I probably ate the same things my pickiest eater does now...hot dogs, mac and cheese and pizza. I also had a thing for peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I ate scrambled eggs with cheese for breakfast every single day until I one day became satiated from them and haven’t been able to eat eggs ever since. Since I didn’t keep Kosher, I was all about going to McDonald’s, but I only ever ate cheeseburgers. At my favorite Chinese restaurant, I only ate beef and gravy with rice or pan fried noodles until I started working there and got a chance to expand my tastes.

I’ve always been a reader. I memorized books when I was three years old and then just read them to myself. We’d go to this family friends’ house and they had huge bookshelves full of kids’ books. I’d just curl up on a chair and read however many I could. I eventually got into book series as I got older. Some of my favorite books as a kid were the ones by Beverly Cleary and Judy Blume. I really liked the Ramona Quimby books and "Ellen Tebbits" (both by Beverly Cleary). My favorite places to visit were the library and the bookstore. Imagine if Barnes and Noble had been around when I was a kid, I would have never left the store! All they had at the time were little mall bookstores such as Waldenbooks, Crown and B. Dalton.

I hated getting my hands dirty. While the kids at preschool were playing with sand, I was washing dolls. I only know this because my mom told me, but it must be true because it has carried over into adulthood. I do remember from my junior high days, helping a friend and her mom plant flowers and rushing into the house every few minutes to wash the dirt off my hands. I still can’t stand when my hands get grime, dust, or anything sticky on them.

I loved playing Barbies and Cabbage Patch Kids. I created elaborate storylines for whenever I played with either. My sister and I could spend hours acting out these storylines.

I was a performer. I enjoyed doing anything theatrical or musical. My sister and I would act out different TV shows and movies or come up with dance routines.

Some of my favorite TV shows were Family Ties, Diff’rent Strokes, The Facts of Life, and eventually Punky Brewster. I also liked Small Wonder (don’t ask) and a fun lip sync show called Puttin’ on the Hits. And then Full House came along…. :)

I had a huge crush on Michael J. Fox (especially from Back to the Future) until Dirty Dancing came about and then it got transferred to Patrick Swayze.

I was a major Madonna fan. I even dressed like her for dress up day at camp. I would do school projects that related to Madonna in some way. I probably wore holes through my Like a Virgin cassette.

I was an Indian Princess. I loved going to meetings and campouts with my dad and sister. Before that I was a Brownie, but I lost interest after a year, which coincided nicely with joining Indian Princesses.

I used to be afraid of the dark...and vampires. I thought that if it was too dark in the house, vampires would come to my room and bite my neck. I would pull the covers up to my chin in order to protect myself. I still don't like vampires now, but for different reasons.

I didn't learn how to ride a bike (two wheeler) until I was 12. I was afraid of falling. Once I learned how though, I was unstoppable! I loved riding my bike everywhere. I don't even ride a bike anymore, as I just use the equipment in my basement when I need to exercise.

My favorite stuffed animals were a white cat that I named Mindya (Mindy-uh), Friend Bear and Love-a-Lot Bear (both Care Bears).

I was very passionate about my friendships. If I felt that I had found a good friend, I wanted to hang out with them all the time and emulate the things they did. My friends are still very important to me, but there are only a few I've known since my youth.



I had a pretty goofy sense of humor, which has probably carried on into adulthood.

I was definitely a girly girl, all about wearing dresses, makeup and nail polish, going shopping, playing with dolls, etc. It probably explains my current obsession with chick lit!

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This is just a glimpse of who I was as a kid, from what I can remember. I'm sure there are more memories that will come to mind as soon as I publish this post. I can't help but wonder what my daughter will be like as she gets bigger. Will she be a girly girl or a tomboy (thanks to having two older brothers)? Will she like to play dolls and read or will she want to play sports and run around in the mud? I guess time will tell, but I can't wait to watch her discover what makes up her personality.

Still me...but I can imagine my daughter
looking like this in a couple of years

Life is a highway....but not at 16!

Remember the blog project I did in 2010 with three other women? Well, Froggie decided to resurrect it with me and we each got to invite another friend to join us. She invited a mutual friend (someone I met through her) and I invited a friend whose blog I really enjoy reading. So now it's Froggie, Mom of Many, Moma Rock and Merrylandgirl. Hope you enjoy the topics that we'll be exploring!

This week, Moma Rock picked the topic: Who taught you how to drive? And, what sort of experiences did you have as a new driver on the road?

Before reading ahead, first see what everyone else had to say on this topic:
Froggie
Mom of Many
Moma Rock

It's interesting that this topic comes up right before I turn 36, as I am approaching my 20 year anniversary of being a licensed driver. I didn't get my license the day I turned 16 though. I got it about two months later....

I started my driving lessons through high school driver's ed class, second semester of sophomore year. It was a way to get a permit and not have to take extracurricular lessons. Really, I would have preferred to take the lessons outside of school though, for what they were worth to me in school. There was one nice teacher, Mr. J, but he just led the instructional portion of the class. I don't think he went on the road with anyone. He should have as he was the friendliest and most fatherly of the three teachers.

Mr. W was decent. He was the tough love type, but he didn't make people feel horrible about their driving skills. He said what worked and what needed improvement. And then there was Mr. L. People like him should NEVER become driving instructors. Maybe he should deal with people who get tickets for doing stupid stuff like drinking or texting while driving. He could scare them straight. Instead, he scared me off of driving highways for FIVE YEARS!

Aside from the fact that it was torturous enough being in a silent car (no music) with the sound of the turn signal clicking like a metronome, but also being with peers who are bound to make fun of you if you mess up during a road lesson, having Mr. L as the on-road instructor just multiplies that torture! And it's even worse when you're the only student in the car with him, he gives confusing directions and likes to step on his instructor brake even though it's clear that you're coming to a complete stop. So when I had a highway lesson with him and was reduced to tears afterward, that was it for me. I was never going to drive on a highway, tollway or expressway, even if you paid me to. I would take back roads to get to where I needed.

In the meantime, my dad taught me how to drive through lots of practice...and patience. He and I are alike in personality, so I'm surprised he stayed patient for so long. I can't even imagine teaching any of my kids to drive! In any case, he did whatever it took to help me become a good driver. We went out on weekends, just driving around the neighborhood. He took me to empty parking lots to teach me how to park between the lines. He let me drive to school every day before he took the car to work. I enjoyed those drives to school every morning. We'd listen to the radio in companionable silence while I navigated my way to school. He didn't make me nervous at all.

The summer leading up to my 16th birthday, I went to England for a month on an exchange program from high school. When I got back, I was somewhat out of practice and watching people drive on the other side of the road was strange for me. On my 16th birthday, I didn't go to get my license. I wasn't planning to anyway, as the pressure of turning 16 and getting your license that same day is a bit much. Instead, I managed to crack my mom's headlight while trying to park the car. Oops!

At the beginning of junior year, my dad signed me up for private driving lessons. The instructor was kind and patient...the complete opposite of Mr. L. After a few lessons, I felt ready and about two months after my 16th birthday, early on a Saturday morning, my dad took me to get my license. And you know what? I got it on the first try! I think I only had trouble on one type of turn but that wasn't enough to keep me from getting it. I was so proud of this accomplishment that the first thing I did at school the following week was find an excuse to flash it in front of Mr. L!

Shortly after getting my license, I got my first car...a 1986 Pontiac Sunbird. For a while, I just used it to go to and from school. Eventually, I started driving other places or out on errands. I had a decent track record until my first minor accident toward the end of junior year. I barely did any damage to the other car, but I got a ticket anyway. (At least it kept me from seeing a really bad movie.) There was another time my car scraped against my mom's car, but I wasn't getting a ticket for that!) Aside from that, having a car allowed me to bond more with my sister, especially when she started high school that fall. I drove her to and from school every day. We'd listen to the Eddie and JoBo show on B96 every morning and a Broadway soundtrack (usually "Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat") every afternoon. I'd also pick her up from her babysitting gig after I started working at the Chinese restaurant.

In the summer of 1997, on the eve of my 21st birthday, I wanted to go to the city to see "Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind."  My friend who was supposed to drive us to the city bailed on me, so I took it upon myself to learn how to drive on the expressway and made it safely to the show and back. It was an exhilarating feeling and my birthday gift to myself was conquering my fear of highways. (Take that, Mr. L!) After that night, I'd go to the city all the time to visit friends and felt totally comfortable. There were a couple of times I got lost, but I managed to find my way to where I needed to go. It also came in handy for going back to college in the fall, as I got to have my car down there and had more freedom to visit my family whenever I wanted. I took some other road trips that year, as well (such as my first interstate trip to visit my sister in Indiana).

These days, I don't drive on the highway as much, except to go to Baltimore for speech therapy. The Beltway is extremely congested and it's quicker to go to work on main roads. My latest driving fear is the van. I have yet to drive it anywhere. It seems so big and intimidating. I feel like it would be a driver's ed instruction all over again. I hope I can give myself a (good) reason to conquer this fear, but I haven't figured out what that will be yet. Time will tell, I guess....

I Heart Hotels

Remember the blog project I did in 2010 with three other women? Well, Froggie decided to resurrect it with me and we each got to invite another friend to join us. She invited a mutual friend (someone I met through her) and I invited a friend whose blog I really enjoy reading. So now it's Froggie, Mom of Many, Moma Rock and Merrylandgirl. Hope you enjoy the topics that we'll be exploring!

This week, Froggie picked the topic: What is something you have a tendency to romanticize?

Before reading ahead, first see what everyone else had to say on this topic:
Froggie
Mom of Many
Moma Rock

With our power failure last week, we couldn't stay in our house. It was too insanely hot and there was nothing for the kids to do. In lieu of all this, we decided to check into a hotel. As soon as we got into the room, we felt a nice blast of air conditioning and that alone made the decision worth it. Oh, and there was a pool too! It was like a vacation, even though it was only a few towns away and even though we were sharing a room with three kids who wanted to pull an "all-nighter." Still, the pillows were fluffy, the towels were warm and they had those little shampoo, conditioner and lotion bottles. Cable TV too! (We did away with our cable a few months ago, so going someplace with cable is an extra bonus for the kids who need their Nickelodeon and Disney channel fix.) And they smell so clean, like special hotel air is being pumped through.

When I was younger, my family and I would go on mini-getaways. We'd stay at local hotels, enjoy the use of their indoor pool, partake in their happy hour and then go for dinner nearby. When I was in high school, we'd spend weekends downtown and stay at hotels during those times, as well. It was a fun and relatively inexpensive getaway. When I was in my mid-20's, my BFF connected me with one of her friends who worked at a hotel. I'd sometimes go out to that hotel to use the pool and hot tub after hours. He even let me throw a Halloween party there and keep the room overnight. When my family and I came to Chicago for a visit last year, my parents put us up at a hotel because there wasn't room for the five of us in their house and it would be better to keep my older son away from the cats as much as possible. The room we got was relatively spacious and included a sofa bed. They had a nice pool and a breakfast buffet every morning.

I guess what I'm getting at here is that I tend to romanticize hotel stays. I've stayed at many a hotel during my life. I really liked the gorgeous ones with the super comfortable beds and spa robes for after showers. I stayed at one of those after my cousin's Bar Mitzvah party. The hotels in Vegas were also really nice and each one had a casino inside. There's just something to be said for staying in a hotel. When I read novels, like "I Heart New York" by Lindsey Kelk or "Monarch Beach" by Anita Hughes, where girls get to stay in hotel rooms and be treated to all the amenities, I fantasize about how awesome that would be. The more luxurious the hotel, the better. Think of the hotel suite in Pretty Woman. Yeah, it's like that.

The last hotel we stayed at was a Hyatt. It was just for a night, but the room was beautiful and the beds were ridiculously comfortable. We didn't want to get up. We went to the pool before we had to check out and the water was so warm in comparison to the pool we went to at the other hotel. The only thing that was missing was a continental breakfast buffet, but I guess we can't have it all. It was nice enough to be out of the hot, power-devoid house and get a good night's sleep. The hotel looked so glamorous and I felt so out of place carrying a sleeping four year-old and covered in sweat from digging around our hot, dark house for clothes to bring with. I wouldn't mind a nicer reason to stay there (or any other really nice hotel) in the future, and thanks to Priceline, the cost will make more sense!

Our room from our most recent hotel stay

What you own

Remember the blog project I did in 2010 with three other women? Well, Froggie decided to resurrect it with me and we each got to invite another friend to join us. She invited a mutual friend (someone I met through her) and I invited a friend whose blog I really enjoy reading. So now it's Froggie, Mom of Many, Moma Rock and Merrylandgirl. Hope you enjoy the topics that we'll be exploring!

This week, Mom of Many picked the topic: In light of all the fires and other natural disasters, if you had to evacuate your home, what would you take with you and why? If your home was destroyed what would you miss most?

Before reading ahead, first see what everyone else had to say on this topic:
Froggie
Mom of Many
Moma Rock

The topic for this post made me think of a song from Rent, which is what I used for the subject line.

I recently read a novel called "Keepsake" by Kristina Riggle, who visited Chick Lit Central this week (and there's a chance to win a free copy....hint, hint). It's about a woman who becomes a compulsive hoarder and could potentially lose custody of her child after some of her stuff falls on and injures him. The story made me put my own collection of “stuff” into perspective. I even went through a box of toys and papers in my boys’ room and made them help me organize it. I was proud of my older son for making some mature decisions about what to keep and what to throw away. However, when we went to the mall to beat the heat, he wanted everything he saw, even if it didn’t make sense for him to have it.

This past week, we had a major storm, probably the worst I’ve ever seen. It knocked out our power from Friday night until Wednesday morning. It was so stifling hot that we escaped to a hotel for some much needed air conditioning. They had a pool too! I was rushing around packing clothes to last us a few days, given we were expected to be without power till mid-week, or possibly longer. My first priority was all the stuff my older son and daughter need for their cochlear implants. If they couldn’t hear, it would be like our camping trip all over again. I brought their batteries and battery charger, as well as manual batteries, just in case. Then there were the toiletries, like important prescriptions, dental hygiene products and hair care products. (My hair gets so frizzy in the heat!) We also had to make sure we had swim wear and inner tubes for the pool. We ended up buying the inner tubes since the ones we had were dirty or out of air and I didn’t feel like dragging them along. Then there were clothing items, which were a necessity and toys to keep the kids entertained (even though the TV and pool did that job even better). I had to take my laptop so I could communicate with everyone and keep Chick Lit Central stuff updated. Plus, a majority of my photos are stored there or on my Facebook account. Finally, I brought along some books. I can’t go anywhere without a book!

Whenever I go to visit my family, they tell me not to bring a lot since there’s a Wal-Mart nearby and they also have a laundry machine. In this case, we also had a Wal-Mart nearby (and this one was so nice too), but we weren’t going to spend a fortune on hotel laundry services. When we had the power outage, I was reminded of this reality show we watched back in 2003 about two couples who try to live on a prairie with limited resources. (They had to plow for their grain to make wheat for bread and wash up in a pond.) I was thinking how fortunate we are that we have stores around to replace whatever we leave behind. When we were at the mall, I was mainly shopping for kids’ clothes, even though I got myself some much needed shoes (my other shoes were so worn out that they were getting really uncomfortable). I got a few little toys for the kids, but nothing else all that major. I was tempted to get some more Full House DVDs, but the used versions were still so overpriced!

I may seem materialistic, but I really am not. I could use a beat up purse for years without thinking much about it. I try to spend frugally, only looking for sale prices to justify my purchases. (I tell you, I am REALLY spoiled by the prices at my favorite thrift store!) I think it’s important to have comfortable clothes and all the other necessities. I like to spoil my kids with fun little things, as long as they aren’t overpriced. I couldn’t justify getting my older son a pen that cost $5.50 because it had a Disney character on it. What a joke! A PEN! For $5.50! I can get two boxes of cereal for that amount! So when it comes to a potential or real evacuation, I just take the stuff that we’ll need to get by (clothes, toiletries, hearing items). I even pack along some food items since my kids are picky and sometimes breakfast is not included at a hotel or it’s too early to get up and partake in their continental buffet (the one at our first hotel ended at 8:30). Then there's my laptop and at least one good book, if not more. In the end, I was more upset about all the food we lost than the potential of losing our material items. My wedding ring is always on my hand, so that stays with me. I would be upset if I lost it because of the sentimental value and all the thought my husband put into designing it for me. The diamond was handed down to him by his grandfather, so it's something we can carry along to future generations.

Hashem forbid, if something were to happen to our house to render it unlivable, I'd definitely miss the kitchen. My husband did an amazing job designing it and the contractors really brought his design to life. It's the central focus of our house now. I'd hate to see all that hard work and planning go to waste. I think that's really about it. Everything else is replaceable, even though some things were passed along from one generation to the next. I don't feel as strong of an attachment to those things when it comes down to making sure those don't get destroyed. The most important thing is that my family is safe and we're all together.